Special Chapter XX - Awaken (part 2)

I let out a sigh while waiting in the room. Was it really that difficult to handle the only patient in this hospital? 

Then again, since I'm the only patient, it simply means that they are so bad at treating patients, that nobody else is coming.

That was a joke though. Obviously nobody else got wounded beside me.

But how did they know my name…?

It ended up taking a while, so I strolled down to the kitchen for a while and found a fruit. It was an apple, and it looked quite fresh.

Nice. Yoink.

I picked up the apple and took out a knife to peel it.

…

Wait…

Where's my ring?

Where's my goddamn magic ring!?

All my stuff is in there!!!

"Huahhh..."

I ended up walking back to the room annoyed and took a forced bite from the apple while leaning my back on the wall. I ended up enjoying the apple, even though it wasn't peeled.

While I was still eating, I could hear a loud commotion coming from the outside. As soon as the commotion arrived inside, I could tell that whoever was coming was in a rush. It didn't take long before the door to my room was smacked open.

"R-R-R-R-Rizeeee!!!!"

It's Lyona.

"L-Lyona?"

Immediately, I lifted my hand that was holding the apple upwards. She ran towards me at the speed of light and landed on my chest.

While she was hugging me, everyone else started to show up into the room. Eva, along with the captain, entered the room. Gajah, Belmar, and Kirene too. The other knights and the rebels who were with me on our mission were also there, but the room was quite tight so they waited outside.

And from my senses, I can tell there's a whole lot of others waiting right outside the building.

Am I really that famous here?

I took a glance at Eva, and she somewhat nodded at me while smiling. The captain gave me a thumbs up. Belmar and Gajah just gave me a double thumbs up while grinning like sunshine. Kirene was silent as she watched.

"Lyona--"

"Just a little bit more..."

She hugged me a little bit more. And more. Until she let go ten awkward seconds later.

"Sooo... Anybody want to tell me what happened?"

Eva and the captain stared at each other. The two communicated in silence, and somehow came to an agreement that Eva will be the one telling me.

"We had a guess that... you somehow were floating in the ocean."

"I... was aware… at least when I fell into the ocean."

"And... you were floating in the ocean for about a week."

"… A week!?"

Eva coughed when she saw my reaction, but the captain had another question.

"R-Rize. Were you... also aware when you... exploded?"

The captain must be talking about the events that happened that time. To answer that question, I simply shook my shoulders. 

"More or less."

"More or... less…?"

I nodded.

"Well, I'm not entirely sure. If I knew I would get burned like this, I wouldn't have done it."

"Hmm. I guess that makes sense… Wait, burned?! So you… knew?"

I nodded heavily at him. His look changed into a horrified one, but then Gajah moved in to ask.

"Rile-I mean, Rize. You fought against Prym, the strongest Rank 1 in Veldonia. Do you... still have any memory about fighting him?"

I placed my hand on my chin and closed my eyes.

Yes, I do remember. But it was quite fazed out, that some parts of my memories are missing. But I do remember the part where I got very angry… and then his scared face… 

So the answer is pretty much the same.

"More or less."

"More or..."

Gajah saw that I was not lying when I answered that, so he decided not to ask any further. Belmar isn't going to ask anything, so Lyona went ahead and asked the most important question of all.

"Rize... How do you feel?"

"How do I... feel?"

I checked my whole body.

During that battle, I somehow activated my… devil… mode again, and was able to become extremely powerful. And from my past experience, activating the red mode means damaging my magic soul. 

So I checked my magic soul, trying to see if something was wrong. I closed my eyes, and checked them while focusing.

Hmm…

Nothing's… wrong…

"I'm… fine…"

"R-Really?"

I nodded at Lyona while grinning, but then Eva rejected coldly.

"No, you are not."

I turned my gaze to Eva, who stared at me with a very saddened look. I turned my gaze around, and found everyone else was also wearing a horrified expression.

They are all very confused as to why I am grinning like this. After all, I am absolutely not okay.

Geez… they are always so serious.

Let me smile in front of Lyona for once, okay?

I know what they meant. I know exactly what they meant. I have been keeping my mind off it the entire time. By going outside, talking to people, and even eating an apple angrily.

But in the end, I really can't escape from this… I will have to face it.

"So you meant these wounds..."

Just for them, I slowly opened the bandages on both my hands and legs. Once the bandages were gone, everyone could see them very clearly, and both Gajah and Lyona covered their mouths.

My hands, all the way starting from the elbow, all the way until the tip of the fingers. Completely charred.

Both of my hands had the same situation, except that my right hand still had slight marks of normal skin, but that only makes it look worse.

My legs were also the same. A full black-brown charred skin, from the bottom of the feet, all the way to just a little bit above the knee.

It's like my arms and legs were replaced by a demon's limbs… These do not look human at all.

"This is…-"

Seeing that I am staring at them for the very first time, Gajah walked forward and tried to reason.

"It's the best that we can do… You were actually a lot worse before-"

"… Cool."

Gajah's words were choked midway, and everyone else looked heavily shocked at my sudden comment. They all stared at the black charred skin on both my hands and legs, and then stared at my eyes again.

My eyes are probably shiny, because they seemed to be getting the wrong message here.

Gajah cleared his throat, and continued to try reasoning.

"Ekhem… Excuse me, Rile-Rize… Both your arms and legs were… burned. How can you say they are cool?"

"Well, I mean, aren't they?"

Everyone else seemed to be confused. I moved my hand around, noticing that nothing seemed to be wrong with moving them. The only thing bad is their appearance, which looked very ugly and horrifying, but still cool.

"Stop seeing this from the bad side, and start seeing the good side. Yes, I am... very annoyed seeing my hands and legs turned out like this. 

But we all need to keep moving forward, right? There's no point in being sad about it. Do you guys understand?"

Hearing that came out from my mouth, suddenly I can feel the mood become heavier. Everyone suddenly went teary eyed, and some of them even started dropping snots.

"Emm... Guys?"

They all immediately rushed in and hugged me.