Phoenix Healer - A Meaner Azarinth Healer

The next day, everyone kept sneaking glances at Ted.

His performance had left everyone stunned.

Monica retracted the Golden Flame that she had been using to form little wisps for Ronnie to play with—and also to heal any potential injuries that lingered on the two children—and then, during a break, went up to Ted.

“Yesterday night, you played really well,” she told him.

She had understood Ted clearly had some bad history with music and that’s why she hadn’t pressed him to play something, but now that he had, she couldn’t keep herself from at the very least complimenting him.

“I just played the first thing that came to my mind, dude,” he deflected shyly. “It’s this thing,” he pointed at the mandolin. “I think it’s got some powers and allowed me to play like this.”

But Monica, who was very sensitive to Mana, hadn’t felt the slightest power vibration from the tool.

“Mh,” Monica said, raising an eyebrow. “Whatever it was, that was great. You should consider playing more often, Ted.”

“Huh, thanks,” Ted replied, scratching his head.

“For the kids, of course,” Monica cleared her voice.

“Yeah,” Ted smiled, patting the body of the mandolin.

Soon, they resumed their trek and, finally, around noon, managed to make it to Rock’s Heel. With Monica carrying Ronnie all the way and setting a relentless pace, they had managed to get there earlier than expected.

Everyone else had been winded, but they had not dared tell Monica what to do and not do. Not even Ted.

* * *

Monica had ordered the kids to stand down and had taken Ted aside, hoping to get just a little more information before entering the place. She had asked Dotty about it at length, but the girl didn’t seem to like her that much.

“Why’s Rock’s Heel in such a state?”

Dotty was currently running behind Ronny who had an infinite supply of energy as he ran back and forth between trees.

The night had gone undisturbed by any monster, which Monica was extremely thankful for. She had stood guard most of the night, not fully trusting the young man nor her Dotty with the watch. Honestly, she didn’t feel much need for sleep, and her protective motherly instincts had done their fair share to make it so that she wouldn’t close an eye to the thought that wolves could sneak up on them while she slept.

“It’s a slum. Also, it’s far enough from Valoria that if monsters spilled from a Dungeon, they wouldn’t be able to reach the city… not in less than a month,” Ted explained. “It’s not a safe place for children, you know?”

He’s quite thoughtful once you get past his quirks, Monica smiled to herself.

“And the girls there? U-gly.”

I spoke too soon, Monica sighed.

“Anyway, it’s poor. There’s not much to do there. You should probably go straight to Valoria as soon as you’re done doing whatever you need to do. I think it’s time to visit the capital again.”

“You can just go once we reach the village, Ted,” she said. “You don’t have any obligation toward us.”

“Yeah... about that,” Ted cleared his voice. “The Cultist dude was the guy who protected me from threats on our way there. I’m not comfortable walking there by myself.”

“Then, you can stay with us,” Monica said. “I need someone to explain things since I’ve lost all my memory. Are you good with people?”

“I don’t know,” Ted replied earnestly. “I usually know when to run from the taverns. Does that count?”

Before they could continue their conversation, a wooden palisade came into view. It was barely holding together, with wood rotting in several places where it wouldn’t take more than a kick to make it topple.

She saw an old woman look up from a patch of reeds she was pulling out of a small river nearby.

“Dotty!” The old woman slowly got up and put her reeds on her knees on the ground. “Where were you?!”

“Gertrude,” Dotty grimaced and said the woman’s name back.

Then, Gertrude saw Monica behind the two kids, and her frown deepened.

“Who are you?”

“We got the kids out of the Cultist place,” Ted said with a straight face.

Gertrude looked at the three men who had been changed out of their Cultist outfits on Monica’s orders and frowned.

“Dotty,” she said, turning to the girl, “

You’ll have to build yourself a new place. Ivor is evicting you.”

“What?!” Dotty shouted. “I told him I would pay the taxes!”

“He said your last chance was yesterday, and you all disappeared. So, he’s moving in. He likes your house, Dotty, you know that,” Gertrude sighed.

Monica looked at Gertrude and then at Dotty.

“Who’s this Ivor?” She asked Dotty.

“The village chief. He’s a level 12 Fire Mage, pretty strong for his level. He collects the taxes from the villagers and is supposed to fight the criminals.”

“Supposed to?” Monica frowned.

“Often village chiefs are crooks themselves,” Ted interjected from the side, drawing a frown from Gertrude.

“Alright,” Monica said, cracking her neck. “Heidi, keep the three out here and tie them to something. I’ll go visit this Ivor.”

“Huh, Monica,” Ted cringed. “You know that Fire Mages are quite dangerous?”

“A Fire Mage, huh?” Monica cackled. “We’ll see.”

* * *

Dotty had briefly tried telling Monica, their savior, not to meddle. Ivor was a dangerous individual. Whoever Monica was, she didn’t want to mess with him unless she had more levels over her head.

In fact, it was a known fact that Fire Mages were a nasty business even for people with higher levels. Because their magic was so destructive, they were natural level-hoppers, which meant they could easily kill people ten levels higher than them.

