Dante’s Immortality – Chapter 17

Dante practically ran out of the room, trying to get away from the person who he assumed was the servant that Hobert had mentioned. He didn’t think their first meeting had gone very well. Actually, he was fairly certain that she hated him.

It wasn’t his fault, it was the beds. He had never slept so well in his life, it was completely disorienting. He couldn’t even remember where he was or what he was doing when he had first awoken.

As he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. Fair skinned, with midnight black hair. Her pouty lips, petite nose, and thin eyebrows accented the delicate features on her face. She was absolutely stunning. The only person that he had even met that could compare to her would have been Layla, but even though the girl in front of him couldn’t have been more than twenty, she gave off a mature air that Layla couldn’t compare with.

He only had a moment to look at her. Blinking away the sleepiness in his eyes, while wondering whether or not he was still asleep and in a dream, the girl in front of him suddenly stumbled and fell back against the wall behind her.

He started to panic and began stuttering out an apology. For what, he didn’t know. He just had a sudden urge to help the girl who had fallen in front of him. That was when reality came crashing down around him.

As soon as he touched her, she grimaced. She tried to hide it, but it was noticeable.

Somehow, in his disorientation, he had forgotten how much his appearance frightened and angered others. As quickly as he could, he backed off of her in an attempt to give her space, but things only went downhill from there.

After the revulsion was gone, she looked up at him with a blank, yet slightly confused expression. “Why were you sleeping in my bed?”

He turned around to look at the bed for a moment. “This is your bed?” The realization that the bed wasn’t his was emotionally crushing. “Does that mean I can’t sleep in it?”

He didn’t realize how that had sounded, or the implications that could be behind it, until after he said it. The girl became so angry that her entire face turned crimson.

He had no idea what to do, but was relieved when she took control of the conversation. “This is the servant’s bedroom, yours is on the other side of the building.”

Dante let out an involuntary sigh. He was flustered from the girl’s looks alone, but her anger was completely destroying any confidence he might have had in rectifying the situation. “Oh, is there a bed in my room?”

Stupid. Of course there is…

She smiled at him, as though he were an idiot. “Of course there is.”

Thrilled to finally have an excuse to leave, Dante practically ran to inspect the bed in his room.

And now, he was almost positive she hated him. She most likely thought he was an idiot as well. If she was a servant for other nobles, there would be no way for him to match her expectations.

After running into the bedroom that was supposedly his, he didn’t see much of a difference from the servant’s room. The room itself was roughly twice the size and filled with the additional furniture of a nightstand and two dressers. To his relief, the bed was the same. He had fallen in love with the other one at first sight, and wasn’t sure if he would have been willing to give it up.

There was another door to the right, and he was about to go and see what was behind it when the servant walked in behind him and cleared her throat.

Dante turned to see her giving him a formal, slight bow. “I think we got off to a rough start. My name is Mia, and I am the servant assigned to you by House Calman. Here is your identification card.”

Mia handed him the identification card, and he looked over it carefully. A few things caught his attention. The Warrior Classification on it was as he thought it would be, and the credits that Alexander and Layla had mentioned were also on the card. The only thing he really didn’t understand was the arena rank. “I am Dante, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Do you know what the arena rank on my identification card is, and what it means?”

Mia seemed pleased with his normal question. “Your rank determines both the difficulty of your fights in the arena, as well as the rewards you will get from winning said fights. Your rank is bronze, the beginner rank. After bronze, there is silver, gold, and platinum. Most of the older academy students are actually in gold or platinum because ranks are based off total credits earned, not total credits possessed.”

That made sense, if he went into the arena and fought some of the older students, he would most likely get demolished due to his lack of combat experience. It may be different if he could use his Blink ability, but by just relying on his swordsmanship, he wasn’t much of a combatant.

Asking questions that Mia could answer seemed to be far easier than having a regular conversation with her. “What is behind this door?” He pointed to the door inside his room, it was the only place in his new living quarters he hadn’t checked yet.

“It’s a bathroom, used for relieving yourself as well as bathing.” Mia looked at him skeptically, as if prepared to answer his question on what bathing was. “In Housing District 1 all of the bathrooms are equipped with modern enchantments. That includes both heating and waste disposal, so there is no need to use a chamber pot.”

