Chapter 353: 128. The Deformity on the Back
Amidst the freshly fallen heavy snow, several eagles attracted by the loud noise stood on branches completely bent under the weight of the snow. They curiously gazed below, but in the next moment, a man suddenly leaped up from the thick snow, carrying two ladies with him, startling the eagles into opening their wings and screeching.
“Are you okay? The snow above has slid down significantly. I hope it hasn’t buried the supply point that Balzak mentioned, or I’ll have to arrange to set you here in the snow.”
“That cannon looks small, but I didn’t expect it to be this loud. That little girl from Cardu has always been discreet; I didn’t expect her to have this trick up her sleeve. My goodness, Fisher, I’ve slept for so long and still haven’t recorded any technical knowledge about your human steam engines. You must show me one after we go down. A great Sir Book cannot lag behind the times!”
“Yeah, next time for sure.”
Emhart called out and landed on Fisher’s shoulder, while Fisher took the opportunity to carry Valentina on his back and also needed to assist Felis, who had only received a simple bandage.
Her lower abdomen was completely pierced by a mechanism, and Fisher used his last healing magic on her. The recovery ability of the sixth-rank lion race was comparable to that of the underage Raphael, and the speed of her bleeding was beyond that of normal creatures. If it had been an ordinary human hit by that, they might have died on the spot.
Unfortunately, Fisher had no extra magic left on him. His magic had already been mostly depleted from use and giving it away while in Miya, and he had not carved any magic after Erwind’s warning.
At least in terms of completing the manual, Erwind hadn’t lied to Fisher, because after he stopped consuming a large amount of magical power to carve spells, that annoying illusion hadn’t appeared for a long time. To avoid seeing Jahl Uzz’s bald head again, he decided to be more careful, especially since he had hardly any magic materials available.
“What a pity, the cursed prisoner has been preserved so well for so long, and you humans are so wasteful when it comes to destroying it. I don’t even know if there’s a second relic like this in the world. Sigh.”
Emhart, standing on Fisher’s shoulder, looked back at the thick snow behind him, seemingly touched by the scenery, and sighed, perhaps thinking of his former creator—the angel race.
The cursed prisoner had lost control when Valentina shot it in Corion. Furthermore, because it had been consuming energy without proper storage, when Fisher lost control, it crashed through two distant mountains, turning into useless scrap, making Emhart feel quite sorry.
Valentina also turned her head from time to time to glance at the snow pile behind them, where several magic rings Fisher had given her were stolen by Nali agents. However, in the face of such a terrifying avalanche, it was clearly not feasible to dig through the snow to find those Nali people, and Fisher didn’t want to waste more time here.
There was good news, however. Although he almost encountered disaster dealing with the cursed prisoner, at least now he had gotten rid of two of the four enemies, and they were the weakest two. What remained to face were the unknown curse within the Parasol Tree and the life elder Erwind.
At this moment, Valentina, who was on Fisher’s back, turned to look at Felis. She had been too dark in the slime circle earlier to clearly see her injuries, which had already been bandaged by Fisher.
“Felis, how are you? You look so pale.”
“Ah, I’m fine. I just feel a bit lightheaded from blood loss. That weapon is even deadlier than bullets. Ugh, when did humans create such things? Are they for sale? I want to get one to play with.”
Felis, whose abdomen had been pierced by a mechanism weapon, could barely open her eyes now. She was basically being supported by Fisher, yet she still had the energy to joke with Valentina, leaving Valentina unsure of how to respond.
But whether it was due to Felis’s optimism or not, the luck of Fisher’s group was quite good. He easily supported two people and finally reached the last peak on the outskirts of Sema Snow Mountain. Near the slope close to the top were traces left by previous teams, and the area affected by the avalanche had just brushed past this camp, leaving the facilities mostly undamaged. This was the first camp on Sema Snow Mountain where they could rest.
Many teams climbing Sema Snow Mountain would probably unload some of their heavy burdens at resting camps after deciding the burdens were too heavy. Those descending would also leave behind remaining supplies they thought unnecessary. That’s why there might still be some leftover provisions in these camps. However, even without these items, just having a place to rest a bit on the snow mountain was already precious enough.
Fisher laid Felis and Valentina down in a small cave naturally surrounded by three giant rocks. In the center of the cave was a extinguished campfire and living tools left by previous adventurers. Fisher easily relit the campfire and took out some food donated by the Snow Fox Tribe to cook.
“Eat something to replenish your energy and warm yourselves up a bit. Felis, with your injuries, you probably can’t go deeper into the snow mountains. I’ll leave some food here. Once you can move freely, just head back down the way we came.”
Felis smelled the meat Fisher was cooking, and just as she was about to sit up to eat something, she felt a sharp pain in her waist, causing her to lie back down immediately. She sighed and said,
“I definitely can’t go on. It’ll be up to you and the boss from here. But since that Turan family has all died here, plus you’ll soon enter the most treacherous parts of the snow mountain, they probably won’t be able to catch up for a while. Anyway, good luck to you all.”
“Now, let me think about where to go after losing my job. Cardu? No, it seems that place isn’t welcoming to subhumans. Shivali? But the food there is terrible, and it’s Old Ba’s hometown. I don’t want to go to a country full of people like Old Ba.”
Felis optimistically swept her tail beneath her, and although the pain in her abdomen was still sharp, she had already started to consider what to do after leaving the Northern Region, causing Valentina, leaning against a rock, to burst out laughing. However, the laugh caused her back to rub against the stone, instantly sending a stinging pain that made her frown.
Fisher, who was cooking the meat, glanced at her and placed the meat into a bowl while saying,
“You’re injured too?”
