Level Up Saintess

So my plan for treatment was simple: It’s very hard to tell what’s wrong with a person just by looking most of the time, so I’ll just appraise them first and see what their health and status say. I’m only going to look at those two stats. I don’t want to accidentally look at any tragic backstories and cry; I already have my own to contend with. Hopefully I can fix everything up nicely and it ends smoothly, but life’s rarely ever that easy, so I’ll just have to play it by ear.

 

First up was a dog-girl. She looked excited to meet me, and shook my hand. I did my best to not look awkward and keep my business smile on the whole time. When I scanned her it listed her health as ‘bruised’, but it didn’t say where. …You know, I'm starting to think that maybe I didn’t really think this part through. Chella told me that I needed to think about the exact area that I wanted to heal, but if it just says bruised and doesn’t tell me at all where, then what the hell am I supposed to do? Do I… Do I just ask her where it is? What if she doesn’t even know that she’s bruised? What if she argues that she’s not bruised at all?

 

No. I’m not going to miss out on precious exp just because someone doesn’t believe my diagnosis. Screw that.

 

So, the solution I came up with was just to strong-arm it. I have a ton of energy, so I’ll just trust in it until it becomes a problem. Let’s just picture her entire body and use a basic [Heal] on it.

I placed my hand on her shoulder and opened my eyes a bit wider to try and get a better view of her whole figure.

 

“[Heal].”

 

A thin light covered her entire outline and shone for a brief second before fading away. Before she could even finish lifting her hands up to look at them in amazement, it was already gone. I scanned her over with [Appraisal] once again, and she came up as simply ‘healthy’, so it seemed that my healing had worked. My first try at actually healing another person was a complete success.

 

“Alright, you’re all healed.”

 

“Thank you! I don’t feel achy anymore!”

 

As she said those words to me, a ‘+5xp!’ floated up from her head. I waved goodbye to her as she left and glanced over to my character sheet, noting that I was now at 20/200 exp. That’s already 1/10th of the way to the next level. This should net me a pretty good amount of exp by the end of the day for sure. I also noted that my energy was now only at 1065/1100. Let’s see, I healed myself from that 2 missing health earlier in front of the adventurer's guild, but that only cost 5 energy like it said it would. That tiny bit of missing energy should have all managed to regen by the time I got chased through the slums… And then I used [Heal] on myself 4 times to fix my hands and knees, so that was another 20. So then healing that dog girl cost me 15 energy? Okay. So using [Heal] without a focus takes triple the energy, it seems. Maybe that’s true for all skills, or maybe just for the basic [Heal]. I’ll have to find a time to test it out to see. Could be I'm completely wrong, but I'll take it and run with it for now.

 

The second girl came forward, forcing me out of my thoughts as she shyly said hello. Her voice was a sort of soft husky sound that made my ears tingle a bit. It seemed she was a lizard-person, but if her nose weren’t so flat and she didn’t have those white scales randomly patching her skin, then I don’t think I ever would have noticed. She’s actually quite androgynous looking, but she’s also very pretty I think, although she’s a bit too flat for me, and-

 

Oh. Didn’t Ferr say some of the ‘girls’ are actually boys? I think I remember reading that some lizards are actually hermaphroditic and switch back and forth sometimes. Could it be that even the lizard beast-men here also

-

 

“Um… I-is there something wrong?”

 

Oh no, I made the poor lizard pout since I didn’t shake her hand right away! I desperately grabbed her hand and shook it up and down. I’m sure my smile looks way too big and rushed. I’m sorry miss lizard, I shouldn’t be having such rude thoughts about you right now! Let me do my job properly for you to show how sorry I am!

 

[Appraisal] showed that the lizard-girl had a fractured tail. Specifically, it said ‘Fracture (Tail)’. If it was able to be that specific then why didn’t it do that for the dog-girl’s bruises? Were there just too many for the skill to list effectively or what? At least it’s nice to know that it gets a bit more specific with the more serious problems... Hopefully anyway. I’m just guessing here, so maybe it doesn’t. Guess I’ll need a bigger sample size to really tell.

 

So getting back to business, uh… Did this girl have a tail? I certainly couldn’t see it very well from here.

 

“Excuse me, um… Do you happen to have a tail?”

 

“Oh? Why yes, I do actually, but it broke off recently and I only have a small stub left.”

