The road to Aldenmoor stretched endlessly before them, winding through forests and valleys, past villages and towns that grew progressively larger as they approached the capital. Each day brought new sights, new challenges, and new opportunities for Arin to grow stronger.
He practiced relentlessly.
Magic in the mornings, when his mind was fresh and his mana reserves were full. Physical exercise in the afternoons, pushing his small body to its limits with running, climbing, and basic combat drills that Lia taught him. Meditation in the evenings, learning to feel the ebb and flow of mana within his body, understanding its rhythms and patterns.
And slowly, he was improving—but it was too slowly for his liking.
His earth magic remained weak—barely enough to move small stones or create minor tremors—but his mana pulse grew sharper, more controlled. He could now direct it with precision, carving specific patterns into trees rather than just releasing wild bursts of energy. It was still exhausting, still draining, but it was progress.
Lia watched him train with a mixture of pride and something darker—something she kept carefully hidden behind her stoic expression.
*He's getting stronger,* she thought. *Stronger every day.*
*Soon, he won't need me anymore.*
She pushed the thought away, but it lingered like a shadow.
---
The further they traveled, the more Arin learned about the world.
And the more he learned, the more he realized how little he truly understood.
The economy of this world was not what he had expected. In the cities, there was wealth—merchants in fine silks, nobles in gilded carriages, academies with towering spires of white stone. But in the countryside, there was poverty. Farmers struggling to feed their families. Villages with no healers, no protection, no hope.
The war had taken its toll.
Humanity was surrounded by enemies—elves, beastkin, goblins, and countless other races that saw humans as weak, vulnerable, ripe for conquest. The reason was simple: men. Human men were rare, precious, and the other races wanted them. For entertainment. For show. For power. For reasons Arin didn't want to think about.
And so humanity fought. Endlessly. Desperately.
Resources that could have gone to feeding the poor, healing the sick, building infrastructure—all of it went to the war effort. Soldiers needed weapons. Soldiers needed armor. Soldiers needed healers.
Which brought Arin to the Healer's Guild.
He had heard of it before, of course. But as they traveled, he began to understand its true importance.
The Healer's Guild was the backbone of human survival. Every healer, from the most basic spell-caster to the most advanced magical surgeon, had to be registered with the Guild. It was the only way to legally practice healing, the only way to receive training, the only way to access the resources needed to save lives.
And healers were rare.
Incredibly rare.
It took years—decades, even—to train a single competent healer. The magical theory alone was enough to break most students. The practical application required precision, control, and an intuitive understanding of the body that few possessed.
The cost of healers could be defined by one simple fact: most of the resources went to healing soldiers fighting in the war zones. Humanity's survival depended on those soldiers, and keeping them alive required an enormous amount of magical energy and material. Making healing potions was tough—it required many, many elixirs to make even a simple pill. The ingredients were rare, the process was delicate, and the failure rate was high.
Not even that—healing consumed too much mana. Even Arin acknowledged this. The reason he was able to cast long-term healing spells was because he pinpointed attacks at the injury part and not the whole wound area, which helped him conserve mana. If he were to cast a wide-range healing spell, he might not survive 5 minutes of it—whereas an average female healer might survive eight minutes at most.
What Arin could do—what came to him as naturally as breathing—was considered a gift from the gods.
He didn't know that. Not really.
To him, healing was just... something he did. Something that felt right. Something that flowed through him like water, pure and instinctive.
But to others, it required years of practice—day in and day out—to comprehend the human body and perform even basic healing.
---
They stopped at a small village called Thornwell, nestled in a valley between two forested hills.
It was a poor place—barely more than a collection of wooden huts clustered around a well. The people were thin, their clothes patched and worn, their eyes hollow with hunger and fear.
Arin noticed the woman immediately.
She was sitting outside one of the huts, cradling a small child in her arms. The child—a girl, no more than three years old—was pale, her breathing shallow and labored, her tiny body wracked with fever.
Arin stopped walking.
