“Good morning. You must be Oliver. My name is Jayr. I’m the doctor who treated you when you were found critical injured in the forest.” Doc, Jayr, introduced himself. He put the index finger of his right hand on his heart and bowed his head.

“Yes. Good morning.” I greeted him in kind.

“Amanda says you’re not much of a talker. That’s alright, but please tell me if you have any discomfort or pain. It would make my job a lot easier.” He said the last part in a murmur, but I couldn’t still barely hear it.

“Amanda, how was his condition?” Jayr asked Amanda who was sitting on a stool on the side.

“I changed his bandages last night.” So she’s the one who did it. “Although there was a lot of blood lost, Oliver here drank all the medicine so he’s fine for now. There weren’t any infections or diseases that I could tell, but that’s up to your diagnosis.”

Doctor Jayr looked surprised. His eyes widened and he looked at me when he heard that I drank all the medicine. “That’s surprising. Most people would completely spit all of that stuff out the moment it touched their tongue. I’d even put a more concentrated dose so that even if a patient swallowed only one mouthful, they’d get a decent bit of medicine.”

It was my turn to be surprised. Did I just overdose myself involuntarily?

As if he read my mind, he said “Don’t worry about drinking too much of this stuff. At worst it would give you an upset stomach and a bad aftertaste. It would help heal your body in the long run.”

Amanda stood up. “Well, I guess my job here is done. I’ll be going back to the guild. It’s going to be noon soon so I have to go. See ya Oliver.” She waved goodbye as she left the room. I waved my hand back.

“Okay, I will ask you a few questions. Please sit straight and breathe deeply. You only woke up just yesterday right?” He inquired, taking out a smooth wooden rod.

“Yes.” As I responded, he pointed the stick at my chest, sort of like how you would with a stethoscope.

Not noticing my bafflement, he continued asking questions. “Do you feel any severe pain? Do you have any difficulty breathing, or difficulty moving your limbs?”

“... The places with my wounds sting somewhat, but I can bear it. I can’t move my legs though.” I hesitantly responded. He moved to my back and I could feel the wooden stick poking at the area near my vertebrae.

I’m getting worried now. Is this one of those “quack doctors” I’ve seen in N*tional Ge*graphic? What is he doing with that stick?

“Have you felt anything strange in your body? Anything at all.” He asked an incredibly vague question. How am I supposed to respond to that?

“I’m not sure what you mean by ‘strange’. I can’t feel my legs and my body hurts. That’s about it.”

“...” I couldn’t see doc behind me but I could still feel the stick. He suddenly became oddly quiet. I couldn’t help feeling uncomfortable.

“... Doctor Jayr?”

“Hahhh... What were you doing in that forest in the first place?” it seemed he had let go of all pretenses. He roughly scratched his head which ruffled his hair. Now instead of looking like a friar, he looked more like a tired lab scientist.

Now I started to feel sorry. I remembered that Amanda said that he was the one who helped me get past critical condition. Even if he’s a quack in some regards, he still does his job properly.

“It’s...” I hesitated. How exactly do I explain to a layman that I was a 17 year old scientist using an international research laboratory’s greatest invention and possibly the most dangerous machine in the whole world for my own personal reasons? And because of that machine, I was thrown an unspecified distance away, and that basically UFO-like wreckage outside was actually an escape pod inexplicably built into the laboratory’s emergency exit in the assumption that said incredibly dangerous technology would fail at some point.

“Ahp! Nevermind. Forget that I asked. You don’t have to tell me. Or rather, I don’t want you to tell me. I feel like I’ll be involved in something incredibly annoying.” He interrupted.

“...”

I was honestly astonished. Should a doctor be taking this sort of attitude to his patients? Though he’s probably a quack. It’s reassuring knowing that he won’t pry too deeply.

“I’ll fix my questions. Did you eat anything bizarre recently? Any strange occurrences?” He asked more frankly. Different from earlier, the former is sort of like an interviewer reading off the listed questions, while the latter are impromptu questions based off of the state of my body and his experience.

“No. Why do you ask?”

“That’s because of the state of your body. It wouldn’t be strange if you just fell apart into a pile of mush and died before, but somehow you’re still alive, with prospects of recovery even.” He looked at me with a gaze that was similar to someone looking at a strange creature.

That’s definitely Ez’s work. The recovery protocol works a lot better than I thought it would. I’ll slate it for the commercial market after I tweak it some more when I get home. Those old geezers are gonna go wild when this comes out.

“The only thing that would explain your crazy recovery is that you ate a legendary fruit somewhere in the forest before you got hit.” He sighed. “I’ll give you a rundown of your body’s state. When we admitted you, you were no better than a slab of meat.”

‘a slab of meat’ isn’t a nice description to hear about yourself at all.

“Your body was mangled, your bones were pulverised and your blood was splattered everywhere. Yet now, although you still have large wounds and traumas, you’re a lot better than before. Your legs still won’t be functional for a while though.”

“... I see.” I need to wait before I can move huh. That’s inconvenient.

