More importantly, though, is Arleaf.
“What level are you again, Arleaf?”
“I’m already at level 19. I feel having experience in D-Psy Earth and Chemist makes me quite strong.”
Oh, yeah, that’s right. People in this world not only tell others what their current job level is, but also use their combined level as some sort of standard as well.
That’s what you’re supposed to tell others when you introduce yourself, or so Arleaf said to me.
Anyway, we’re pretty ready to skip town… or so I thought.
The next few days turned out to be rather turbulent in the village.
Arleaf’s father said it started with only one villager.
They weren’t feeling quite well, so they visited the apothecary for a medical check-up.
Within hours, though, more and more villagers came by saying that they didn’t feel well.
We returned after slaying some monsters to find Arleaf’s parents in this hectic situation.
“Ah, that you, Cohgray? Sorry to trouble you, but could you help out a little?”
“Did something happen?”
“Well… for some reason, a bunch of the people in the village complained about not feeling well; some even bedridden.”
‘What? It has only been days since we have cured Bloodflower, yet another epidemic?’
No, hold on, you don’t think there are other possibilities?
“Don’t tell me Bloodflower is back again.”
‘Hast thou no faith in my formula?!’
Veno voices his displeasure at my words, but if someone were to be blamed, it’d have to be you, right?
Since we said we’re going to cure it, we’ll have to get to the bottom of this.
‘T-That is impossible!’
“Naw, it ain’t Bloodflower again, so don’t worry.”
“O-Oh, good.”
“Umm… then what is it, Father?”
“I still can’t tell exactly yet; gotta further monitor their development. But I’ve given them some medicine to soothe their symptoms.”
I hope they’re okay.
‘Aye… we should deal with it as soon as possible so that there is not unnecessary attention.’
If it’s just a bad case of the flu, then it’s not so bad, but… I hope it’s not a contagious disease that my world would find serious either.
“Well, if it’s you, Cohgray, then you might be able to deduce what it is. Wanna give it a shot?”
‘It is not such a poor idea as thou hast meddled once already. Just… be sure of the responsibilities thou must bear.’
… I know, I know.
But need I remind you that I wasn’t a doctor before I came to this world?
Well, Veno, you’d probably know a thing or two. Let’s take a look.
I go check on the villagers who have flocked to the apothecary.
‘First, take their temperature with your hand. Aye… his breathing may be erratic, but with no odd noises. Nor does he seem to have abnormalities in his magical energy.’
You can tell whether his mana is normal or not?
‘It is easy to tell from one’s eyes. A change in magical energy shall affect their consciousness as well. Check for pupil dilation and mental stability; even avoiding eye contact can be a sign.’
Hmm… but what if making eye contact turns me into stone? You sure about that?
‘Without a doubt.’
Oh, wait. This is unusual.
“What’s this…?”
On his upper arm is a scab-like crystal growing.
What do you think? Something translucent and purple like that obviously has no business coming out of a human, right?
‘Obviously. I believe that surface growth of crystallized quintessence is a symptom of a disease called Dorimsvoyta.’
Talk about quick.
That’s a Poison Dragon for ya, eh?
‘Nay, ‘tis but knowledge learned because I was curious.’
Oh, is that right?
“I think these are initial symptoms of Dorimsvoyta.”
“Huh? Dorimsvoyta? But you never see it around here.”
Arleaf’s father takes a look at where I pointed out and brings out a book from somewhere.
“Sure looks like it though…”
‘A compound of a herb named Y’led and a flower named Sol shall be effective.’
I parrot the words to Arleaf’s father.
“How impressive of you to so easily diagnose the problem, Yukihisa…”
“I just happened to know of it.”
“But… you know of any medicines that the villagers can afford?”
‘Sprinkling holy water shall delay the progression of the disease; and prioritize the ones who are in worse condition.’
I explained it to their whole family and had the villagers to get some rest for the day.
This might be easier to deal with than I thought…
The following day.
More become infected.
They needed the help and so we went over to the apothecary to help out making medicine.
“Thanks to you, Cohgray, we’re able to deal with this problem quite quickly. Still, this thing spreads fast.”
Arleaf’s father mutters while prescribing drugs to the villagers.
Oh, and of course, he has a gas mask on to prevent catching the disease.
I think we’re likely able to contain the disease.
“It seems so. Rather, we’re lucky to be able to treat the problem so quickly.”
I’ve gotta treat these folks as per Veno’s instructions or else he’ll warn me of repercussions and all that.
I keep at it on making medicine and the situation seemed to be improving.
But in the evening…
“My grandmother has fainted! Can I get some help please?!”
The voice reverberates inside the apothecary.
The same crystals we saw yesterday are on this old lady’s face.
“This…”
I’m frozen with fear.
