If the prophet can’t come to the mountain, the mountain must come to him instead. Or something like that.

  Marco tapped his fingers against the dining table. Following Diana’s instructions, he was staying away from the academy. That meant no training, no lessons and incredible boredom. He couldn’t even visit Ualani.

  But, he also had the whole home to himself.

  He had caught Olen first thing in the morning and asked him to pass a message to Ualani. Directly after, he caught a mosser, and the drugged animal was currently snoozing away next to his boots.

  Finally, Ualani showed up on the pavement, her short steps quickly taking her all the way up to his home. Before she could even knock, Marco opened the door and ushered her inside.

  Was it wise to let her know where his family lived? Perhaps not, but it wasn’t a well-kept secret to begin with.

  “I’m here,” She exhaled, her breathing slightly uneven. “What’s the emergency?”

  “I can’t enter the academy for the foreseeable future.” Marco picked up the sleeping mosser. “So I thought we could have our lessons here.”

  “I rushed here for this?” She covered her face with her hands, groaning. “You could have explained that in the note.”

  “But then you wouldn’t come.” He shrugged as he placed the mosser on the table. “And aside from training, I did want to spend a bit more time talking to you.”

  “Just wonderful.” She stepped forward with unhidden annoyance. “I’m missing out on synchronized casting lessons to coddle a bored child.”

  “So, shall we get started, or do you want to grumble some more?”

  The look she shot informed him that if he stood any closer, she’d smack him.

  Without further bickering, they placed cloth under the tied up animal and Ualani grabbed a kitchen knife.

  “Close your eyes.”

  Marco did. She rustled toward the animal. He heard her lift a kitchen knife and then the animal whimper.

  “There is a wound on its leg. Find it, analyze it and close it.” She counted out as she grabbed his wrist.

  She pulled him closer toward the table and placed his right hand on the mosser’s belly.

  Marco slid his hand down, until his fingers became slick with blood. Delicately, he poured in the tiniest fraction of mana out and into the animal. Behind his eyes appeared something akin to a three dimensional model.

  “Your touch is still a bit heavy.” Ualani clicked her tongue as the animal whimpered.

  It’s the best I can do.

  Once he had a good grasp of the size and shape of the wound, he began infusing it. The bloody tissue was charged, and natural regeneration processes increased in speed hundredfold.

  He could feel the mosser’s body pulsating. Under his fingers it pumped out new tissue to repair the wound.

  Of course, such a haphazard process could lose its aim and result in tragic failures. That was his last challenge. To guide the body’s efforts to where they were needed.

  As he felt the mosser relax, Marco opened his eyes. Though blood remained, the wound was gone.

  “Good, good,” Ualani said, as she studied the animal for abnormalities.

  “You had to learn such magic for both your own kind and humans, right?” Marco asked as he rolled his shoulders. “How did that happen?”

  “I thought we agreed I won’t share anything about my people.” She replied tersely.

  “We didn’t agree for me to cover for you either, did we?” He chuckled. “At this point, it’s fair to say we moved past the initial agreement.”

  “I don’t think so,” her lips remained tight. “Such changes are not necessary.”

  She placed her hand on the mosser’s chest. The animal tensed, afraid, and soon screeched in pain. It tried to roll around, fighting against the ropes that bound it.

  “I have done some damage to one of the internal organs,” She simply moved away. “Be quick about it.”

  Marco cracked his fingers and got to work.

  He quickly identified that Ualani had destroyed parts of its liver. He already warmed up, so despite the task being slightly more challenging, he managed it in half the time.

  Though the animal slackened, it didn’t relax as before.

  “Lately, I had an occasion to share a great secret with someone else.” Marco smiled, happy with his performance. “A very liberating experience, you should try it.”

  “You’re bothersome.” She rolled her eyes as she stepped closer to the mosser again. “I already told you my reproductive system is dysfunctional and from my knowledge of humans, you’re too young for such things anyway.”

  “Wait, you’re suggesting I want to get in your pants? Or, robe I guess?” Marco burst out laughing so hard the mosser flinched.

  “Do you not?” She looked confused, her hand hovering over the table. “Then why are you suddenly so needlessly friendly?”

