Chapter Text
“Look.” He said sternly “All I’m saying is that I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
They stood at the edge of a cliff, in an underground dungeon, dark, damp and depressing. All tools the lo-cal used as a deterrent for curious adventurers. Most importantly, however, the canyon in front of them was deep, not ‘can’t see the bottom deep of it’ deep, but more than deep enough to kill, and it wasn’t their first time. In reality, he was getting rather tired of trying to get across this thing, sure, the promise of hidden treasures on the other side was tempting, but her continued attempts despite any improvements defied all logic. Alas, once she had her sights set on something, it was nearly impossible to change her mind.
“Come on! I’vee been practicing.”
“Practicing what? How to crack your head open more efficiently?” He chuckled a bit at that, she did not.
“My agility, you know, like how good my legs are, at jumping.” “It’s all in the ankles!” She flashed a confident smile. “Getting across will be no biggie!”.
His brows pinched together, trying in vain to hide his exasperation. “I’m sorry, I think you’re missing the point here, what’s the name of this place again?” She frowned at that, he knew good and well where they were, he just wanted her to say it out loud.
“The Uncrossable Gorge.” She mumbled under her breath.
“Hmm? I didn’t quite catch that, what di-“
“The. Uncrossable. Gorge.”
He reached out and put a hand on her shoulder, she wasn’t likely to be convinced by the gesture, but he hoped it would help, at least a little. “Just my point, for once, let’s listen to our big brains and go back to town. If it makes you feel better, we can wrap around to the slime dungeon, loot a bit, and still be back in time for nightfa-“
And that was all he could get out before she stepped back and made a running start for the cliff’s edge. Trying again, albeit in vain, to cross.
“Geronimo!!!”
Because of course she would make it across, he hadn’t seen the hours spent training, granted it was only three of them, but it would be more than enough. This would be a breeze! Jump the gorge, make it across, and then… well, she hadn’t thought about that yet, but it would come to her, totally.
Wait a minute, was she getting lower? She wasn’t even halfway across yet, maybe this wasn’t a good idea.
“Renai!” she yelled out his name just before she hit the bottom, and with an un-ceremonial thud, she was dead.
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…“Vonones?!”… No response. “VONONES!”… He let out a heavy sigh before lowering himself down to the ground, he could feel the dampness of the rocky cave, even through his clothes, but he would be done soon enough.
He placed his hand on the ground and uttered an almost in-perceptible word under his breath: .o*Locanus.*o. Almost instantly, he felt his vision begin to transfer as the spell did its work, his view shifted from the world around his body, to gazing upon everything the energy of the spell touched. Along the ground, over the cliff, down into the crevasse, and then… Bingo. Impaled on one of the particularly sharp rocks was Vonones, and other than the obvious large stab wound and broken bones, she wasn’t in that bad of a shape. Other than being dead.
Good, that’ll make this easier.
Rising again to full height, and without skipping a beat, he began to cast another spell.
.o*Arivanden!*o.
Renai watched as her body gradually surrounded with energy, slowly prying off the rocks below, before floating up to his eye level and landing softly on the ground in front of him. He sauntered over before leaning down and tossing her body over his shoulders.
“Next time, maybe you’ll actually listen to me when I say something’s dangerous. Ah, wouldn’t that be a dream… Alas, you’re destined to be reckless, just like I’m destined to keep you alive, or, well, you get what I mean. Or you would, if you were alive… Nevermind.”
It took longer than Renai would’ve liked getting out of the dungeon, mostly due to some of the traps reactivating on their own, fun. The spike traps were easy to evade, as were the arrows traps, the hidden trapdoor, less so.
“Huh? Oh n- Gaahhh! Ack, ac, ack! Hoo…”
After making sure Vonones was ‘ok’, he glanced up at the dim light shining down from the opening they’d fallen through.
“I’m so getting double pay after this.”
Now on the outskirts of their home settlement, Renai took a brief moment to pull V’s hood up over her head, hiding her face from view. Next, he readjusted his hold, wrapping one of her arms around his shoulder, holding it there with his hand, whilst putting his other arm underneath her arm on the opposite side. This cumulated in them preforming a kind of drunken stumble into town, good, hopefully everyone would just assume he was helping a friend home, which he technically was, even though that friend wasn’t moving, like, at all. Despite this, getting back to the Potion shoppe was simple, other than having to deal with how tired his arms were getting. It’s not that she was extremely heavy or anything, but carrying dead weight several hours at a time never really gets any easier.