“Ah, that, I got thrown off when I was on Felis’s back. The snow there was a bit thin, so…”
Fisher nodded, turned his head to inspect the campsite, and found some medicine left by previous teams, which seemed to be Cardu’s traditional ointment or something. Even now, Cardu, this ancient country, hadn’t given up on their traditions, constantly innovating many customs, including medicine, which was quite a hallmark of theirs.
After roughly checking if the medicine was still usable, he found out it had only been brought up in the recent months. He raised an eyebrow, then took the ointment and approached Valentina.
“What are you going to do?!”
Valentina suddenly covered her body, her face flushing as she looked at Fisher, only to find him staring at her expressionlessly. Her gaze immediately darted away.
Before Fisher could speak, Emhart on his shoulder began to grin mischievously.
“What else could it be? Of course, he’s going to check your wound~”
Emhart’s teasing aura made Fisher give him a light but unintentional slap, interrupting his strongly suggestive words. He then shooed Emhart away from his shoulder, pointed to a nearby tent, and said,
“Using the ointment will help your wound heal quickly. If it isn’t treated well, inflammation will be troublesome. Just stay over there, and I won’t do anything to you.”
Valentina pouted and then whispered,
“He won’t do anything to me anyway. My legs can’t move, so it’s not like I can resist.”
As she grumbled, she suddenly found her words familiar. The scene from earlier in the ice flashed back into her mind, startling her and causing her wound to press against the stone behind her, making her gasp in pain.
“Ugh, that hurts.”
“Are you an idiot?”
Fisher helplessly lifted her from in front of the stone wall, carefully guiding her into the tent. One hand wrapped around her waist while the other supported her arm. Fisher’s gaze was drawn to her fair neck and earlobes, and as he drew closer, his nose was nearly touching her neck.
“Clothes, how do you open them?”
“Wait, wait, why do you… I’ll do it myself.”
“Alright.”
It turned out that apart from the heavy coat Valentina was wearing on the outside, the few garments inside had openings in the back, allowing her to tend to her back injuries without having to completely remove her clothes. She could also do it herself, but afterward, Fisher would need to help her tie them back on.
Fisher waited somewhat disappointed for her movement. As the heavy garments were slowly removed, only a traditional undergarment was left on her body. Her earlobes flushed slightly as she turned her back toward Fisher, unfastening the buttons on the back of the clothing little by little. In the next moment, her creamy back appeared in Fisher’s sight.
However, on that fair skin, a series of twisted black lines spread out from the spine like a middle line, converging just below her shoulder blades, protruding into two deformed bulges, resembling an ugly pair of incompletely grown organs.
“Don’t look, treat the wound.”
Valentina had always felt a bit self-conscious about the ugliness of her back. Feeling Fisher’s discerning gaze sweeping over her back made her somewhat embarrassed. She timidly urged him to bypass the deformity and proceed with the treatment.
“Shh.”
But Fisher kept inspecting the underdeveloped wings. He leaned in a little closer, and his warm hand gently touched the protruding areas on her back, making Valentina shiver slightly.
In Fisher’s eyes, those weren’t two deformities but rather large wings that seemed to have been chopped off at the root. It appeared that a certain bloodline inside Valentina had begun to construct the form she was originally supposed to have, but due to the dilution of that bloodline, it ultimately failed, leaving behind this so-called “deformity.”
“This is… wings. You were originally supposed to grow a pair of beautiful wings unique to the Phoenix race, but because of the impurity in the bloodline, we have the situation we see now.”
“Wings?”
“Yeah, your internal Phoenix bloodline is rich enough, but it’s still insufficient to form the appearance of a Phoenix race. It’s easy to imagine how much the demon who made a pact with your family diluted that originally thin bloodline, but I believe you have hope in resolving your family’s bloodline issue, and you might really turn into a Phoenix someday.”
Valentina looked back in confusion but found Fisher completely focused on her bare back, making her shyly turn away again, her tone trembling,
“P-Phoenix? But I’m already an adult. Can I still develop? Or turn into a Phoenix that isn’t human?”
Fisher shook his head and explained,
“After researching so many subhuman races, I’ve gradually come to understand a fundamental issue—that is, you cannot use human standards to measure subhuman races. The higher the rank, the more this applies. The distinction between adulthood and childhood based on human lifespans is meaningless for a Phoenix. In my view, your body is still developing, and it is developing toward the Phoenix race.”
At this moment, in Fisher’s eyes, just above those deformed protrusions, a faint azure pattern seemed to emerge. But if you scrutinized it, you would find that it was not a pattern at all but rather a patch of fine fuzz, like that of a newly hatched chick, visibly exuding cold air, yet Valentina seemed completely unaware of the slight chill from that fuzz.
Fisher smiled, no longer observing. Instead, he applied the ointment to the bleeding wound on her back. Valentina, seemingly grasping what he was conveying, nodded slightly. Then she suddenly realized something and turned to Fisher to ask,
“Wait, did you… did you research other subhuman races before? Did it involve strip searches like this?”
“No.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
Valentina contentedly turned away, feeling grateful that Fisher showed no discrimination toward the flawed parts of her body. Even the bandaging of her wound didn’t feel painful anymore.
Meanwhile, outside the tent, Felis, who had been listening to their conversation the whole time while lying on the ground, and Emhart, who was roasting by the fire, when Felis heard Fisher answer “no,” she raised her eyebrows slightly. She turned to the side to look at the calm relic of a book, only to see that Emhart had long since grown accustomed to it. He was just staring at the fire in front of him while quietly explaining to her,
“Shh, this is just how he is. You’ll get used to it.”
“.”
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(End of this chapter)
