Roger followed Knight Stine for a good distance before finally arriving at the camp area where the wounded were being housed.
Even before he lifted the tent flap, a foul stench rushed into his nose.
Stine frowned as he pulled back the curtain. Inside the dimly lit tent, wounded soldiers lay side by side on straw mats, wrapped in bandages.
Several camp followers wove between them, carrying basins of water and replacement cloth strips, while flies buzzed everywhere overhead.
When the nobles of this world went to war, they seemed to always bring a host of non-combatants. Among them, these camp followers were responsible for tending to the wounded, washing clothes, cooking, and other chores.
Some of these women were relatives of the soldiers, marching alongside their husbands or brothers. Others had been recruited from towns along the way, relying on the army for a living but also facing the risk of being abandoned by them at any moment.
Roger followed Stine into the tent, arriving just in time to see a camp follower cover a wounded soldier's face with a white cloth.
Knight Stine frowned and averted his eyes from the white-shrouded face. Turning to Roger, he said, “Let's begin.”
Roger walked over to one of the wounded soldiers and cast Heal.
Once the man's wounds had closed, Roger moved on to another. Squatting down just as before, he reached out with his hand adorned with the Rune Ring.
Then, his gaze locked onto the man's wrist.
Beneath the sleeve, a section of a twisted tattoo peeked out.
“Tsk...” Roger instinctively took half a step back.
The wounded soldier, who had been lying flat on his back, suddenly snapped his eyes open. He sat bolt upright and lunged for Roger's throat with both hands.
Reacting instantly, Roger drew his sword and slashed down hard on the reaching hands, carving two deep gashes that exposed the bone.
Yet the man didn't even flinch. He didn't even pause from the pain, his hands continuing straight toward Roger's throat.
Roger took another two steps back to put some distance between them. Staring at the "wounded soldier's" face, he quickly realized something was wrong.
The face was completely expressionless, and the eyes were completely hollow.
The camp followers in the tent screamed in unison, drawing the attention of the guards outside.
“What happened?”
“Nothing. A 'delirious' patient attacked our healer.” Stine had already drawn his sword and stepped up beside the "wounded soldier."
However, after having his wrists slashed, the wounded soldier remained motionless, sitting on the mat with his arms outstretched. When the others stepped forward to inspect him, they found his body had already gone stiff.
“He's actually been dead for quite some time. Rigor mortis has already set in,” Knight Stine said.
“He can still get up and try to choke me even like that?” Roger muttered as he sheathed his sword.
Stine looked at the guards. “Go explain the situation to Baron Raymond. Hopefully, he can relay this to Count Nigel as soon as possible... unless the Count wants the camp crawling with vessels controlled by the undead or cultists.”
The guards saluted and left.
Well, this doesn't seem to be my problem for now, Roger thought. He went back to healing the remaining wounded, determined to farm as much experience as possible.
As for how a corpse controlled by dark magic had managed to slip into the tent, that was a headache for the people in charge.
Before long, a military chaplain entered the tent, guided by a guard, to inspect the corpse.
“It is quite obvious that this man was already under the control of a cultist's dark spell long before arriving here. The person controlling him is likely not nearby; this was merely a delayed-trigger command.”
As the chaplain spoke, he placed his hand on the corpse's forehead. A faint golden light flared, and dark purple mist seeped out of the body's facial orifices, dissipating into the air.
The corpse slumped rigidly back onto the mat. Stine gestured for the laborers to carry it out of the camp.
The chaplain continued, “Therefore, I suggest we screen everyone in the camp. If anyone else has been placed under a spell, there could be more incidents.”
Stine nodded in gratitude to the chaplain, then ordered his squires to inspect everyone. He then gestured for Roger to continue his healing.
After treating the last wounded soldier, Roger returned to the private tent Stine had arranged for him.
This seemed to be standard treatment for any mercenary with extraordinary powers. According to Baron Raymond, it was to prevent outsiders from disturbing their training.
Stepping inside, Roger sat down on his cot and opened the system interface, ready to organize his gains for the day. As his eyes swept across his status panel, he noticed that his Magic level had somehow risen to Lv2.
“Does this mean I'm technically a Rank Two Mage now?”
A Rank Two Mage who only knew Heal. He had no idea where such an unbalanced student stood in the mage community, but judging by how others reacted to him, he figured the treatment wouldn't be half bad.
He closed his status panel and opened the shop.
Having 1,500 points was neither too much nor too little. While he couldn't afford high-damage, wide-area skills, it was more than enough to pick up a few highly versatile utility skills.
He scrolled through the dazzling list for a while until his gaze landed on a specific icon:
【Name: Arcane Hand
Description: Shapes a translucent hand out of mana. Its reach depends on Magic level, while its strength and precision depend on Skill level. Can be used to grab objects from afar, manipulate items, trigger mechanisms, etc. Initial strength is roughly equivalent to one-third of an adult human's single-hand grip.
