Old Man Dragon

Without even waiting, Finn walked over to the next bed. The group he was with were too distracted to notice, crowding around the healthy sleeping girl in awe and amazement.

This was a perfect opportunity for Finn, for he was quite curious about the nature of healing he provided. He wanted to examine its effects even closer.

Looking down at the medium sized brown haired man, Finn could tell this man"s injuries were noticeably less serious than the girl he just healed.

However, without effective medical treatment, he too would likely succ.u.mb to infection. Most of his right side was burnt shades of dark red bordering on black. Right now, he was sleeping, although it did not look peaceful.

With the attention off himself for the moment, Finn found it easier to focus as he breathed healing energy onto the man"s body. Looking closely, it appeared as though the man"s arm was a vacuum, sucking up any light energy that got too close.

Once an area began this process, the tissues around appeared to react violently.

Looks gross... Finn gave an honest opinion as he watched the cells on the man"s body wriggle and squirm as if there were worms moving beneath the skin. Finn couldn"t get gooseb.u.mps, but he figured he would have if he still had his old body.

Just as Finn was about done, the sleeping man opened his eyes.

"Nnngh... what"s going-" The man stopped abruptly as he noticed a large ominous white figure standing over him. The man"s eyes met the drake"s.

"WHAT THE h.e.l.l!" Like a coiled spring, the man leapt off the bed and took a panicked fighting stance, instinctively reaching for a weapon on his left hip that wasn"t there.

His yelp brought back the attention of the group who had been examining the formerly cauterized girl, and several came walking over, including Anya.

WHY IS A... drake... in here... The man"s sentence petered off as suddenly realized the obvious. The arm he was pointing with, his right... was completely fine!

"Garen? Are you alright?" Anya couldn"t help but ask, seeing him in his state of shock. When Anya noticed his arm, she covered her mouth, too moved to speak.

Unlike with Selmor"s daughter, Anya had witnessed Garen"s brutal injury during the fire drake"s initial ambush. He had been too slow to dodge a stream of intense fire, ending up in such a poor state.

How can this be? Garen felt his surroundings fall away. Memories of the fire drake resurfaced, bringing along feeling of intense suffering. I was too slow...

But now... Garen flexed his right forearm and wriggled all his fingers. There was no horrifying pain, no loss of motion, no scars to bear witness to such a terrible burn.

Garen, forgetting himself, sank to his knees cradling his arm in disbelief. Hearing a slight chuckle, he looked up to see Anya smiling at him with tears in her eyes.

"Lady Anya, what is going on? Wait!" Looking over his shoulder, Garen finally noticed that the drake was gone. Scanning the pavilion, he saw it breathing a golden yellow stream of energy onto someone else.

Feeling a hand on his shoulder, Garen felt his astonished gaze connect with Anya"s. Answering the question in his heart, Anya explained in simple terms. "The G.o.desses have sent us aid!"

Although Garen still didn"t quite understand what was happening, he knew a miracle when he saw one. Looking at his arm again, Garen couldn"t help but nod his head mutely.

Finn continued on from bed to bed, healing the burns from all the victims in the pavilion. Each time, he watched carefully, trying to sense the flow of energy as it healed those he provided it with.

Unfortunately, once his energy entered someone else"s body, it was like the connection was cut. He could no longer sense its flow.

This made Finn wonder if it was possible to regrow the limbs of someone else. When he had regrown his own, it was because he had pushed the flow of healing energy into his stump. If I cant control the flow once it enters someone else"s body, how am I supposed to do the same thing? Finn thought of Bryn in this regard.

Finn also found that it wasn"t just fresh injuries that healed either. One of the women he "fixed" had scars on her arms initially, but they disappeared during the healing process.

This is surprisingly easy... The amount of energy Finn was using to heal everyone could almost be considered negligible if he added the amount he gained from pa.s.sive recovery.

After Finn finished working on those with more serious injuries, he continued on to anyone who happened to be hurt. At first, those who had been awake were still intimidated by him, leading to many awkward situations.

However, as he healed more and more people, everyone began warming up to him. In the eyes of the people, he was being seen less as a terrible magical beast, and more as a kindred spirit sent by the G.o.desses.

It was not long before those with less serious injuries who could walk came up to him on their own, to which Finn obliged.

News spread fast. Those who had been healed left to find their friends and loved ones. People began talking. It wasn"t long before the story about Lady Anya bringing home a drake that was healing their wounded began to spread.

It was a ridiculous tale, but one that soon proved to be anything but as formerly wounded tribesman left the medical pavilion in droves.

Curiosity was a potent drug, and many of the tribe couldn"t help but investigate such a wild story.