Dante’s eyes lit up at the news that the bathroom was fully enchanted. He was itching to go and look but had more important things to take care of, the bathroom could always come later. “Is there a place in the academy where I can sell some spare items that I picked up?” He really wanted to get rid of the items he had taken off of the archers, as well as try out the combat simulation enchantments that Alexander had told him about.

Mia nodded. “There is, but we don’t have time today. It’s almost time for curfew, and we still haven’t picked up your academy uniform.” She indicated toward his tattered clothing.

“Curfew?” The idea of a curfew was somewhat troublesome. There were a few things that he had wanted to get done before he actually started swordsmanship training the following morning, top of the list was getting his shoulder properly patched up.

“Yes, the guards will begin stopping anyone out after dark, its fine if you have somewhere that you need to be, but they won’t allow you to wander aimlessly… Of course, since you’re a resident of Housing District 1, I doubt they would dare to cause problems for you.”

“I’m not sure how long I was asleep, would we have time to get my uniform and get my shoulder fixed before my Swordsmanship training tomorrow?”

Mia looked at both of his shoulders for a moment, unable to see the arrow wound hidden under his shirt. “Did you get injured?”

Dante nodded. “About a week ago I took an arrow through the shoulder during an ambush. I got it patched up, but it’s still too painful to fully use my left arm in a fight.”

Mia smiled at him in delight. “Of course, we can head to the academy healers first. Their services are free for any students within the academy, and you will get the best ones since you’re a resident of Housing District 1.”

Dante looked at her for a moment, eye twitching.

Why was she so happy when I told her I took an arrow through the shoulder in an ambush? Does she really hate me that much, or was she just happy that there are academy healers who can help me…?

“Alright, lets head to the healers first.”

Mia nodded and walked toward the front door, holding it for him. “I’ll lead the way to the hospital, my lord.”

He followed her out. As he passed, Dante inspected Mia’s facial expression, trying to determine whether or not she was resentful when addressing him as ‘my lord’. He couldn’t tell, but he supposed it didn’t really matter. “There is no need to address me as if I am a noble, just call me Dante.”

Mia just nodded. “Of course, Dante.”

As they walked out of the Housing District 1’s main gate, Mia visibly hesitated for a moment, then a look of determination filled her face, and she snatched his hand before leading him toward the healers.

He didn’t realize that just touching him would make her so uncomfortable. It made him far more self-conscious about his appearance, but at the same time, he appreciated that she was trying.

As they headed towards the healers, he noticed that there were far fewer people in the streets, which was a relief. When he arrived at noon, he must have caught the afternoon rush.

Curious, Dante looked up and checked the location of the sun so that he could estimate the time.

There were only a few hours left in the day, he had slept far longer than he thought.

As they began to walk, he noticed that they were getting closer to some of the large stadiums that he had seen earlier. Now that he had a servant who seemed knowledgeable about the academy itself, he didn’t hold back his questions. “What are those large stadiums for?”

Mia didn’t miss a step, answering him without even looking back. “Those are the arena stadiums, in total there are eight. One for each of the four ranks in both team battles and solo fights.”

That was interesting, it seemed that the team fights had the same four ranks as the solo fights.

They treaded down the stone brick road until they were practically outside of the largest stadium. Just before they reached it, Mia turned into a separate, smaller building to the side.

As Dante walked in, his senses were immediately overloaded. The sounds of people screaming in pain was the first thing that hit him as Mia opened the door, but the smell came immediately after. It was sterile, yet at the same time smelled similar to a freshly burned corpse. He recoiled, completely unprepared for the mixed smell and grating sound of the screams.

Mia, who was holding the door open for him, just rolled her eyes. “I’m sure none of them will die, a team battle must have just ended. We need to hurry or we won’t get your uniform before curfew.”

That screaming is the result of a team battle?

Although hesitant, Dante followed her in.

There were four people getting treatment within the building. It turned out that the screaming was coming from a single person. Seeing him, Dante stopped, staring at the screaming boy’s arm. Or what was once an arm, the thing that was connected to his shoulder looked like a shriveled piece of charcoal.

