Level Up Saintess

Halfway through me reading the Saintess book, the balding priest spoke up and told me it was about time for dinner. While I followed after him, I looked at my death counter on my quest and tried to figure out what exact time it was. Sadly, from the time it was trying to tell me, I think my timer started from when I actually arrived in this world, and not at like midnight or something. Okay I shouldn’t say 'sadly', I mean, if it did start from midnight then I would have had a lot fewer hours to work with. I’m at 85/100 experience right now, so honestly I’m not too worried about leveling up at the moment; All I have to do is do one more of those dailies and I’ll level up, after all. But I still don’t really know if the counter will reset after I level up, you know? I think it will, since some of those Saintesses that I read about used skills that I’m fairly certain I’m not going to be able to reach within the week. Shouldn’t that mean that they were alive for much longer than that? I mean, like I said, their lifespans seem to have been all over the place, and I’m pretty certain that it said they all first appeared as Saintesses around my same age, so there had to at least be some way to extend the death counter, right?

 

Ah, I’m getting distracted worrying about stuff, it’s time for dinner. Let’s care about this another time.

 

Seems dinner is pretty much just the same as breakfast? Once again it was just bread and soup, just like earlier. As I brainlessly ate the bland food, I thought over what I was going to do tomorrow. I’d level up after the morning prayer daily quest for sure, so long as it still gave 30 exp like it said it did today, so that means I should have access to some new skills, right? Or even if I don’t, if it still gives me a skill point to spend or something like in video games, then if there’s nothing better to spend it on I’ll probably get that [Appraisal] skill and see what that does for me. Screwing around with that shouldn’t take me very long I don’t think, so then after that maybe I finally get started doing some good deeds? I haven’t actually gotten to try healing or curing anything yet, so I’m a little worried about how that will go. Maybe I should start off small and practice a bit first? It’d be a real problem if I try to go big right off the bat just because I’m a Saintess. Yeah, let’s start off small and see how far I can manage for now.

 

~~~

 

After a fairly uneventful dinner, Chella led me away to a back room off of the small bathroom that we used to brush our teeth earlier. I’d come to this bathroom again a few times throughout the day to use the other small doorway connected to it that led to the toilet, but I had yet to see what this other doorway led to. Oh, and for the record, I absolutely hate the toilets here. They’re basically an outhouse, and the smell in the room was absolutely atrocious. I had to hover-sit every time I had to do anything in there because I was so afraid of what I might have caught if my skin actually touched anything. Why couldn’t this stupid world have developed actual toilets already by the time I got here?!

 

Ah, I’m getting off track. The room Chella took me to was a room with a tub built into the floor. How can their toilets be so terribly primitive, but their tubs be so hot-tub-like? I really don’t understand. Whatever, I should just take what I can get, I guess. …Even if there doesn’t seem to be any proper soap here.

 

The awkward silence while we were washing up was absolutely deafening, so I decided it might have been alright to try and strike up a conversation with Chella. I didn’t really have anything simple in mind to ask her about though, so I ended up just asking something that I actually really needed to know.

 

“Hey, Chella? Do you know anyone around here that could use some healing?”

 

The way she looked back at me like I was stupid for a moment really stung, but then she sighed and diligently gave me the answer, just like always. What a trooper.

 

“If anyone needed healing around here then they would’ve already come to the church and seen the priests.”

 

“Oh, no, that’s not what I meant. I don’t mean people who need it urgently enough to come to the church, I just mean people who want healing but don’t need it. Or maybe people who don’t have the money for it I guess?”

 

Chella’s eyes narrowed at me when I mentioned the people who didn’t have enough money to pay for healing, but then she just turned away and started talking again.

 

“There’s plenty of poor people on the outskirts of town that could use the help but don’t have any money, although it's dangerous to go there. And maybe you could convince the adventurers to let you help them, but it might be a bit hard since they can be on the rougher side. Or if… If you’re any good at curing, then maybe… the whores could use your help.”

 

It worried me how strained she sounded when she was talking about the whores, but alright. It was a good point; Maybe I could get a bit of practice with curing and then see what it was that they needed from me. I’ll take whatever leads I can get at this point. Although actually, now that she feels like talking to me…

 

“Thanks for the suggestions! But um… Hey, do you know how to use [Heal]?”

 

“What? Of course I know how to do such a basic thing. You think I made it to being an Apprentice Priest without knowing something as simple as that?”

 

Wow she sounded really offended. Did she think I was calling her stupid or something? But then what does that make me, who doesn’t know how to do it at all?

 

“No, well, I was going to ask you if you could teach me how to do it.”

 

Oh yeah, that one definitely made her give me a look again. Can’t say I blame her.

 

“You don’t know how to- What do you- How can you call yourself- Ghhk!!! …No, you know what? Fine. Are you really saying that you don’t know how to use [Heal]?”

 

I’m honestly impressed that she got over that little conniption that she was having so quickly. Hats off to her, although that intense look she’s giving me right now feels like it could stab through me at any minute.

 

“I mean, I know for sure that I have the ability to do it, but I was never taught how it was actually done, you know?”

 

Chella looked conflicted and confused for a while, not to mention pissed off, but then just like always she diligently did what she had to do as my senior. She tentatively reached out and touched her hand to my arm.

 

“[Heal].”

 

Her voice resonated in a different way than when she was just usually talking, almost like it was twinkling or ringing. A split second later there was a small shine from where her skin touched mine, and I felt a warm, tingling feeling coming from where we were connected. As soon as it was done she pulled her hand away like she was touching something mildly disgusting, and put it back under the water.

 

“There. It’s really simple, all you have to do is imagine the effect you want, make appropriate contact with the area you need, and say the spell’s name. Do you get it now?”

 

That’s freaking amazing how simple it seems. I’m sure there must be more to it than she’s saying, but on the off chance that it’s really that simple…

 

I touched my hand to my other arm and stared at it as hard as I could.

 

“[Heal]!”

 

Just like she’d shown me it began to shine, although instead of a small tingle, it felt like a strong ray of sunlight had shone on my arm. Incredible. I can’t believe something so magical is actually this easy. But why did it feel different? Is it because I did it on myself? Or maybe she actually healed something on me, and what I felt was a lack of healing because there was nothing left? Who knows. Let’s move on.

 

“That’s really neat. And does [Cure] work the same way?”

 

By now Chella looked like she was looking at some kind of inferior life form. Like maybe I was just an icky slug in her eyes right now.

 

“...Yes.”

 

“Great!”

 

I tried [Cure] on myself and it worked just the same way, although instead of any kind of heat, it came with a feeling of a soft waterfall rushing over me. There was also no light, only just something like a shadow sliding off instead. How interesting. Now with all the things I learned today I should be super ready to tackle my good deeds and see how all this crazy stuff works tomorrow!