Chapter 40: Expensively Free

“Sir knight, I have cured your legs. Could you check them for any issues?” Eli puffed out her chest as she cleaned the table where she treated Bernard. Count Shadowstep had given Eli permission to treat the wounded soldiers at a building near the town square.

Eli thought she would need to do it in a shack near the wall or something. Most free clinics were in a somewhat rundown state back on Earth due to the lack of funding, but the citizens here assaulted her with free housing. Rich and poor men alike offered their places as free clinics and were even willing to pay Eli to use their property.

Eli didn’t realize how tightly knit the community inside Shadowstep was. It was no exaggeration to say that everyone knew everyone. Knights were a lucrative job, so merchants knew all their faces, as they were the ones to drive the economy here with their wages. A knight lost meant lower security and less salary for them to spend on the populace.

“Thank you, Lady Elidranthia. I thought my life would be over when I lost my legs. Thanks to you, I can support my family and they will not suffer through the upcoming winter.” The knight knelt and bowed so hard that his head reached the floor.

“It’s fine. Thank you for protecting us. May I rely on you to further protect Shadowstep? Please watch your back in the future, alright? Don’t get injured against monsters again.”

“Of course, Milady. I will dedicate every inch of my life to this land! Thank you.”

The knights and even the civilians outside cheered when they saw Bernard leaping out from the clinic, his steps light as he skipped around the fountain. The square turned into a festival as peddlers offered discounts to passersby. News about how the scion of Shadowstep was performing free healing sparked a buzz within the community. It was not a simple healing from a low-rank light mage, but limb regeneration, too. It was a rare spectacle. In fact, Shadowstep County has never seen limb regeneration in its county before.

“Alright, next! Ugh…” Eli held herself at the monumental task before her. A destitute man, his body exuded a pungent odor of feces and urine, his face crestfallen, like a sick dog waiting at a hole to die. He had lost not only one leg like Bernard, but his right hand and the lower half of his body were eaten by monsters—a fate more tragic than Bernard’s. Two soldiers lifted him onto the table. Eli recognized him. He was the knight she had saved yesterday. Eli was about to ignore the stench and cure him, but Jadenbale was having none of it. He roared at both the man and the soldiers for bringing such filth before her lady.

“Oi! Both of you, why did you bring him here like this? Couldn’t you at least bathe him and give him new clothes to wear? How unsightly! Remember, you stand before not only the scion of Count Shadowstep, but the first mage of Shadowstep! Get this man something proper to wear!” Jadenbale said.

The man was like a dead fish; he neither talked nor responded to Jadenbale’s scolding. Eli would have believed he was dead if not for the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.

“Yes, sir! Right away, sir.” Two soldiers, presumably his former squad mates, saluted and carried the lifeless man away.

“He will need a while to heal,” Eli said.

“Should we move him to the last line?” Jadenbale asked. Eli shook her head.

“No. At the very least, I will regenerate his right hand. There’s a lot he can do with both arms intact. It wouldn’t be fair not to heal him. He already came here, after all.”

“Understood.”

Half an hour later, the man returned in new clothes. A bit of pungent smell still lingered, but it was far better than before. Eli unsheathed her dagger and drew blood from the stump of his hand. Then she began working her magic. Golden light flourished over his wound; every cell of his body rejuvenated, obeying Eli’s command to replicate. Slowly but surely, the stump elongated. His arm, which had been eaten halfway, grew until the wrist. Then, with a final spurt, Eli forced more mana into him, growing his fingers.

Phew! That was tiring!

“Hurray! Long live Lady Elidranthia! Our supreme mage!” The knights hopped in joy, their hands raised in the air. The lifeless man gazed blankly at his hand.

“Please accept my apologies, for this was the best I could do at the moment. I am but a new face in the arts of the arcane. I will work hard later to cure your legs later,” Eli said.

“Thank you, Lady Elidranthia. I will strive to meet your expectations.” The man bowed. It was not just his hand, but life seemed to have returned to his eyes. He looked five years younger as a smile appeared for the first time.

Unlike before, Eli knew when to quit. Her father had warned her that he would forbid this event if he found her collapsing again. That was when Jadenbale stood up.

“Sorry, Kain. But you will have to be moved to the back line after this.”

“Eh, why? It’s just the legs left! Please! The light healer in Slane County charged over 300 gold for this! There is no way I can pay them! I promise I will continue to dedicate my life to Count Shadowstep!” the knight said, his voice unintentionally rising. It felt cruel—his hope of gaining a normal life, which had only just been revived, was slashed to pieces.

“We want to put as many soldiers back into enrollment as soon as possible. You know the rules: lighter injuries first, saving as many lives as possible. The same rules apply here,” Jadenbale said. Several of these soldiers were still technically recruited, and in Shadowstep, if you were still enrolled, you had to work. Jadenbale was trying to evade as much paperwork as possible by declaring them wounded instead of permanently injured.

