Fired

Noah woke up to a ceiling he had only seen once before, following the ogre subjugation. He tried to piece together his hazy memories of the events of what happened, groaning after a moment of thought. The natural conclusion for the events in his memories was that the four were probably in quite the predicament at the moment. Sitting up on the bed he was on, he looked down at the plain white tunic and pants that were characteristic of infirmary patients.

"You're finally up?"

The voice came from the bed to the left of him, where a girl with a stump of an arm lay. As Noah lazily swivelled his head to look at her, he realised they didn't really have a chance to talk following the events of the Demon Lord encounter. After all, they had been sent back only to be immediately met by a room of angry royals. His gaze lingered on her arm as he thought about what words he could say. He could not summon any to his mouth easily.

He had always known Mia to be quite timid. Even now, despite being the best swordsman on the continent with an entire fanbase dedicated just to her, she still had not completely let go of her social anxiety and insecurities. Her lack of conviction had in large part to do with this. When one found themselves to be interested in an activity, whether that be gaming or sewing, they would, at some point, join a community, and their skills that had been steadily built up would accumulate respect within the community, which translated to confidence.

Mia did not have a community, a place she felt she could belong, or a calling that could bring her confidence. And this was why Mia's discovery of the sword had been so revolutionary for her. She had found her life's purpose, only to have it snatched away from her.

The more Noah thought about it, the more he realised how endlessly cruel her reality was. Now that she knew what could have been, it would be a challenge for her to settle for how it was before.

Of course, it wasn't just about the sword. She also lost her arm. However, both Noah and Mia knew that the loss of the path of the sword struck much deeper for her than losing the utility that an arm could bring.

"Don't give me that look, Noah. Evan heard that we'll be getting replaced by some actually qualified heroes. That means our run is over. I don't even have a need for this anymore."

Mia waved her stump arm around with a forced smile, clearly trying to make it seem as if she was unbothered by the loss of her arm. However, one used their arm for a lot more than just a sword, and judging from the fact that she immediately only linked the loss of her arm to losing the path of the sword, suggested her inability to take her mind off of what she had lost.

Evan turned his head away with a wince he tried to hide. The sight of a friend who had accompanied him for most of his life, grieving like she was, was enough to make him feel like a stake had been driven through his heart.

"The other two are in there."

Mia pointed with her stump towards the other two beds on the other side of the room, which were fully covered by drapes. Trying not to think about how Mia was unused to her lost arm and still tried to point with her dominant right arm, he walked up to the bed opposite to his and paused, trying to clear his mind.

With a firm pull, he parted the drapes to reveal Emma. She was dressed in the same infirmary wear as him, except that her eyes were closed in a serene expression. Noah assumed she was just asleep and placed his hand on the drapes to close them again, but the pitying gaze Mia currently had trained on her bed made him freeze and reconsider. Was she really just asleep?

"Her weakened spirit when she pushed herself almost allowed her soul to escape. Her spirit's fine now, but she's developed dormant soul syndrome. The medical mages say that she will never open her eyes again."

His relaxed eyebrows shot upwards, and it felt like a thousand needles were pricking his head. Never again? Stop fucking around here; she's Emma. For Noah, he had always imagined her to be the last to get hurt on the team. Hearing Mia's words, Noah's heart felt like it would shatter. As he shut his eyes, a tear snuck out of his right eye. He firmly gripped the drapes in despair and slowly shut them after taking one last look at her.

Spirit-soul attraction was enigmatic and difficult to explore. Both the spirit and the soul were fickle entities that were not directly observable under typical circumstances, which made very little known about them on the continent as research was next to impossible. It was said that a Prince in the Haldor Kingdom, one of the many small kingdoms on the continent's border to the Demonic Forest, had suffered the same affliction as Emma, and had been cured by the power of the Spirit Queen, an entity said to live in a space prepared for her by the Haldor Kingdom.

If not for the fact that the Haldor Kingdom existed next to the Demonic Forest, causing many monsters to rush into the Haldor Kingdom every year, one of the major nations would have long since invaded them just to be the ones providing for the Spirit Queen instead, so that they could have easier access to a cure for one of the illnesses thought to be 'incurable' on the continent, in the event an important figure within their own kingdom were to fall victim to the same affliction.

Noah shoved those thoughts out of his mind. He would think about them later. For now, he was not done inspecting the damage. With heavy steps, Noah walked over to Noah's bed beside Emma's and opposite Mia's. Mia's eyes tracked Noah's every movement, trying to gauge his reaction. Despite their long history, she was not familiar with his reaction to grief, and she was worried about his ability to handle it. Noah did not notice this, however, and yanked Evan's drapes open as if trying to do the same to the painful anticipation currently wreaking havoc on him.

To his surprise, however, he saw Evan balled up upright on the head of the bed, his knees to his chest, and his head on his knees. Noah's opening of the drapes caused Evan to look up, slowly towards the source of the light that now streamed in. Physically, he looked unhurt. However, his eyes resembled the abyss itself, with how empty and vacant it was. This was not a familiar look on his face, and Noah's cheerful words that he mustered together to greet him upon seeing Evan being seemingly alright died in his throat when Evan's eyes fell in his general direction.

"Ev…an…?"

"Hey. It's good to see you awake, Noah. Let me have some alone time, though. We'll talk some other time."

Once again, Noah's words failed him. Silently just noddimg, he shut Evan's drapes. Even as the drapes closed, Noah just stood unmoving from the spot he stood at, with his eyes shut. At this moment, the door that was stationed a slight distance away from Noah and Emma's bed opened, and a doll-like princess with brown hair, usually in a thick Dutch braid, but now frazzled and ruffled, stepped in holding a platter of food, dressed in a pink garb typical of medical mages, reminiscent of a nurse's attire from Earth.

Over the past year, Princess Elara and Evan had begun to secretly date, to the knowledge of only those in this room. As soon as she noticed Noah on his feet, she let out a tired but gentle smile of genuine delight that Noah had recovered. When she noticed his dark expression and the location he stood at, her eyes imperceptibly clouded over momentarily.

"Good to see you up, Noah. I'm not sure if you've been told yet, but it's been 3 days since the incident. Sorry about this, but let's chat later."

With that, she walked over to the spot Noah was at, moved inside the drapes with what looked to be a simple meal of bread and soup, and closed the drapes. A few moments later, the sounds of the Princess attempting to softly coax Evan to open his mouth as she fed him could barely be heard. That was enough for Noah to figure out what happened to him.

Noah walked over to his bed, sat down with slow and deliberate movements, and closed his eyes, letting everything sink in. Mia finally tore her eyes off of Noah at this point and cast her gaze downward to her stump. A moment later, she spoke up again, and her words dealt the final blow to Noah, leaving him in shambles.

"Due to the decision of the major nations to restrict access to us from their countries, we can no longer reside in Eldoria. We were given a week to leave. That leaves us slightly less than four days."