"Lia," he said quietly. "That child..."
Lia followed his gaze and frowned. "Arin, we need to keep moving. We don't have time—"
"She's dying."
The words hung in the air between them.
Lia's jaw tightened. "Arin, we can't—"
"I can help her."
"Arin—"
"Please."
He looked up at her, and Lia felt her resolve crumble. Those eyes—those impossibly beautiful eyes—were filled with a compassion that made her chest ache.
*Damn it.*
"Fine," she said through gritted teeth. "But we do this quickly. And you don't overexert yourself. Understood?"
Arin nodded, already moving toward the woman.
---
The mother's name was Christine. She was a widow—she had been lucky to have a husband once, but he was captured by the elves in an invasion, leaving her to raise their daughter alone. The child's name was Mira, and she had been sick for weeks.
"I've tried everything," Christine said, tears streaming down her face. "The herbs, the prayers, the charms—nothing works. The nearest healer is three days away, and I don't have the money to pay for treatment even if I could get there."
Arin knelt beside her, placing his hand gently on Mira's forehead. The child's skin was burning hot, her pulse weak and thready.
"May I?" he asked.
Christine looked at him—really looked at him. A child himself, really. What could she possibly do?
But there was something in her eyes.
"Please," she whispered. "Save my daughter."
Arin closed his eyes.
Mana flowed through him, warm and bright, and he directed it into Mira's body. He could feel the sickness—a virulent infection that had spread through her lungs, her blood, her very bones. It was aggressive, relentless, consuming her from the inside out.
But Arin was stronger.
He pinpointed the source of the infection—a cluster of corrupted tissue in her left lung—and focused his mana there. Not a wide-range healing spell, which would have drained him in minutes. A precise, targeted attack.
The infection fought back. It was stubborn, clinging to life with a tenacity that surprised him. But Arin didn't relent. He pushed harder, his mana burning through the corruption like fire through dry grass.
Minutes passed.
Sweat beaded on Arin's forehead. His hands trembled. His mana reserves dipped lower and lower.
*Just a little more...*
And then, finally, the infection broke.
Arin felt it give way, felt the corrupted tissue dissolve and fade. He redirected his mana, encouraging Mira's body to heal itself, to rebuild what had been destroyed.
When he opened his eyes, the child's breathing was steady. Her skin was cool to the touch. Her pulse was strong.
"She'll be fine," Arin said, his voice hoarse with exhaustion. "She needs rest, fluids, and warmth. But she'll live."
Christine stared at him, her eyes wide with disbelief.
"How—how did you—"
"I'm a healer," Arin said simply.
He tried to stand, but his legs buckled beneath him. Lia was there in an instant, her arm around his waist, supporting him.
He actually had a lot of mana—but he had an intense session with Lia in the morning, and thus he had exhausted most of it, leaving only a little for the healing.
"We need to go," Lia said, her voice tight.
"Wait—" Christine reached for them. "Please, let me pay you. I don't have much, but—"
"No payment," Lia said sharply. "Just—" She paused, glancing around at the small crowd that had gathered. "Just don't tell anyone about us. Keep her face to yourself. Understand?"
Christine nodded quickly. "Of course. Of course. Thank you. Thank you so much."
Lia didn't respond. She was already pulling Arin away, her grip on him almost possessive.
---
They left Thornwell behind, continuing their journey toward Aldenmoor.
But the incident stayed with Arin.
He had helped someone. Saved a life. It felt good—better than good. It felt right.
But it had also drained him more than he expected. His mana reserves were still recovering, and he felt weak, vulnerable.
Lia noticed.
"You pushed yourself too hard," she said quietly.
"I had to."
"You didn't have to do anything. That child wasn't your responsibility."
Arin looked at her, surprised by the hardness in her voice. "Lia, she was dying. I couldn't just—"
"I know." Lia's expression softened slightly, but there was something else there too—something possessive. "I know you couldn't. That's who you are. But Arin..." She reached out, taking his hand. "You need to be more careful. We can't reveal any more information about your god-tier healing magic unless you want another noble family to have their eyes on you."
