Chapter 901 – Stigma

While I stare with interest at the broken, frozen shards of what once was my arm, the door of the inn opens, and Jean’s babysitter healer, known as Spacepup, enters.

A teenager. No more needs to be said.

He quickly sweeps his eyes across the room, stopping at some of the women for a few moments longer before finding me and the arm in my hand.

“Holy fuck, man, people are already starting to say that they’ve been seeing you more often with one arm than with two.” He laughs and, after greeting Jean, passes by him to head towards us. “I can heal you for 100 thousand shards.”

I purposefully suppress my passive and watch him come closer.

“Ten thousand and I won't beat you down,” I say, curious to see how different his healing is from Lily’s or the other healers I've met.

“What the hell, are you threatening me? I’ve given you no reason for that, at all!”

“I don't like your face or the tone of your voice. I don't like the way you walk and talk. And… I don't know, maybe I just want to? I bet I would feel better if I punched you. I am sure you've had a similar feeling yourself.”

Spacepup looks around as if seeking support from Tess, my sister, Gareth, or Gloria.

Honestly, no one seems to care all that much, and Tess speaks up, seemingly out of duty alone. “Lucien, Nathaniel is just teasing you. He wouldn't beat you up-”

“I totally would.”

“-and thank you for coming here as well. I hope you’re doing well. And you, Nat, either heal yourself or we can call Lily.”

“Lily is here?” Lucien perks up, immediately forgetting about anything else going on here and looking around like a meerkat.

And when he finds her in the far corner near Tacita and Fuci, his smile grows as he calls out, “Hey, Lily!”

Of course, she hears that and takes her eyes off the golden ferret struggling to escape her grasp to look toward Lucien. She then slides her gaze over to me, noticing my missing arm.

I could swear I see her eyes roll before she gives a polite smile that makes Lucien beam. She lets go of Fuci, who bounces backwards diagonally while spinning.

Tacita covers him protectively, and I notice Lily concentrating. She takes a deep breath and leans in towards us. I watch as the tip of her shoe touches the ground, and she breaks her bones and muscles as she twists it. Then the floor cracks under her other leg, and she moves.

Utilizing that crazy way of mimicking kinetic movement she’s grown so fond of, she does something that looks like an approximation of Wraith Dance, bringing her to stand right in front of us.

As she comes to a stop, she sways slightly, and before that little sway can end, all of her bones snap back into place.

Lucien staggers back, surprised, as she passes by him, speaking to me all the while. “You know what, in a way, you’re kind of lucky? If you’d had a more durable body, it would have resisted Victoria’s stigma a bit longer, and there would have been more time for that weird anti-healing, well, more of an anti-everything, effect to spread, and it’d have been much more difficult to restore.”

“What else did you find out?” I ask curiously as she puts her hand on my shoulder and restores my arm.

Once she’s done healing, she sits on the barely free armrest of the armchair Vic and I are currently squeezed into. Victoria, meanwhile, doesn't react and, as expected, seems extremely dignified even now, though she carefully makes sure her arm doesn't touch me.

“Victoria didn't tell you anything?” Lily asks me, surprised.

“He kind of went straight to getting his arm shattered to pieces,” Gareth says from where he sits.

That makes me realize we now have three healers from Earth’s tutorial here, between him, Lucien, and Lily.

“I would never have made such a mistake,” Lucien snickers, and, like someone actually invited him, takes a seat in one of the chairs nearby. “But you healed him really fast. Is he fully, fully healed, or did you leave a residual effect behind to boost his natural regeneration?”

Lily looks confused. “Kind of? It is more difficult to restore his blood and circuits, so as you said, I need to leave something behind to speed up the process.” She admits, giving a bit of an awkward smile.

“Wow... so pretty,” Lucien says, staring at Lily, before quickly scrambling and waving his hands while smiling charmingly. “I-I meant how cool! You’re really great at healing!”

