Polymath Redux

Chapter 9//The Good Doctor

Even in this extraordinary world of monsters and fantasy, the talent to use ‘Magic’ was a rarity. No, perhaps that wasn’t the most accurate way to describe it; it was rare in the same way Doctors and Lawyers were rare- due to the immense time and dedication it required learning the skill set. Technically, everyone could learn it if they tried, though most didn’t because of the aforementioned problem of time consumption. Although, not that all magic was unusable. The majority of combat-capable people in this world knew basic augmentation magic: strengthening attack, bolstering defence, sharpening accuracy or amplifying agility. The thing that was truly rare were ‘Mages’; in other words, the ability to convert mana into a tangible physical phenomenon. So rare in fact, that if someone who had an aptitude for it joined the military, they would be given special considerations to skip ranks and be placed into an elite cell of Mages. Highly trained Mages could be likened to a very mobile artillery unit, and thus indispensable during wartime situations.

“Ermm… Hmm… how about if I do it like… no, wait, that’s not right…”

Standing before Mordred was a young male soldier from the local garrison, ‘Graham’. His soft brown hair and rather naïve-looking face suggested that he could not be any older than his early twenties- perhaps about a year younger than Mordred himself. Although he had trained to develop his technique with the sword for most of his life, he was admittedly not that great. He certainly obtained a lean but muscular body type with all that practice, but his actual skills were disproportionately lacking. Yet, by mere coincidence Mordred had noticed that this young man might have the potential as a Mage.

Thus, Mordred became a ‘teacher’ of sorts, but… “you still can’t do it?” Mordred asked with a slight tone of disappointment. Of course, none of this ‘teaching’ business was done on a whim; Graham had unknowingly become a guinea pig for an experiment. ‘I wanted to see if the residents of this world could learn skills from the game, but perhaps that may not be the case. Either that, or it’s just him’. “Well, I suppose it can’t be helped. Converting mana into a tangible phenomenon isn’t exactly the easiest thing to do without understand the theory behind it.”

“Yeah, I’ve only managed this much,” Graham replied as he conjured a small ball of flames that could be the equivalent to a flame of a lighter. Perhaps the stress of having practiced the same thing for over twelve hours had gotten to him as he shouted, “bah! It’s impossible, doctor. Honestly, I have no idea how you’re so capable when you’re barely older than me. You know elemental magic AND healing magic; just what kind of prodigy are you?” Graham sighed and slumped over onto the grass. “What is this overwhelming sense of defeat as a man?” Though he said that, a few days ago he was unable to use any magic, thus the fact that he could do anything was a miracle in and of itself. As Mordred understood it, most people would not even be able to do as much as this young man had done in such a short time.

“You’re still having trouble, Graham?” asked a voice that came from the distance. A female officer; she was a tall, noble-looking woman with a sharp gaze and long, silky black hair tied neatly behind her. Even though she wore the same issue of chain mail as the other garrison troops, she had somehow managed to make it seem more stylish and the allure of her womanly proportions were leaked through.

“Lieutenant!” Graham called out in a chipper tone.

“Lieutenant Marianne, good evening,” Mordred greeted her with a cordial, if a little professional, smile- the kind most would show when going into a business meeting. With his ‘friendly’ personality, within the past five days he had successfully befriended most of the citizens and garrison of the village. They all offered him an amiable relationship, like they had known him for years and was very welcoming.

“Sorry Doctor, for dumping this idiot onto you,” Lieutenant Marianne apologized. “Even though you must be awfully busy with your work, we’ve made you play along,” she said with a subtle hint of a blush on her face, though it may also easily have been the effects of the auburn sun as it was setting. “Still, the prospect of having a rare Mage in our garrison was a little too enticing.”

“Not at all. I actually quite enjoy teaching. Since my sister isn’t one to sit still and properly study, it’s a refreshing change of pace for me to have such a studious student like Graham,” he told them as he turned his sights towards Morialia who had been running around with the village children with a child-like smile on her face. The ‘Demon Lord’ Morialia was known to be a free and rather immature character, though it was amusing to see her flavour text description enacted in real life. “Unfortunately, my methods appear to be too hard to understand. We’ve not been able to make much progress,” he told her as though a teacher giving an end-of-year report to a parent.