Soon, the medical pavilion was packed with people watching intently as a large white scaled drake walked from bed to bed and healed person after person without so much as a growl.

Too much noise... Finn began realizing a depressing truth about his physiology. With senses much stronger than a human"s, it was too much stimulation when a lot of people gathered in one place.

The smells and sounds were overwhelming. When he was only rank two, it didn"t bother him so much, but now it seemed far worse. Finn started feeling agitated.

By the time he was done with all the wounded, there might have been over a hundred people in the pavilion. Even as large as it was, it was beginning to feel cramped.

Voices clambered over eachother, but to Finn it was all white noise, since he couldn"t understand their language. Not understanding what they were saying only made his agitation worse.

Anya grew concerned the more she watched the drake. Being well versed in magical beast body language, she could tell it was growing either angry or frustrated by the rapid swishing of its tail or the unconscious gnashing of its teeth.

Although it was understandable how excited her people had become, she was worried it was becoming too much.

It was becoming too much for Finn. Trying to work his way to the exit was proving to difficult. Unfortunately, due to his lack of aggression, people were now getting a little to close for comfort.

Instead of moving out of the way, they clamored closer, eager to see the miracle beast sent by the G.o.desses. One person even tried touching him, which proved to be the last straw. The smells, the sounds, someone trying to grab onto him. Finn snapped.

Bowing up to his full height, Finn reared back and slammed the earth with his two front legs, creating a large tremor. Spinning his head around, he roared menacingly at the people surrounding him.

A wave of panic took hold as people scrambled to get away from the angry drake. Finn continued to growl, but he still saw no way out. There were still people in the way, and they were now too scared to move.

Great... Finn"s agitation grew worse. He found himself wanting nothing more than to leave at this moment, but those people weren"t getting out of the way.

Before the situation could devolve anymore however, a loud whistling sound grabbed everyone"s attention.

"Clear a path to the entrance at once!" Anya demanded as she walked past the drake, helping those who were knocked over to get out of the way.

Finn"s growling subconsciously dimmed significantly as he realized what the girl was doing. Once the path was clear, Finn did not hesitate to quickly escape the confines of the pavilion.

Those who came to see watched with fear and awe as the drake left. The original party he was with were left scratching their heads, unsure of how to feel about everything that was happening.

Once out of the pavilion, Finn felt the pressure on his mind ease drastically and he relaxed his body.

Seeing how he was still in the middle of the village, Finn made his way back to the entrance, leaving many stunned people in his wake when he waltzed back into the woods.

I just need to get somewhere quiet... Finn felt like taking a nap, as drained as he felt. Walking a good distance away from the village, Finn found a nice sunny spot where there weren"t any villagers around.

Eep!

A small squeal brought Finn some much needed relief. His little friends had returned, having left him at some point when he entered the village. They gathered and settled in the crook of his form, falling asleep as he did. He would deal with the aftermath later.

Running out of the tent, Anya was quickly informed that the drake had left the village entirely. Although she wanted to go after it to ensure it was ok, she simply had too many other tasks to complete.

Although, knowing that all her injured tribemates were alive and healthy thanks to the drake, she prayed to the G.o.desses that the drake would return. The village was in its debt after all.

.

.

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Selmor"s eyes snapped awake. Sitting up quickly, he rubbed his head and winced.

I was... knocked unconscious? He remembered seeing and feeling the tail of the drake slam into him before everything went dark.

It seemed that, at some point, someone had moved him onto one of the beds.

"How you feeling shorty?" An unwelcome voice grated on Selmor"s eardrums.

"Borg, have you come to mock me again?" Selmor growled out, not in the mood to deal with him. Where was the drake?

Selmor looked over at Borg, who was sitting on a barrel cleaning his fingernails with a dagger.

Instead of an uncouth jab like he was expecting, Selmor was surprised when Borg remained uncharacteristically silent. He seemed to be staring at his right hand deep in thought.

Shaking his head, Borg stood up abruptly, flicking the dagger into the dirt at Selmor"s feet.

Selmor scowled, only now realizing it was HIS dagger that Borg had been picking his nails with.

However, before he left Borg mentioned something quietly. "Selmor, how about you go check on your daughter."

Selmor watched Borg"s back as the large man exited the pavilion. Forcing the ache down, Selmor stood up and headed over to his daughter"s bed, already fearing the worst.

Only, when he got there, what greeted him was not the sight of his dead child, but rather a sleeping and healthy little girl.

The blood rushed to Selmor"s head, unable to process what he was seeing. Am I dead?

With a shaking hand, Selmor gently rubbed the face of his daughter, the sensation of soft skin confirming that he indeed was not dreaming.

Thud!

Selmor fell over backwards, landing on the ground. He had fainted.