Dotty barely remembered her mother getting into a conflict with the other villagers: she had been terrified of losing their place in the village. That’s why Ivor had always pressed them so hard for taxes: he knew that their mother would break. And break she did, falling to apathy after a while, resigning to a pitiful fate.

“How much do you owe to this Ivor?” Monica suddenly asked her, taking Dotty out of her reverie.

“Two silvers,” the girl sighed at the paltry sum. She knew that for people in Valoria, that wasn’t much. But here at Rock’s Heel, she had seen people fight over copper.

“Alright, that sounds like it won’t be a problem,” the woman said.

Dotty didn’t know how to react at that. She had seen Monica die and come back to life, something that the woman had not addressed beyond saying, ‘I can’t die, it seems.’

And so, they walked through the dirty roads of the village, with Ronny jumping all around his new favorite person. Dotty somehow envied how her brother could just go along with whomever this woman was—she claimed she didn’t have any memories, but if that was the case, why did she even act interested in them?

I don’t understand, Dotty sighed inwardly. What is she doing?

But it appeared like she would soon get a response since she spotted their house in the distance.

Their house was the only construction in the entire village made of solid stone, a remnant of the Stonemasons who had taken shelter here for their work in the nearby caves.

Their father had done it. He had been a Rock Mage, and her mother used to flaunt such a thing to everyone, saying that they could have moved into Valoria whenever they had wanted.

However, her father had ties in the village, or so that’s what he used to say, and had refused to move into the city.

One day, the man had just disappeared and left them all behind. Her mother had been beyond devastated.

“Home!” Ronny shouted, stopping in his tracks as Monica looked toward a rather thin man with a stained tunic walking around a house, helped by two burly men tossing things out of it. The house itself wasn’t much different from the rest of the place, but it had stone walls, which weren’t common, if they were a thing at all, in there.

“Well,” Monica smiled to the kids, “let’s see what we can do.”

As she walked toward the thin man, she scanned his tag.

[Fire Mage – Level 12].

“Monica,” Dotty whispered from the side, “Ivor is a powerful fire-[Mage]. Please, be careful.”

“Dotty,” Monica said, crouching a little to get their heads on the same level, “never worry about me, ok? I’ll take care of this for you. I don’t like bullies, anyway.”

Despite being much more skeptical than her young brother, who was completely smitten by this woman, Dotty felt a knot in her throat.

The tension left her shoulders, and it felt like the massive weight she had been carrying up to this point was finally relieved of her heart.

She hadn’t even known how wound-up she had been to this point.

But hearing Monica say that, Dotty felt every muscle in her body relax.

* * *

Monica saw a crying woman lying down over the steps of the stone house, pale and disheveled.

Monica eyed a thin man with a stained robe appraising the house from the outside with a large smile on his face. Then, she looked at two thugs alongside the man throwing some clothes and furniture out of the house. She saw a doll fly out of the door and heard Dotty take a sharp breath at that sight.

Suddenly, Monica felt a burst of fury coming through her veins. She had to actively try to calm herself down before Fury of the Phoenix could activate again.

This guy’s not worth the skill, she reasoned, stepping forward toward the trio.

The two movers weren’t anything much in her eyes.

[Thug – Level 6]

[Warrior – Level 7]

“Hey there,” Monica waved at the man who had just turned to stare at them, Ivor.

The village chief looked surprised at Monica and then at the two children with a displeased frown.

“You two are alive? Whatever, it doesn’t matter. You didn’t pay. We’re seizing your house.”

“Ivor, I’m one day late!” Dotty tried justifying herself before Monica could say anything. “I can get you some pelts that will be worth a few bronzes, and then—”

“I am not a [Merchant]. Keep your pelts and scram. You can build yourself a hut. I’m taking this for myself.”

“Ivor,” Monica smiled, “How much do they owe you?”

“Five silvers because of the interest,” Ivor said, looking at Monica up and down, now focusing on the little bits of skin she was showing. “Who are you, anyway?”

“A friend,” Monica smiled sweetly. “How about I pay you and extinguish this little debt?” she said, taking out a gold from her Inventory and tossing it to the man.

The man scrambled to pick it up from the ground, looked at it with a frown, and decided to bite to check if it was real.

“What are we doing, boss?” the two Warriors asked the man as he was throwing some old clothes out of the house.

“Well,” Ivor said, weighing his words, “I don’t think that will be enough. They forfeited their house, which is now mine. A construction made of stone this big, with reinforced walls and all these amenities, would go for at least ten golds.”

Even though the slimy man had just said that, he pocketed the gold Monica had thrown at him. The two Warriors shrugged and were about to resume the forceful eviction when the Healer said something that made everyone stop.

See, Monica wasn’t gifted with a glib tongue. Maybe, if she had thought about this long and hard, she could have devised an even better plan. She might have had Ivor sign a contract for the ten gold coins, gone back to hunt a few days, and returned with the sum for the two kids. There was an array of options outside the one that she immediately went with, but Monica was just like that, a bit... impetuous.

“Well,” Monica imitated his tone. “How about I punch your teeth out and take the house back? How does that sound?”