He observed my impassive face for a moment. “I don’t have the tools to treat your legs here. I’ll need to get them delivered from the capital, but that will take a few weeks. Sorry, but you will have to stay in here for that long.”

...? No, wait. Somethings not adding up here.

“Do you have any wheelchairs here?” I hesitantly asked.

“W-eel cha-yre? What’s that?” He looked at me, confused.

The translator didn’t get my intentions across. Damn. It seems there’s no equivalent to a wheelchair in their language. I’m also not aware of any words to be a replacement, and I can’t explain it well.

“Do you have anything to write on?”

“Ah, Uhm, yes here.” He passed me a yellowish-brownish sheet of... parchment?

“... Parchment?” Are they serious? Even this is reproduced... Their dedication is incredible. Not in a good way. How am I supposed to write on this? Shouldn’t documents of a doctor be on legitimate paper? This guy really is a quack.

“Sorry, I don’t have the money for anything better. You’ll have to settle for goatskin.” He huffed, displeased. What do you mean? Paper is less than a traction of a fraction of the price of this thing.

As I held the yellow parchment in hand, I could feel the roughness and thickness of it. It was half a millimeter thick, which is already way too big to be paper. He even passed me a stylus and a bottle of ink. My god.

As I complained in my head, I slowly scratched out a rough sketch of a wheelchair. It took much longer than I wanted to, and some splotches of ink messed up my drawing.

Beside me, Jayr looked incredulously at what I was doing, but gradually his gaze turned more serious. Once I was done with my sketch, he held the parchment and observed it very closely for a while.

“I was talking about this. This is a sort of vehicle for people who are disabled so that they can move even if they can’t physically move their own bodies.” I explained. “It’s just a rough sketch so the functions aren’t properly shown, but you should know what this is right?”

“... Oliver.” His voice sounded much more serious, lacking the slightly languid air he had before.

“... Yes?”

“You won’t need to pay for the medical treatment. Just give this to me. No, I’ll even pay you for it.” He said in earnest. His eyes held a fiery passion in them, like a starved man put in front of a feast.

... Uhm, what?

“I’m sorry?” I was confused. Why does it look like he has never seen the concept of a wheelchair before? Aren’t these pretty widespread, even in small communities and tribes? I’m getting a bad feeling...

Contrary to Oliver’s unease, Jayr was ecstatic.

‘If I use this, I can give it as a gift to the cardinal and I can get a promotion!’ He had already begun calculating and planning in his head...

...

“Hey, do you mind explaining the structure in-depth? I’m going to commission a craftsman to build it for you.” Jayr stated.

“I don’t mind, but why?” Oliver asked.

“What do you mean ‘why’? You made this incredible thing, you should know how it works.”

“I didn’t create it... In the first place, it’s just a simple construct. I don’t understand why you would go so far.”

“You...” Jayr was speechless. ‘Does he not realize how valuable this object is? The old cardinal has always been complaining about how uncomfortable it is to ride a horse with his old age just to go on a stroll. All those old codgers would be foaming at the mouth to have this thing!’

Unless...

“If you’re thinking about the cost of the object itself, I will shoulder the expenses. The... wheelchair, was it? It will belong to the clinic when you’re done using it, so don’t worry.”

“No, that wasn’t what I... Nevermind.” Oliver became quiet somewhat reluctantly.

‘It isn’t too big of a deal. He’s the one using money anyway. I’m guessing from the lack of knowledge of wheelchairs, I’m probably somewhere significantly more remote than I first estimated. This might be a problem..’ He thought pensively.

“Here, you can make a more proper illustration on these.” Jayr brought out white sheets which almost looked like paper. The only difference was that the vellum was a little thicker than a sheet of Oslo paper and it didn’t fold. It also had a strange sort of texture that wasn’t quite like paper, but it was still smooth.

‘So they do have actual paper.’ Oliver failed to notice the subtle differences though, or rather, he just didn’t care.

“I’ll start from top to bottom. Here are the handles where...” He then proceeded to explain the various parts of a wheelchair in-depth.

“mm...” Jayr initially listened carefully, but soon his expression started to turn strained. Gradually Oliver’s discussion went beyond his scope of understanding.

“These are primarily built using steel for durability, but it could be built with aluminum instead to allow for a lighter structure, but steel is preferred for this folding structure-“

“Stop, stop, stop.” Jayr interrupted him. “I can’t understand what you’re saying anymore, but get the gist of it. I’ll bring the craftsman to you instead and you two can talk it out.”

“Mm, okay.” Oliver agreed.

“Amanda said you were quiet. I thought the same at first, but you can be pretty chatty too when it comes down to it huh.” Jayr stated.

Oliver didn’t say anything to refute that.

——————————

Hey guys, it’s me. Sorry about not updating last week. A whole bunch of things came up and I didn’t have the time nor the mood to write. It’s mostly settled down now so I’ll be able to write constantly again. I’ll release this chapter, and then another chapter later, then expect a third chapter sometime in the middle of the week, and finally the fourth chapter next Saturday once again. The action will pick up soon enough so look forward to it.

As always, any feedback is appreciated.