Mia seemed correct, they weren’t going to die. While two others seemed relatively fine, there was a corpse laying on one of the treating beds, left completely alone. The man, who was clearly dead, couldn’t have been more than 18 and had a gaping wound in his neck that was leaking blood.

A neck wound… That seems like it was intentional.

After noticing their presence, a middle-aged woman with a kind smile walked up to the two of them. “How can I help you?”

Mia immediately took charge, which was good because he was still staring at the corpse and charred arm. “My lord has an arrow wound that he needs to be healed.” She said while flashing her identification card, which showed her status as his servant.

The woman motioned toward him. “Of course, right this way dear.” The middle-aged woman didn’t seem to care much for titles or propriety at the very least. Then again, he didn’t exactly look like much of a lord at the moment.

As Dante went to follow her, Mia grabbed his attention behind him. “I have something I need to take care of, if I’m not back by the time you’re done, wait for me.” Before he could even reply, Mia darted off.

Dante just shrugged and followed the woman leading him. She took him into a smaller room, which was empty. “A healer will be here shortly.”

Only a few moments after the woman left, a wizened old man walked through the door. “How might I be of service, my lord?”

‘My lord’ may just be something he needed to adjust to, he couldn’t correct everyone, and even if he did it would only make him look bad.

Wasting no time, Dante pulled off his shirt and indicated to his shoulder. The wound was beginning to heal, but was threatening to reopen if he overused the limb. “While I was traveling to the academy I took an arrow to the shoulder. We did some rough patchwork, but it’s still not healed properly, and I have training in the morning.”

“Very well, just give me a moment, and I’ll have it fixed good as new.”

The old man stepped closer to Dante and put his hand on the wound. At the healer’s touch, an itching sensation seemed to dig into the wound, constantly traveling deeper into it. Dante watched the healer closely, trying to perceive how he was doing the healing.

The old man noticed his staring. “Not to worry my lord. I have the Cleric Classification, and am quite adept at healing.”

The old man seemed to misunderstand his prying eyes, so he backed off. He reasoned that there would be plenty of opportunities to watch a healer first hand in the near future, given that he would be fighting in the arena and the healing itself was free.

The old man took his hand off of his shoulder, and the wound was gone. In its place was a small silvery scar that looked like a dot. Dante looked the shoulder over for a moment, pleased, but noticed that he was feeling slightly drained after it was finished.

“Excuse me, I feel slightly tired after you healed my shoulder. Is that normal?”

The old man snorted. “I must be losing my touch...”

He was surprised by the healer’s reaction, the healer almost seemed angry.

“How tired a patient is after a healing depends on two factors. The first is how much mana they use. The second, and most important, is their control in mana manipulation. Given how light of an injury you had, you shouldn’t have felt it at all, satisfied?” The healer let out a deep breath, as if calming himself. “Your shoulder is healed. You may go, my lord.” With that, the now disgruntled healer left the room.

What was that?

Things had changed quickly. Somehow, his question seemed to thoroughly anger the healer. He would need to find a way to apologize to the old man. A healer was not someone he would want to be angry with him.

Regardless, he got some useful information. It seemed healing’s proficiency depended on mana manipulation, he might be able to make his Rebirth of the Revenant passive usable if he learned more about it.

Following the old healer, Dante walked back out to the main room and waited for Mia.

It had to have been at least half an hour before she reappeared, walking through the front door of the building. It seemed that his absence was rather good for her mood. Compared to earlier, she looked far happier, the change was actually shocking.

She is that happy after leaving me for less than an hour? She hates being with me that much…?

Mia was practically bouncing with each step as she came up to him. “Ready to get your uniform?”

Dante just let out a sigh and nodded.

Her head tilted slightly in confusion. “What’s wrong?”

“I think the healer hates me.” And he’s not the only one.

That didn’t clear up her confusion at all, so he elaborated. “I asked him why I felt tired after he healed my shoulder, and he seemed mad when he explained it to me.”

Mia began to laugh and quickly covered her mouth. “Of course he hates you. He thought you purposefully insulted him, but probably answered your question anyways because he thinks you’re a noble that he can’t offend.”

Now he was confused. “Why would he think that?”

“Every noble house employs at least one healer, and even commoners should know how healing works. You implied that he was inferior to the healer your house employs, while simultaneously making him tell you why he was inferior.”

