Chapter 563 - Doppelganger Dilemma (Patreon)

Thirty five years after the events at the Phoenix Peaks.

I was in a bad mood, putting it lightly. A number of elves had decided to ‘go get some levels’, and their way of doing so involved flying into Exterreri, murdering a bunch of farmers and villagers, then fucking off before news arrived at the Sixth, and we were able to muster a response. My foul countenance was echoed six hundred times, the entire cohort darkly looking over the burnt fields and bodies nailed to the wall. 

[Centurion] Nix spat and asked what we were all thinking.

“Why, by all the gods, are we letting them do this? Why aren’t we retaliating? We should be burning their fucking forests to the ground!”

They grew up so fast.

The sentiment was met with much agreement, and in spite of my [Oath], a part of me tugged in agreement. I wanted revenge, plain and simple.

I knew why we weren’t, the higher level analysis that went on behind the scenes. I kept it to myself, knowing it wouldn’t make me any friends.

We’d lose.

We’d lose hard, and not only would Tympestshard overrun us, but the Golden Courts would join in, and the rest of our neighbors would jump on the opportunity. We might spark off the next Immortal war, but Arachne and the rest believed that everyone else would simply see a chance to eliminate a competitor before the ‘real’ fighting started. The end-game dictated that some treachery and backstabbing would probably kick off the ‘true’ war before Sanguino was sacked - it was almost as far away from the borders as possible - but most of Exterreri would be burned and dead by then.

In contrast, defensively, we were in a much better position. If the elves had to sally out of their forests to us, we’d still lose, but we were too tough of a nut to easily crack. They’d have to overcommit, send bodies into the grinder, and by that point their neighbors were more likely to invade them instead. 

It was death by a thousand cuts, but I wasn’t so naive as to think we weren’t cutting back. Night’s meetings were more often run by his devilish aide Addolorata than not, and the number of Sentinels at the meeting had plummeted, most of them being deployed. It wasn’t all defensive action, and even Iona approved.

Well. We assumed we weren’t deploying our most valuable military asset raiding farmers and soft targets. Night and Arachne were smart, they knew that simply invited stronger retaliation with powerful justifications behind it for no good reason. Command… I didn’t have as much faith in, but the other Sentinels would bitch and moan if they were ordered to basically go out and murder in cold blood.

Well… most of the Sentinels would. 

“Cohort, halt!” The order came through the [Tribune’s] [Standard-Bearer]. “The elves are gone. Break by century, we’re moving into search and recovery patterns. First century, you’re staying here. Second century, Dacia. Third century…” The [Tribune] continued to efficiently split the cohort up, and I knew from bitter experience that each [Centurion] would further break up the individual lines to help individual places. 

I drifted over to the [Tribune], mindful of my appearance and role as the Legion’s War Sentinel. Couldn’t be too relaxed and in touch, not in the field, not in the current situation. I waited until all of her orders were issued before quietly speaking up. Her support staff could catch what I was saying - but they had to be in the know anyway.

“Tribune, all due respect, I’ve already searched for survivors.”

His hardened face blinked away a tear.

“I know.” He confirmed. “I think we all know. I believe the search and rescue phrasing is better off. Since the elves have left, Sentinel, I believe your time might be better spent elsewhere?”

I tumbled the suggestion through my thousand and one rules, determining in the end that it was truly a suggestion or comment, and not an attempt at an order. The whole thing was depressing enough, and I wasn’t feeling useful enough, to stick around versus seeing if I could do some more good somewhere else.

A question I’d been debating was settled though. I needed to talk with Auri about her bakery, and see if she was willing to wind down operations for a bit. One of these days everything would go to hell, and I wanted my loved ones nearby when it happened. I didn’t want to push the pause button on life, but perhaps spending more time together would be a good thing. Of course, that was simply my desire, and everyone else might be thinking other things. Plus, it wasn’t like we could haul Skye and Titania around, and they were sorta part of the family at this point. Amber and Nina were forever off doing her own thing, and… yeah. 

Speaking of Amber, I should buy a bunch of protective gems for everyone. The really nice thing was since I’d thought of making a large purchase from her, it was almost guaranteed that she’d be over for dinner. 

Okay, Amber was going to be fine regardless of what happened.

