The Priesthood

It is 3:45 a.m. Tired novices walk through the corridors of the southern building of the campus; their way goes through a park that is only lit up with streetlights and the bright white moon above them. Late night skinny dippers in the fairly large pond could see the novices walking slowly past them; they peer in silence as the zombielike priests soon disappear into the darkness again.

Some of those walking like they had a goal had only slept maybe an hour, maybe two if lucky.

Kanrel was one of the unlucky; he barely got any sleep, as even when he had put his notes to rest, they were still awake in his mind, and he couldn’t help but go through them over and over again in his own head.

Now he had to pay for his mistakes and hope that repeatedly going through the same thing over and over again would be useful within the first day. But he could guess that reality would only be constructed from these two possibilities: One, the problems to solve, also known as patients, that the simulation would create for them would be so easy that Kanrel would want to leave the hospital and go back to sleep.

Two, the problems would be so complicated that he would be so out of his depth that he would blame himself for sleeping an hour when he could have given up from the beginning and just slept a good six or so hours.

Reality would be a mixture of these two things; either way, he would blame himself for his own foolish choices.

Would, even then, it all be worth it? Probably not, but yes, either way. It had to be just in the name of the duty that was so important to him.

The novitiate gathered in a large flock at the large doors of the magnificent building that was the Academic Hospital. If only it were bright enough for them to appreciate it, even if only symbolically. If only they could leave work much earlier than 8 p.m., then they could at least do that for the sake of the supposedly impressive beauty of the architecture of the building.

As the doors finally opened, it was 4 a.m. sharp. And the flock poured into the building, giving no regard for the expensive craftsmanship that adorned the interior of the hospital. They had reached the reception area where Professor Forsvarn was waiting for them; she didn’t look too happy as she had her hands crossed on her chest.

"You’re all late." She accused them loudly.

A deafening silence answered her accusation; sure, saying such a thing seemed unfair, but arguing with her was something no one could enjoy or win, if there even was such a thing as winning in an argument.

Then she suddenly burst into this weird laughter that was without any joy.

"I am only kidding, of course. Go into your groups and follow suit."

So Kanrel found Yirn, Yviev, Uanna, and Wen, then they followed the other groups that had formed; their professor was quick with her steps, so they often had to run to keep up with her.

They went first up a flight of stairs, then through a corridor that had several rooms on both sides. Then they went up another flight of stairs to reach an area that overlooked a large room. This room was filled with hospital beds; between them there were no walls, just cloth that was used as dividers.

"This, the room that you can all now see below us, is where most patients are first brought. Here they will all be diagnosed and treated if possible; depending on the diagnoses, they can be moved to different wings of the hospital.

Each wing has its own job; for example, one wing deals with disease, another with broken bones and fractures."

"Here, we won’t spend another minute, unless one of you happens to find themselves in one of those beds; then you might pray to the Angels that I might have mercy upon you."

She then continued on her way, and the novices followed; they went past the large room and descended multiple flights of stairs until they must’ve been underground. They went through a door, and on the other side of it there was another large room, but there were just about a hundred chairs, and all sides except one had eight doors; only the side from which they came had one door.

"And this is our simulation complex." She explained after reaching almost the center of the room.

"Behind all of those doors, there is a simple-looking bed on which one of you will lie at a time; after using the correct code on the bed, there will be some changes happening in the person that is lying on the bed.

They will get a random wound, a disease, a fracture, or any other possible issue. The rest of you shall, in turns or together, diagnose the patient; after that, you may put your diagnoses to the test and try healing the issue the patient might or might not have."

"All patients will only feel the symptoms of their given issue; they may not speak; in fact, when they try to speak, their words will be formed into screams. Screams will, of course, remain as screams."

"This isn’t life-threatening, as far as we know, but I would still advise caution since each time a used healing method either fails or is just simply incorrect, the patient will feel pain."

"Depending on the medical issue of the patient, you might also have a time limit before the simulation just ends and the patient will be able to get up from the bed."

"Of course, you might want to beware of the vengeance of the patient, as they will in the end have their own turn and could easily cause an equal amount of pain back at you."

"Also, the code, which will be written on a booklet with instructions on how to use it properly, will also collect data on all the things that are said within the room; so I would advise the one doing the diagnosing and healing to explain what they are doing and why. Failing to do so will be noted, and my colleagues supervising the simulations will be notified; they will then notify me, and I don’t like being bothered."

