Kurayami

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Emily ate the soup, surprised with how good it tasted. It gave her faint reminiscence of better times on Earth, eating vegetable soup during cold Winter days. Though, here it was neither cold nor Winter.

That night, they didn't exchange many more words. The rat man gifted her a bed to lay in. Even though she needed to curve her body against the wall, it ended up being the most comfort she'd felt since arriving in another world. Sleep found her before the sun had fallen all the way, and she'd awoken when the star rose.

Her tired eyes blinked in the small hut, until they flashed to awareness. She spotted the rat already mixing something and leapt to her feet.

"Relax Emily, there are no enemies in this hut."

The kitsune closed her eyes and sighed before sitting across from him. She clasped a mug from Ratagast and took a sip of tea. The warmth of it settled in her stomach, and it coated her throat with a layer of protection.

Ratagast gestured towards her staff. "It looks like that thing has stopped shining. Is that what I think it is?"

Emily looked towards it with a twitch of her ears. The brief image of her tendons hanging in the air flashed into her mind. She cut off the thought and smiled slightly.

"Is that what happened to your arm?"

Emily nodded.

He reached towards the staff with a questioning gaze. "Do you mind?"

The kitsune reached out with hesitation, but after a moment, her remaining hand hung in the air. The thought of letting someone hold her only weapon felt like stabbing herself with her own dagger, but ultimately, she shook her head. As she watched him grab the handle, the fox girl closed her eyes, and took steadying breaths.

He lifted it with his four-fingered rat hands and held it up in the air. Two of his fingers traced the nanobot stitching in the center. Green mana flowed from his fingertips into the item, and he finished after a few seconds of surrounding it with a glowing aura.

Ratagast turned towards her with a grin and held it out. "You have a special class, don't you?"

Emily's ears twitched as she accepted the staff, her eyes growing wide. "I am not entirely sure."

The rat placed his hand along his chin, stroking the fur beneath his snout. "Show me your magic."

Emily stared blankly at him and thought about her reserves of power. She had reservations about using it to show off, especially if she'd need it in an emergency. Her thoughts roamed towards the previous scientist who'd inspected her as if she was an item. She swallowed and shook her head, her tail waving behind her uncomfortably.

Ratagast shrugged. "Suit yourself." He sighed and sat back down across from her. "I am going to collect some plants today if you want to join me."

"Why?"

"Well, the food doesn't come freely. I have to get it from somewhere. There is a lot of bounty in this part of the swamp. All the more reason, we must protect it."

Emily thought back to that coiling snake and how it easily killed a large crocodile. How would a singular rat protect against something like that? Maybe it was magic? He did start a fire easily with his fingertips, but he doesn't look very strong.

Her curiousity came surging back, and she wanted to use her cybernetic eye. However, this had been the only person she'd had the pleasure of conversing with in a long time that wasn't out to prod at her body. She wanted to open up and say more, but her tail drooped between her legs.

Ratagast opened the door, and Emily hurried after him.

The morning sunlight filtered in through the canopy of trees. Warmth glowed against her skin, and the sounds of buzzing insects filtered into her ears. Though, her ears twitched to all new sounds. Something that she hadn't heard in a while. It was the distant chirping of a bird.

Emily's focus drifted to Ratagast who cast a sidelong glance at her. His nose twitched, and a small smile played out on his face.

He moved forwards with much more grace than a rat should have. His long tail dragged behind him in the dirt, but he stood upright. His rounded ears wiggled from the sounds of the swamplands around them.

The kitsune followed after him with hurried steps.

"They call this place the Orcinium Swamplands after the Orcish conquerors of old." The rat knelt down next to a grey plant. "They brought with them these Orcimer vines."

He pulled a scalpel from his waistband and cut the vines out of the ground. They started wilting right away in his hands. "They wilt fast like this, but you can eat them. Here."

Ratagast handed her a bit of crumbled vine, and Emily stared at it blankly. The grey thing had turned completely brown, and was now crumbling in her hands. She waited for the rat man, and he obliged her silent request, taking the first bite of a newly clipped vine. Even after watching him, she still had to double check.

After watching him turn around, her right eye narrowed again into a target.

This thing is really edible? Does it taste good, though?

She lifted it hesitantly towards her lips and bit down on it. It crumbled in her mouth with ease, and she crunched on it. By itself, it didn't have that much of a flavor, but the texture reminded her of breaded onions. The crunch sent a delightful twinge of joy through her body, and her tail waved idly behind her.

Ratagast stared at her with a knowing grin before turning away. The next plant they'd found was one she'd already seen before several times. The glowing yellow flowers clued her into it.

Though, his technique at collecting the potatoes was much better. He channeled green magic into his fingertips and pressed them onto the ground. The potatoes started coming to the surface on their own.

"The flowers don't wilt?"

Ratagast shook his head. And opened a small pouch on his side. Incredibly, all of them slid into it and disappeared. Once again, Emily found herself wanting to use her cybernetic eye on it and hesitating.

"This is the best way to harvest them. If you start digging up the roots or cutting away at the stalk, you will kill the plant. It's very sensitive to our touch." To showcase his point, he hovered his hand near one of the flowers, and the yellow light started to dim a bit. "These can be harvested as well in dire cases."

"In dire cases?"

"If a victim of fatigue is dying, you can gather the flowers and make a strong stimulant."

Emily didn't respond and waited for the man to move onto the next plant. This one was much different. It was a type of small tree, and it glowed with little red berries on it. To Emily, it reminded her of a banzai tree, and the berries were like small apples.

"These are much more rare, and you won't find many in the swamp." He plucked several berries, and the tree's glow started fading. "Much like with the yellow flowers, this tree will die. Only...the type of nature magic you need to preserve this is far out of my wheelhouse. I imagine it's in the realm of elves."