I took off and returned to the Sixth Legion, assisted with a few bloody drills, then spread my wings and took off towards home. 

The wind blowing through my short hair was nice, and I closed my eyes and enjoyed it for a minute. Then I opened them, knowing I could get quite off course if I flew blind for too long with my speed. I had a bit of fun playing ‘hawk’, spying on people’s day to day lives, getting quick snapshots and speculating what was going on. Some [Farmers] were hard at work in their field, and one teenager was napping behind a shed, probably slacking off. Two travelers were having an argument, and a young couple were passionately entwined in a forest. Birds sang and squirrels ran, dinosaurs lumbered around eating grass and bees buzzed flowers.

Just… life, all around me.

Then I spotted a body in a ditch. I flew a little lower, making sure they were inside my healing radius, but nothing happened.

Dead. Damnit. Should I stop and bury them, or-

I almost zipped by entirely when they twitched, and almost went head-over-heels as I screeched to a stop, plunging down.

I rapidly cycled through different healing models, making sure all elvenoids were included, then expanding a bit to make sure changelings, skinwalkers, slimes, and other such creatures would be healed. Still nothing, and I could see her breathing raggedly. In minor desperation, I changed my image to a broad-spectrum ‘heal everything’, only to get no results.

[Identify] returned nothing - it didn’t even recognize the woman,  same response as casting the skill on a tree - but [A Light Shining in the Darkness] didn’t dispel any illusions.

I landed next to the woman, immediately assessing her condition with [The World Around Me] while [Luminary Mind] split off, speculating on what, exactly, had happened and what was going wrong.

I was able to see that she appeared to be an elf, and a preliminary analysis suggested she’d been brutally beaten. 

I will never see a patient as anything other than another creature in pain.

Fuck the raids, fuck the war, fuck my anger and rage at elves in general right now - she was hurt, she needed medical attention, that was that.

I cataloged her injuries, dredging up old memories and rusty skills. I knew the theory of healing and fixing someone, but it’d been decades upon decades since I’d needed to practically do anything.

Bones, clean break: Left radius, left ulna, right humerus, ribs 2, 3, 5, 7, 8 on the left side, ribs 3-6 on the left side, jaw in three places, coccyx, and her right clavicle were all cleanly broken. Both of her tibias and fibulas had been surgically broken, and those were simply the clean breaks. The right side ribs were clearly from a single punch.

Bones, compound break: Two of her phalanges on the left hand.

Bones, shattered: Orbital socket, hips, shoulder bone, most phalanges, most metacarpals. Right wrist was an absolute mess.

Bones, missing: Central incisors top, lateral incisor left, bottom left canine.Top Left pinky, left index phalanges. Her giraffe horns had been cruelly sawn off.

Bones, crushed: Entirely on the spine, the difference between ‘crushed’ and ‘shattered’ being fairly subtle. C2, C3, C4, T6-T11.

Bones, fractured but unbroken: The list was ‘most of them’, but the only ones that concerned me at the moment were on her skull. 

That was just the bones. Tendons, ligaments, muscles, blood vessels, organs, nerves - everything was a mess. From a collapsed lung to a brain bleed, a dead kidney to a lacerated liver, from steady internal bleeding to bruises at the back of her throat, from deliberately crippled to half a knife broken off in her back, it was frankly a miracle that she was still alive, and not a corpse. 

There were also a large number of unusual microscopic injuries. Parts of bone and marrow that were missing, thinner-than-expected vein walls, some nerves that were disconnected and not close to the trauma

The first step was to stop the bleeding and preserve her life. As long as she was alive, there was more work that could be done. Once she was dead, that was it. There was a cascading order to organs and their importance. First and most critically was the brain, which required oxygenated blood flowing to it, which brought in the heart, lungs, and circulatory system. As long as those were intact, I’d have hours to handle the rest.

[Universal Cure] wasn’t working, and so I wielded [The Rays of the First Dawn] like a burning scalpel. I narrowed it down to a fraction of a millimeter, able to control a fraction of my power at that size. I didn’t need close to my full power, she had no vitality, and I ran the risk of burning additional areas with the heat already. I seared shut a nasty gash on her side, then burnt through abdominal muscles to stop her liver bleeding. I severed and charred the vein leading to the failed kidney before delicately closing the wound on the side of her head. The wretched smell of burning pork filled the air, smelling disgustingly, nauseatingly delicious. 