  “No, I do not want to get intimate with you.” He shook his head, wiping off a stray tear with his sleeve. “I just realized lately, if we’re working together anyway, what’s the point of constantly holding one another at knifepoint? It gets tiring, and I have way too much on my plate to bother.”

  “We will end up on opposite sides of a barricade one day. It’s only natural.” She crossed her brows.

  “Eh, will we? If it were up to me, I’d figure out a way for our species to coexist.” He shrugged. “And it’s not like I plan on becoming a soldier or an informant.”

  Ualani went silent for a brief while, then returned her attention to the mosser, her fingers caressing its spine.

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  It spasmed, its muscles tensing briefly, then it went limp below the head.

  “I’ve struck a nerve, so you did too?” Marco smirked.

  “Nothing of the sort. You’d have killed me if I weren’t useful to you.” Ualani spat out. “It’s not easy to trust you.”

  “That was then. Even the next day, you could have ambushed me, then escape the city.” Marco said, as Ualani went red. “Don’t even try to pretend you didn’t consider it.”

  “I–-I did think about it.” She sighed. “But I don’t hate you. There’s no need to kill if you’re not going to expose me.”

  “You don’t hate me…” Marco stretched out his arms. “You know what? I’ll take it.”

  Marco turned his focus back to the paralyzed animal. He quickly found where Ualani broke its spinal cord, but then the inherent difficulty of working with nerves became apparent.

  Not only you had to use much more mana to stimulate the nerves to regenerate, but it required precision, to avoid future complications.

  As such, Marco’s work was no longer as elegantly efficient, and progressed much slower.

  It was the hardest test, but unlike a punctured heart, there was no time limit.

  “You’re on the verge of overloading it,” Ualani chimed in. “Cut back and be more patient.”

  With a broken spine, at least it doesn’t feel the pain.

  Sweat flowed down in beads as Marco focused.

  Eventually, after what felt like forever, but was at most ten minutes, Mosser’s little paws twitched.

  Marco smiled as the animal started moving again, if slowly. It would have been a much more pleasant sight, if they weren’t the ones inflicting the damage as well.

  With a wet cloth, Marco wiped his face.

  “I think it’s enough.” He stopped Ualani from moving toward the animal again.

  “Tired already?”

  “Not really…” He sighed. “But it likely won’t survive more.”

  “So what?” She sneered. “Suddenly, at dead mosser two-hundred and fifty, it’s too much for you?”

  “It’s number seventy-six, actually.” Marco’s eyes fell to the floor. “It doesn’t cost me much to release it, and lets me not increment that number further.”

  “You counted, seriously?” She raised her brows initially, but then shrugged. “A meaningless gesture, all of it.”

  “I am well aware.” he said as he slowly caressed the animal, now petrified from fear.

  “Well, you should be moving on from mossers to humans anyway,” She moved her fingers, leaving colored lights behind. They formed a tiny human figure. “Or at least something humanoid.”

  Yeah, there’s also that.

  “Pretty trick. You could teach me that, too.” Marco quipped as he massaged his temple. “I know, I know. I’ll figure something out. For now let’s just keep at it, I have other things to deal with.”

  “If that’s all you wanted, I’ll be going. I have work to do.”

  “But we have a lot of catching up to do. Want some tea?” He smiled as he started cleaning up the table. “For example that recipe you finally gave me. Riveting stuff. Did you know…”

  With brisk conversation, Marco managed to keep Ualani at the table and serve her tea. Though she started out guarded and annoyed, she quickly livened up as she talked about her recent experiments.

  “And then I figured it out,” She clapped her hands. “All I had to do was find a non-toxic substance that would delay absorption of liquids. It took a while to search through the library, but when I finally found goblin’s ear shroom it all clicked into place.”

  “Incredible.” Marco slowly nodded his head. “I had no idea you were able to create never-seen-before potions.”

  “Ain’t that right?” Ualani took the rare chance to gloat for all she could. “If I were born a human, I’d be rich and powerful already.”

  “If only, eh?” He scratched his head as inspiration struck him. He had the Hito problem to handle and someone probably very experienced with such issues sat right in front of him. “Say, Ualani…”

  “Yes?”

  He took a deep breath. “How would you take me down, if you had to?”

