Karina: "I-I do too, but I'm out of mana..."
As you undo the tourniquets, she nods and faces you.
Woman: "That's fine. I already did the heavy lifting closing the wounds up. Even a low level spell should be able to take it from here. Good thing too, cause I'm wiped."


Karina helps Leon drink more water at your urging, and the woman shakes her head a bit.
Woman: "Only blood replenishing spell I know is soup and bedrest. Though it'd be hard on him anyway, all that blood's gotta come from somewhere and he doesn't seem like he has a lot of fat to spare.

Damn birds. They're not durable, but they can hit fast and those claws are sharp. Do a lot of damage to people before we can wipe them out."
She then notices the ones still stuck in your arm.

Woman: "Uh. Speaking of. You need to get those out."
You poke at them a bit. Still hurts. Still raw wounds despite your magic, but the claws being lodged in is minimizing the bleeding.
They're definitely stuck in your leather armguard real good, but you think you can get them out of your arm without much fuss.

Woman: "Not much. My stones are tapped out too, I had to help with everyone on the other ships already.
And no, don't leave em in for that long. If you wait to get it fixed up for too long it could get infected, and that'd be a lot worse. Let me take a look."

You present your arm and she investigates, gingerly peeking beneath the armguard where she can, and estimating based on the other birds' talons where she can't.

Woman: "Well, the fact you're not still bleeding a bunch means they went in clean and it's just punctures instead of gashes. Good.
Where magic falls short, we got medicine."

She assists you with your arm, and soon you have it all healed.
Removing the claws was the hardest part. The tendons had all thankfully gone limp after being severed, but your stiff leather arm guard made them difficult to remove individually, so you ended up peeling the whole thing off in one go. Thankfully the tourniquet did its job, and you now have a thoroughly sore and still somewhat fragile, but intact and no longer bleeding arm.

Woman: "Alright, I think I'm done here. Make sure you heal up your buddy again, too.
Let's go Joseph."
Joseph(?) nods, and scoops the woman back up in his arms, then turns back to face the other ships.
Woman: "Alright, let me just get read-YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY"
He jumps mid-sentence, sending them up into the sky and landing gently on the other ship they first came from.

She did say you should give his arms one last heal. The wounds aren't bleeding anymore, and they're pretty much all closed up, but you go ahead and cast over both arms one last time just to be safe. Leon is still awake, and still pale, but his expression relaxes a bit after you cast.
Leon: "Feels a bit better. Thanks."
Karina slumps down in relief, and Frederic starts busying himself with cleaning all the blood and birds.


[ Timeskip ]
[ Other ]

You clean your knife off, and-
Oh. Hm. The edge is a lot less pristine than it was earlier. A lot duller, and even a small chip. It didn't get like that when you carved up the wolves. Well, you'll take care of that in a bit.

You then help Karina move Leon inside to rest, but rather than having you clean up, Fred has you take the helm while he and Karina clean. The other ships sound off their bell to leave shortly after the cleaning starts, so someone does have to steer.

While the others clean, you take out your pocket whetstones and get to caring for your abused knife while you make sure to stay on course with the other ships.


~~~~


The sky is darkening, and the ships have all moored together for the night. Tomorrow you'll be arriving in Belus, docking at the port of Gunan. Everyone is lounging outside on the deck after eating, with Frederic having cooked roast bird. Pretty good, if you ignore the source.

Frederic: "So. That's what adventuring is truly like. There's fun and amazing sights. But there's also fights for your life. Close calls. Sometimes, people die.
I've had it happen to friends and comrades. More than once.

Still interested in being an adventurer, Karina?"

Karina stays silent.

Leon: "I like my arms..."
Frederic: "Even if you think you're well prepared, sometimes that isn't enough. Sometimes you just get the short end of the stick and fate conspires to end you.
You should-"

Karina: "Leon!"

He startles at Karina's yell. Looking over, Karina is visibly angry, with her fists balled up at her sides.
Karina: "Are you going to give up?!"
Leon: "Wha? Well, I-"
Karina: "Gram! What about you?"

Karina: "See?!"
She snaps back to face Frederic.

Karina: "We're not backing down! I meant it when I said I wanted to be an adventurer! We all did!"

The two of them stare down each other down, the oversized knight and the girl barely up to his elbows. Leon seems frozen, his eyes darting between the two.

Eventually, Frederic's face softens, and he quietly speaks.
Frederic: "Fine. If that's what you've decided."

Leon: "Barrier spells would be nice..."

Karina snaps her glare to you, but after a moment wavers, and her face falls as she looks down.
Karina: "...yeah, I, guess you're right."
Frederic: "Defensive magic, a medical kit, and emergency-only mana stones. I'd feel better if you had those.
Maybe all of you, but I won't push it."