The unfortunate part to [The Rays of the First Dawn] was it was poor for opening spaces up. The blood sloshing around her abdominal cavity wasn’t a problem, but the cranial pressure needed to be relieved, and fast.

[Luminary Mind] had been working the entire time, every parallel thought process working hard, and I was starting to get some ideas of what was going on.

First. The lady wasn’t attached to the System, for whatever reason. It was different from the angel I’d healed, who had been ‘attached’ to the System so to speak, allowing my skills to work on her. No backend image in the System? No healing. It brought to mind creatures that had been assembled out of raw material by an expert [Biomancer] - not modified from an existing baseline, but wholly created - but to create actual intelligent life like that was monstrous.

The thought of ‘wasn’t attached to the System’ and ‘no vitality’ came at almost the same moment, two different thoughts leading to the same conclusion, and a whole new world of possibilities opened up.

No vitality meant no vitality defense. Which meant [Event Horizon] was in play, I could [Teleport] her, and so many other skills that normally couldn’t be applied to people were now in play.

The elf started to seize, and I immediately applied my knowledge and new capabilities with no hesitation. A few small [Event Horizons] surgically sliced through her skull, relieving the pressure in a geyser of blood, then her brain started to literally poke through her skull. Her thrashing was simply causing more problems, and I briefly entertained the idea of severing a spinal nerve to prevent further harm before electing to slime her instead, restricting her movements.

One different track of [Luminary Mind] was trying to work out where to take her for further attention. In an ironic twist, her lack of System access meant anyone good probably wouldn’t be able to use their skills on her. I needed apprentices, preferably less-well-trained ones that still had ‘basic’ skills that could work on her.

I will admit when I don’t know how to heal a patient.

In my - admittedly, confidence, not hubris or arrogance - I’d assumed I wouldn’t encounter another case that I was incapable of healing. The impossible had happened, and I was pleased I’d quickly and without ego recognized the problem and the solution.

Find someone who could.

Virtually everyone I’d ever trained was out of the question, and I entertained the idea of the Healer’s Guild in Sanguino. My role as a Sentinel carried weight, and I could yell and everyone would jump. There were a lot of healers and apprentices there, and we’d have sheer force of numbers. Anyone who could even help would get dramatic and impressive System achievements - ‘Healed someone Sentinel Dawn couldn’t heal’, ‘Assisted the Mother of Modern Medicine with a patient she lacked the skills to fix’ and all manner of related potent achievements.

Those didn’t come along every day.

Except… they were generally well-educated, and my weight and imposing presence could and would completely overawe them. Add in the critical nature of the patient, and I could easily imagine most of them freezing up in the moment. Additionally, the Sanguino Healer’s Guilds were big, and that came with its own downside. Namely, everyone was fairly well-educated, which meant a dearth of the type of skills I needed. 

The nearby city had enough of the overlapping problem. The education was a little worse, which was a plus for once, and I’d be able to contact the local Ranger group about the assault and press them to find the perpetrators. That would happen far later though, and I could assign it to them once this was all solved.

I had their sick scent already, and if all else failed, I could try to literally sniff them out and bring them to justice myself. It was overkill, but I was mad. The people who did this were going to pay, on my name as a Sentinel.

The other issue with an apprentice with poor skills was they didn’t know enough to fix the myriad medical issues the poor elf was facing, let alone restore her horns, fingers, and the rest. No, I needed a [Biomancer], and the best one I knew was on a flying island. I didn’t keep perfect track of the School, but I knew someone who did.

Normally, transporting someone so injured would be nearly impossible, but I had two things working in my favor. First was medical. She was in such bad shape that it didn’t matter if her neck injury got worse - her back was already broken in two places, her brain was poking out of her skull, and it was a fucking miracle Black Crow hadn’t seized her soul already. Elves were tenacious and well-built in the first place.

The second was her lack of vitality. Holding onto her, I simply teleported us into [Tower of Knowledge], softly whispering to her as she floated in space.

“It’s going to be alright.” I said in High Elvish. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

Checking that she wasn’t going to drift into a spear or anything, I quickly teleported back to reality, unfurled my wings, and took off with an earth-rattling sonic boom, bushes bending back and trees losing their leaves in the force of my takeoff.