Hey, Veno… I thought you said this is curable.
‘… aye. It seems to be quite the stubborn disease.’
“This is different.”
Arleaf’s father mutters as picks out the crystals with a pair of tweezers.
Right… this time it’s not purple, but green.
By the way, it doesn’t seem like the crystal is caused by the quintessence in the body.
The crystals are a surface concentration of the pathogen and a symptom of the disease.
Rather, the disease is forcing the body’s quintessence to crystallize.
In other words, the disease will leech the infected of levels and experience.
The more experience you have, the less likely you’ll die.
‘This is a mutation. Dorimsvoyta type III. This type causes quintessence crystallization. I know not why it mutated… aye, ‘tis quite the headache.’
It mutates that easily?
‘It seems quick, but it would not be impossible for both types to occur simultaneously… however… hmm.’
“Whatever it may be, we apothecaries have but one job. We must keep compounding for the sake of our village!”
Arleaf’s father, full of energy, blurted out.
Deep down, he’s a good person. Except for sabotaging his daughter’s future by displaying her cooking, I’m sure he’s a good guy.
But what does he grow again? Narcotics?
Maybe he’s a bad guy after all.
“Cohgray, I’ll have my girl to fetch some medicines from the next village over. Can I get you to stay put and keep making medicine?”
“Yeah, let me help out.”
“Yukihisa…”
“With his knowledge, I’m sure Cohgray can be counted on to help me make meds, but…”
He’s praising me, but all my knowledge is from Veno.
Anyway, I’m sure he can let Arleaf handle procuring medicine while I keep working with her parents.
‘I believe he wants to find more medicine to supplement the current one.’
Oh, right. Kinda reminds me of Japan then.
When you get tuberculosis or pneumonia, the doctors prescribe you with, like, three different type of drugs.
It probably wouldn’t be enough without that cocktail.
Something about drug-resistant bacteria too.
‘It is no different here. Indeed, when one intends to get rid of harmful creatures, it is important to kill them all before they get a chance to multiply.’
“I’m not sure if it’s quick to mutate or if it’s a subspecies to happen at the same time, but I’ll try to find medicine that will work well together with what we have already.”
“Oh, that’s right. I know a recipe for something that’ll work even if it’s a subspecies. Arleaf, I’ll write you a note for what to buy. Honey, I’ll get you to post a quest at the town hall if there are any adventurers.”
“Okay!”
“Muu, I’ll get you to shuttle people around and help out too.”
“Mu!”
And so, Arleaf’s father keeps prescribing his medicines while looking for a way to eradicate this infectious disease.
The situation seems to have stabilized… but after two days, it took a turn for the worse again.
‘How curious… no matter what it may be, it is mutating far too quick. I have seen nothing that mutates in mere days.’
My knowledge of the diseases in Japan isn’t useful, but I recall that other countries had more aggressive diseases.
From what I know, though, is that if you don’t have an effective medicine, things will get more complicated. At least we have something that kinda helps right now.
But even then, our meds are effective until the Dorimsvoyta pathogens mutate again. Why is this happening?
Even when we predict the mutations to happen and combat it with a cocktail of drugs.
This shouldn’t be a breeding ground for superbugs.
‘Aye…’
“I’m back!”
Arleaf rushed back from her trip.
“Umm, Yukihisa, Father, I have… news to report.”
“What is it, Arleaf?”
“The neighboring towns and villages all have symptoms of Dorimsvoyta as well and it seems rather serious too. The nation has decreed a quarantine zone and has shut down all passage through the bridge near the town.”
“What?!”
Arleaf’s father folds up his arms, steaming mad.
“Crap. Cohgray and I could delay their conditions from worsening, but I guess other places weren’t so lucky.”
“It seems so. Not only that, but Bloodflower might have devastated nearby towns and villages already.”
Whoa, hey. Aren’t they a little screwed then?
“Fortunately, there ain’t any dead so far… but if they declare it to be an epidemic outbreak, they government will form a squad to purge this whole area from existence.”
‘Unbelievable… they are rather pragmatic about it. Oh, and what he meant by “purge” is that the villages, towns, and everybody here shall be burnt to ashes. After that, it shall be a quarantine zone for the next ten years or so.’
We’re fucked!
“For better or worse, at least we don’t show any signs of the disease… but they ain’t exactly gonna let us live either. What’ll we do?”
‘Indeed… the two of us can still survive. All thou hast to do is escape via the swamp where the miasma is thick. Pursuit would be futile. We are fugitives anyway, so this may be a good chance to leave the village.’
Aren’t you being a little too fuckin’ rash to just ditch these guys?!
‘I expected thou wouldst answer this way. Do understand that if we have no better plan, then that would be our only choice. I am not almighty after all.’