Her explanation just made Dante heave another sigh, this time more of a groan. It was hard enough to behave appropriately when people didn’t have any expectations of him, but now they expected him to have the full knowledge of a noble as well.

Dante turned around, preparing to go back into the hospital and explain himself to the healer, when Mia tugged on his shirt. “You can apologize later, we still need to get your uniform.”

Dante gave a defeated nod and allowed Mia to pull him out of the building.

As they were walking, he noticed that the others around him weren’t wearing similar clothing. Curious, he asked Mia. “Why do I need a uniform so badly? No one else is wearing one.”

“Of course they aren’t. The semester doesn’t officially start until tomorrow, so until then, they would prefer to wear their own clothes.”

That was understandable, but he had no idea what a semester was. “What do you mean by ‘semester’?”

“A semester is just how long the academy’s classes last. There are four of them in a year, broken up into roughly three months a piece.”

That basically meant he would only have three months to learn swordsmanship in the world essence manipulation class Sir Andres had signed him up for, which wasn’t nearly long enough. “A class only lasts three months? How do you sign up for more?”

“Yes, a class only last 3 months. Your world essence manipulation class will only last for three months as well. The only way to get more classes in the next quarter is to buy them with credits. If you do not have any classes when a quarter starts, you will be evicted from the academy. It’s a good way for the academy to sift through combatants. Those who can’t win fights in the arena are kicked out. To stay for another quarter, you will need to win at least 13 fights in three months, or you won’t be able to afford even the cheapest classes. It’s the reason over half of the academy’s students are about to start the first quarter. Many either don’t earn enough credits, or are unwilling to stay for the second semester.”

That wasn’t good news, he had been seriously second-guessing the arena since he saw the corpse with its throat slit in the hospital, now it seemed he had no choice.

Just staying in the academy was secondary though. Taking more classes, like mana manipulation, which seemed important from the healer’s words earlier, was his real motivation. That knowledge could prove invaluable and wasn’t something that he could just pick up through trial and error.

His thoughts were cut off as Mia turned into a building on the side of the road. Surprisingly, it was almost directly across the street from Housing District 1.

He had been expecting to just pick up a uniform in his general size, perhaps used, from a storage shed somewhere. What he saw when he walked into the building with Mia was the complete opposite.

A perky woman standing in the middle of the room was holding a pin cushion in her mouth and seemed to be torturing a noble that was around his age.

The seamstress was scrambling over the noble with different patterns and sizes of cloth, making measurements and checking styles while also managing to accidentally stick him with a needle every couple of seconds. It was easy to tell, because every time she did, he would let out a soft whimper.

Even though he felt bad for him, he couldn’t help but feel some amusement at the noble’s plight.

Dante watched, mesmerized as the woman seemed to dance over him, slowly pinning more and more cloth to him until it looked like he was actually wearing clothing.

After that, she stopped, took a few steps back, then rubbed her chin and nodded. “Not bad, not bad.” Stepping forward, the seamstress began plucking out all the needles she placed in the cloth, causing it to fall off as she collected them one by one. Then, taking out a piece of paper, she started to write down different measurements.

That was amazing.

Her agility and dexterity must have been at least twice the average at 20 a piece to move that quickly and precisely.

As the woman finished scribbling on her paper she smiled and shooed away the noble, who was now standing in his undergarments, away. “Next.”

The noble, who was covered in small puncture wounds from the needle, picked up the clothes that he left on the floor. As soon as he did, he seemed to regain his confidence, and began cursing the woman as he got dressed and left.

Dante hopped into the line that was formed to the side of the shop. It wasn’t really much of a line, there were only three other people in it, but he was eager to watch the seamstress’s masterful work again.

The next noble in line, clearly hesitant, stepped slowly toward the seamstress. He looked almost afraid of the woman. Dante soon found out why, although the new noble she was working on continuously flinched, he didn’t get stuck by her needle a single time.

When she finished and shooed him away, instead of cursing her like the other noble, the boy heaved a sigh of relief and picked up his clothes.

Lesson learned, don’t piss off a seamstress.