Max Level: Lv5
Prerequisite: Magic Lv1
Cost: 600 points】
This skill had practically zero offensive capability, but its utility was off the charts. Roger didn't hesitate for long before choosing to exchange his points for it.
“Points -600. Balance: 712.”
Before the system notification could even fade, Roger raised his right hand and activated the skill on a small pebble on the ground.
A small portion of the mana in his body was drawn out, and a translucent blue hand materialized out of thin air. It grasped the stone on the ground and slowly lifted it into the air.
“Slow speed, weak strength, but at least it obeys my commands well,” Roger evaluated in his mind as he cancelled the spell.
He then placed his system-provided arming sword to the side, summoned the Arcane Hand once more, and had the blue hand grip the hilt, attempting to draw it.
However, when the blade was only about a quarter of the way out, the blue hand shuddered violently and dissolved into the air.
“Perhaps its level is too low, so it lacks the strength.”
Roger felt he still had about forty percent of his mana reserves left, which was more than enough to maintain such a minor skill. This meant the failure wasn't due to running out of mana, but rather because the skill level was too low, limiting its maximum output.
The Arcane Hand's current initial strength was only about a third of an adult's. A motion like drawing a sword, which required sustained force, was still too much for it.
He stepped out of the tent, found an open space near the camp, and summoned the Arcane Hand again, practicing by grabbing stones and other objects off the ground.
During his practice, he also tried to throw a stone into the distance, but it only flew about two meters before dropping to the ground.
“Is this thing suffering from muscle weakness or what...” Roger looked at the stone lying just a few paces away and couldn't help but mock himself. At this distance, let alone hurting anyone, he would struggle to even toss it to the entrance of the opposite tent.
Mockery aside, he didn't stop his practice.
“Lord Roger, I would like to speak with you,” a voice called out from behind him.
Roger was currently controlling the Arcane Hand to hold a stone. Hearing the voice, he let the hand toss the stone aside before turning around to see who it was.
Irene stood a few paces away, watching the blue hand slowly dissipate in the air.
“So, you know other magic besides Heal?”
“Just some casual practice,” Roger replied casually, then steered the conversation back. “What's on your mind?”
Irene stated her purpose succinctly. “In the next battle, how about we team up? I'll handle the killing, and you handle the healing. We can look out for each other. That way, we won't have to fear no matter how many goblins come our way.”
Upon hearing her proposal, a line inexplicably popped into Roger's mind:
With both of us fighting, who could possibly stand against us?
Instead of brushing her off like he did when Stine made a similar suggestion, Roger began to seriously consider the proposal.
Before the siege on the castle, Knight Stine had also suggested finding a teammate to protect him, which he had politely declined.
Credit was secondary; his main concern was that he didn't want a teammate stealing his kills. He barely earned enough points from a single battle as it was, so how could he afford to share them with a partner?
But after his experience of being chased down by that goblin warrior, Roger felt that maybe he really did need to find himself a tool... oh, right, a bodyguard.
With his current lack of strength, it would be too easy to get killed if he didn't find a tool to draw aggro for him.
He had only escaped by pure luck when the goblin warrior chased him. He probably wouldn't be so lucky if something similar happened next time.
The current issue was finding a balance between utilizing a tool and earning points.
Roger thought about it for a moment and finally proposed a compromise.
“How about this? You don't need to specifically stick with me. Once the battle starts, we'll still do our own thing, just don't wander too far. If either of us gets into trouble, the other will step in to help.”
If they were facing ordinary goblin grunts, the two of them together could indeed go on a rampage... but the one doing the rampaging certainly wouldn't be Roger.
“That works. It won't get in each other's way, and we still have room to support each other.”
Irene's reply was straightforward. Clearly, she was also the type who disliked being tied down and restricted, so this arrangement suited her perfectly.
Without saying another word, she turned and walked back to her own tent.
Roger watched Irene walk away, pushed those thoughts aside for the moment, and resumed practicing with his Arcane Hand.
By the time the sky turned pitch black, the system notification finally chimed: “Arcane Hand upgraded to Lv2.”
He once again had the Arcane Hand grip the hilt. This time, the arming sword was drawn completely from its sheath. He tried to manipulate the Arcane Hand to swing the sword twice, but the movements were sluggish and clumsy.
“I can draw it now, but it's still suffering from muscle weakness.” Roger sheathed the sword and sat on the edge of his cot, beginning to calculate how much more he would need to practice tomorrow before he could actually use it to swing a sword.
That way, he would be able to use both a bow and a sword at the same time.
Rate on N.U.
