2 Chapters today!
—•——•——•——•——•——•—
The Blue Pharmacy, a quaint shop operating in the comrcial district.
Hestia practically kicked the door open. "Miach, I'm here!"
Inside the shop, a man and a woman waited. The man gave off a gentle, calming divine aura, and the woman beside him was a chienthrope. They were the God Miach and his only Familia child, Naaza Erisuis.
"Oh, Hestia. What brings you back so soon?" Miach, the perpetually squinting God, smiled as she entered.
His eyes quickly moved to the young man walking in beside her. This was the child Hestia had been bragging about nonstop.
"Hello, August. I believe this is our second eting," Miach said warmly. He had been one of the gods present when August first appeared in Orario.
As August listened to him, he could sense the man's gentle nature. It was almost impossible not to like a god like him.
"Greetings, Lord Miach," August replied politely.
Miach nodded. He already had a good impression of this boy whom Hestia kept praising. Still, if he rembered right, August was supposed to be in the Dungeon today. Why was he back so soon?
"Were you injured? You returned awfully fast," Miach asked, assuming a rookie run had been cut short by an accident.
"Heh! Not at all!" Hestia puffed out her chest with absolute pride.
"My child finished his first run perfectly! He went straight to the tenth floor, defeated a huge group of monsters, and ca back while the spawn rates were still down."
"By the way, Miach, here are the Valis for our trade agreent." Hestia turned to her child.
August nodded. He reached into his [Spatial Backpack] and pulled out a heavy sack of Valis they had just exchanged. The large bag still had the official seal of the Adventurer's Guild.
"This..." Miach was stunned.
He hadn't expected Hestia to co up with the money so quickly. More importantly, if he had heard her correctly, August had gone to the tenth floor, wiped out an entire horde, and returned without a scratch on his very first day. And that ability just now... it really was a spatial inventory.
Beside him, Naaza, the captain of the Miach Familia, unceremoniously took the heavy sack of money. Their Familia was buried under a mountain of debt, after all.
"Thank you for your patronage," Naaza said sincerely. They had just finalized a massive bulk order, and Hestia was already paying the full amount upfront in cash. What a generous goddess.
Seeing his child accept the money, Miach didn't stop her.
"Hestia, are you sure about this?" he asked, a trace of worry in his voice. "Your Familia is only just getting started. You don't even have a permanent place to stay yet."
Hestia had not been in the lower world for long. If she left the care of the Hephaestus Familia, she would technically have nowhere to stay in Orario. At a ti like this, spending a fortune on potions before even securing a roof over their heads seed reckless.
"Don't worry. We have a place to stay," Hestia said, waving off his concern. "Actually, since my child is here... would you like to see his magic for yourself?"
"When he awakened his Falna, he gained more than just a spatial inventory. He also acquired a miracle-tier spell: [Healing Fire]."
"He can completely regenerate Naaza's missing arm."
Hestia was genuinely curious to see how August's magic would affect an adventurer's body. She had already seen it work on ordinary humans back on Earth. Now, she wanted to test the limits of that miraculous spell on soone from this world.
Miach, normally calm and composed, snapped his eyes open in shock.
"Hestia. Do you realize what you're saying?"
"Limb regeneration? Magic of that caliber..." Miach was floored.
Even the rarest, most powerful healing magic couldn't regrow a lost limb from nothing. Surgically reattaching a freshly cut arm was the best current spells could do. Hearing that August had sothing even stronger was shocking.
August has magic like that? Even Naaza could only stare at him in shock. He was just a rookie. How could a Level 1 cast a spell on that scale?
"Of course, the side effects are severe," Hestia warned, pinching her fingers together. "If the patient lacks the will to endure it, the agony of forced cellular regeneration could literally overwhelm their mind."
The effects happened instantly and seed like a miracle, but the downside was harsh. The pain was so bad it could make you question your will to live.
At the ntion of that terrifying side effect, Miach and Naaza both froze, a chill running down their spines.
A lack of willpower could lead to brain death from sheer agony? What kind of horrifying side effect was that? Thinking it through, Miach realized Hestia spoke with the certainty of soone who had already tested the spell. He had no idea who they had used it on, but the results were clearly beyond doubt.
Miach glanced at his traumatized Familia child.
"Hestia... thank you for the generous offer," Miach said softly, choosing to decline.
Naaza wasn't just missing an arm—her spirit had been broken. She had lost her will to fight. Making her go through that much pain now wouldn't heal her. It would be deadly.
"Alright. If you ever change your mind, you know where to find us," Hestia replied, maintaining her cheerful smile.
She wasn't upset by the refusal. In fact, she respected Miach even more for putting his child's ntal health first.
"Thank you very much." Naaza bowed her head deeply, her gratitude beyond words. Goddess Hestia's willingness to do so much for them moved her deeply. She then bowed to August as well.
August just offered a polite smile.
He wouldn't have minded healing Naaza's arm. He already knew how the spell worked on normal humans back on Earth, but he hadn't tried it on an Adventurer yet.
Adventurers were fundantally different from ordinary humans. They possessed Falna, mana circuits, and enhanced physical abilities gained through leveling. Since Naaza was a rare case, August was eager to find out whether his magic could fully regenerate a leveled-up limb without stripping away its enhanced stats. Unfortunately, they never gave him the chance to test it.
But on second thought, August completely understood why Miach declined.
Naaza was terrified of the Dungeon. Her trauma had turned into a deeply rooted ntal block. If August forced her through that kind of hellish agony, she might break completely and end up in a vegetative state. That would be a disaster.
Just as there were evil gods, there were also benevolent ones. A kind god like Miach would never knowingly push one of his children into a life-threatening psychological crisis.
...
"Yo, Miach."
"Oh? Hestia's here too?"
Another voice called out from the shop entrance. The newcor sounded casual when greeting Miach, but his tone spiked with surprise upon noticing Hestia.
"Oh, Take!" Hestia turned around and waved brightly at the newcor.
Well, look at that. It was another one of her close divine friends, Takemikazuchi.
—•——•——•——•——•——•—
~ For every 200 Power Stones = I'll drop an extra chapter!
~ 15 Advanced Chapters Available on Patreon!
sp-atreon/dragonnx
(Just remove the hyphen to access Patreon normally.)
User Comments
0 comments from readers