The next person in line was a girl, the seamstress led her into the back where she could undress and not be seen by prying eyes. It was somewhat of a disappointment, watching the woman work was entertaining, and he had nothing to do as he and Mia just sat quietly in the back of the line.

While they were waiting in the line, loud voices arose from the doorway of the shop. Three nobles walked in, unattended and full of swagger. They were quite an interesting trio, one was tall and lanky, another soft and pudgy, almost like a more refined Greggory. The last one held his attention though. He had never seen anyone more ‘perfect’. His short cropped pitch-black hair and cultured features were matched with a seemingly perfect build, even his voice was perfectly masculine and filled with self-confidence. The only thing he could find wrong with the noble was his eyes, they just felt… sinister.

Dante quickly turned away before they noticed him, and Mia didn’t react to the voices at all. She just ignored them without checking to see who it was.

As soon as the person who was ahead of them in line saw who had just entered the shop, he immediately left the line and walked out. There was no hesitation, and he didn’t look back.

That can’t be a good sign…

Determined to not catch their attention, Dante just stood still in line. He didn’t say a word to Mia, and he didn’t move, not even an inch.

By the time the seamstress finally came back, the three nobles behind them were talking about how enjoyable killing in the arena was, and he was in the middle of praying to the Goddess that the seamstress would hurry up.

He had never been so relieved to see anyone in his life.

The girl who had just finished getting her measurements taken, took one look at the room, then rushed out of the shop as quickly as she could.

“Next.” Dante stepped up to the seamstress. “Undress to your undergarments.” He couldn’t understand the seamstress’s personality, she seemed so perky, yet so uncaring.

He began to take off his clothes, not touching his glove, which seemed to grab the woman’s attention. “Will you be keeping your glove on?”

The question took him slightly off-guard, but he nodded. He had no intention of ever removing the glove. “Is that a problem?”

The seamstress shook her head. “No. But House Calman doesn’t allow students to use decorative combatant’s gloves during the academy’s semester. You can where your glove, but I’ll need to cover over the decoration on it.” She motioned to the dragon symbol on it. “Now strip.”

Dante stripped as she told him to, and was preparing to have his measurement taken when booming laughter filled the room. That ‘perfect’ boy from earlier was now pointing at him and laughing. “Look at that skeleton, I’ve seen chickens with more meat on them.” Dante looked down at his protruding ribs, he had actually put on quite a bit of weight since he left Alazel. Still, he was far skinnier than what could be considered average.

The other two picked up the laughter and started to throw out insults of their own like it was a competition. The seamstress didn’t seem to mind, just began taking his measurements at her quick pace.

The pudgy one was the quickest to speak up. “He looks like some beggar that was picked up off the streets.”

The taller one shook his head. “Even the beggars eat far better than this rotting carcass.”

It didn’t matter how fast seamstress was going, it felt like an eternity. Even if he was used to being insulted, the nobles before him seemed to carry more weight with their words than the random shopkeepers or priest in Alazel. Even Greggory’s words never carried much meaning to them. Still, he endured silently, allowing the seamstress to do her work.

The three of them were relentless, never stopping and only becoming more vicious as time went on. They didn’t stay on his frame, they touched a variety of issues, mostly just his appearance though. From the scars left by the wolf that raked down his ribs, to his silver hair and red eyes. At some point they finally began to make fun of who his parents were, giving him some reprieve. The whore mother and bastard father jokes didn’t bother him in the slightest, he had never met his mother or father.

“I bet the only way to make someone as fucked looking as you, was if your whore of a mother fucked some foul creature.” The pudgy was barely able to get the words out around his laughter.

They are really reaching now…

He was just starting to feel better about the entire situation when he saw movement in the periphery of his vision and glanced over.

Mia was shaking, obviously trying to hold in her laughter.

For some reason, Mia’s reaction cut deeper emotionally than any of the insults the other three had thrown at him. Far deeper. He knew that she didn’t like him, but…

He sighed.

It doesn’t matter anyways.

He could feel his face flaring crimson in his embarrassment. Instead of looking up, at the four people who were laughing at him, Dante looked down at his feet until the seamstress was finished.

“Next.” The seamstress shooed him away. As the ‘perfect’ noble stepped forward. Dante grabbed his rugged clothing and got dressed as quickly as he could, wanting to get out of the shop as quickly as possible.