She then peered at her students and faked a smile. "I’ve always thought that this invention of mine would’ve better suited those who work at the House of Truths; they love complicated torture devices!"

She then left them behind while she herself went on to diagnose actual patients.

Just moments after she left, the room of many chairs burst into an ensemble of many voices, from lots of whining and questioning of their professor to even calling her names. But soon the groups chose their own simulation rooms and entered.

The room was small; there were a few chairs and a bed; a desk that had a booklet on it; a pile of empty pages; and ten or so pens and ink readily available. There was also a light that came from the ceiling; it worked with electricity. Known as a complicated game of trying not to shock oneself to death.

Kanrel took the booklet and read the code. It was by far the most complicated code he had ever read; there were so many parts to it that it was unlikely for a novice like himself to cast it alone. So he passed it around to the others; they would have to cast it together.

Kanrel studied the bed; he wondered if it had more of a function than just being an object that was easy to use in coding. He found nothing that would indicate otherwise.

"Who wants to go first?" Kanrel asked, turning around to look at them again; the others had already taken a seat for each of them as they studied the piece of code.

Kanrel let out a long sigh and muttered to himself, "This is just great."

Without much more hesitation, he lay on the bed and waited patiently for the four of them to cast their magic on him and the bed. The bed was probably considerably more comfortable than the bed in his own room, but that was difficult for him to confirm or deny.

But if they took long enough, he might actually fall asleep on this bed, which could become his last resting place. What a blessing!

After a quarter of an hour, the others were finally ready to use the code; the four of them had to cooperate in weaving it together, as none of them was quite skilled enough to use it on their own. In the back of his head, Kanrel wondered if he would ever become skilled enough.

They finished weaving their spell, but nothing happened for a while. It made Kanrel wonder if they had failed and if he could get up from the bed. So he tried to get up from the bed, but for some reason, he couldn’t move even an inch. He could only blink his eyes in surprise. The code had worked.

"Oh, the mighty Son of the Herald is now under our command; what secrets might he tell us to regain control of his body and to make the pain go away?" Yviev said that, while taking a step forward, it was clear that she would be the first to try.

"Yviev, don’t say such things; that is heretical!" Uanna hissed quickly; she sounded a bit upset for some reason.

Then it dawned on him: she was one of those zealots who believed the Herald of the Gods to be almost as divine as the Angels, and for people like that, their fervor often extended to related individuals of the herald, in this case, Kanrel.

Them calling him "the Son of the Herald" made a lot of sense now, and it also seemed that they didn’t know that he was adopted. But then again, that might not matter to them. In their eyes, he was chosen by the Herald of the Gods to be her son.

Yviev scoffed in what seemed to be a mockery of her friend's remarks, as if the thing that Uanna had said had been a joke. She then began concentrating on Kanrel. "He isn’t screaming in pain yet... Did we somehow fuck up the code?" She asked and looked at Yirn, who was basically reading about how to torture for the sake of learning medicine.

"It says here that you’ve touched the forehead of the patient for the simulation to begin."

Yviev grimaced. "So I have to touch such a creep?" Yviev spoke as if disgusted, or perhaps she actually was disgusted. Kanrel couldn’t really tell.

"Yviev! Stop saying such things!" Uanna hissed at Yviev. Kanrel could see as Yviev imitated her while making faces.

He just blinked at the sight and came to another realization: this beginning of a woman, this face-making individual, would be basically torturing him, starting from the moment that she touched his forehead.

No, the torture had already begun, for he couldn’t even let out a sigh to protest this unjust turn of events.

Yviev approached him; she then placed her delicate hand on his forehead, and in an instant, he started to tremble, and soon he screamed at the top of his lungs, trying to yell, "STOP! STOP! STOP!" Over and over again, but all that came out were just his screams.

The trembling stopped, but the pain remained. Yviev had rapidly taken her hand away from his forehead.

Kanrel could tell exactly what was wrong with him, and oh the Angels it hurt like the hells. He knew that not a word would come from his mouth and that he couldn’t move or really do anything other than just stare and witness as she tried to figure out what was wrong with him.

All were now in her hands.