Rules of Biomancy: A LitRPG Healer Fantasy

The smell of blood was unmistakable. It was not a massive surprise out in the slums at night, as murder did happen every few months, but the groans of pain did get Elijah’s attention. They were low, barely perceptible, and without any other sound to accompany them. One or more people were slowly dying without anybody else around.

Elijah knew it would be in his best interest to keep walking down the street. He’d done so before. Ignoring and even avoiding such noises was the best choice when it came to your own survival. But… something in those whimpers of pain made him turn around and move over to the alley they came from.

Age brings stupidity, I suppose.

The darkness of the night made it hard to see much of anything at first, but Elijah’s eyes adapted the further he went in. It allowed him to see what his ears had partially revealed already.

Three bodies. One was in two pieces. The others were in one, though the multitude of smaller cuts, bruising, and unconscious states made it clear that it wouldn’t matter in a few hours. Soon, all three would be dead.

Elijah frowned when he got close enough to see their outfits. The two still alive, a man and a woman, had strange, colorful fabrics. Nothing he’d seen before, meaning it was likely richer foreigners. From where, he wasn’t sure. As for the third… Elijah regretted stepping into the alley.

“Is a bit strange to see a Royal Mage out and about in these parts with two weirdos, ain’t it?”

He stiffened. A voice whose source he hadn’t noticed before. Alarms rang inside his mind until Elijah’s old eyes were able to flick to the person who’d commented on the scene. Their disheveled state, large eyes, and thin limbs made it clear he wasn’t in danger.

“You’re the one behind this, Tom?” Elijah asked the homeless man. He got a grunt in reply. The drug addict had done no such thing. No surprise. Whoever had killed a Royal Mage, one who openly wore their expensive, purple robes out in the slums, had to be much stronger than whatever the locals could come up with. “See who did it then?”

“Ain’t seen nothing. Just heard a bit of shouting, some flashes of light, and then a small group leaving the place,” Tom replied. No surprise there either. Though his back began to protest from the act, Elijah bent down to check out the wounds on the young man. The bruising around the neck implied he’d been shoved hard into the wall behind them. Some head trauma wouldn’t be unexpected, and that slow bleeding steadily coloring the back of his jacket made it clear that survival was a far-fetched dream. “Don’t waste your time looking through their pockets, by the way. Already snatched all the good stuff.”

Elijah turned to look at whatever Tom had found. Two rectangular disks, one side metal while the other looked to be fractured black glass. Buttons on the side implied some extra function, though the damage sustained likely made the things useless either way.

Strange gadgets, slowly dying next to the corpse of a Royal Mage, and clearly not from around here.

Nobody would blame Elijah if he stood up and left. Just about everybody sane would’ve done so by now. Even the most prideful of samaritans had limits, and whoever had killed a Royal Mage out here wasn’t somebody you needed to get on your bad side.

Yet the youthful faces made his heart tense up. Their hands were calloused yet still not riddled with the scars of age. If they were allowed a second chance, they could have so many more years to experience life.

Aleksi, please forgive me for not discussing this with you first.

“How much do you want to carry the man back to my shop?” Elijah asked, estimating the woman to be slightly lighter. Somebody in his years shouldn’t be carrying a person. The herbal bag on his side was more than enough for him. But, making the homeless man deal with them both at once wouldn’t be feasible either. And letting more people know about his involvement in this mess… that was something Elijah couldn't accept.

“I didn’t take you for somebody who harvested the dead from the streets,” Tom commented with a wet chuckle, showing off the row of missing teeth. “Didn’t you shout at me the last time I offered the location of a fresh corpse?”

“Times change,” Elijah bluntly replied, eyes unwavering. “Can you carry him?”

“Easily,” Tom said, the man’s ugly grin still standing. “For five silvers.”

“You can get half a dose of Bliss.”

“Full dose.”

“Full dose of whatever is leftover from the last brew.”

“Deal.”

Working with drug addicts was too easy sometimes. Elijah despised the stuff himself, his only interaction with it being during the brewing process itself, yet even he had to admit that it was effective. The homeless felt a sense of happiness, he had a steady source of income and favours when needed, and the chance of getting stabbed while returning from night trips into the Dungeon was negligible.

