Badge in Azure

Eleanor was carried to the seventh floor of the magic tower. Her wounds were grave. She was damaged down to the bone marrow. The attack from the heavenly angel was too powerful and there was little that she could have done to defend it. She survived only because she had Seven Nights with her.

Saleen used branches from four divine trees to craft the longbow named Seven Nights for her, enabling her to use her abilities to the fullest. Material-wise, the longbow could already be considered a godly item. It was only due to the immaturity of Saleen’s craftsmanship that the power of the weapon failed to reach that of a godly item’s. Eleanor had only managed to make use of a very small portion of all the four special features present in godly trees.

Seven Nights was also Eleanor’s close combat weapon. The Power of Life and Power of Taboo infused within the longbow had been protecting a vital spot of hers; it was a power that blocked the Lord of Glory’s divine attack.

The Sword of Light was too powerful and the Seven Nights was a long range weapon in nature, thus it was only able to keep Eleanor alive.

Eleanor was put onto the alchemy table and Saleen dismissed everyone else in the room, except Lex and Stephanie.

“Master, she suffered the worst injury here. Let’s see to her first.”

In reality, Su did not fare much better, but Su was way more powerful than Eleanor and he had the protection of armor, which enhanced the powers of the Golden Grand Swordmaster temporarily. He was in the residual wave from the Sword of Burst, but his head and heart remained completely intact. The injuries he suffered were little more than burns on his internal organs, dealt by the beam that went through him from his back.

The defense of Golden Sword Aura was greater than grade-9 magic. He was only swept by a residual wave, meaning that his life would not have been in danger.

The injuries suffered by Eleanor, however, were bone-shattering ones. They spread out all over her entire body. No bones in her remained in one piece. Having to stay conscious in such a state was torturous. Even if she had mages cast spells to enable her to be immune from pain, the resulting fear of being in such a state was not one that could be eased.

Eleanor lost all control of her fear, as she knew how bad her injuries were. What she suffered was not something that could be completely mended and recovered from.

Saleen had left her to protect the northside magic tower, yet he himself was willing to hand over the protection of said tower to a grade-6 mage, due to worrying about the safety of the palace itself. Was this something worth worrying over?

Now that she was rendered a useless cripple, would her master, a man who had just married, just cast her aside?

She had imparted most of the elf’s skills to Saleen and Nailisi. How much worth did she have left?

“Eleanor, I will heal you,” Saleen stood by her side and looked at her. He was able to read all the thoughts in her mind through her eyes.

Stephanie turned, “Lex, go to the eighth floor. Watch over the palace for me. Don’t let anyone in right now.”

Lex nodded and headed straight for the eighth floor of the tower, leaving Saleen with the injured elf. Saleen said, “Master, what would you need to heal her?”

“You seem to care a lot for her…”, Stephanie stated as she cast a grade-7 restorative spell. It did not heal her completely, but the spell had at least mended all her broken and shattered bones.

“Eleanor…she had no one.”

“I had no one myself. That isn’t good enough a reason,” Stephanie replied impatiently. Eleanor was a pretty being, Stephanie was worried that Saleen fell in love with the elf.

Saleen turned to look at Eleanor. She shied away, not wanting to look into his eyes. She did not know what awaited. The battle with the angel could be said to be an act of impulse. Coming to think of it now in fear, she had began to regret her decision somewhat.

Such was the temperament of elves who, unlike humans, were meticulous with their calculations of things. The betrayal of the entire elf plane back long ago was just as ridiculous.

“She is my follower. As such, I must have her returned in full health, whatever the price,” Saleen sounded rather awkward when those words were spoken. He did not think much of Eleanor himself, but looking at her eyes, he knew well that he needed to protect her.

“Whatever the price, you said?”

“Indeed. She did a lot for me. Eleanor… she is an elf,” Saleen blurted out the truth without second thoughts. He could not have been the only one who knew things like that. it was impossible to keep such secrets under wraps forever.

“An elf?”, Stephanie’s eyes sparkled with interest, so much so that she had forgotten to follow up the price question.

She bent, looked at her injuries up close and nodded, “So it is so indeed. Some work has been done with her musculature. I’m very interested to find out what she looked like before.”

Healing was a process that had little difference with dissection most of the time. It enabled one to clearly analyze a living thing’s physical structure. Stephanie, as a grade-8 sorcerer, could not have been able to resist looking into Eleanor. She was the only elf to exist on the entire mainland.

Eleanor’s fear deepened. Her cover was blown and the one who had just found out was a powerful mage. Would she be dissected? Saleen was no match for Stephanie in this case. Even if he had the badge with him, there was still a need for him to be able to brandish it.

“Elves, the race who had once betrayed humans. I wonder, if their hearts would actually be black?”, Stephanie said as she traced her finger over Eleanor’s chest, looking for a wound, as if she wanted to tear out the elf’s heart and see it for herself.

