Becker had supposedly once been close to Zenos’s mentor, yet even he couldn’t remember the man’s name or face anymore. According to the letter, this was likely due to a curse. The mentor—at the time an elite healer himself—had paid a steep price for dabbling in the forbidden arts of resurrection magic.
Zenos quietly recalled the furious expression on his mentor’s face after smacking him for trying to use resurrection magic on a corpse in the street. He still remembered the man, perhaps because the curse had activated before they’d met. Becker had written in his letter that, if Zenos wanted to know more, he should look for his mentor’s notes.
“His notes, huh...?” he murmured.
Lily peered into the letter. “Hmm. Are you friends with Mr. Becker now, Zenos?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Look, it says so right here.”
At the end of his letter, Becker had written, “Zenos, I hope your path as a healer is filled with fortune. Your friend...”
“Oh, you’re right. It does say that,” Zenos said. “I see. So we’re friends...”
“What do you mean, ‘you see’?”
“I haven’t really had friends in a while, so I’m not good at this stuff, you know.”
Aston and his other former party members most certainly weren’t his friends. And he got along with the demi-humans in the slums, yes, but they were also his patients. His mentor had been, well, a mentor, and Umin and Cress from the Royal Institute weren’t exactly his friends either.
An eerie chuckle echoed from above. “Not a single friend. What a lonely man you are,” said Carmilla, a wraith (and their housemate) clad in jet-black garb and wearing a mischievous grin.
“You say that like you have any,” Zenos pointed out.
“Of course not,” Carmilla retorted. “No one is worthy of Carmilla, the Lich Queen.”
“True. I doubt anyone can match up to a top-tier undead who’s been around for three centuries.”
“I reign upon a solitary throne. I need no friends. None can domesticate me,” she said, puffing out her chest proudly.
“Yeah, yeah...”
“Oh, right!” Lily interjected, as though she’d just remembered something. “I was thinking of baking a cake tonight. Will you be there, Carmilla?”
“Naturally.”
“Okay. I want you to eat it fresh out of the oven, so come down to the table as soon as I call, okay?”
Carmilla chuckled. “Of course. Nothing beats freshly baked. I shall be here as soon as you beckon me over.”
“Sounds to me like you’ve been thoroughly domesticated,” Zenos remarked, unable to help himself. He then propped his elbows on his desk, and his chin on his hands. “Friends, huh...” he mumbled. “I think I used to have some, long ago...”
Memories came to mind of huddling together in a dimly lit room, fending off hunger. The children he’d spent time with at the orphanage in the slums had been his friends, surely. But now he had no idea where any of them were.
Lily peered intently into Zenos’s face as he reminisced. “Hey Zenos, what am I to you?”
“Hmm? Well...” The healer crossed his arms and looked at Lily, who appeared tense. “You’re like...family, I suppose.”
“What?!”
“I mean, you know, I’ve never had any family, so I’m not sure, but...”
Lily approached him, blushing. “S-So, if I’m family, that makes me your wife, right?”
“Huh? Does it?”
“Yeah! It does! I’m your wife!”
Carmilla chuckled again. “Jumping to conclusions as usual, Lily.”
Lily grumbled. “What about Carmilla, then?” she asked Zenos.
“Uh... A guardian spirit?”
“N-N-Nonsense!” the wraith snapped. “How dare you call the Lich Queen a guardian spirit!”
“It’s a joke,” Zenos told her. “You’re family too.”
“Wh— But— I—” Carmilla stammered in confusion, then floated up, disappearing into the second floor.
“What’s her problem?”
“I think she was embarrassed,” Lily said.
As the healer and the elf exchanged glances, the clinic’s door loudly burst open, and three women—the leaders of the demi-humans in the slums—nonchalantly barged in.
“Ooh, what’s happening here? Anything fun?” asked Zophia of the lizardmen.
