“Is it that strange for good friends to know how the other would have reacted in a given situation?” - Berthold Amblin, Adventurer from the Istria Jarldom.

“Hah! I knew that must have been related to you!” exclaimed Lucea with proud satisfaction when Aideen told her about her travels in Alcidea, specifically the early part where she encountered a certain guild of unscrupulous healers and took action against them. “I told this old doodler and he said that certainly such coincidences don’t happen in real life, hah!”

“From the way you said it, I guess you’ve heard of the Guild of Unburdened Healers, then,” noted Aideen with some curiosity. She had not heard of that guild operating in Ur-Teros before she left.

“Oh yeah, we got an infestation of those bastards around… was that fifty or sixty years ago?” pondered Lucea as she tried to recall the past. Given their ages, it was not that strange to be unable to remember the exact time of when things happened in the past, unless they were of great importance to the person involved. After all, how many people remembered the exact date of when some minor thing happened decades ago?

“It was forty-seven years ago, mother,” supplied Luina from the side.

“That, then. Thank you, Luina,” said Lucea with a satisfied nod of her head. “Anyway, yes, those rotten bastards came to the south around fifty years ago. We didn’t hear about them until a few years later when their activities came to our attention. I’m sure you knew of my grandfather’s view on things like what those scum tried to do, don’t you?”

“I certainly do,” replied Aideen with a nod of her own. Khaer Ul Tessarii, the First Emperor of the Third Elmaiya Empire and Lucea’s grandfather was a healer just like them, who used to live as a wandering healer. He had especially loathed how during the reign of the Second Elmaiya Empire magical healing was strictly the province of the wealthy and powerful.

He had done a lot of reforms to the system and made rules that allowed even the poor to have access to magical healing, partly by adopting a conscription system similar to what the Lichdom employed. Lucea had furthered those practices, so her reaction to how a bunch of people attempted to monopolize magical healing to be used as a commodity could be imagined.

“So, what did you do once you caught wind of them?” asked Aideen after a moment.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“Oh, a few of the rats managed to scurry back to the north. It was around then that we learned that they were losing their footholds en masse there due to a movement amongst other healers to help others whenever they can without extorting payment like these ones did,” said Lucea. “Incidentally, that was also what made me think of you, since I recalled that you never asked for any recompense either.”

“Either way, as you might expect, I wasn’t going to lend them a sympathetic ear or anything. I had the lot of them we caught tossed into the jungle, along with the one noble audacious enough to shelter and cooperate with them,” continued the Empress. “As for how their efforts outside the empire went, I have little idea. I did hear that they tried to proselytize everywhere.

“Well, we saw no sign of them when we passed through the Jarldoms,” noted Aideen. “Given how the culture there is so heavy on helping each other to survive through the tough times, that doesn’t surprise me either,” she added. “As for the Lichdom… well… if they had tried to ply their trade there, I think Grandpa would have ended them quite violently.”

“Considering how greedy the bastards were, it wouldn’t surprise me if the Bone Lord chose to execute them by drowning them in gold. Molten gold, that is,” replied Celia with a chuckle.

“Normally I’d refute anyone saying such things about Grandpa, but he does like to have a dose of irony in the punishments he gave out,” Aideen admitted nonchalantly. “What about the north? Your Empire likely have more news from there compared to us, given our respective locations.”

“Heard that they managed to take root in some small sultanates and khanates, but the larger ones drove them out. Overall, I’d say that those bastards won’t be finding much success here in Ur-Teros,” answered Lucea. “I’ve taken some steps personally to ensure that would be the case, at least during my reign as Empress.”

“I imagine you made it clear just how you viewed that guild, huh?”

“Uh-huh. Made it very clear that those working with those money-hungry fleas would incur my displeasure, and the Empire’s with it. Not many would consider them worth the effort that way, the few that do are those who never had any real relations with us anyway due to their location,” explained Lucea with a toothy smirk that displayed her rows of dagger-like teeth. “They’re on the eastern side of the north, so they’re far outside our reach, other than our merchants boycotting them. Even then they could just buy the goods from their neighbors instead.”

“Makes sense, as it’s not like it’d be worth going further against them just for that reason,” noted Aideen with a nod. “That said, I might make a trip in my personal capacity to those places in the future, who knows?”

“Hah! Yeah, if you do end up going there, do pay me a visit and let me know how things went,” said the Empress amidst a bout of amused laughter. “That sort of bloodsucking organization is better removed off the face of the world anyway.”

“We think alike on this matter, you and I,” said Aideen as she accepted the toast Lucea offered with a smile. “I might just head there after I take a trip to the west. Wanted to see how the Veros family is doing these days first.”

“Oh, they’re doing fine as far as I know. It’s now Illyvich’s great great grandson who is the head of the family, still from the direct line. Other than some curious news about some odd crime in one of their cities, things seem to be well over there,” said Lucea as she clinked her glass with Aideen’s. “To a better tomorrow!”