Level Up Saintess

So, a quick appraising of the dwarven girl showed that she had some kind of UTI messing with her. Gross, but I’m sure she’s far from the first girl working here to be afflicted with one. I’m betting a lot of the humans and dwarf girls might just have gotten that problem with the lackluster cleanliness in this world. Heck, maybe even the elven women could get afflicted with it. The beast-men were a hardy group, so I doubt I’d see very much of it in them, but…

Well here’s the real problem: I’m definitely not going to just reach down to give her the [Cure] she needs. I already feel weird because she looks so young, but I’m definitely not so carefree that I’d be able to touch any of the girls here like that, even if it’s to heal them. Guess I have to bite the bullet and use an unfocused version.

I put my hand respectfully on her shoulders and thought about wanting to remove the UTI.

“[Cure].”

I saw that interesting sensation again like an almost fully translucent shadow slipping from her, and a quick [Appraisal] proved that I’d removed the debuff from her. Interestingly enough, I still only lost 10 energy, so I guess I didn’t actually use the full body version of the skill? I guess it makes sense that I don’t actually have to directly touch something to [Cure] it. I mean, what would I touch if I was curing a cold or something? The lungs? The nose?

The hurried looking dwarven girl’s face quickly calmed down now that she was no longer bothered by her afflictions. She gave me a firm nod, almost looking like some kind of warrior with how resolute of a look she was giving me.

“I give my thanks, Miss Arissa.”

