Belinda watched Piusz frightened appearance and laughed. She heard a lot of gossips about Horác, so she knew how afraid of the students were. Her favorite one was the story, where during midnight Horác’s body turned into liquid. He ‘walked’ around the academy as a mud monster and frightened the students who dared to date late at night. In the beginning, she didn’t understand where this came from, but later she heard the gossip about Horác never had any girlfriend. Because of it, he cursed every lover.

This part made her speechless. It wasn’t that hard to guess this, but some other things mentioned by the students weren’t that easy to notice. Or it was completely impossible to know by others. This made Belinda realize, someone controlled everything from behind. She hoped, she would never find out what was their motivation.

Piusz finally come back to his senses and realized the situation. „You!... You lied to me!”

„Sorry, I can’t miss this chance.” she apologized.

Piusz sighed and stroked his hair. „... Then let’s buy some herbs and find a place.”

„I got 10 herbs from Horác, we can use them now. It isn’t that early.”

„Okay. We can use my old room.” he nodded and showed the way.

Belinda followed him and entered the little familiar room. She looked around and saw that it was still the same. As messy as ever.

„... I didn’t come here in the last month. Only used the room to store some old things.” Piusz turned away. „I’ll clean up right away.”

„It’s okay!” Belinda stopped him. „Just clean a corner and let’s practice.”

Piusz nodded and made enough space for them. They sat down to the opposite side of a table. It was so little, they needed to sit on the floor.

Belinda took out an herb and the things they just bought. She watched the tools one by one and Piusz told her what was it and what was its use. Most of them were similar to the things that were used in an operating room. Belinda felt that she became a doctor and would perform a surgery in the next second. It’s just that her patient was a plant...

Piusz finished introducing the tools and took over the herb. He slowly performed the ’surgery’ and told Belinda every step. It was almost the same as cutting out a tumor.

Some years before, Belinda watched a documentary series about performing different surgeries. Now she really felt that she went back to that time.

„Do you have any questions?” Piusz woke her up from her thought.

„Uh... There’s one. Can’t we use a hypodermic syringe to suck the poison?” it was her first thought after seeing how Horác removed it. She really wanted to try if it could work or not.

„That won’t work. The sack is too weak. You can’t remove the poison enough fast before it’s split.” Piusz sighed. „Some students tried it before. It’ll be easier that way, but they couldn’t find out why the sack destroyed itself. Even some teachers came up with different ideas, but all of them failed...”

Belinda was surprised. „Did they saw how Horác removed it?”

Piusz nodded. „It’s possible. Even I wanted to try it after you told me how he did it.”

Belinda could understand it. It seemed so easy to do and no one thought it was only Horác’s privilege. This step was so troublesome and some pills needed a lot of herbs. Not to mention there were some high level herbs, whose poison’s sack was hard to remove. If they could make it easier...

Belinda’s eyes suddenly lit up.

  Isn’t poison some kind of fluid? Can’t I control it the same way as controlling water?

She was excited. Once she went back to her room, she would give it a try. Even if she couldn’t control it properly, but if its molecule had part of the water’s, then she could make easier her work.

Belinda cheered herself and took out another herb. She slowly followed Piusz instruction and cut out the sack. She felt the sweat run down on her nose. She really wanted to shout ’wipe’ as in those old series. She wanted a third hand and someone, who would give her the tools. Piusz spoke a lot but sorrowfully didn’t help her.

It was just some minutes, but Belinda felt that an hour passed. She tried to lift out the sack, but she didn’t cut enough deep and it broke. The poison flew out and the herb dried out in some seconds.

„Not bad!” Piusz praised her. „You already understood the steps. You only need to practice more.”

Belinda wiped off the sweat from her forehead. „Then let’s go and eat dinner. I’ll practice in my free time and show you my progress the next time.”

Piusz nodded happily. He liked persistent students.

They left the room and went to the cafeteria. Belinda bought some dishes as thanks to Piusz. They eat them slowly and spoke a lot about herbs.

Belinda just stepped on this road, so she didn’t have too many questions. But Piusz told her a lot of things he experienced during his first year or saw later after he became Hiador’s disciple. He had too many stories and it made it hard for Belinda to leave.

After 2 hours, Belinda finally ran back to her dormitory. She was so fast as if someone chased her.

  I forgot he loves to speak so much!

She stopped in front of the building. She couldn’t go in, because half of her classmates stood in her way. She tried to get closer and listened to what they said. Their exam’s result was posted next to the door. It seemed it was mentioned before the exam.

Belinda looked blankly in front of her. She wasn’t interested and completely forgot about it. She looked around and tried to find a way to go in. She wanted to practice and the next morning she would have the chance to see her result.

Her eyes suddenly stopped on a shining person. He looked at her with disdain, then snorted and left.