… you’re right. If I need anything, I can always rely on you. You also know the right medicines to make.
But that won’t solve the problem at hand.
Still, we need to think of our future plans.
“Let’s focus on what we should do before those purge troops arrive.”
“Ah… but even Cohgray—who’s as good as I am with medicine—can’t stop this disease.”
I have a few qualms with that, but now’s not the time to argue.
It’s just that it’s not me… it’s all thanks to Veno.
“We’ve got an important question to figure out first. What exactly is the cause?”
It’s weird for a disease to plague us all of a sudden.
There must be a cause to this effect.
Like with Bloodflower, they’re tiny little monsters created by a big monster long ago, according to Veno.
If we don’t get to the root of this, it’ll haunt us for a long time.
“It’s due to the toxic gas from the swamp. Not exactly unusual for any disease to just pop up.”
Don’t give up on figuring it out already.
Of course it’s weird for anything to “just pop up”!
“Why is there a village here in the first place? To buy and sell expensive herbs?”
“No… that’s ain’t it…”
Arleaf’s father avoids answering my question.
“Call it a pretense or a dream, but the founder of the village wanted to clear the miasma and the poisonous swamp.”
‘How lofty of a goal.’
It’s a noble goal, but that doesn’t answer anything we need to know.
As I look at Arleaf’s dad with a dubious look, Arleaf speaks up.
“Father, Yukihisa is trying his best to figure out what it might be. Could you give it a shot too?”
“… don’t tell nobody about this, alright? Bloodflower spread from a guy in the village who went to the swamp to pick herbs.”
He hesitantly answers.
From this exchange, I learned that he just wants to protect his fellow villagers.
Arleaf’s dad has a grave look on his face, aware of the consequences if anyone were to start laying blame on anyone.
I understand that at the very least, he wants to avoid the possible situation of the villagers pointing fingers at each other.
“The villager who went to the swamp to pick herbs…”
Everything clicked for me.
I seem to have all the pieces… yet I don’t understand a lot of it.
When did Dorimsvoyta first appear?
It was the third noon after Arleaf became a Thaumaturge.
And then two days after, it mutated. Taking a bunch of medicines didn’t help either.
Plus, it wasn’t just this village either; the surrounding villages too…
It was the same for Bloodflower.
I know that Arleaf went out to trade with other villages, but did other villagers go out too?
Even though they’re so sick?
“Umm, do the villagers go back and forth between towns, even when they’re like this?”
“Like Arleaf, they’ve got to go trade too, but probably not as frequent as she does. And we told the ones who showed symptoms not to leave the village.”
“Hmm.”
There are too many factors to consider and we’re not managing the villagers well enough.
Well, we are in the countryside after all.
But are the ones infected by Dorimsvoyta the villagers as well?
I take a look at their lesions with Detect Poison.
First, the monster-created Bloodflower and now Dorimsvoyta…
… that’s right. What about those adventurers? We haven’t seen them around lately.
Right, Veno? My instincts tell me it’s those adventurers we saw right before Arleaf changed to Thaumaturge. Should I say something about them?
I’m curious about how quickly the disease spreads too.
If they didn’t stay for long, they must have went to other villages.
We haven’t seen them ever since that day.
An adventurer’s job is to hunt for treasure in dungeons.
There are many stories where explorers dig up old ruins, get infected by some weird disease, and unnaturally die off one by one.
I thought those were just interesting stories, but there might be some truth behind it. Anyway, that’s not the issue at hand.
What I’m trying to say is that it wouldn’t be inconceivable that there are adventurers who were infected by a dungeon.
No harm in asking about it, I think.
‘It may seem as if thou art passing the buck with such a wild leap to conclusion, but there is merit in talking about it. Do not assume that others will be so benevolent. Besides, I may have an idea too.’
What do you know, Veno?
‘I have told thee of the story of Bloodflower and its creator, aye? Since Dorimsvoyta is mutating so quick… there may be a being deliberately spreading this disease.’
You really think so? Then we’ve gotta find proof of this.
“Do you know where the injured adventurers may be?”
“Hmm? Oh, if they’re not at the church, then they’re probably at the town square or at some inn.”
“I have something I’d like to ask an infected adventurer, so I’m going to look for them.”
“Yukihisa, you’re saying that…”
“Yeah. It’s not the villagers who were the first to be infected by Dorimsvoyta, but it may be those adventurers that time.”
Since adventurers tend to be tougher than your average villager, their symptoms may show up later too.
But it doesn’t change the fact that they’re infected.
If they’ve been in contact with villagers, then they’ve been spreading it around, right?
That’s my hypothesis at least.
“Turbulent times are coming, huh?”
Arleaf’s father grumbles.
With that, I set out to search for the adventurers we past by on that day.
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