“But I will still get cured in the end, right?”

“Of course.” Jadenbale nodded.

News traveled at the speed of light. Both the Count and Elidranthia thought they would only need to heal ten men. After all, that was the number of knights who had permanent injuries, and the reports did not lie. Eli thought she would be finished with them in a week or two, but the crowd did not disperse. More and more knights with permanent injuries lined up for free health care sponsored by her. Even after a month, the number of disabled soldiers lining up before her clinic grew instead of shrinking.

“Sir Jadenbale? Was he a Shadowstep knight?” Eli asked, feeling suspicious. She didn’t remember every knight’s name, but she was sure she had never seen this man before.

“I was a knight of Shadowstep! Ten years ago, I got this injury when a stampede invaded our lands.” The knight, who had lost most of the fingers on his right hand, groaned. Life in the medieval world for commoners was harsh—Eli knew this, but she hadn’t seen it firsthand. People died and were injured all the time due to monster attacks. “I used my pension to become a peddler in Duke Luca’s territory! I am willing to return to Shadowstep as a knight if you heal my hand!”

Eli recalled Shadowstep had been around for at least 200 years. During that time, stampedes happened at least twice a year, and soldiers got hurt—sometimes permanently—every time. She was not looking at ten casualties from the last stampede, but possibly a hundred or more.

“Um… sorry, but we do not recruit men past their forties.” Jadenbale answered.

“Alright. If your identity is proven, I will heal you. You don’t have to return to the army.” Eli sighed. It was her fault for not excluding knights from years prior, and it would feel unfair if she quit now. She had said she would heal all knights of Shadowstep as thanks for their effort in defending the city. She was amazed that this man had come all the way from Duke Luca’s territory to here on such short notice. The journey alone should have taken him at least two weeks.

“Thank you for healing me. Please accept this as a token of my gratitude. I may not be in Shadowstep anymore, but my heart will always be with all of you,” the man said as he offered a box toward Elana. Inside was a silver necklace with a pearlescent white gemstone—his most prized treasure.

“Please wait, past knight of Shadowstep. You didn’t have to pay.” Before Eli could refuse, the man had already left.

Problems began surfacing one after another. After that stunt, various hopeful people began to show up. Eli suddenly regretted her decision to raise a free clinic. Not because she didn’t enjoy healing people, but because people with attitude showed up.

“I am a knight of Duke Bron! Count Shadowstep is a vassal of Duke Bron. Could you extend this service to his knights as well? We defended the Althemer Empire on the western front. We need your expertise in restoring limbs. Those in Slane territory charge an obscene amount for this—it is unacceptable!”

“Could you heal my injured son and daughter as well? We live in Shadowstep, in a neighboring village.”

“I am Baron Khire, a vassal of Count Shadowstep. Please, extend this service to my son as well. He was born without a right hand. We have been loyal vassals of Shadowstep for a hundred years. Please, grace us with your benevolence.”

A hopeful crowd began to gather before her clinic. Instead of gratitude, complaints piled up on Count Shadowstep’s desk. The crowd grew so large that even the town plaza could not contain the crowd that wanted to watch. A thought surfaced in their minds: could the little girl heal them all? When would it be their turn if she could only heal one or two people a day?

So, they grew restless. Instead of gratitude, they complained—using underhanded methods such as leveraging their connections to dukes, proclaiming loyalty to Shadowstep, or even offering money.

“Ugh… even the duke himself wants to talk to me. Eli! I thought you were just curing those ten knights!” Count Shadowstep groaned. He knew Eli was not at fault. He had been too greedy, trying to waive the severance pay for those ten knights—and now it had blown out of proportion.

“Um… I am sorry. It was my mistake. I should have properly clarified that it was only for recent Shadowstep knights.” Eli bowed her head. She didn’t mind becoming a doctor—saving people had always been her dream—but the problem was how these desperate people caused trouble for her father by leveraging their status and money to cut in line.

Several boxes of fine dresses and jewelry were now piled in the corner of her room, sent by her father’s vassals hoping to coax her into healing their relatives. Eli later discovered that some of those vassals weren’t even sick—they just wanted her favor in case misfortune struck later.

She couldn’t entirely fault them. In three months, she would leave for the pre-school in the capital, and her days as a healer here would be over. With hundreds, perhaps thousands, still waiting outside her clinic, there was no way she could tend to them all.

Besides, Shadowstep never intended for her to remain a doctor forever. There would be social gatherings she needed to attend—tea parties, salons, and courtly affairs. This clinic was supposed to be a modest achievement she could point to, something to make her stand out politely in conversation. Instead, it had spiraled into something much larger.

The crowd knew it too, and their desperation showed.

“Well then, how about this, milord? I have an idea,” Alicia spoke up. Her presence throughout the entire chapter was nowhere to be found despite always being at Elidranthia’s side. She was one of the main characters in this novel as well.