 

She turned around with a little blush on her cheeks, and I could see the little bump poking at the back of her skirt. I guess something must have happened while it came off to fracture whatever bones were left in it? It did seem like it was maybe poking at an odd upwards angle that most lizard tails didn’t typically grow in. I was tempted to ask her what exactly happened, but… That would probably be terribly rude, and I doubt she’d want to say it in a room filled with people.

 

…Let’s just do our best to be professional, okay? Okay.

 

Looks like this is going to be my first use of [Greater Heal] if I wanna fix that bone. I wonder if it would fix the entire tail, too? Or maybe that’s something that only [Regenerative Heal] would be able to do. I guess we’ll find out after this test, but first-

 

“W-would it be alright… If I touched your tail?”

 

The lizard girl looked surprised for a short moment, but then she understood what was happening and bashfully nodded as she pulled her skirt over enough to give me access to her tail. I can’t lie, the girl’s mighty cute, but that whole scene was more than just a little sexy. It’s going to be hard not blushing along with her at this rate. Just focus, focus, make this quick so it doesn’t get to you. Touch the little tail and do your job already.

 

“[Greater Heal].”

 

The glow around her tail looked slightly brighter than the glow from just a simple [Heal]. Also, I could see the bones in her tail slightly squirming back into place, and the flesh of it looked like it had plumped out and was more healthy now. Even where the skin had knit itself back together was looking like it had healed perfectly, instead of the slightly squirmy line that it had been before. However, it was still just a cute little stub of a tail instead of growing back to whatever length it might have been before. How sad.

 

“...Could you try moving it?”

 

For completely professional reasons of course. I promise.

 

The tiny little stub did a cute little wiggle, almost like a duck wagging off water from its tail, only a bit slower. I could see the lizard girl’s face quickly blossom into a smile almost immediately after she’d moved it.

 

“Wow, it’s really all better now! I was worried I would have to chop it off again if it kept growing like that. Thank you very much, Saintess!”

 

Yup, that smile made everything all worth it. Also, I suppose the ‘+10xp!’ that floated up from her made it even more worth it, but hey, we’re having a moment here.

The cutie dropped her skirt back over her nub and marveled at how it no longer hurt when it rubbed against the fabric. It was a very heartwarming scene. The girl behind her looked impatient for her to move, but I just smiled and watched the lizard while taking the opportunity to peek at my stats out of the corner of my eye.

 

I’m at 30/200 exp now. Seems using [Greater Heal] to fix something gives double the exp that a simple [Heal] does. I’m pretty sure it’s because I solved a harder issue than just healing some bruises, but if it’s somehow due to the fact that [Greater Heal] itself takes more energy or is just a higher tiered skill, then… No, I’m sure the Goddess wouldn’t just let me cheese everything by using unnecessary skills. And besides, using [Greater Heal] costs 30 energy, and although I still have 1035/1100 energy left, it’s actually ticking down at a rather good rate now. I still have almost 30 more people left to look at, and if I have to use an untargeted [Greater Heal] on one of them, then that’s a whole 90 energy! Or at least I think that's how much it'll be. It’s best to just use my energy wisely for now.

 

Well, maybe it does warrant some testing in the future, though.

 

The next girl finally got annoyed enough to push the lizard-girl out of the way and rush up to me for her turn. Rude, but ya know, I get it. She seemed to be quite the young looking dwarf, although considering her race she might actually be like 50 or something, who knows. Her deep red hair was in quite the intricate braids, and oddly enough she didn’t have a beard. Was that normal for female dwarfs in this world, or did she just have to shave it off to appeal to the customers around these parts? Or maybe she’s just too young to have one yet? She does have a bit of peach fuzz on her chin, but that could have been true for anyone, really. Maybe the females just actually don’t grow beards in this world unlike the fantasy crap that I’ve read? I suppose it would be too rude to just straight up ask her, wouldn’t it. Maybe I can ask Chella after thi-

 

“Hey I’m talking to you! Are you gonna fix me or what?!”

 

“Sorry! I’m sorry! Just give me a minute, please!”

 

Aaaah I’m so bad at being professional! I can’t blame her for yelling at me after I ogled her like that. This is what I get for being in a room full of pretty people like this. I wonder if I’d be faster treating the adventurers just because I didn’t want to look at them…

No! You just got yelled at for this! Work!