Dante quickly picked up his clothing and quickly left. As he headed for the door, Mia in tow, he could hear the boy’s shouting from behind.

“Ouch! You just stuck me with that damn needle you stupid bitch! If it happens again, I’ll have you sold to the brothels.” After a brief pause, there was another curse and more shouting. Dante couldn’t help but give a slight smile, at least one person hadn’t thought the insults were funny.

They took the short walk across the street to Housing District 1 in silence. Mia dealt with the guards as they walked through the gate. She seemed to be considerate of his somber mood at the very least, not troubling him with meaningless conversation.

He actually appreciated Mia’s effort. It didn’t take a genius to see that she disliked him, but she did her best not to show it.

As they walked through the door she looked at him with a sympathetic expression. “You should probably take a bath, your training tomorrow is at first light. There are spare clothes to sleeping inside of your wardrobe, and the academy’s seamstresses should have your uniforms done by the morning.”

Dante just nodded back to her and turned to his room.

Not in the mood to waste time, he went straight to the bathroom. What he saw baffled him, there were tubes everywhere connecting to everything. The bathroom seemed to have everything; a bathtub, a small bowl in front of the mirror, and even a chamber pot in the shape of a chair. The entire bathroom was amazing and each tube was covered in enchantments that activated various functions.

Dante focused on the bathtub. He wasn’t in the mood to play with the enchantments, and was determined to bathe and get to sleep. He walked up to it, inspecting it. There were only two enchantments, and one he recognized. It was almost the exact same as the fire stone he had taken from Isaac, but slightly altered.

Not sure what the other did, he began to slowly channel world essence into it to test it. Water began to trickle out of a tube that emptied into the bathtub. Curious, he channeled world essence into the fire enchantment, the water that trickled out instantly became warmer.

Pleased with the enchantments’ usefulness, he determined the heat he wanted the water to be, then began filling the tub.

It was only a few minutes later that Dante was relaxing in the warm, steamy water of the bathtub. He planned on actually washing himself, but for the moment was content to relax. The feeling that the warm water gave him almost rivaled the pleasure he had experienced when he had slept in the bed earlier.

Thinking about the bed he would soon be sleeping in, Dante gave a pleased sigh.

At that moment, he was interrupted by a soft knock at the door.

What could Mia possibly need?

“Yes?”

The door opened and Dante jumped to cover himself as best he could in the clear water.

What in the hell…

Mia came in with a towel, only a towel. She had the slight tinge of a blush on her face and she was looking down at the floor to the side of the room as if embarrassed that she was there. “Would you like some help getting washed?”

Dante stared at her blankly, there was definitely double meaning in her tone. He didn’t understand what was happening, she clearly looked uncomfortable and he couldn’t understand why she would come to him of her own initiative.

Is this what is expected of a noble’s servant?

The thought disgusted him. “No Mia, but thank you for your consideration.”

He saw a hint of relief flash across her eyes, but it was instantly gone. “As you wish.” Mia bowed slightly while tightly gripping the towel that was draped around her, then turned to leave the bathroom.

Dante watched as she turned to exit the room, he had some mixed feelings regarding Mia. Even if it was just her job, he was thankful for how hard she was trying. It must be hard to go from dealing with proper nobles to someone who looked and acted like him.

“Mia.” She looked back, slightly startled, as if almost scared that he was going to reconsider her offer. “Thank you.” After hesitating for a moment, Mia nodded and walked out of the bathroom.

Dante relaxed back into the warm water of the bathtub. Even if she didn’t want to, having someone help take care of him felt… nice.

Mia

Mia walked back into her servant’s room, the hidden limp no longer in her step after getting herself healed earlier.

Her heart was racing. She had in no way expected Dante’s reaction. It was almost funny, it seemed like the only man in her entire life that she had met with a shred of decency was the one she was supposed to be seducing.

The entire thing was stupid, she had thought that she could make him feel better by doing… that. For some reason that was the only way she could think of to console him.

Mia clenched her fist.

The way that Dante had reacted to those three shit head nobles was heart wrenching. And all she could do while it was happening was sit in a corner and shake in rage. It had been years since she had an urge to go against her orders, but after what happened earlier, she truly wanted to kill them…