"How could you do that? The boy is just fifteen," Alklair shouted, and Asmodeos had the decency to look ashamed.

"We risked our lives with much more dangerous odds," Asmodeos spoke, and Alklair took a hold of his shoulders and gave them a rough shake.

"If he dies, I will make sure you end up chained in the heart of the world, this time," Alklair pointed at Leander and then stormed off. Asmodeos watched him go, then he looked at Leander, who was before a blackboard, writing intensively and drawing the occasional diagram.

Liver swelling. Cause, more iron in the body than it is normal. Cure: Avoid iron rich foods such as red meat, and blood-letting. Action to be taken immediately: bloodletting.

But: bloodletting causes problems with the cardiovascular health.

But: I have no time, the mana is swelling my liver too much, and forcing more iron into my blood.

Verdict: get out a pint of blood.

Just as Leander wrote the last one, he nodded, and took out a dagger and a small tube. He cut open a vein and began to fill a jug that was laying on the table.

The healer looked faint as he finished, pale as a ghost, but erased everything from the blackboard and began writing anew.

Blood loss, because of the bloodletting. I need more water and offal.

Leander underlined that, and then took out a bottle of water out of his bottomless bag, and drank it dry. His mana had long since healed his cut vein, so, there was no danger coming from that front.

The healer then took out a box from his bottomless bag that had an ice rune on it. He opened it, to reveal a pig's heart. He smiled at that. Originally, he had packed offal in case either Morris or Dorian got too hurt. That had been months ago. Now, he was finally going to use it.

Leander, with shaky hands, cut up the heart into manageable chunks and took it to the fire. He placed it in a pan and fried it with just a pinch of salt.

As he waited for the heart to cool, he went back to the blackboard.

What do shaking limbs and liver swelling have in common?

No, my limbs are shaking because of the bloodletting.

Could it be? Cirrhosis?

Leander underlined cirrhosis and used mana to check his liver for scarring. He found that his liver had a lot of fat around it, which worried him. But, he also found the scars. They were still in the beginning stage, so, he was sure that, with a bit of mana, he could heal the cirrhosis.

Leander used his A ranked healing spell to begin patching up the liver. He was lucky that Asmodeos had attacked just the liver and nothing else, for the liver was one of the most possible organs that could recover from pretty much everything, as long as at least 20% of it remained undamaged.

In the middle of the healing session, Leander began to feel faint. He went to the fried pig heart and began eating it as he healed himself. Then, he felt a fever coming over him and his eyes widened.

A fever could have come from anything, really. It was not brought about from bacteria, for Asmodeos had not touched him. Instead, letting the mana seep into him.

Leander knew that, seeing as he was already fat, this test would be hard for him. His body was not healthy. Years of overindulging could not be washed away by a couple of months of healthy eating and exercise.

Leander had no wounds, so, it was not brought about from infection, either. What he needed was water and a lukewarm bath, so he could continue to heal his liver.

The blonde guild master wrote that down on the blackboard, and he was off.

Valerie watched him go. She had read what he wrote over his shoulder. As any healer, Leander had begun by healing the symptoms. But, Valerie knew from experience that, until the sickness was diagnosed, a healer would heal the symptoms until the patient died.

She turned to Asmodeos, who was back to reading his book.

"Five hundred years of an exile were not enough for you," she spat, and the necromancer raised an eyebrow at her.

"Do you think him weak, or stupid? Because, I have seen healers throw themselves into healing just with mana, not even bothering with a bloodletting, or thinking that food might help," Asmodeos bit back, and Valerie's frown deepened.

"A dark mage could have given him a mild fever, and then, he would have healed it by now," she argued, only to hear him sigh.

"Leander is the guild master," Asmodeos reminded her. "I am certain that he will become a great healer, one day. If you can't believe in him, why follow him?"

That stopped Valerie in her tracks. A thousand excuses came to mind. The blonde was just fifteen, surely, he did not know that much about healing? But, all those arguments fell flat. Because she had seen Leander use the knowledge he did have to combat a sickness that an SSS ranked necromancer infected him with.

"I am going to go see what Al is up to. Tell him that his heir is one hell of a healer," Asmodeos stood up and dusted himself off. "Unless you want to contradict me?"

Valerie shook her head. There was no denying that Leander worked like a world-class healer.

As the necromancer left, Valerie reflected on her own test. It had been a cut, followed by an infection that had nearly seen her with an amputated arm.

If Leander ended up needing a liver transplant here, in the middle of nowhere, he might just die. But something told Valerie that he was going to pull through, somehow. He always found a way.

In his tent, Leander soaked in the lukewarm bath and let the water bring down the fever. He drank from a water skin every so often, and healed his liver all the while.

He did another thing, something only a dungeon core could do. He got all of Asmodeos's mana out of his system and into the hourglass. One was not expected to keep poison in their body, and Leander was not going to wait until another organ of his began to fail.