My face twists into an expression I have a difficult time describing. Even to me, it is obvious that every part of that was on purpose and that now he’s just acting out some sort of clumsy, innocent boy persona.

Secondhand embarrassment? Is that what they call it?

“I'm going to fucking die. This is painful to watch,” Gloria groans, standing up and walking away.

“Can you control it?” I ask Victoria.

“Not as of now. And before you ask, yes, my duplicates have it as well. The strength isn’t diminished in them either, and there are a few more things I’m only going to tell you in private. As for the stigma itself, it serves as your connection to a god, usually handed down to their apostles and heralds. It is similar to the way Rulers have their vessels. I think it can be taken from me, but I also think it can be made stronger,” Victoria says.

“So, nothing you should rely on.”

“Correct.”

“Does it mess with your skills and other stuff?”

“It does not.”

“What are you doing after this meeting, Lily?” Lucien asks.

“Does it only spread through touch, or are there other ways?” I ask Victoria.

“I’m busy,” Lily answers him.

“I will tell you when we’re alone,” Victoria says.

“Don’t tell me you’re still clinging to this guy,” Lucien complains.

It doesn’t escape my notice that Tess seems to be having way too much fun as she keeps smiling and looking at the old guy, while Gareth himself is smiling in such a way that I can absolutely imagine him saying: Oh, to be young again.

“Can you talk to Starless Sky? Summon him, or can he take over your body or something?” I ask.

“I will tell you once we are alone,” Victoria answers.

Lucien seems to be annoyed at the conversation taking place around him while he’s trying to talk to Lily, so he lashes out. “Just say that you don’t trust the others from Earth and you don’t want to talk about it in front of us.”

Before he can say more, or Victoria can stand up, turning her hand and fingers into a quasi blade, Jean’s figure towers over Lucien and grabs him by the neck, dragging him away from us.

No matter how much Lucien struggles, Jean doesn't seem phased in the least, and out of curiosity, I observe the power of his body. There is a little mana in there, but the rest is raw strength.

As I watch the wavelengths around him, it's almost like his heart is an engine that uses outside mana as fuel while his own serves to spark skills into activation. The feeling around his body itself isn’t unlike the field around Derick's, just orders of magnitude stronger.

I look away before I start feeling the need to fight him, and hear Gareth muttering as he watches Lucien being pulled away: “Oh, to be young again.”

During all of this, the atmosphere inside the inn is fairly crowded. It’s nice to see people from Earth, talking about shared experiences, and shitting on the same movies and politicians they did before all of this.

Of course, there’s Victoria, Tess, Lily, Sophie, Jean, and Tacita, who all participated not so long ago in the fight against the Champion that Frontier prepared for. The one with a weakness to mental attacks that Frontier’s mind mages, led by Sophie, exploited.

Them being here obviously means it went well, likely much smoother than it did with the Champion the Primordial Knights challenged. It’s never easy to kill a Champion, even if you are well-prepared, but this one went as smoothly as it could have, with just a few deaths and some wounds that got healed anyway.

I also noticed the second key Tacita has on her forearm, meaning she’s been out thieving again. She must be on some kind of wanted list by now.

Even with all of this, with so many things I could ask and learn about my fellow Earthlings and their tutorials and experiences, I find my mind wandering. I continue to go over the information I’ve just been given, selecting from the Champions to face, taking their strengths, weaknesses, locations, and so many other things into consideration.

Saying I’m not nervous would be a lie, but it would also be a lie to say I’m not enjoying it either. The feeling of anticipation continues to grow inside me, slowly and gradually. It is as if all my emotions are turned down, boiling inside and preparing to explode once the fight starts.

That’s the feeling I crave. It almost makes me want to close my eyes and smile while indulging in it to the fullest.

But I still have time. A week, maybe two. Not much longer, and I will throw myself into that fight.

Until then, I can enjoy this evening for an hour or two, before I get socially exhausted and move off into a corner somewhere to sit and watch the others have their fun.