“Be careful not to stretch any of the wounds,” Elijah instructed as he watched Tom lift the unconscious man over his shoulder. Being treated like a bag of potatoes wouldn’t help with the injuries in the slightest. “I’d rather not have them die before we get to the shop.”

“Yes, yes, I know how this works,” Tom replied, waving away the orders before stepping aside to let Elijah grab the woman. Going down on the ground, he positioned himself so his back was against her front. Wrapping her arms over his shoulder, he got a good grip before standing up. Pain came from his spine instantly, his body not handling the extra weight well, but Elijah just ignored it. “You want me to go back afterward and grab the mage as well?”

“No,” was the short reply. It was the only one he had breath for, his mind and body more focused on getting one foot in front of the other. “Avoid this area entirely after this.”

“Sure, sure. Was going to do that anyway,” Tom promised, the man sounding a little fearful at the end. “Don’t want to run into whoever did this anyway.”

Neither do I, and you might partially remember me once we’re done here.

The location and time of day that Elijah had willingly stumbled into this mess couldn’t have been better. Nobody in their right mind went outside this late in the slums, and those that did kept to the larger streets. They were in an off-shoot of an off-shoot, safe from random encounters and spying eyes.

Elijah hoped so, at least.

It took ten minutes of steady walking to get to the house. It was just on the edge of the poorer part of the city, in a good enough spot to be clean and mostly free of thieves but cheap enough that Elijah could afford to own it.

Putting down the woman beside the door, and ignoring the screams of relief from his back, he went up the two steps and knocked on the wood. Two quick knocks, two slow ones, and three more quick ones at the end. A longer code that meant unexpected occurrences. Elijah hadn’t needed to use it in several decades, but the speed at which the door opened made it clear Aleksi hadn’t forgotten.

“I was wondering why you were taking longer than usual,” the giant man commented, eyes flying to the man in Tom’s arms as well as the woman beside the door. “Are they related to you, Tom?”

“Nah, I’m just the one who found them,” the homeless man replied casually while Aleksi carefully lifted the white-haired woman from the cold stone tiles. “Probably need to get them in quick, if your buddy is supposed to get anything good from the harvests.”

“... Too right, my friend,” Aleksi said. He and Elijah shared a look that explained enough for now. “Can you help me get the man up the stairs? I can handle the payment for your work as well, while my buddy prepares for a long night.”

“He’s been promised a dose of leftover Bliss,” Elijah explained before Tom could start lying. Not that he had been any better to the man. “Make it memorable, please.”

“Extra strong?” the giant asked.

“He needs to be able to walk without assistance.”

“Should be doable,” Aleksi muttered, walking towards the stairs while Elijah opened the door to his laboratory. “Please follow me, Tom. And do watch your head here. It’s a little cramped halfway up.”

Elijah tuned out the noise as he walked through his workspace. The familiar smell of ground-up herbs infiltrated his senses as he brought the bag of recent finds to the table. He would normally sort out everything gathered and start processing it all into the proper pastes needed for the next day’s delivery, but his priorities had changed. Olivia would be mad at him for not keeping up with demand, yet that wasn’t important now. He had work to get to.

Mortar and pestle were brought over and put to use, the gas burners were started, and Elijah was able to get some water boiling by the time the door into the room opened up again. That mild smile he’d seen on Aleksi’s face before had vanished.

“Tom?” he asked.

“Going through the concoction in the kitchen. He’ll be drugged out of his mind in a few minutes. Won’t remember a single thing about tonight within the hour,” Aleksi recounted in a calm voice. The giant looked at Elijah’s work, studying the herbs that had been pulled out for use. “You’ve brought in two strangers with ties to a dead Royal Mage and you’re intent on helping them with healing pastes meant for Olivia.”

It was less a question and more just a general statement. Elijah couldn’t detect any anger from his friend, though. There was little negative emotion at all. Only mild curiosity remained.