I didn’t know where the School was right now, but I knew who did, and I knew where she was. 

The whole time, another [Luminary Mind] thought process was furiously talking with Ciriel over the issue.

Ciriel.

I’ve got a genuine medical mystery here. Hoping for a little bit of divine nudging for what’s going on. I know the more unknown information you transmit the harder and more expensive it is - can you give me a hint?

Elaine!

Hmmm… you’re right, this IS a curious one. Let me see… oh! That’s interesting! Think of the Mirror element. Love to chat more later!

Mirror, Mirror… the current symptoms… oh!

Ciriel’s hint was the subtle nudge in the right direction that got the entire puzzle to fall into place.

[Clone] was one of Mirror’s more infamous spells, allowing a powerful Classer to literally make copies of themselves. There were all sorts of complications around the skill, and several famous plays involved [Clone] shenanigans, from comedies where they pretended to be triplets, to an infamous tragedy where the [Clone] couldn’t handle being ‘the fake’, and murdered the original to become the ‘true one’, before fading away himself.

It took one hell of a mindset to successfully pull it off, and while I knew the Jiwa rune for the spell and had the magic power to cast it, I lacked the mentality for it. I couldn’t bring life to this world then abandon it, nor would I let her fade away. In short, I cared too much to create “disposable” selves - and I was unsure if I had the mindset to survive knowing I was ‘a clone’.

It had sounded fun once upon a time, but the harsh realities of the situation had me flinching away.

The benefits were theoretically endless if it could be pulled off. It depended on the details of the skill, but some [Clones] had access to the same System as the ‘original’, and others didn’t. Having access to the System allowed them to use skills and be stronger and faster, but lacking System access freed [Clones] from restriction skills and curses alike. Being able to create dozens of loyal helpers every day was a quick way to creating a one-woman town. Many hands made light work, from chopping down trees, tilling fields, erecting structures, and so much more, dozens of minds in dozens of bodies could easily solve problems.

For elves, some of the more self-aware could use it to get a clever point of view that wasn’t impacted by their curse… assuming they could break their arrogance long enough to listen to themselves. It probably helped that the [Clone] was them, neatly bypassing most of the innate issues with it.

It wasn’t for me, but I could understand why people would do it. Unfortunately, a [Clone], peeled away from the ‘main body’ or even after the main body was killed was fairly helpless. No System, no support, and a rapidly decaying body was a bad mix.

It explained everything I was seeing. The microscopic missing aspects? That was conjured material dissipating. The lack of System access? The original was dead, or the skill was deliberately done that way. I was leaning towards the first one. Also explained why it was so difficult to heal her. Her nature as a [Clone] with a dead original meant there was no System image to tap.

I was on a tight timer, and I landed inside Sanguino minutes later.

The guards took one look at a blood-soaked Sentinel in full combat gear - they knew the difference between cape off and cape on - and promptly turned back to their patrols, only one guard peeling off and hustling over my way.

“Arachne, this is Dawn. I need the current location of the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft now.” I spoke to a wall coated in threads. There were a few [Biomancers] in Sanguino, and I could easily commandeer them. I didn’t know if they were good enough for the surgeries required. I knew Marcelle was, and the time needed to investigate and interrogate the [Biomancers] to check if they had the appropriate level of skill would take too long. It was possible they’d miss something crucial, and by then it would be too late for me to transport the elf somewhere else.

Unless the School was too far away, or inaccessible. Then I’d have to go to a local [Biomancer] and pray. 

The threads shifted and morphed a moment later into words, detailing the exact location of the School, along with its current trajectory.

“Thanks!”

I took off with slightly less force, not wanting to cause any harm to people.

I chewed on the inside of my cheek as I blazed through the clouds to the School, mentally resolving myself. 

I will apply all measures that are required to my patients.

I didn’t have the time to be slow and polite. The nameless elf in my [Tower] was dying, and dying quickly. I grabbed one of my spellbooks from storage, the gale force winds almost ripping it from my hands. I flipped it open and flew backwards for a bit, sheltering the pages while I continued to hurtle towards the School, casting the set of Jiwa runes that let me see the magic of the world laid bare.