Kicking open the back door of the shop, Renai gently laid her down on the couch, before closing the door and collapsing down in the nearby armchair. The shop itself was a family heirloom, his mom inherited it from her mother, and her mother before that. Each generation in turn, taking over the running of the shop along with their spouses. It was a quaint little building in the midst of town, primarily built from light evergreen wood, with dark oak accents; the roof was flat and slanted, with a brick chimney coming out the back. To top it all off, all the windows were stained glass, depicting various types of potions and their effects. Overall, it was cozy, and not a bad place to settle down and raise a family. If only, any girl in her right mind would immediately rat him out to the guard as soon as she found out about his linage, and the only girl he’d ever run into that wasn’t in her right mind was currently laying dead on his sofa. Speaking of which, he should probably do something about that. As much as he wanted to pass out right then and there, he didn’t want to draw this out any longer than necessary, and if he was also starting to miss her incessant background chatter, he wasn’t about to admit it.
Prying himself out of his comfy chair, and it was oh so comfy, he began grabbing the ingredients he would need for the spell.
“Bloodroot, Bottled Bell chimes…”, his hands fluttered about picking up and putting down vials with much discrimination, this was his element, and it showed. “Let’s see, something to close the wound… am I out of Star Jelly?” He picked up a large jar halfway full of a clear, goo-like substance. “Should be enough.”
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Alright, no use procrastinating, time to get this over with. First, the ingredients.”
After the addition of several more vials of various shapes and sizes, he made his way into the basement. It was warm, the boiler in the back corner doing it’s best to keep the temperature level, and mostly empty, bar the stray bookshelf and potion tubes scattered around the place. After setting his things down, he ascended once more to get most vital component for the spell, the bod- her. He was going upstairs to get Vonones, like he’s done before, and she’ll be fine, just like before…
Despite this, he couldn’t shake the nervousness that always flooded his mind time and time again. He’d never revived someone so regularly in past, what if one day she just, didn’t wake up?
“Agh!” He shook his head “Time to focus, we can have a mental breakdown later, when it’s convenient.”
Taking great care, Renai laid her body down in the center of the room, then began drawing his usual guide with piece of chalk. “Start with the wounded areas, to the veins, through the heart, and end with the brain, simple.” Finished, he took a deep breath as he took position at the edge of the guideline, a circular shape, nearest Vonones’ head. The stage was set, and the guideline was perfect, several circles to match the number of spell ingredients, four in this case, split evenly on either side of the circle, with the body taking dead center.
“No time like the present.” He began the rite.
All at once the room filled with power, to a bystander, it would’ve felt like swimming in a magical soup, magical chicken noodle soup if he had to guess, one with tender chicken, lots of vegetables, with the thick noodles that mom used to make an-… and he really needed to stop skipping breakfast, and dinner, and lunch. Yikes.
Then the energy stopped, waiting for a command, his command.
He focused, “Wound, veins , heart, brain. Wound, veins, heart, brain.”
Wounds.
Veins.
Heart.
.o*Brain*o.
Gradually the hole in her chest grew smaller, tendons joining and tethering together once more. Bones mended, and the cracks disappeared.
.o*Wounds*o.
.o*Vein*o.
.o*Heart*o.
.o*Brain*o.
Her veins began to flow once more, blood pushing and pulling, back and forth.
.o*Wounds*o.
.o*Vein*o.
.o*Heart*o.
.o*Brain*o.
A tremor, pump, several beats, then a return to a regular rhythm.
.o*Wounds*o.
.o*Vein*o.
.o*Heart*o.
.o*Brain*o.
“Bring her spirit back to us, to me, once more.”
.o*Hoc… Corpus… Vivifica… STATIM!!*o.
All at once lighting bounded across the room, its blue glow overpowering, casting the cold hue on everything in sight. The vials floated, then glowed, shook, then exploded from the inside out, the force of the explosion evaporating their contents into nothingness. He drew backwards before facing both of his palms in her direction one final time.
.o*VIVIFICA!*o.
With a loud BOOM the chalk circle poofed into dust, followed by the energy’s quick escape from the premises. Like a strong wind, it blew back, up the basement steps, out the door, and back from whence it came.
Panting and out of breath, he fell to his knees, the last of his energy gone with the spell, and then-
*cough, cough! Ack!
Her violent hacking faded into steady breaths. His job was done, at least for now, and he was ready for a break. As much as he wanted to crawl into his bed, and never leave, the best he could muster at the moment was to sit himself up against the wall. Comfy? Not at all, but it was manageable. At least until she woke up fully.
For now, he would wait…