“Stephanie!”, Saleen sounded severe.

Stephanie laughed and said, “Relax. I will treat this elf for you, but I have no control over the expenses required to do so. I will not become Lex’s personal mage before Lex becomes a mage as powerful as I am. If you want to see her treated, there will still be a price.”

Saleen nodded furiously. The other two grade-8 mages were clearly not of Stephanie’s caliber in a lot of ways. Both of them were dirt poor, and their skills lacked versatility and diversity, even their combat prowess paled in comparison to Stephanie’s.

Nicholas was not as powerful either. His fallen divine arts were useless to treat injuries caused by angels. The reason why Nicholas had yet to return from the southern side was probably due to that fact.

Eleanor laid there and listened to every single word exchanged between Saleen and Stephanie; her heart ached. Saleen was not a man devoid of compassion, and he looked determined to save her. Would she ever be able to truly recover?

“Saleen…,” Eleanor moaned weakly.

“Don’t talk,” Saleen said to comfort her gently.

“Will I be able to…shoot arrows after this?”, Eleanor had no control over her body, except her head. All she was able to feel was a sense of numbness. If the spell was to wear off, she would have been assailed by indescribable pain.

“Of course. I still need your skills, to lock onto my enemies,” Saleen answered solemnly as he looked into her with his deep blue eyes.

The more such words were uttered, the sadder she felt though.

“What worth is there to consider? I’m his follower and it is only right and proper that I put my life on the line for him. I should be feeling grateful that Saleen even considered saving me. To cast away a care like that of a loved one’s would just be awful! Saleen is a human after all!” She thought to herself.

“Alright, say no more. Help me get the ingredients ready. There is one thing I need to craft before I can save her. Bar all entry onto the seventh floor of the tower and let no one in, including Lex and those other mages. Kill anyone disobeying the order,” Stephanie said as she took out her magic pen and paper, listing all the items she required.

Stephanie’s writing was pretty. Most mages were capable of very good writing, but they were of course more skilled in drawing magic scrolls. No mistakes were permitted in the making of scrolls.

Stephanie handed the piece of magic paper to Saleen as soon as she was done writing and said, “This is the first batch, of ingredients needed to completely heal her bones and muscles. The expenses after this will be hefty, more than enough for you to hire a grade-8 sorcerer, I would say.”

Saleen took the list and said to Eleanor, “Just relax,”, before heading for the seventh floor.

Su and Cuisi were being treated on the sixth floor. Su was gravely injured, but he did not require any special medicines. He was able to treat himself using the Silver Sword Aura. He was sleeping in a container and submerged in magical medicines. Su was not able to recover immediately due to having lost too much blood. He barely had enough strength to even stand.

Cuisi was of a height taller than eight yards, while the height of each floor of the magic tower was six yards. The demon had to be laid on the ground while several mages attended to his wounds.

These mages did so voluntarily, as the chance to closely observe a demon was hard to come by for a mage, and therefore very tempting.

Eleanor began to feel fear rushing over her as Saleen left for seventh floor. Stephanie looked at her green eyes and smiled, “Are you are afraid of me?”

Stephanie looked young, somewhere in her twenties, but Eleanor was able to sense that this was only due to the fact that Stephanie became a sorcerer in her twenties. Her looks were then preserved. The woman standing in front of her, was no naive girl fresh out of the countryside.

“Eleanor, why do you fight so hard for Saleen, I wonder?”, Stephanie’s eyes were like Saleen’s, blue, but they instilled a deep fear into her instead. That blue, it was a cold one, like the Dark Blue Chant. It was pretty, yet very deadly.

Eleanor spoke with a tinge of bitterness, “Impulse, I guess. Or simply because I had nowhere to run to.”

Eleanor’s answer startled Stephanie somewhat. Nowhere to run to…what a pitiful answer indeed. As an elf stranded on the Myers Mainland, what choice did she have but to follow Saleen?

“Eleanor, there is no guarantee that I will be able to heal you completely. Grade-9 sorcerers would say the same. The techniques we would use to heal you would be the same, but I will be able to oversee to your treatment with better equipment. Even so…if– just supposedly– if your wounds were to never heal, would you have any regrets?”

Eleanor shook her head. She was not able to feel anything below her neck.

“No regrets? And I thought elves were all weak beings, but I don’t know if being reckless is better,” Stephanie’s words felt like a knife, thrust right into her chest and twisted to make matters worse.

“What …is there to regret?”, Eleanor mustered her strength to reply between breaths. She recalled the words Saleen said to her before he left, ‘just relax’.

She was now in such a pitiful state and therefore there was no need to lie to her. If Saleen told her to relax, then she would. The worst thing that could have happened at that point was being made into a specimen and kept as part of a collection in Stephanie’s tower.

She looked just like a specimen right now, what could have been worse than this?