  “What?” She bristled, pulling away from him a little away, as if betrayed. “I just said I don’t plan to.”

  “Yes, but if?” He tapped his chin. The gesture grew on him, seeing Diana and Aura both do it so often. “Imagine for some reason it's you or me. You need to take me down in a way that won’t come back to bite you.”

  “What kind of sick game is this?” She scowled. “For a second I thought you might seriously trust me one day, and this is what you pull out next?”

  “Hold on, that’s not what I meant.” He gestured for her to calm down. “I have a similar situation, that’s all. There’s this person who has leverage over me, and they’re being nasty about it.”

  “Nasty how?” She scanned his face, a little rattled.

  Marco clenched his teeth to control the anger that rose within and briefly explained what Hito had done.

  “... And he has some dirt on us, so if I just report him carelessly, it might turn out even worse.” He finished his explanation.

  “I’d just suck it up.” Ualani shrugged. She noticed the scowl on Marco’s face and continued. “And if not, then I’d run. Humans aren’t good at sharing information, you’d all be fine in the next closest city. But I guess that’s not the answer you wanted.”

  Marco reclined in his chair, watching her attentively.

  “Perhaps stage an accident? It’s risky, but not too hard to pull off. Especially since you have Diana to smooth it over.” She mused.

  “That’s a side of me I don’t want Diana to know… Maybe as a last resort.” Marco scratched his cheek. “And I’d rather not kill him, if possible. Sophie wouldn’t approve of that.”

  “Now you’re just trying to make it impossible.” She shook her head and fell silent.

  They sat like that for a few minutes. Ualani was thinking hard, her eyes darting from side to side, and so, Marco didn’t interrupt.

  “There might be a way.” She finally spoke up. “But you’d need a lot of help from me, and I don’t think either of us would be fine with it.”

  “At least sate my curiosity.”

  “Supposedly, there are crystallized memories in every thinking being. We can’t measure or see them, but by testing on live subjects, we roughly located where they are,” She brushed her hair away, “and what happens if you tamper with them.”

  “If you could control other people without leaving your body, we wouldn’t be talking now.” Marco chuckled. “What’s the catch?”

  “I don’t know a lot about it.” She shrugged. “From the tests my people made, you had to find a small structure in the middle of the skull. Damaging it a little could cause the person to forget recent months and years…”

  “And if you overdid it?”

  “There were cases of minds reverting to those of broken, newborn children. No memory, no skill and no personality to speak of.”

  “And at that point, it would be more merciful to kill.” Marco squeezed his sleeve, the conversation making him a bit queasy. “Can’t you check in your current body? I assume you’re a physical being in there somewhere.”

  “Not quite. How to put it…” She looked to the ceiling. “There isn’t much left in here,” She pointed at her head.

  “I… have been ignoring that, but...” Marco took a large gulp of the tea. “How does it work? Not in details, I don’t want to pry, but in general. Is Ualani your name or the girl’s? Is she still there somewhere?”

  “You tried very hard to seem completely unbothered by my nature,” She chuckled. “It’s commendable how long you lasted.”

  “Thanks for the participation trophy, now back to my question?”

  ”I am Ualani and there is no one else,” she smoothed out her robes. “Without me, this body is an empty, rotting shell.”

  “I get it, I get it. You’re always so blunt about these things.” He shivered trying to ignore the image of a spider-like parasite in an empty skull that somehow made its way into his brain. “So, how would we go about executing such a plan?”

  “We wouldn’t. I already told you, I am not doing this for you.” She shrugged.

  “And yet you explained it. That makes me think you have a price,” Marco reclined, sipping the tea. “I know I still owe you for the recipe, but at least name it.”

  “Let me experiment on you, then.” She smirked.

  “You’re not joking, are you?” Marco flinched. “What would you even want to test?”

  “Hey, don’t take it the wrong way.”

  “Is there even a right way to take it?”

  “I trust you to see past the taboo of my request.” She leaned closer, her eyes carrying a glint of excitement. “Ever since we met, I wondered if I could transplant those living weapons of yours.”

  “Is it going to hurt?”

  “Very.”

  Marco sighed, but deep inside, he knew the answer.