I [Teleported] through the School’s shields, flickering a few more times to prevent setting off any alarms or wards. I shot towards the School’s hospital, going so quickly and touching so little that I barely saw any faces, most people having no time to react to my presence. I stopped in a dramatic gust of wind in the emergency department, paper, pens, and gowns flying everywhere.

Didn’t matter. I scanned my surroundings with [The World Around Me], combining what I saw with the knowledge I had from when I’d been a [Student] here myself. I pointed to one [Healer] with a bushy white beard who looked more outraged than shocked or afraid.

I was an armed and bloody soldier storming into their hospital after all. It wasn’t a good look, and I could sense the security forces already starting to descend upon me.

Who made teachers fight anything? The idea was absurd.

“You. I need a full team in room 304. [Biomancers] preferred, non-image stabilization required. Normal skills won’t work. Move!” I shouted before [Teleporting] twice to reach the empty room in question. I darted into [Tower of Knowledge] before coming out with her limp body, carefully placing it on the table. Some [Healers] and the like were starting to mingle outside of the door, none of them daring to come in. I threw the door open, restraining myself from yelling at them.

“Patient’s there, normal skills won’t work. Move!” I yelled before [Teleporting] out of their way to a lower floor, then dashing out of the hospital to find Marcelle. I dodged a pair of demons in leather with clubs, then dashed off to the Wood tower to find my old mentor. She wasn’t in her office, and I flew through the tower, finding her lecturing to a class. I barged in, mentally apologizing to the students but not having the verbal bandwidth to say anything.

“Marcelle. Commandeering you for an urgent medical emergency in the hospital, room 304.” I tapped my Sentinel badge, knowing she was loyal to Exterreri and I could, in an emergency, request her services.

It was a power I’d almost never exercised, but today was the day.

Marcelle gaped at me in surprise, and I had to remind myself that she wasn’t a combatant, wasn’t used to high stress, high pressure situations like this. Some of the students were starting to make a ruckus, but they were idiot nobles for the most part. 

Her mouth snapped shut.

“Understood.” She said, starting to head towards the door.

“Class, dismissed until next time, where we’ll be discussing the case that Sentinel Dawn has brought.”

I offered to carry Marcelle and she declined. I didn’t like it, but I accepted her decision, and I rapidly explained the situation, a thought occurring to me as I did.

I knew for a fact that vampires could be healed even under sunlight when they were ‘cut off’. Huh. Interesting.

That was when the vines came for me, and I debated playing a game of cat-and-mouse with the Witch in White while giving Marcelle more details of the patient.

No.

I’d done enough, and at this point I’d be escalating the situation for no good reason. Marcelle was competent, and I’d literally traveled hundreds of miles just to tap her.

I let the vines wrap around me and carry me away, confident that I could talk my way out of the situation, then felt startled by the thought.

When I had become so confident at talking myself out of trouble?

=========================

I had not managed to completely talk myself out of trouble. Just mostly.

I got thoroughly scolded by The Witch in White for ‘invading’ the School, and Iona pointed out that my utter lack of remorse was why Vitus and Marcelle had both gotten fired.

Like it or not, I’d flown in under Exterreri colors, representing Exterreri, and as such, ‘Exterreri’ was being punished by losing a number of their recruiters.

I’d leveled from the whole ordeal, and Authil - the elf we’d saved - was eternally grateful to everyone involved. The Witch in White wasn’t so cruel as to immediately evict us all, and Marcelle found the challenge of morphing ‘true’ dead flesh into living flesh and bone endlessly fascinating. She leveled far more than any vampire had a right to, and I was genuinely concerned with her thoughts on ‘doing this again.’

Marcelle had literally replaced a brain one strand at a time, and everyone involved claimed consciousness had continued the whole time, which was a huge can of worms that made me glad I wasn’t a [Biomancer] anymore. Authil had basically sworn a life-debt to the vampire - I only felt vaguely put out by that. The Rangers had been competent enough to catch the men doing the mugging, and I liked to think my stormy presence at the trial had helped sink the ‘she wasn’t actually a person so its alright’ argument.

It sucked to think that the justice system worked that way, but nobody and nothing was perfect. I only had so much time and energy, I did what I could and let myself sleep soundly at night.