“Ugh… my apologies, Doctor,” Graham expressed regret.

“Well, it’s not really something to be ashamed about,” surprisingly Lieutenant Marianne cut in to console him. “Learning the fundamentals of magic and controlling mana is something that normally takes years to master. Most Mages have either studied it from a young age or dedicate decades to its research, so of course it’s not something you could achieve in just a couple of days. In fact, just being able to make that small flame is impressive enough. It means you actually do have an aptitude for magic as the Doctor says.” Unfortunately, for Mordred a ‘small flame’ was not enough to test out his hypothesis on whether they could use Hellgana’s skills.

“When you put it like that, yeah, I guess I am pretty amazing,” Graham joked.

“Heh, if you think you’re amazing, then what does that make the Doctor? Not only healing magic but all forms of elemental magic; the word genius wouldn’t be apt enough to describe him,” claimed lieutenant Marianne as though they were having some kind of show off. “You know, all the Clerics back at the capital were all old men and women.”

“What? How come?”

“It just means healing magic takes that long to master. Apparently, you need not only a profound mastery of magic but also an intimate knowledge of the human body. Due to how absurdly complex all of that is to mesh together, even Mages put Clerics on a pedestal.”

“Seriously? Damn, just what is the Doctor then? Some kind of monster?”

“I think you’re all overestimating me,” Mordred tried to reel back the compliments. “It’s just that my father used to be a Cleric as well, so I was privy to all of his research data. I’m sure if anyone else had access to all that information they’d be just as good as me.”

“Somehow, I doubt anyone but you could…”

“Ouch!” suddenly came the pained cry of a young girl. One of the children that had been playing with Morialia fell over and scraped her knee. Noticing this, Mordred walked over and crouched down before her.

“What’s wrong, Lily?” he asked in a soft, friendly tone. ‘Lily’ was the youngest child in the entire village, yet also the most precocious, often acting as the leader to all the other children. That bright child was on the verge of tears due to her injury but was soothed by Mordred’s magic. A bright twinkle of light surrounded her wound and slowly- as though time were reversed- closed the injury. After wiping off the remaining blood, he gently patted her head. “You didn’t cry, good girl,” he said with a warm smile.

“Ah…! Ah… umm… thank you very much!” she replied. Her eyes brightened with adoration and admiration for the gentle doctor who helped her.

Yet, in the background, Morialia made a sour expression as she saw this mysterious and inconsistent creature known as her master; ‘whoa… he’s really hamming it in,’ her face seemed to say.

“Oh!” Mordred jumped up, pretending to have just remembered something. “Sorry guys, I need to go gather some ingredients from the forest. One of the plants I’m looking for only sprouts at a specific time in the evening, so I need to hurry.”

“Ah, Doctor!” Lieutenant Marianne stopped him. “Well, if you don’t mind, why don’t I accompany you? Going into the forest at this time of day might be a little dangerous. Not to mention we also had that monster attack a few days ago.”

“Wouldn’t the Doctor be just fine?” Graham interjected. “He was the one who took down the monster after all.”

“Shut up, idiot!” the lieutenant whispered at him under her breath.

Mordred thought for a moment and ultimately agreed. “Yes, I don’t mind. Or rather, it’d be my pleasure. Then, please meet me at the front gate in ten minutes.”

“Whew! Way to go, Lieutenant,” Graham nudged at her as if insinuating something scandalous.

“I. said. Shut. Up.” She jabbed him in his sides to silence him.

*

*

*

At the outskirts of the village, several figures dressed in dark robes had gathered around.

“Mistress Petra, the specified location seems to be a little north from here,” one of the figures relayed.

“All right, then I’ll move in first. I want the rest of you to encircle around and survey the area from different angles, hm?” as she gave her order she noticed a strange black bird sitting silently on a nearby tree. It was a rather ominous animal with its shadowy black body and eyes of dark crimson. If she didn’t know any better, she would’ve said it was spying on her, but to her knowledge there were no skills like that. ‘Am I just being paranoid?’ she wondered to herself.

“Mistress?” her colleagues called out to her.

“Oh, nothing. Anyway, we’ll each survey the area and rendezvous at the specified location afterwards.”

“Understood!” they all agreed and vanished into the shadows.