Otherworld Hospital (3)

"Done.. wheewh," Nine exhaled.

"H-How is she.." Srhro asked.

"Please be at ease, we'll do what we can to help her recover. Thus why you should do your best to rest up," a church sister said.

"I've been wondering, what kind of treatment would be given to her?" I asked.

"She's sent to the emergency unit, and if it comes out alright, it'll be to the rehabilitation unit. We hope that she'll come to normalcy after a week of counseling sessions. From her reactions, she should've not been in there for more than a week. She will recover," the sister explained.

"Alright. That's good then.. how about well. Pregnancy?"

"That'll depend on a number of factors, let's pray that things will turn out alright."

We're currently in this.. um, open hall unit? I don't know what to call it but it's basically a place for general care.

Srhro's arms and legs were healed up, so were her fingers. Apparently, you need advance-class healing magic.. easier said than done. And fortunately we left the wound open else it would've permanent amputation.

A female priest came over to examine her condition.

"I'll do an assessment, do you mind giving some privacy?"

And so Nine and I waited behind a screen.

We looked around the church.

You know, it's weird. This is a hospital right? Yet it's called a church. Then the other building– the church is also a cathedral? I don't know enough about the semantics of this world.

"What do you think we should do after this? Report to the guild?"

"We took up the quest without actually taking up the quest.."

"Don't we have like adventurer tags or something?"

"Oh crap.."

I forgot. Like.. if you're going for a rescue mission and the person is already dead, what you bring back as identification proof is their guild card.

"Maybe later, when the examination is complete.. I'm not sure about Arine though."

"I wonder which party they were from.. maybe someone already took the quest by now and is on the way to the goblin village?"

"Maybe?"

It was an upstart village quite deep in the forest. Normally, one would get lost before even stumbling upon the place.

"Excuse me, could you specify this part? It's a little unclear," the church sister asked with an awkward smile, tapping the pen on the file.

"Oh.. urm, we're just passerbys?" Nine said.

On admission, we had to fill out this form regarding the patient's details– Srhro gave us the consent to furnish her part. There was this one section for emergency use and required us to describe the situation and our relationship to the patient.

"What did you write?"

'Stranger'.

The fuck..

"Um.. actually, what happened was.." I gave a quick explanation of the situation. Some parts were us lying. We were conscious about finding the village because of the guild quest, and when we did, we snuck the victims out.

"I see," the sister wrote down a gist of it in the notes.

"Sister Qilly."

"Ah yes, here."

She passed the notes over to the priest who had completed the examination,

"Good Samaritans huh? May the Goddess of Comfort bless you."

Nine flinched.

"Ah, have you heard? It has been revealed that the Goddess of Comfort does bless the people. The first blessing ever received was conferred to hero-sama, as rumor has it."

"Right.."

"Though you may not be directly related to her, I would like if any of you could accompany her for a while? We'll send a runner to contact her family."

"Oh, okay."

The priest then pulled the partition open and left. Sister Qilly went to grab some stuff after setting up like.. a mini workstation. Basically a table with patient notes and water, and herbs.. something like that.

"What did the priest tell you?"

"T-That I should be alright.."

"Okay.. that's fortunate."

"I-I don't know.. though.. will I get pregnant.." she panicked.

"Um.. probably not?" we already gave her that medicine before.. well.. I don't know how effective it is..

"She's on the luckier side of things. She's not afflicted with poison or anything like that," the sister reviewed the notes written by the priest, "I'm sure you'll be alright," she tried to console Srhro in her own way.

"So we wait here right?" Nine asked.

"We're contacting her guardian, so if you don't mind, please stay put just a little longer," the sister sounded apologetic.

"Alright then.. actually, how about the other girl? Do we need to accompany her later or something too?"

"Leave that to us."

If you say so then.

And so we waited.

Heh.. so Prune and Rin are here too? What kind of coincidence is this..

Nataline? Oh, she gave birth huh? I guess the goblin child was disposed of.. damn. That's actually quite..

"Excuse me, um.."

"Yes?" Nine who had been staring at blank space said– actually, she wasn't staring at blank space, she was reading a book on the system.

"Can I.. ask for your name? I just realized that I don't know who you two are.."

"Nine."

"Nine?"

"Yea. Nine. Just Nine."

She nodded, turned to me.

"The name is Noel."

"Nine-san and Noel-san. Thank you for saving me.." since she was laying in bed, she wasn't able to bow. Though, it was clear as day that tears began to form in her eyes.

"It's alright. If it weren't for the quest being posted, we would've not realized it anyways.." I said– was this appropriate.

"Hey Noel, do you think we should report this to the guild later? Srhro-san, do you have your guild card? Or.. in the first place, how does one go about completing rescue quests?"

"That.. there are a few methods. One would be passing the guild card. The other is bringing proof of document that the person is on treatment. The third is to bring the person to the guild."

"Hm.. second option is the best."

"I don't know if that would work actually.." I was thinking the third would be best.

Guild protocols. If it's really as simple as passing a paper to the guild saying that we've saved someone..

"What if.. right now you're here right? There's some other party that took the quest to try and find you. Wouldn't that be a waste of time? How would the guild deal with the compensation then?"

"I think there won't be any compensation? I'm not too clear either.."

"Do you stay with your parents?" Nine asked.

Srhro nodded.

"My parents work in a factory building magic tools. The circuit boards in totems."

Totems.. what the hell is that? I know the 'totem' that is found in Hawaii or something but I'm sure it's got to be a different thing here right?

"Why did you decide to become an adventurer?" Nine asked.

"Um that.. I thought it was cool.. but it's not.." she looked conflicted, "It's not that I want to quit either, it's been my work for the past year, I'm not giving up.."

It's weird..

Nine's question somehow hit me as to why I wanted to be an artist. Sometimes, drawing sucks pain and I know that earning money through this work is not going to be easy. Yet, it's something I'm still aiming for– for what? Is there any reason to keep doing it?

A passion? Could adventuring, like art or some other craft be a passion? It's a very risky one though.

'Everyone, I bumped into the heroes just now. Is it alright if we had a meal with them later?'

What?

'What hero?'

'That two that came to Bleu's domain.'

I thought the Regressor said he'd take them under his wing? On the map, the Regressor's marker, together with Laura, are somewhere in the nobles district.

Aoki Kaito and Takata Sayu– these two were walking somewhere nearby the monastery. Heh..