Max had only ever heard won moan in two contexts: hentai gas with questionable translation, or, well, porn. So when Ms. Diaza started groaning like a dying banshee in a haunted hospital, his first thought wasn’t, ’Wow, I’m a natural healer.’ No. It was, ’Crap, I broke her shoulder. Rune bug. Fatal error. Please check your syntax and try again.’
Because magic, apparently, was just like coding. Forget a comma, miss a line, boom—your program doesn’t run. Or worse: it deletes soone’s quadriceps. And judging by her twitching, shaking, and near one-minute-long moaning session (which, side note, sounded less like dical relief and more like a late-night browser history situation), Max was ninety percent sure he had bricked her muscles.
So when she finally stopped, panting like she just sprinted a marathon, Max braced for the incoming boss fight: angry nurse edition. He half-expected a courtroom trial, or at least dieval juvie. Maybe even public guillotine. But instead of rage? She looked... thrilled. Her face lit up like a kid on Christmas morning.
"What was that?" she asked, eyes sparkling.
Max, utterly spooked, imdiately panic-dumped his entire cri scene confession: that he’d drawn so rune from a dical textbook, purely experintal, nothing official, please don’t kill him.
Diaza’s grin only widened. Max, of course, didn’t notice. He was too busy imagining how long it’d take to build gallows.
Diaza, still buzzing like she’d just discovered chocolate for the first ti, tried very hard to compose herself. Straightening her clothes and taming that post-moan glow, she fixed Max with what was supposed to be a stern look.
"You know, boy, what you did is unlawful?" she said, voice wobbling between lecture-mode and please-do-that-again mode.
Max shook his head instantly. He wasn’t dumb. He knew enough about law to understand the golden rule: if you don’t know it’s illegal, you can sotis skate free. Bonus points if you act dumb—aka society’s way of saying ’congrats, your brain isn’t fully cooked yet, so here’s a legal get-out-of-jail-free card.’
"Well, you did," Diaza continued, smile tugging at her lips even as she pulled her skirt straight, "and not just one law. You used a rune without permission, and worse, you studied them before your coming-of-age ceremony." She leaned closer, voice mock serious, "That’s a big offence, Max... I should report you to the Ministry of Magic."
Diaza’s words hung in the air like a death sentence wrapped in polite packaging.
Max’s brain, naturally, didn’t process the threat. It latched onto the dumbest part: ’Ministry of Magic? Really? What’s next—owl post and a bald guy with no nose waiting to sue ?’
He could practically imagine himself dragged into so gloomy office with stacks of parchnt taller than him. anwhile, his survival instincts scread: ’Say sorry, grovel, cry;
But what actually ca out of his mouth? A squeaky, "Uh... please don’t?"
Diaza chuckled. Not the comforting, motherly chuckle. No. This was the, ’I know a juicy secret and I’m not telling unless’ chuckle.
"Relax, boy," she said smoothly. "I don’t like paperwork anyway."
Max let out a huge breath—like soone who’d just dodged a very dramatic cell door slam—but didn’t realize he’d just buried himself in an even deeper hole.
"But I do have to do this paperwork, you know as a good citizen," Diaza said, stretching like she’d just finished a spa day. She was relaxed, amused, and absolutely not hiding the tiny smile that said I know exactly what I can get from you. Max, bless his chaotic brain, had seen enough grim movies and read enough grim manga to know when soone was about to play the polite version of extortion.
His inner monologue, predictably unhelpful, offered up the classic solution: ’Should I kill her?’
Yeah. No. That was peak villain-tier thinking and also wildly impractical. Max ca from a society where murder was ranked even higher than tax evasion and, like, public indecency—socially unacceptable and not sothing his nervous, shut-in, ani-consuming self could pull off. He could barely ask for directions without breaking into sweat. The idea of actually committing murder was cartoonishly beyond him.
So instead he swallowed the thought, plastered on his best ’I’m terrified but loyal’ face, and waited to see what terms the Hands of rcy had in mind.
"Please—don’t report . I’ll do anything you ask," Max blurted, voice wobbling like a badly voiced ani protagonist.
The nurse—the conveniently villainous first antagonist of his debut arc—tilted her head, amusent dancing on her face. "Really? Funny, because not reporting this would probably get in more trouble than reporting you."
Great, Max thought, internally sighing. He’d skimd the local laws and half a dozen grim forums about illegal magic; he knew using runes on a civilian could land soone like Cassian in serious trouble. The nurse was right—this wasn’t a slap on the wrist. This was paperwork with teeth.
He was still seething. This wrinkly nurse had just beco the first proper villain in his shiny new main-character life, and that didn’t sit right with him. ’You just wait,’ Max thought, ’I’ll make you regret this.’ Yes, his brain kept gifting him weird lines from his past life—gross, but whatever. He didn’t bother to ntally edit the impulse. Rage spent on inner monologues didn’t need polishing.
Diaza watched him, perfectly calm. "Lucky for you, I’m not so governnt spy," she said. "So I can help—if you help . Deal?"
"I can help," Max blurted, voice all eagerness and too-wide grin.
She nodded at his enthusiasm. "Good. Then follow . Coincidentally, I’m short-handed today. Tell —have you learned the healing rune well enough to stitch and patch?"
The question caught him off-guard. "I... learned it, but I’ve never perford it before." He followed her out of the library and down toward the hospital basent.
She sighed, not unkindly. "Can’t be helped. If you can’t do it perfectly, try your hardest. Soone’s life might depend on you."
Max nodded, trying to look brave. "Right," he said, then imdiately added, because doubt needs company, "What now?"
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