The kitsune's ears twitched from the mention of elves. Once again, her mind was pulled to a time before torture. To a time where she was simply a member of the military and when reading was a pastime. The idea of long-haired beautiful women and those long ears she'd always wondered about.

Ratagast started crushing the red berries in his hand, and with his other hand, he gestured the kitsune to come closer. Once she was in front of him, he pointed towards her missing arm. "Remove the bandages."

She was stunned for a moment, yet the rat held no glimmer of an ulterior motive behind his glasses. His eyes looked at her as if she was a person, not a lab sample.

Emily unraveled her silk gauze and exposed her scabbed elbow to the rat. More phantom pain assailed her when the wind touched it. She winced and took a deep breath, allowing the rat to come closer.

Ratagast pressed the red berry juice against her rotting skin, but instead of pain, she was flooded with a sense of warmth. It was similar to the potion she'd taken in the dungeon, and he only pressed it in more, spreading the salve with his fingertips. "This will not give back what was lost, but it will make you feel better."

She looked down at her elbow and saw it glow with the same red as the plant. Bits of mana attacked all of her pain receptors and dulled them before the arm started closing itself up. After a few seconds, all of the rot and grime was gone. The only thing that remained was the skin around her elbow where her forearm used to be.

He grinned up at her. "Now you wont have to worry about bandaging it up anymore."

Emily looked down at him, unsure of what to say or do. Her mouth opened and closed, and tears pricked at the corner of her eyes again. When was the last time someone was kind to me?

Ratagast clicked his tongue and turned away from her. "If you cry, I am not going to let you sleep in my hut again."

The kitsune choked down her tears and followed after him. Though, even with his back turned to her, she could see the smile on the rat's face. She could feel how satisfied he was with himself. It was like someone taking care of a wounded animal.

Her tail waved behind her, this time in a happy manner. She followed him back to the hut after gathering several more plants. Ratagast had taken the time to explain each of them, but after a few, they started blending together.

Yellow potatoes for stamina, red berries on a small tree for health, and blue berries for mana. This grey plant is edible, that green plant is not. This mushroom is edible, that mushroom is not. These greens are the ones we had yesterday, those greens are the ones where there will be no tomorrow.

And even though, she could hear distant sounds of other animals, the most she'd seen were bugs. The same large dragonflies that greeted her in the bog were still common out here. When she asked Ratagast why there were no animals coming up to them, the answer she got back was not unexpected.

"Most animals don't want to come to the edge of the blight. They're smart enough to stay clear of this place. Bugs aren't intelligent to begin with, and unfortunately for the plants, they can't move."

Ratagast started mixing even more plants in a much larger pot. This time, he'd expected a guest and prepared properly for it. Most of the plants they'd gathered were integrated into the mixture, and the rat reached up towards the same powder to make the soup's stock.

With a flick of his wrist, he'd ignited the magic sigils on his pot, and it began cooking the ingredients with a bit of water. As that started to boil, the rat's attention focused back on his companion.

"I have something for you." He pointed towards her staff. "However, you must agree to show me your magic. It's important for the item."

Emily nodded. All of her previous reluctance had drifted away with her now grumbling stomach and painless arm. She channeled mana down her staff, and nanobots started forming in the air. "I can control these with my mind."

The rat looked at the floating swarm of robotic mana transistors and stroked his chin again. He narrowed his eyes behind his glasses. "What kind of things can you do with them? It appears to me like some kind of metal magic. I take it you used it to repair your staff?"

Emily shook her head. "I did use it to repair my staff, but that's not the only thing it can do." She allowed the bots to form a circle in the air, and in the middle of it, they created heat by sparking against each other. "And that's not all...I have been able to make projectiles or stronger light sources."

To demonstrate, she lit up the lantern on the end of her staff, only to make it brighter after a few seconds.

Ratagast's eyes widened for a second, but he fixed his expression and faked a cough into his hand. "Well, it is certainly a unique class. That, I can be sure of. I've never seen a mage with this ability."

"Have you traveled around a lot?" Emily asked.

Ratagast shrugged. "As much as a single rat can, but I've read books. In all of my years, I've not come across something like this. Usually, these rare classes can be attributed as gifts from the gods. Do you have a devotion?"

Emily nodded. "Kurayami..."

She expected some kind of reaction, but the rat simply stared at her.

"Does she have another name? Perhaps in a different language?"

"I don't know."

He sighed. "I see, well, if you find it out one day, be sure to share it with me. Now, it's time to do what I promised."

Ratagast pulled a large branch from his small satchel, and he placed it on the table. "Grab this and put it against your arm. I think you have a chance to grow it back, using this magic."

Emily's eyes widened and she stared at the branch, searching for any signs of it being special. Though, all she could see was a brown log. There was no glow to it or anything. She could only tilt her head at the rat, her ears flopping with the motion.

He grabbed the log himself and started channeling his green magic into it. Within a few moments, more small branches grew from it, and leaves sprouted at the end of them. With the same power, he was able to recall the small branches back into it.

"I am what could be called a nature magic user, and you have a similar ability, do you not." He looked purposefully towards Emily's staff where the cybernetics in the middle joined the two previously broken halves. "Why don't you attach a limb to the end of your arm? Much like how you can control the lantern, you should be able to control your hand."

Emily sighed. "I already thought to do that, but I couldn't create a limb with only the nanobots."

"Nanobots..." The rat stopped his own thoughts with a shake of his head. "Never mind that, your magic is more suited for tasks like this. How did you join those two halves of your staff together?"

"I stitched them with the bots..."

"And it created that metal ring, right? All you need to do is connect this branch to the end of your arm, and I will use my own magic to form it into a familiar shape."

Kurayami