A lovely ‘+5xp!’ popped up from her, turning my awkward smile at her odd face into an actually sincere smile. It’s not much, but I’ll take it. It’s sad that something that costs 10 energy only gives 5 exp, but I guess it is the same base tier of skill as [Heal] is, so I can’t really complain.

~~~

It took a good bit of time for me to sort through all the rest of the girls. Most of them, around 9 of them, just needed a simple [Heal] to get over their bruises and simple injuries. There were around 4, mostly humans, who needed me to [Cure] their STIs, which I wasn’t very surprised about in their line of work. It seems none of the beast-men had any of that problem with them, and since this brothel was mostly beast-men, they were relatively safe overall. Oh, and while I was treating all of these people, I found out that the two elven women who worked here both had a skill to immediately cleanse themselves of most diseases, so they certainly wouldn’t be needing any of my help with that either.

Interestingly enough there were about 5 girls who needed a [Greater Heal] to fix them. From what I was told, if any of the customers started getting violent, then the beast-men girls would immediately step in and rescue whoever needed it, just like what Ferr had done for me, so for the most part none of the women ever got too hurt. But sometimes it was hard to make it there in time before the girl got hit, and if the injury didn’t seem like it needed treating right away, or it seemed like it would heal naturally without too much pain, then they’d just leave it. This led to a small portion of the girls having something that didn’t heal right, like the lizard-girl that I’d treated, or perhaps a pain that they were just trying to ignore until it went away.

I know I shouldn’t be feeling this way about someone in pain, but those 5 girls really felt like I hit the jackpot whenever I found them.

There were about 4 girls who needed a combination of [Heal] and [Cure] to fix them, which basically netted me the same amount of exp as if I had used [Greater Heal], so I was also pretty excited about healing those ones, too.

It was a smorgasbord of exp, for sure. Overall I got 155 exp, meaning I was now 190/200 towards leveling up. There were about 6 girls that I couldn’t do anything for since they were completely healthy, which made me want to pout even though that should totally be a good thing. What really hurt, though, were the girls that I couldn’t do anything for. There were about 4 that were missing some part of their body, and my [Greater Heal] simply wasn’t going to do the job. It wasn’t like with the lizard-girl, where she would eventually grow her tail back and wasn’t worried about it; Only a [Regenerative Heal] would be enough to ever bring those missing pieces of them back. There was even one girl who had cancer, which apparently my [Cure] wasn’t good enough to treat. It’s a fantasy world full of magic and beast people, who the hell would ever think of one of them catching cancer for Christ’s sake?!

It broke my heart having to tell those girls that I couldn’t do anything for them, but at least I could promise that I’d be able to come back one day and help them with it when I was a better Saintess. Yeah, at least there was that.

I won’t be able to get [Regenerative Heal] until I’m level 10, which at least isn’t too crazy far off I hope, but I won’t be able to get [Greater Cure] until level 20, so that one’s going to take me some time. If I play my cards right and find another treasure trove of people to do my Saintess duties for, then maybe I could get to 10 in about a month? Lord only knows how long it would take to get to 20, but whenever I make it there I’m for sure going to head here and fix that girl’s cancer first, I promise.

By the time everything was finished, over three hours had passed. It’s crazy that it took that much time just to see a little over thirty people and heal them all. Hopefully when I get more used to healing I can get through a line of people a bit faster, or else I don’t know how I’m gonna keep up with my leveling requirements in the future. I didn’t read over my skill tree all that closely before since there were just so many skills to look at, but I think I remember there being a few AOE heals in there, so maybe that’s how I’d get through it? Who knows. I’m sure there’s some way or another in there; It seems like a pretty versatile list.

What really surprised me the most was the state of my energy. All of the healing combined, I’d managed to spend over 350 energy, most likely due to my occasional use of using [Heal] without a focus. Since I started with 1080 energy available before I started healing everyone, that means I should have been around 730-ish, but apparently that’s not taking my energy regen into account. It seems that every hour I suddenly gain 100 energy all at once. And since almost three hours had passed… I was basically a little under the same amount of energy I started at. It’s absolutely crazy. I did so much for so long, and in the end it barely even really made a dent. I could just sit still for an hour and basically be back to full energy at this point. It’s a good thing that the higher tiered skills seem to cost more and more energy, or I’d seriously be questioning the Goddess about how she balanced all of this.

Anyways, by the time everything was done, Ferr offered to walk me back to the temple. I accepted, of course, considering this brothel isn’t totally out of those scary slums I got chased through just yet, and there weren’t an awful lot of people milling around in the area for me to run to if something happened again. Maybe I should consider hiring a bodyguard or something in the future if I ever manage to make some money. I don’t know what I could ever do as a Saintess that someone would try and pay me for, though. Isn’t that the whole point of a Saintess, to do charity? At least it seems like the church will always take care of me once they realize I’m real. Maybe they’ll pay for my bodyguard. Maybe it’ll be a nice paladin or something. I’ll have to ask.

Ferr was really considerate to me by the way. She thanked me a ton and told me I did amazing and that I really must be a Saintess. It was nice to hear that I did well, and it was even more nice to hear that someone actually believed that I was who I was. I’m sure this won’t be the last time people doubt me, considering my looks. She was also worried that I might have overworked myself and was running low on mana. She even offered to carry me, and as nice as the idea was, I gently declined. No, carrying me around is the job of my future bodyguard, not the nice lady who saved me and netted me 155 exp in just a few short hours. Ferr’s quite the good friend to have. She’s also easy on the eyes. Yes, she’s certainly worth keeping around. Hell, maybe I should ask the church to hire her for my bodyguard. That would be nice.

While I was daydreaming about bodyguard Ferr, she ended up asking me if I was planning to come again anytime soon. I told her I’d love to come again, and she said there might be more injuries to heal in a week if I wanted to stop by. Setting up repeat customers is important for any business, so of course I said yes, but then she started looking really sad. When I asked her why, she said something really surprising; She asked me if there was a girl named Chella at the church where I lived. Chella, of all people. You know, it makes sense since she was the one who told me about the brothel in the first place, but I’m sure in a town this size there could be multiple brothels around, you know? The one Ferr works at is pretty big, but still, there must have been some tiny other ones around the place, right? It’s amazing that I made it to the one she meant without even trying to. Maybe it’s the will of the Goddess, or something.

Ferr told me that Chella was born in that brothel. Apparently her mom was a whore there, and she desperately wanted to keep the baby. The madame took pity on her, and let the both of them stay. Chella grew up doing odd jobs in the place, even after her mother died, but when she grew older she was adamant that she didn’t want to end up a whore like her mother was. Sometimes when one of the girls got sick or hurt enough, they would take them to the church. Chella had accompanied one of them there as a teen, and that’s when she found out that she had holy powers inside of her. Less than a week later she’d disappeared, leaving behind a letter of thanks to the Madame, and telling everyone not to look for her. And since apprentice priests didn’t interact with the public very much, it was rare for any of them to catch a glimpse of her.

I couldn’t have imagined the strong seeming Ferr tearing up over anything, but seeing is believing. I gave her an awkward half-hug because I’m not very good at consoling anyone. Hopefully that helped. In the end, Ferr asked me to talk to Chella and see if she wouldn’t be willing to show her face at the brothel and prove to everyone she’s ok. I told her I’d try, but I wasn’t very confident, and she laughed like she understood what I meant. Since I was going to see her again in a week anyways, I suggested she come to pick me up from the church, and maybe I could find a way for the two of them to talk. Maybe it’ll work, but who knows? It all depends on Chella.