Chapter 2

Quinn

It took me two weeks to feel better enough to get out of bed, and after going through a whole lot of confusion, fear, denial, and identity crisis during those two weeks, I came to fully accept that I was no longer living on Earth and wouldn't be starting my new life working as a research scientist, my dream job. I did hope and pray a lot that I'd wake up to find myself back in my old life, but that was not meant to be. I could only surmise that Quinn Chen had died from being struck by a truck while saving a boy's life, which was so cliché. I was done in by Mr. Truck.

I rested my back against the wall of the dilapidated cottage, the home of not only Elizabeth and Quinn Fairchild, but Maria and Liam Fairchild, too, Quinn's cousins. There was no doubt that Elizabeth and Quinn were poor, as shown by the place falling apart.

The fact that Quinn's father, the bastard lord who resided in that fancy manor I could see looming overbearingly in the distance within the estate, did not aid in Elizabeth's and Quinn's destitute life was very apparent to everyone. To that despicable bastard, Elizabeth was merely another woman serving under him he had taken advantage of, and Quinn was merely another of his illegitimate children.

I chuckled in amusement. I couldn't believe that I had died and awoke to find myself now living the life of a girl not only the bastard child of a cruel, selfish earl but a girl who was being mercilessly bullied because what I had woken from had been the aftermath of a beating by none other than the earl's two legitimate sons themselves. Or rather, Quinn Fairchild's half brothers.

Ah, I remembered clearly, via Quinn's memory, as if it had been I who had been beaten, the whip slashing on my skin and the kicking of booted legs again my frail body.

I raised my gaze heavenward and sighed. I said, "I know it's nice of you, whoever you are up there, to reincarnate me and give me a second chance at life, but couldn't you at least give me some sort of advantage here? Like a blessing or something?"

Silence. But, of course, what did I expect?

I stood, my body still aching somewhat severely, but I gritted my teeth and bore it. Despite the pain, I refused to stay in bed another day. I needed to walk about and get better as soon as possible. Prolonged bed rest led to muscle wasting and a decline in health in general.

I was about to turn on my heel when an unimaginable pain ripped through me from my midsection. I sucked in my breath and could only huff as I collapsed to the ground and curled over in a fetal position. The torture coursed through me like a raging inferno, hot and furious. To me, that insane agony felt like an eternity, but I knew it only lasted a few seconds. When it was gone, I lay there, breathless.

What the heck was that?

I raised my hand to wipe the perspiration from my forehead, and that was when I felt something was different within me. I frowned. There was also something strange about my hand, too. I lifted the other one up and glanced from one to the other. I could see some sort of stream of golden particles exuding from the palms of my hands and floating around it.

I widened my eyes. Was this…

I flicked through Quinn's memory, and then there it was, the girl had learned something about magic.

There was magic in this world, which was blessed by the Gods or Goddesses, the deities. Apparently, one was considered very lucky to have been blessed.

If Quinn's memory served me correctly, one was either blessed with the creations, destructions, healings, or foresight ability, and under both creations and destructions, there were sub-classes such as blacksmithing, horticulture, and agriculture for creations while those blessed with strength, swordsmanship, necromancing, monster taming, and such likes were under the destruction's ability. But, once again according to Quinn's memory, there was no mention of this flow of golden particles I was seeing. Could it be mana?

If this was indeed mana, then how could I possibly see it? Perhaps this was a blessing from the deities? If so, then I'd gladly accept it.

I tilted my head to one side, wondering what other blessings I could have received. If I was lucky enough to have more than one, then I'd like the healing ability, since that'd be the most useful to me. Well, I had one in four chances to get that, and right now, I desperately needed it. There was no harm in testing it out, right?

Having understood how crazy everything here was—if my being reincarnated into this world wasn't crazy, I didn't know what was—and have acquired Quinn's knowledge of magic, what little there was she had learned, I was confident in how to make this work.

A grin on my face, I said, "Heal," as I touched both my palms to my chest where my broken ribs were. I felt this warmness washing over me as I watched—wide eyes in pleasant surprise—the glow of particles, or shall I call it mana, dancing about in the space close to my chest.

I couldn't believe it. The pain was slowly receding and then… gone. I sat up.

"Oh, my God!" I chuckled. "I'm blessed with a healing ability." I burst out with a "Yay!" with my arms widespread and fists pumping in the air. My request, or rather prayer, had been answered. I flicked my gaze heavenward and did a thumbs-up. "Thank you. You're awesome."

I imagined the big man, or woman, up there smiling and winking at me, but in reality, there were only dots of clouds against the backdrop of the gray autumn sky. Oh, well.

I stood and dusted the dirt off my pants. Then I stretched and jumped up and down a few times, testing out my new body.

Hmm… Not too bad. Since I had always been in so much pain previously, I had never paid attention to my height. Now, I noticed the view from the ground felt… shorter? I wondered how tall Quinn was. As for me in my previous life, I had been five foot seven, having inherited my height from Mom, an American woman with ancestors from Europe.

