I Wish They'd Do That Somewhere Else
"Yes, well, I can't promise it will come off entirely — but it's certainly worth a try—"
Before Ceres could even finish, Yona grabbed her by the shoulder and clamped down hard.
She had completely forgotten what she was doing — forgotten, even, just how high-ranking the silver-haired woman standing in front of her actually was.
It was Ceres who was caught off guard by Yona's sudden change in demeanor.
She had always seemed so composed, the sort of woman nothing could ever rattle — yet right now she was regarding Yona with a look of mild, genuine surprise.
"Th-then, um... does that mean... you could erase a curse, too? Something like a curse?"
"The result is more or less the same as Purification, so—ah, ouch. Could you let go, please? Let's talk with your hands to yourself."
Yona's grip had been tight enough to make the shoulder throb, so Ceres patted the hand clamped there, tap tap, until she released it.
Only then did Yona realize what she'd been doing. She snatched her hand back, her face flooding scarlet.
"In any case, to continue — my personalized magic isn't all that different from Purification. It's a rather unusual gift, you see."
"...Personalized magic?"
"Yes. Personalized magic."
What on earth is that?
Yona knew absolutely nothing about magic.
Alevian had tried explaining the whole business of how magic worked once or twice, but listening to his lectures had felt like an assault of logic engineered specifically to make her brain explode. She'd shuddered just hearing it.
Personalized magic... She had a vague feeling she'd heard the term before, somewhere.
But she had no idea what it actually meant.
"...You don't know, do you?"
"Nope. Not at all."
Ceres nodded, as if that was exactly what she'd expected.
"Simply put, it's my specialized magic — the kind only I, Ceres Olkamain, can use. The magic best suited to me and to me alone. Does that make sense? I've tried to explain it as simply as I can."
Yona did know that magic came in many varieties, and that it was divided into hierarchies.
It was one of the basic facts of this world, after all.
She knew it only in the vaguest sense — that such things existed and nothing more. Dig any deeper than that and you were in the realm of experts, and unfortunately for her, Yona was a cleric who wielded holy power and could not use mana at all. Even if mana were to arise in her body, the holy power already entrenched there would simply swallow it whole.
It was a power she couldn't use, so she'd never bothered to care about it.
"...I can tell you didn't understand, but the point is, it's the magic I'm best at handling."
Still, Yona did take away one thing from the explanation.
Mana and holy power were, in a manner of speaking, different fuels that produced nearly identical results.
And if that were true — then maybe, just maybe, what had turned her into a woman could be turned back into a man.
"It's not really about this tattoo. Actually, what I was going to say is—"
The words died in her throat.
A doubt stopped her cold: should I really be telling this woman that I used to be a man?
She'd blurted it out without a second thought to her guild companions, but with this woman, some instinct insisted she absolutely must not.
"...No, never mind. It's nothing. It's just — a tattoo like this is, well, a little unbecoming of a cleric, you know? So why don't you... tr-try erasing it."
Ahaha, ahaha, ahahahaha... Yona laughed her way awkwardly past it, and Ceres simply stared at her.
For just a moment, the corners of those eyes crept upward. Then her face settled back into perfect composure.
"Very well. Shall we give it a try, then? If it doesn't work, no hard feelings. Understood?"
"Of course. Naturally."
Yona felt a chill of cold sweat tracing down her spine.
How long has it been since I felt like this?
Back when they'd been about to raid the so-called kobold cave, something had smelled off and she'd talked Alec out of the quest, writing it off as a failure. A few days later, word came that the cave had actually housed three hobgoblins, and every adventurer who'd gone in after them had been slaughtered to a man. That feeling. Exactly that feeling.
The eerie sensation of having dodged death by a hair.
"You'll need to give me your arm, please?"
Yona, who had frozen for a moment under the weight of that skin-crawling premonition, snapped back to attention at Ceres's words.
Then, with a strained smile, she held out her right arm.
"It won't hurt one bit, you know. There's really nothing to worry about."
Yona couldn't quite bring herself to believe it, and she failed to hide the stiffness in her expression.
Ceres, seeing that face, offered an awkward smile of her own.
"I'm hardly doing anything terrible to you. If you guard against me like that, it wounds my feelings, you know. You understand, don't you?"
"Th-that's true..."
"Good. Do watch that expression of yours, then. Now, let's have a look, shall we?"
Ceres took Yona's hand lightly in her own and raised her free hand.
A low incantation began to hum along her lips. As the chant continued, a pale blue light started to gather in her palm, and the closer the incantation climbed toward its peak, the more intensely that blue light flared.
As Ceres's hand drew near, a faint warmth spread over Yona's arm.
Not unpleasant, exactly — just a strange, unfamiliar sensation.
The touch of mana, felt for the very first time in her life.
The warmth followed Ceres's hand as it slowly caressed its way along Yona's right arm, wrapping around it in a gentle circuit.
"A-ah, th-this...?"
The sound slipped out of her before she could stop it, and Yona hastily clapped her left hand over her mouth.
The pitch-black letters that had stained her right hand — not just her arm but her hand as well — were unmistakably, if faintly, fading.
At that visibly lightening black, Yona's heart lurched into a wild, pounding rhythm.
But that was all it was.
They had faded — but they had not vanished completely.
Though no longer the abyssal black they'd once been, the characters that remained — dim but undeniably present — kept that same wrong, otherworldly feel about them.
And yet they had been erased.
Erased, without question.
Ceres drew a weary breath, and Yona looked at her with open admiration.
"This is my limit, I'm afraid. Localized Purification is simply too taxing, no matter how you slice it. A full-body Purification, now — that might be a different story."
"A f-full-body Purification?"
