Normally, Greg wasn't the kind of person to take pleasure in the misery of others. And he wasn't exactly happy about what had befallen the previous owner of this body. However, the injuries the previous owner had suffered, had given him an excuse that allowed him not to interact with others for a few days as he sorted out his memories. Otherwise, Greg was almost certain that he'd be figured out if he'd been immediately forced to interact with others. And given that this was a world of magic where spirits and possession were not foreign concepts, he wasn't sure what would happen to him if he was suspected of being possessed.
Greg turned his head with difficulty when he heard the door to the small hut he was in open. Given how weak he felt, his lips twitching slightly was the only hint of his attempt at smiling. His eyes quietly followed the voluptuous figure of the woman who walked in. Greg had been eighteen years of age when he died in his previous life. Coincidentally, the young man whose body he'd taken over was also eighteen years of age. As such, Greg could be forgiven for being unable to ignore the sex appeal that was almost literally dripping off the woman that was approaching his bed.
The woman had raven black hair and a face that would have had famous magazines fighting to have her on their cover page. Her massive bust quite prominently pushed against her dress almost as if they were fighting to be free. Her petite waist flared out into wide hips that could tempt the most ardent monks out there. From the few times that Greg had managed to watch her leave his room, he knew that she had an ass that could be the fall of kingdoms. Part of him was glad that he was bedridden otherwise he couldn't trust himself not to reach out and grab it. Just one touch and he'd die the second time around a happy man.
Watching her as she came to a stop by his bedside, Greg couldn't help but feel a strange sense of contradiction as he looked at the woman. On the woman's face was a stern expression. Both in the way she moved and how she carried herself, Greg got the distinct impression that she was a straight-laced person that would brook no nonsense from anyone. Yet, somehow, the scandalously licentious outfit she had on stood in stark contrast to this impression of her. The dress she wore wasn't at all short, the way it clung to her form, however, made it a feat of will for any man not to visually devour her. The deep V of its neckline framed her ample cleavage in such a way that Greg was certain that her tits were breaking some law of physics by not spilling out.
The woman reached forward and pulled off the blanket covering his body. Greg's naked body was exposed to the woman. She, however, barely even reacted. She had the neutral, detached look of a physician looking at a patient as opposed to a woman to a man. To her, his body was a broken specimen that she had to put back together and nothing more. And no wonder. As Greg looked down at himself, he could see several ghastly wounds all across his torso down to his limbs. It was clear that whatever animal he'd fallen victim to, it had done quite a number on him. In a bid to protect itself, probably, his mind couldn't quite clearly recall what animal it was or how exactly he ended up at its mercy. The most he could remember was that he'd been on a hunting trip at the time.
Greg had struggled with believing the memories he'd inherited on taking over this body, especially when it came to the more mystical aspects of this world. This woman, however, was part of the reason Greg had been forced to believe that they weren't hallucinations but actual reality. Greg's eyes dropped to the woman's hands as she started moving them in strange patterns before her. While her hand movements may have seemed random, Greg could quite clearly see that they were anything but. It was almost like a luminescent green ink was flowing out of the tips of the woman's fingers. Greg, however, knew that there was no way that it could have been actual ink as the patterns that she was drawing remained floating in mid-air almost as if there was some invisible canvas there that she was drawing on. Given that the woman had been visiting him three times a day for the past three days, Greg had already memorized the strange pattern that she usually drew in the air.
Greg's eyes followed her hands and fingers, watching as she fluidly completed the rather complex pattern. The completed pattern was a complex sigil composed of about ten different runic symbols all crammed in a circle and yet somehow not touching each other. The moment the pattern was completed, the circle shrunk down to about a tenth of its original size and landed on the woman's right palm. Extending her hand towards him, Greg watched as a green light gushed out of the symbols and spread out over his body.
The effect was immediate. It felt like a thick viscous liquid was covering every inch of his skin leaving him with a cool feeling all over. It wasn't anything dramatic like immediate healing, Greg, however, could feel his wounds slowly getting better. The pain was no longer as sharp, and his torso looked just a bit better than before. From the small beads of sweat that formed on her forehead and the way her right hand shook slightly even as the healer held it towards him, Greg could see that it took quite a bit of effort for her to keep the spell going. Still, the woman's serious air didn't break. Her face remained placid as a lake as she watched the results of her ministrations.
Things remained as such for about three minutes. Despite the struggle of maintaining the output of healing magic, the woman remained stoic even as she continued to administer the treatment. After the third minute, however, the magic that had been flowing out of her began to falter. Like a flickering bulb, the magic started to become intermittent. In the state he was in, Greg couldn't move about much, as such, he could only stay still and watch his healer. This allowed him to note the fact that towards the end, her expression morphed from one who was struggling to one who was in pain. To her credit, the woman had a pretty good poker face. She wasn't grimacing or anything, but the subtle way her jaw clenched and left eye twitched told it all.
When she finally lowered her hand, another minute had already gone by. A frown crossed the woman's face as she studied his body and the wounds that crisscrossed it. She clearly had expected her spell to achieve much more than they seemed to have. "The Beyond strongly calls to you, young one," she murmured. This was the first time the woman had talked to him in the past three days. Greg was immediately aware of the fact that the words hadn't been spoken in the english he knew from his previous life. He, however, seemed to have retained the comprehension of language the previous owner of this body had. As such, he could understand the words spoken by the woman. The woman's statement would have been incomprehensible to Greg back on earth. But in this world, or at least in this small remote village, there were no concepts of heaven or hell. The Beyond is where they believed spirits went after death. In short, she was saying that death was calling to him.
The woman's gaze turned to his own as they locked gazes. "However, just three days ago I was certain that you wouldn't make it," She confessed with a small smile. "The fact that you're here means that you already escaped the grasp of the Beyond," She said. Her gaze once again moved to the wounds covering his body, a small frown once again crossing her features. "The Beyond, however, is not so easily eluded. It seeks to recapture what it has lost," She spoke softly, more to herself than to him. "Rest well," The woman spoke as she reached out and pulled the covers back over him. She then turned around and started moving towards the door. "I'll be back in the evening to heal and wash you," She stated calmly. Having such a hot woman say she'll be back to bathe him, should have been exciting. But from his experiences over the past few days, he knew that there was nothing lewd about what she'd said or planned to do. Still, Greg couldn't help getting a strange thrill hearing it.
Once the woman had left, Greg's gaze turned back to the trail of ants moving up along the wall. But while his gaze was in the direction of the ants, he wasn't actually seeing them. His attention was on something else entirely. As incomprehensible as the situation he found himself in was, it was nothing compared to the thing he was currently looking at. In Greg's vision, was a translucent virtual screen. Written at the top of the screen in glowing bold text were the words:
EROS: THE SIXTH SCHOOL!
Under it was a full progress bar that was now golden and reading one hundred percent beside it. As with the words that the woman had spoken, The words weren't written in any language that Greg knew. For some reason, however, Greg could understand it all. Greg knew that this progress bar was the reason that the woman that had just left his room was having such a hard time healing him. Three days ago, the progress bar had been at zero. But soon as the woman started healing him, it started slowly filling up. The thing had been taking away ninety percent of the power that was meant to heal him and leaving him with only ten percent. That's why it seemed to the healer like death was calling to Greg. While healing magic was a miraculous phenomenon, it couldn't grant one immortality. There were certain diseases and injuries that even the most potent healers were powerless against. With how slowly Greg seemed to be healing, it must have seemed to her like he was in one of those niche cases where even healing magic can't make such a drastic difference, hence her words.
