3.4

A warm bath or I can’t believe I wrote this what the hel… heck

Willow could only watch as the door closed in front of her. The Herald had gone off to have his arm cut up by the heretic. It was rather frustrating but she respected his decision. And so, the girl held off her desire to peek in.

But now what should she do, training perhaps. That would help to vent this bit of frustration. Or she could take a bath. The latter would be nice.

Grabbing a change of clothing, Willow entered the bath to changing room to find Caron already there. From the look of it, the woman was having the same idea.

“Ah, sorry, I didn’t know you were in”

“Oh, it’s alright. The bath is big enough if you want to join me and Suiren here”

Willow peaked a bit further behind the door to find the masked woman undressing. Maybe training wouldn’t be too bad. The girl looked out a window nearby to find the someone around the spot where she usually trained. It was one of the summoned, Conrad, who was talking to… Malcolm.

Bathing time then.

“If you excuse me”

___

“Ahhhh”

Willow couldn’t help but exclaimed out loud as she entered the warm water. This was certainly the right choice. The temperature was perfect and there was also a nice aroma in the air. Something was mixed in with the water, probably by Caron.

“I hope this is to your liking, Ms. Brandt”

“You can call me Willow. And don’t worry, this is fantastic”

“Thank you”

Come to think of it, this was the first time Willow had one on one time with her host. Technically Suiren was also here but she didn’t really count.

“Actually, this is way more relaxing than a normal bath. Did you put something in here?”

“Ah yes, I use a mixture of medicinal herb. It helps with detoxifying and skin care as well”

“There are herbs for medical purpose? And here I thought they are only used for cooking?”

“That’s quite a common misconception. We never really rely on them since all known diseases and afflictions can be cured by mana. But they can be a neat bonus”

Where did she get them from though? Mother had a garden dedicated to herbs so Willow was used to seeing them. But here, she couldn’t spot anything of the like.

“So do you use them in bath frequently?”

“No, not really, I tend to use them around once a month”

“That remind me of my mother. Once a month she would drag me and all my sister to a special bath as well. The tub would be filled with milk though”

“Oh, I have heard of that. It was quite popular back when I was still in Vaswani Academy. I never tried it though”

Willow had heard of that place, the most distinguished institution dedicated to the teaching of the arcane. She wanted to study there. But like all of her siblings that were interested in that subject, the girl was home schooled.

Granted, it was by the Academy principle, the Divine Vaswani herself. Despite that, Willow was still horrible.

“How come a healer who graduated there like you would be at this small town?”

“About that” Caron blushed slightly as she reminisced about something “I was already with Owain back then and since he was stationed here, I followed him”

This wasn’t too much of a surprise, all chargers like Owain were trained at Vaswani Academy. But of course, a healer from there was a different matter though.

“Then you must have learnt about all these medicinal herbs there then”

“Yes, although it isn’t part of the curriculum though”

“Huh?” That answer was both a yes and a no. Vaswani only had one curriculum for one subject. All students could also pick only one subject throughout their whole life, no compromise. Caron noticed Willow’s confusion of course.

“About that, I was actually raised at Vaswani”

“So you one of the lecturer’s daughter then”

“… Actually no, I am… an orphan”

“Eh, what is an orphan?”

Willow blurted that out before realising that was a bad idea. Caron was reluctant to give out that reply so it must have been sensitive. The woman still answered the princess though.

“An orphan is someone who doesn’t have parents”

“How is that possible? Then where did you come from?”

“No, my parents died when I was just a baby”

Yep, that was sensitive information alright.

“Sorry… I shouldn’t have…”

“It’s alright, you didn’t know. That’s not a common knowledge either. After all, I believe the number of orphans throughout this century including me can be counted on one hand”

“I see…” Better steered the conversation elsewhere “That would explain why you can use the Ayurveda technique. You must have learnt that from the Divine herself”

A medical method created and named by the Divine Vaswani. Normal healing was done by injecting one’s mana into the patient through blood transfusion. Apparently there maybe rejections so a healer must use a special syringe.

Ayurveda bypassed that restriction entirely. The technique involved dissolving part of the healer’s body into dust which could enter and fix the patient’s body.

Of course, Willow had no idea how that work but she did know practitioners of that technique were extremely rare. Mother would use it to heal the girl after her trainings and sparring with father.

“Actually, I learnt that from Victor”

Hearing that name disrupted all of Willow’s peaceful reminiscing. Ayurveda was created for healing purpose but the heretic had corrupted it for nefarious purposes. With it, he could dissolve his entire body into a black smoke. And using that divine’s power, the heretic created monstrosities of his own like that three-headed dog of his.

But maybe this would explain why Caron seemed rather friendly toward the fiend.

“Really… I never heard of him teaching anyone”

“He actually never taught me directly”

“Then how did you learn that?”

“Victor usually visited at the Academy, he was the one who brought me there in the first place actually. There, he would perform his many experiments”

Hearing that made Willow wondered how Caron’s parents even passed away. Nevertheless, the girl decided not to interrupt.

“While I was not allowed to peek, I did so anyway. I would try to mimic what I saw. Of course, none of my attempts work. But every time Victor saw me doing that, he would just drop one piece of advice. Eventually, I could use the Ayurveda”

“That’s… impressive”

The reason why Ayurveda was not normally taught was because the technique was incredibly complicated. Only the bests of the bests could do it. And here, Caron managed to master that just like that.

Victor must have dropped quite a lot of one piece of advice then.

“I guess that’s why you seemed so… friendly with him”

“…”

Now that was uncalled for, Willow had no idea why she said that.

“I do understand why he is deemed the heretic. I just… can’t bring myself to hate him”

Silence soon fell on them. The two couldn’t really find anything to say. Willow couldn’t help but berate herself for that. It was insensitive of her, the daughter of the Divine. The girl wanted to do or say something to make up for that.

The two’s trains of thought were soon interrupted. It was Suiren, exiting the bath. Her flowing wet hair glistened under the light, it shone in the most brilliant of colour. Water drops traced along her elegant curves, accentuating the woman’s smooth and delicate skin, which was slightly red from the heat.

All of that was seen through the steamy air, which made it all seems slightly sensual. Caron and Willow couldn’t help but admire the woman even though her face was hidden. That somehow made her even more alluring in this instance.

The moment Suiren left the room, the other two realised they were both too preoccupied with talking instead of actually bathing.

“I can give you a hand”

Willow said, still feeling guilty. Her offer was accepted. The girl started to scrub the woman’s back. She should say something before the silence settled back in.

“Your skin is really soft and smooth!”

“Thank you”

“And you are also quite… firm and muscular” Not anything too overt, just surprising for a healer who stayed at home.

“I do try to work out every morning”

“Wait, how come I never saw you during my morning training?”

“About that, I start my routine at 4”

“That early! Is anyone even up then”

“I think Conrad wakes up around that time as well. Then there is Owain who promised to join me but he never could get up before 6”

Willow chuckled and finished washing the woman hair. Now it was her turn and she would certainly need help.

“Your hair is even longer than I thought!” Caron exclaimed as she tried to sort out the bundle of hair.

“It actually reaches past my ankle I think. My mother really like long hair so she asked me to keep it since none of my sisters wanted to”

“How long does it take for you to tie them back normally?”

“Actually, mother made an enchanted ring for me that can bundle them up nicely”

“That’s convenient”

It took those two quite some more time to finish with the bathing. Although they would spend most that time just chatting, normal chatting.

Willow never felt more refreshed as she exited the dressing room. The girl was pumped, like she could take on anything right now. With renewed vigour, she took off to search for her Herald.