"Yes. As a Healer, you'll understand this well — my Purification works the same way as a priestess's healing, so targeting just one area like this is terribly inefficient. Tell me, have you shown this to the priests at the cathedral?"
"I have. Shown it, I mean."
To Sister Aize and no one else, to be precise.
"And to the Saintess?"
"...Not yet."
I'd sooner bite off my own tongue and die than show that girl.
She couldn't quite bring herself to say the rest.
"Is that perhaps why you're heading to the Wizard Community?"
Ceres asked the question with her usual languid smile.
"No, it's not that, exactly..."
"This doesn't seem to conflict with holy power in any way, so I imagine the cathedral didn't give you the answer you were hoping for. That made me think you must be going to the Community for it — but apparently not, either. Hmm—"
Ceres hummed, turning something over in her mind, and then broke into a soft laugh. Yona found herself returning it, awkward though it was.
"Well, Miss Yona surely has her circumstances, and there's no need for me to pry. In any case, I understand now. Magic can do it — that much is certain. But if you're traveling to the Wizard Community just to erase a tattoo, you'd be wasting your time. There won't be a single mage there who can perform mana purification, after all."
"I-is that so."
She did, in fact, have other reasons — but she couldn't exactly announce them to this woman's face.
Some instinct, fierce and unshakable, told her that with Ceres — with this woman — the whole truth was a door best left shut.
"In any case, I understand. I have a feeling the day is coming when you'll need me, Miss Yona, and soon. I'll be waiting for that day."
Ceres smiled at her.
Yona could not smile back.
She felt it too, unmistakably — the sense that before long, she would have business with Ceres Olkamain. And the feeling was overwhelming.
Live the adventurer's life long enough, and your ability to sleep in dies a quiet death.
Rise early, get ready, and reach the guild before the crowd, and you might snag a decent quest. Diligent companions were, for the most part, skilled ones — which meant diligence was tied directly to survival rate.
Back when Yona had first started out, she'd been up with the dawn without fail.
But then she'd acquired a Guard named Alec, and as a Healer she rarely needed to chase after quests — if anything, the quests came chasing after her. Somewhere along the way, her old habit of sleeping in had crept right back.
"What's with the late entrance? Rubina's been waiting for you forever."
"Don't act like you didn't know I like my mornings slow."
Yona had dragged herself out of bed long after the sun came up, thrown on some clothes, and come down to the first floor.
There, in the makeshift dining nook tucked into a corner of the manor, the whole party was already sitting down to breakfast.
"Grab a seat and eat."
Yona answered by simply standing behind Alec and scanning the menu. Not the usual rye bread, but a loaf steamed from cornmeal. Beside it, a plate of sauce that might have been grape — or might have been something else entirely — and milk.
Smack!
"Ugh, why is this brat acting up again?"
"Rude."
Yona dragged the milk pitcher over with a squeak while picking up the empty cup that had been sitting in front of Alec.
She confirmed it held nothing, filled it with a full measure of milk, and set it back down before him.
"You know dense bread like that sits in your stomach like a rock, so why don't you wash it down with milk like a normal person, hm? Do I really have to baby you like this? Are you a child? Did your brains fall out along with your hair?"
"I was going to drink it."
"Going to and actually doing it are two different things. You really do love making people fuss over you, don't you? Hm?"
"Miss Yona, Miss Yona! Sit here!"
Rubina, seated beside Alec, quickly scooted over to clear a spot.
Yona gave the girl's head a few gentle pats, then settled into the seat.
"Good grief, why does my arm feel so sore."
She rolled her right shoulder in a big circle as she spoke, and Kayak, now seated on Rubina's other side, blinked at her.
"Is that not your holy shroud? A spare, then?"
Yona looked at him and snorted a laugh.
Then she shot a sideways glance at Alec on her opposite flank, and let out a pointed little cough.
Ahem. Ahem. "This happens to be a rather high-grade holy shroud, thank you very much."
But Alec only dipped his bread deep into the sauce, took a bite, and went on drinking his milk.
"Holy shrouds are expensive, then?"
It was Ludwig who asked, watching the exchange, and he directed the question at Vigrind.
She, a light eater by nature, had already finished her meal — a single piece of bread and a cup of warm milk.
"They have to be handmade, so they're not easy to come by. And judging by her, that oddball healer must have—"
Yona's head snapped around in a glare.
Vigrind paid her absolutely no mind.
"—had an even harder time finding hers. I wonder how she managed it."
"Does she, now? My goodness — holy shrouds are handmade? Every day in your company, Saintess, my horizons widen a little further."
Hahaha.
With that, the Hero tore his cornbread clean in half.
It was still warm from the oven, and the bread's soft white crumb pulled apart in a long, even stretch, steam curling up from the tear in thin wisps.
Ludwig dipped one half deep into the reddish-brown sauce and thrust it out toward Vigrind without warning.
"Have a bite of this, Saintess. It's delicious, truly. I noticed you've only been touching the apple sauce, but this one's made with wild raspberries. It's quite the delicacy, I promise. Go on — try it."
"H-Hero, please. I'm full already—"
And she truly was.
Vigrind had never been one to eat much.
"Oh come now, my arm's going to fall off? Aaaahhh — it's really falling off, it's really faaaalling!"
Ludwig hammed up the act of dying so theatrically that Vigrind's face went red as a boiled beet.
He'd never make a scene like this! The Hero, of all people, would never be this unserious!
And it's embarrassing, besides!
"I-I'll eat it! I'm eating it, so please, stop...!"
In the end, Vigrind snatched the bread from Ludwig's hand in sheer desperation.
She popped the piece into her mouth and began to chew.
...Huh. It's good?
The wild raspberry sauce was genuinely, properly delicious.
What an absolute circus this is.
Yona's mood curdled.