When I feel her fingers caressing the back of my hand, I don’t react at first, keeping my attention on the conversation Victoria, Tess, and Gareth are having. Then, just for a moment, I glance back and look straight up at Lily.

Her hand slides lower, touching the fingers of the arm she restored, and I move my own fingers in response, gently squeezing hers for a brief moment before letting go.

With one last soft stroke across my hand, Lily takes her hand off. She keeps smiling as she stands up, saying goodbye to the others before rushing off to find Tacita, who, according to her, needs to be checked in on to ensure she stays fed.

I watch her back for a second before turning to Gareth. “So you’re saying you met with a Beyonder from Earth on the 11th floor, and he was speaking to people from Easy difficulty while he was there? What is so interesting about that?”

Gareth puts down his glass. “Apparently, one of the groups has this person who’s been calling themselves Myrra. I was told you would know who it is.”

I blink a few times and ask him a few more questions.

In the end, I come to a simple conclusion. Myrra still holds the system status of that Easy difficulty murderer. That guy reached the 11th floor before he died, from what I remember, and it seems Myrra was thrown out right where he left off.

Thinking of it logically, Myrra will be ending the tutorial soon. There’s just no way she won't totally obliterate the Easy difficulty floors.

Meaning, she’ll be making it to Earth soon.

What a mess.

The rest of the night continues as planned. I spend hours talking to people and eating food that the Primordial Knights will be paying for.

I speak with Victoria about her stigma and learn more about it. It turns out to be a truly mysterious thing. For a time, I also have to endure Jean, though the guy seems to be calmer now. He even tells me why: simply said he has to be. He still loves a good fight, but he can't just throw hands with everyone he sees anymore, not unless he wants to end up with an unwanted body count after what happened recently.

I can see it saddens him a bit. He seems like the kind of guy who, even if he were a billionaire, would still be going to street bars and drinking with a bunch of random interns.

Currently, just the slightest of his movements could evaporate some of the weaker Hard difficulty attendees, sometimes even people from Hell difficulty. He has a bit more trouble controlling his power than I do. I mean, his body endures it well, and he is good at it through his particular combination of skills, passives, and traits. His problem is that, unlike my Mana Cycling, there aren’t really any techniques to suppress his strength.

Well, most likely there is, but he just hasn't shown the talent necessary to get a skill for it.

After talking to a few more people, I head into a corner I’ve been eyeing from the start, carrying a bunch of snacks and drinks. It is out of sight of everyone, next to a big open glass door that leads to the terrace with a view toward the city.

The hum of conversations fades into the background as I snack and once again go over my information. I also continue to level up the skills I know I can push a bit before the fight. Additionally, I plan to let black mana into my body tomorrow to closely observe the way it affects my blood. I think I can squeeze some purification in.

Some hours later, Lily joins me. She is not nearly as exhausted as I am, but she is tired of all the attention she has been getting. In my opinion, it was bound to happen, as she went around healing everyone with the slightest wound and handing out healing marks.

She almost falls onto the couch I’m sitting on, sliding down until she lies horizontally, her head resting against my leg. Blindly, her hands reach up until she grabs one of the mana stones I’m studying and starts looking into it as well.

She offers some of her ideas and opinions, coming up with eldritch monstrosities she could armor me with or just asking questions out loud. Both of us know I will reject all of it, at most accepting a few healing marks, as this is something I want to deal with on my own. Still, I find hearing these questions out loud interesting, and it sometimes makes me think differently about things I have already given a lot of thought to.

When she makes an especially good point or asks a good question, I pick up a snack and feed it to her. She sometimes takes it so clumsily that she bites my fingers.

After one such incident, I pinch her nose, ignore her mumbled complaints, and hand her a mana stone containing some drafts of my megaconstruct, which I plan to finish before level 450. This is where I won't mind her help, especially since I think it could end up quite badly without it.

We spend the rest of the night like that, eventually leaving the inn as the last ones left long after everyone else has gone.