I drifted my gaze across my new pair of limbs. They were too thin and short, and obviously, this body's overall height would be nowhere near the five foot seven of my previous body. Considering Quinn's upbringing and the family being so damn poor, I doubted the girl had enough to eat to even support her growth. My estimation was that Quinn was probably around five foot two at most.

Short.

So. Damn. Short.

I wondered if the healing ability could encourage bone growth. From Quinn's memory, however, healing magic could only cure physical injuries, such as a broken rib, stab, or cuts to parts of the body. I suspect healing what was already lacking, such as essential nutrients, malfunction of the body system in genetic disorders, and pathogen attacks on the body and immune systems in infections and diseases, was not possible. I guessed apart from the genetic disorder, severe infections and diseases from bacteria and viruses could be solved with antibiotics and vaccines, and a deficiency in a particular nutrient could be solved with supplements and a proper diet.

I wondered if it was possible for me to create medications with healing magic. I could always explore that possibility later. For now, my priority was to fatten Quinn's frail body. After that, it'd be me leaving this place.

I was given a second chance at life, and I wasn't about to live it as an ill-treated bastard daughter of some despicable lord. I had my new life ahead of me, once again, and a whole new world to explore, and I wasn't going to let it go to waste.

That said, I wasn't going to be leaving this shithole alone. In this new life, I had a new loving mother in Elizabeth. She'd be devastated if I were to leave her behind. Not to mention the lord's legal wife and their children would continue to torment her at every chance they got, and I wasn't going to let that happen any longer either. There were also my new cousins, too, Maria and Liam.

And speaking of.

I watched as the two figures came strolling along the pathway, and the moment they saw me, Maria rushed over, her face full of concern.

Now that I wasn't alone, it looked like I had to pretend to be unwell and in pain, since I wasn't going to let it be known—at least not yet—that I had acquired a blessing and had already completely healed myself, not especially when, according to Quinn's memory, a blessed one was obliged to serve the kingdom and work at court under the royal family.

Those blessed with a healing ability were rare and were usually either given the option to join the military as part of the medic team or work in the palace and serve the royal family and the nobility.

There was no way I'd agree to do either of those two things. Technically speaking, I, as Quinn Chen, was not a citizen of this world, let alone this damn country, so I had no obligation to serve the kingdom or the royal family. I'd be using my blessing for myself and with whomever I like, thank you very much.

"Quinn! Quinn!" Maria said as she hurried to me. "What are you doing up and about? You should be in bed."

Ugh! This girl was a headache to deal with. She fussed over me like a mother hen during the last two weeks when she was aiding Elizabeth in taking care of me and would cry every chance she got after catching a glimpse of my horrible condition. I understood she loved Quinn, or rather now me, as her cousin, and I understood it had been because of her that Quinn's body ended up in that state, but…

I flick through Quinn's memory and saw that day clearly in my mind's eye. There in the secluded area at the back of the Bedford Manor, Austin and Charles, Lord Bedford's sons, had cornered Maria and did only what entitled, privileged bastards like them did to a vulnerable girl like Maria.

Maria had already been in an uncompromised position, her maid gown torn and skirt up, cheeks bruised from slaps while lying on the ground, helpless, when Quinn witnessed the horrid scene. Quinn had rushed forward and started shouting and bashing at Austin and Charles with her puny fists. Hence, the girl had ended up being the target of Austin and Charles instead, for interrupting their fun time.

I could surmise that Quinn had died sometime after that beating, and I, from the twenty-first century who had also died from Mr. Truck, had reincarnated into Quinn's body.

From Quinn's memory, it was due to Elizabeth's fear of Quinn getting unwanted attention and being subjected to unwanted sexual harassment that had led to Quinn dressing as a boy. Since Quinn was a unisex name, no one had ever questioned Quinn's true gender. Though Quinn had never been subjected to any sort of sexual harassment, she had always been bullied.

Maria was pulling me by the arm and leading me back into the cottage, while Liam walked silently behind us.

I glanced at Liam. I didn't miss that despite his thin physique and pale complexion, no doubt from lack of nutrients the body desperately needed, he was a good-looking young man with dark-brown hair and brown eyes. He was twenty-three, and if he were born on Earth and my cousin there, we'd get along famously since we were close in age. Come to think of it, he looked to be around five foot seven, slightly taller than Dad, who had been a Chinese American man. I had no idea how Liam could get that tall when he clearly didn't have enough to eat like Quinn, but I supposed some people were just blessed with height.

From Quinn's memory, Liam wanted to be a knight and had taken every opportunity he could get in the little spare time he had working as a stallion boy for Lord Bedford to train himself. It seemed he had even requested Lord Bedford to transfer him into the knight department as an apprentice, too, but that bastard had declined Liam every single time simply because Liam was a Fairchild, which didn't surprise me.

Well, once we got out of here, I was sure Liam would be able to join an academy or something and become a knight, undoubtedly in shining armor.