The sunlight coming through the window by my bed was doing its absolute best to be cheerful about the whole situation, and I appreciated the effort... really, but the sheer harassment I felt for feeling this hospital gown against my skin was one thing I genuinely cannot get over.

I had worn these for eight long years, and I had truly hoped I wouldn’t ever have to again. But then again, such is life. And life loves its little jokes.

The priest that stood before, examining me, was an old man with the kind of gentle eyes that belong to someone who has spent decades delivering difficult news without cruelty, and he was currently doing exactly that, moving through his examination with quiet care.

His eyes were tracing the stump of my left arm first, then the stump where my right leg had been, then pressing with his finger lightly around the stitched stab wound at my stomach, before finally cupping my chin and tilting my head to look at the left eye with a small lamp held close.

Peko stood at his side with her hands folded, listening to everything he said with the focused attention of someone who would be producing her own notes from this conversation later.

Nom-Nom, meanwhile, sat at the foot of the bed with her elbows on her knees and her chin propped in her hands, leaning so far forward that her mass of black hair had fallen over her shoulders, with her violet slit-eyes tracking every movement the priest made down to micro tremors of his hands.

"A terrible curse indeed..." the priest murmured as he lowered his lamp, straightened slowly, and let out a soft breath through his nose. "Forgive me, child. Only a Crusader can truly make you whole again."

I turned to the stumps that now looked like perfectly rolled cigars, and couldn’t help but sigh at the obvious.

Where the skin met the edge of each wound had been treated and stabilized but they simply refused to go further. The skin was pulled tight and pale around the edges, and the wounds were holding but not closing. I could even see a bit of bone jutting out of them.

"How do we manage them?" Peko asked, her voice carrying the practical forward motion. She had long processed the bad news and moved directly to what could be done about it.

"You must always treat them as though they are fresh wounds," the priest said, gesturing first to the stump of my arm and then to my leg, pointing specifically to the place where the skin had pulled as close as it was ever going to get. "As you can see, the curse ensures the wounds never fully close or heal... His wounds will always remain in the state in which they were first treated. Stabilized, yes. Healed, no."

"That means I can’t get a prosthetic either..." I said, looking at the leg’s stump, already done with the math in my head before he confirmed it. "Pain aside, the accumulating sweat and pressure would basically start rotting the attachment point."

"Indeed," the priest said softly.

"And this pain..." I continued, "It’d be like a freshly treated wound except... permanent now."

"Yes."

"What about painkillers?"

The priest folded his hands together and looked at me as he framed the best way to put it, but found no version of it that landed gently.

"I cannot, on good conscience, recommend a complete reliance on them. You will rapidly develop resistance, which will force progressively stronger doses over time. And with stronger doses come jitters, dependency, mood instability, a narrowing of focus that would work directly against your abilities in a fight should it find you... anxiety, and in some cases, hallucinations. Not to mention addiction."

"So what options do we have?" Peko asked.

"I will prescribe medication to aid sleep, and light painkillers for when the pain flares beyond what can simply be endured. For daily management, that is the extent of what I can offer."

"So I’m supposed to just deal with it?" I said, which was not quite a question.

"Yes," the priest said, and he looked me in the eye when he said it, which I respected. "Seeing as our Lady has still not chosen her next Crusader, the sooner you learn to live with the pain, the better."

"But there has to be something!" Nom-Nom’s voice jumped in from the foot of the bed, eyes going wide, her entire posture straightening.

She had been waiting for the point in the conversation where the priest would offer a solution and simply make it all go away, only for that point to never arrive.

"Something we can do, anything at all, there has to be-"

The priest turned to look at her with genuine gentleness and shook his head.

"Without our Lord Crusader, I am afraid not."

Nom-Nom’s jaw tightened. She sat back in the chair without saying anything further, her violet eyes going to the stumps and staying there with an expression that was doing a great deal of work to remain expressionless.

The priest turned back to Peko and began laying out the care plan.

"I will prescribe Grade 1 Healing Jelly to prevent exposure and reduce the risk of infection. Though the wounds cannot heal further, they can absolutely worsen without proper care. The jelly is resistant to liquids and is designed to be applied directly over fresh wounds to prevent blood loss, limit infection risk, and provide a protective barrier. Change the dressings and reapply the jelly twice daily, and after any strenuous activity."

[Medical glue, basically...] I thought.

"The stomach wound carries the highest risk of reopening during movement, so the stitches must be replaced weekly." The priest glanced at me, then back to Peko. "As for the other wounds, there is nothing further that can be done beyond what I have described."

A brief quiet settled over the room.

I had been looking out the window while he spoke, watching two birds moving between the branches of the tree just beyond the glass, doing whatever birds did at nine in the morning.

Peko was deep in thought, and Nom-Nom was still glaring at the priest as though she was absolutely certain that he was withholding a technique she hadn’t heard of yet, and was going to hold that suspicion indefinitely.

"Are there any questions?" the priest finally asked.

I turned back from the window and looked at him with a rather carefree smile, and just as I was about to speak, a knock came at the door before a nurse stepped in with a small, apologetic bow.

"Pardon the intrusion, your holiness. Knight’s Commander Dove is here."

My heart immediately went jittery at the mention of that name.

And before I knew it, I had reached up a hand and began fixing my hair before staring out the window with what I hoped was a profound and collected expression.

From beside the priest, Peko rolled her eyes at me, not even trying to hide it.

The priest smiled, tucking his lamp away, and turned toward the door, taking his leave. After a few steps, he paused and turned back.

"Young Nico," he said, in a voice far warmer than the clinical gentleness he’d been using throughout the examination, "... what you did that night, what you sacrificed... it is proof that it was no luck that even a Greater Dragon such as Lady Nom-Nom follows you. It is proof that you are worthy of every bit of power the heavens have vested in you."

I looked at him, and something about the way he said it, like he truly meant every word he said, so plainly and without ceremony, landed differently than just praise.

The room sat in quiet for a minute or so after he had walked out before the door opened again, and Dove walked in.

She had black hair pulled back in a loose bun, bright blue eyes that registered the room in a single sweep, and the full knight’s armor that I had seen on her before.

The blue cloth beneath the white plates, the shield strapped to her back, the sword at her waist, she carried it all as though she had long stopped noticing the weight.

She gave a polite nod to Peko and Nom-Nom as she entered.

Peko did not return it, simply holding her position with hands folded, her expression perfectly neutral as though she was withholding a judgment she had already made.

Nom-Nom jerked her chin up once in acknowledgment and left it there.

While Dove stopped beside the bed, looked me over in a single assessing sweep, and said, "I have read your medical report thrice now, and you look... surprisingly good."

"Come now..." I chuckled, "I look like war-worn underwear. Let’s not pretend otherwise."

Dove replied with a small chuckle of her own as she pulled the chair over and sat down.

"But isn’t that how all real men look?" she said.

"Damn, Dove!" I laughed at full volume, doing my best to ignore the pain radiating from my stomach. "... Never have I ever had my ego stroked this masterfully... So that’s your type, huh? The gruffy ones."

"Actually," she said, with a brief chuckle, "no."

"Too bad..."

Slowly, her expression morphed into one of complete seriousness and sincerity as she took a breath.

I already knew before she opened her mouth that the reason she was here was not the reason I had briefly and foolishly allowed myself to hope she might be here for.

"Nico," she said, "I want you to join the Knights."

I looked at her for a beat.

"Aww..." I said, dropping my head with theatrical disappointment that’d put trained actors to shame. "And here I thought you came to see me... Don’t play with my feelings like that, Commander. I’m a sensitive real man, y’know."