“This alone won’t help them,” Elijah replied. “I didn’t have the chance to look over their state too thoroughly, but both of them have clear internal bleeding. They need something more.”

“And you intend to give them that extra push to ensure their survival?” Aleksi asked, making Elijah narrow his eyes at him. He didn’t like the smile on the giant’s face. “Between the two of us, I always thought I would be the one to do something idiotic like this. To finally ignore all our rules and risk everything for somebody else.”

“If you’re against my choice, I’m fully willing to let them die and bury their corpses in the basement,” Elijah offered. The smile on the other’s face only grew wider. “If you don’t have anything against it, go upstairs and do a proper inspection of the two. I’ll finish this up and join you in five minutes.”

…

“Never said I was against it,” Aleksi finally relented, a chuckle escaping the giant’s lips as he turned around to check up on the two patients. “Was just hoping we could reach 50 years of hiding before something like this happened.”

Elijah had personally been hoping that nothing like this would ever happen, yet here they were regardless. Ignoring the laughing from outside, he went back to the alchemical task before him. The final ingredients had been crushed into a fine paste. After that, the semi-magical reagents simply needed to be burnt, mixed in with the boiling water, letting the concentration slowly grow as the liquid evaporated, and finally have a generic thickening agent added in to allow for proper usage. After that, the only step needed was to cool it down with ice, and Elijah was now in possession of a basic healing paste. Enough for an entire person if needed or just about enough to take care of two people with a good amount of wounds and bruising.

And it can do so much more if encouraged.

He opened the door into the tiny hallway, taking deep breaths of fresh air as he went up the stairs. As the step was a battle, his legs started to feel the burden of the previous extra weight. Becoming old was too much trouble at this point, yet there was little he could do to stop it.

Instead, he focused on the one part that he could control. A part within him that had been locked away for a long time.

“Is it worse than I predicted?” he asked when he finally got up the stairs and the guest room. It was rarely used, though the two beds inside were always prepared for emergencies.

“Not by much,” Aleksi replied, getting up from the man’s side. The darker skin had paled significantly since Elijah last looked at him. “You’re right that they’ll die before morning. With how much bruising their cores have, I’m surprised they’re still breathing at all.”

“The human body is capable of great things when needed,” Elijah recounted, putting down the jug of paste in between the two bodies. Inside, he could feel his core starting to tremble. Sensations not felt for decades were starting to awaken. “Can you look through storage and check if we have anything that can fit these two? If they live, having them wear whatever this is won’t help anything.”

“... I’ll see what we have.”

Aleksi left, leaving Elijah to take a deep breath and settle himself. Healing paste in hand, he brought it to the larger wound on the man’s chest. The red mixture began to near-instantly seep into the skin, the slightest of changes starting on the surface level, but… this wasn’t enough.

You can do so much more.

But not without guidance. Not without a guiding hand that pushed the magical regents to do their best. Normally, this was near-impossible to accomplish. Even the most masterful alchemists had trouble bringing out the true potential of the medicinal herbs, and Elijah was nowhere near those levels himself.

He didn’t need to be either, as the core inside him finally shed its chains and began to shine in its brilliantly green color.

It felt good, the rust that had built inside his magical veins being cleaned out. Elijah felt better than he had in years, the dull ache in his chest seeming to disappear just a little. This was life. This was the true experience of magic.

“Get working now,” Elijah ordered the paste on the man’s chest. Pressing his hand against it, he felt the threads of mana connect, letting his words have true influence over the mixture. A strengthening in the effects, a deeper cut for effectivity, and an intricate knowledge of how it all progressed. There was nothing hidden from his senses. “Don’t even think about slowing down.”

He let go of the threads, letting the healing concoction work its magic. As he moved to the woman to repeat the starting process with her, the World finally seemed to take notice of his reawakening. A part of him that had been missing for so many decades was shot into his field of view once again.

The proof of his magical core was here, right in front of his eyes with its blue glow obscuring the true world behind it

The System recognizes the Biomancer’s return. We are happy to have you back.

“Good to know you remember me,” Elijah muttered before pushing the blue box away from his vision. He had a long night ahead of him if he was going to make these two live past sunrise.