Arin's face flushed at the contact. "I just wanted to help people."
Lia squeezed his hand. "You are not supposed to reveal your power until someone powerful is backing you up."
They walked in silence for a while, hands still intertwined. Arin didn't pull away—he found he didn't want to.
But something nagged at the back of his mind.
*Why did Lia seem so... intense about it?*
He dismissed the thought. Lia was just protective. That was all.
---
Over the next few days, they encountered more people in need.
A farmer with a broken leg. A child with a fever. An elderly woman with a wound that refused to heal. Each time, Arin asked to help. Each time, Lia said no at first.
And each time, Arin convinced her.
But Lia's behavior grew stranger.
When Arin healed the farmer, Lia stood so close she was practically touching him. Her eyes never left the farmer , watching with a wariness that bordered on hostility.
When Arin healed the child, Lia positioned herself between him and the child's mother, her hand resting on her sword hilt. The mother, intimidated, kept her distance.
When Arin healed the elderly woman, Lia didn't let anyone else into the room. She stood guard at the door, turning away anyone who tried to enter.
And at night, Lia became even more protective.
Arin would wake to find her wrapped around him, her arms holding him close, her breath warm against his neck. It was comforting—safe. But also... strange.
"Lia?" he whispered one night.
She stirred, her grip tightening. "Go back to sleep."
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine." She pressed her face into his hair. "Just... let me hold you. Please."
Arin didn't argue. He let her hold him, let her warmth chase away the cold.
But as he drifted back to sleep, he couldn't shake the feeling that something was changing between them.
Unbeknownst to her, Lia's possessiveness was growing too rapidly. Arin was like a drug to her—the more she indulged, the more she craved him. And she was slowly losing her rationality.
---
Meanwhile, in the shadows, they were being watched.
The spies were women fully covered in dark, form-fitting garments that seemed to absorb the light around them. Their faces were obscured by hoods and veils, leaving only their eyes visible—cold, calculating, and utterly devoid of emotion. They moved without sound, breathed without rhythm, and existed without presence.
They were the best the Veldryn family had to offer.
They were called the Veil—an elite network of operatives trained from childhood in the arts of stealth, observation, and information gathering. They were ghosts, invisible to even the most perceptive warriors.
Lia never noticed them.
She was good—better than most—but the Veil were something else entirely. They moved like shadows, watched like hawks, and reported like clockwork. They did all the handiwork of the Veldryn family.
And they had been following Arin and Lia since they left the Veldryn manor.
Every night, they sent reports back to Margaret. Every day, they observed and documented. Every moment, they waited for the opportunity to confirm what Margaret already suspected.
And finally, that opportunity came.
It was a night like any other. Arin and Lia had made camp near a small stream, the fire crackling softly in the darkness. Lia had fallen asleep first, her body curled around Arin's, her arm draped protectively over his chest.
Arin lay awake for a while, staring at the stars.
Then, thinking Lia was asleep, he did something he rarely did.
He removed his illusion.
The magic that maintained his disguise—the magic that made him look like a girl—flickered and faded. His hair shortened, his features sharpened, his body returned to its natural state.
For a few precious moments, Arin was himself.
And the Veil saw everything.
The spy closest to the camp—a woman known only as Whisper—watched through a spyglass, her breath catching in her throat.
*It's true,* she thought. *The healer is a boy.*
She waited until Arin restored his illusion, until he fell asleep in Lia's arms. Then she retreated into the darkness, pulling out a small notebook and a piece of charcoal.
She sketched quickly, her hand moving with practiced precision. The face that emerged on the paper was unmistakably male—beautiful, yes, but undeniably a boy.
When she finished, she rolled the sketch into a small tube and handed it to her partner.
"Take this to the manor," she whispered. "Priority one."
The partner nodded and disappeared into the night.
The sketch was on its way to the Veldryn family.