"I… am not sure, my friend," Aslan said. His normally stoic and professional visage was twisted in a conflicted grimace. It was times like this that made Symon aware that under all their scars and scarily competent combat skills, his friends were all of a similar age to him — barely adults. Not even, by their own customs.

"You don't have to if you don't want to," Symon assured him. "It'll take longer to do it this way, but it will work eventually." Not everyone was willing to harm themselves just to improve numbers on their Ledger. Even Symon, whose abilities were perfect for such a brutal training, hesitated to subject himself to similar tortures.

Although, maybe I could stick my hand in the campfire. With my Pain Resistance, I'll barely even feel it…

"Perhaps… I could think about it? Is that okay?" the other man asked, biting his lip nervously.

Oh. Symon just realised why Aslan was so hesitant. It wasn't just the pain, or the risk of death if something went wrong. It was the worry that Symon would rescind his offer of such an incredible boon. People would pay serious, serious money to gain an easy resistance. Keelgrave had even suggested it was the type of thing you couldn't put a number on. While he hadn't been privy to the inner workings of the upper class, he did know about the limitations every healer other than Symon faced.

Even the most powerful healers could only speed up the body's natural healing. It was to an incredible degree, yes, but not in the way that Symon could survive serious wounds indefinitely, given enough vitality. They had some neat abilities from the Ledger, and access to proper spellcasting — something Symon still knew very little about — but they didn't have the incredible, undiluted healing that he did.

Aslan wanted the resistance, both for its own sake and for potential entry to a dungeon, but the risk made things hard to stomach.

"Of course! There's no pressure, we'll get there when we get there. Maybe I can talk about it with Entisse too: she seems more likely to accept, and it'll be more worth the risk, too. Without the resistance, she's got no way of easily coming and going."

They could use the mana-draining manacles to get everyone through the mist, but that had its own complications. They hadn't told him exactly how long they took to regenerate all their mana, but Keelgrave had told him it would be around a full day. It was one of the more well-known drawbacks regarding mana, especially for powerful mages, who had one main weakness. As their core size increased, so too did their regeneration rate, but it didn't keep pace.

The time it took to refill an empty core would only increase as they grew, something Keelgrave was all too familiar with. On the open ocean, he and his crew had often needed to tightly ration their mana usage.

This left using the manacles as a possibility, although they would be severely weakened upon their entry. Not only did having an empty or nearly empty core cause its own issues, but his Dumosan friends' abilities would all be useless.

Besides, the interior of the barrier still had pollen everywhere, so Symon would still need to be constantly healing them.

Symon frowned to himself. Healing… oh shit, my Ledger! He'd been at level 19 for his healing, and that was before healing Entisse and all this time spent with Aslan.

Why couldn't I get a big popup box, he complained as he left Aslan to his thoughts. He wandered away to the treeline, took a look around for monsters, and summoned his Ledger.

[ Status: Name: Symon Class: Cursed Healer Strength: 0.99 {+0.01} Constitution: 1.33 Acuity: 1.04 {+0.01} Intelligence: 1.08 {+0.02} Will: 1.41 {+0.03}

Vessel (Vitality): 23/23 {+1}

Abilities: Idealise (20) {+1} Seize (20) Essence Bond (15) {+1}

Passives: Anatomy (6) {+1} Bleeding Resistance (3) Languages (11) {+1} Pain Resistance (15) {+1} Poison Resistance (5) {+1} Running (9) Swords (6)

Titles: Blessed by Order Blessed by Chaos World Traveller ]

Fairly minor gains across the board, but it wasn't bad at all when you considered it had just been a bit of risk-free healing. He'd even increased his vessel capacity without realising it — he'd tried to avoid the roses when he had a full vessel, but there was only so much he could do. He was prioritising using the roses to help in his future training, but a bit of extra capacity was hardly the worst thing in the world.

More importantly, he was right about his Idealise levelling.

[ You have reached level 20 in Idealise. As a reward for your efforts, choose any one tailored Evolution. Unpicked Evolutions will be available at next Evolution. You must make a selection before Idealise can gain additional levels. ]

Symon rubbed his hands together eagerly. The evolution to Idealise probably wouldn't be as life-altering as the one for Seize, but it was still a very large part of his personal power. He didn't really have a specific direction he wanted to take his healing, although something like more range could make it easier to use. He focused on the meaning of the words as he read them, ensuring Keelgrave could pick up on his thoughts and understand the English words.

[ Idealise Evolution: Tributary Sacs.

Those you heal will begin to grow large sacs, converting their personal excess vitality into an essence-rich fluid. ]

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"What. The. Fuck," Symon said, staring down at the letters in the leaf mulch. "Who the hell would ever pick that? What the fuck…" he said again, because what else could he?

<Uh, yeah, what the fuck?> Keelgrave agreed. <Just go to the next one, I don't want to think about that anymore.> Symon couldn't blame him.

He kicked some of the nearby leaves over the letters and mentally commanded the Ledger to continue.

[ Idealise Evolution: Black Veins.

Those you heal will begin to grow black veins. ]

"Okay, what's going on? My Seize choices were all pretty normal-sounding. Even that one about draining memories wasn't as freaky as these." This one didn't even say what it did. Was it purely visual? What was even the point?

Symon roughly rubbed at his face, leaning against a wide tree for support. Seize was always the ability he struggled with, while Idealise was his faithful ally. If the evolutions were tailored to him, why would he ever even be offered these? All of the options for Seize had been valid in their own way, although he couldn't think of a scenario where he'd want to drain people's minds.

<Uh, I don't know. These don't sound like healing evolutions at all. What were your thread evolutions like?>

Symon quickly filled him in, not hiding anything.

<Those sound normal enough to me. What in the infinite hells did you do between now and then?>

Symon pushed himself off the tree, shocked. "What?! How is this my fault? I don't want creepy-ass mad science abilities!"

<Just… try to think happy thoughts when you go to the next one?>

[ Idealise Evolution: Flesh Grafting.

Successfully attaching severed body parts no longer requires the target to be the original owner of said part. ]

At least this one was vaguely healing-related. He could even guess why he was offered it: re-attaching Entisse's feet after freeing her from the manacles. Still, he wasn't interested in this, although he had to admit that the prospect of attaching razor stalker blades to his wrists Wolverine style had at least some level of appeal, which put it above the others. It also had the benefit that this was something extra he could simply choose not to engage with, while the others all modified how something he relied on worked.

[ Idealise Evolution: Undead Servant.

Imbue a corpse with a semblance of life. This creation will obey simple commands. Costs vitality to create and maintain. ]

<Hmmm…> Keelgrave contemplated.

"Oh, don't tell me you're seriously considering it," Symon said. Being a necromancer was… well, maybe it wasn't that bad of an idea. Again, nothing said he had to use it if he didn't want to, although he didn't want to pick something he wouldn't use if he could help it. Nothing said it had to be a human's corpse either, which was a lot more palatable. Plus, he was often walking around with a full vessel, so as long as the cost to maintain it wasn't too high, this shouldn't be something with a large drawback. Plus, while it had a bit of a reputation, necromancy wasn't illegal in the Empire.

"Okay, fine," Symon said, even though Keelgrave hadn't uttered a word. "It's not the worst idea."

[ Idealise Evolution: Web of Life.

Form a bond with those you heal. This connection decays with time, and deepens with prolonged exposure to healing. A strong enough bond allows the implantation of mental suggestions and compulsions. ]

"Huh," Symon said blankly, staring down at the words. "I'm not really sure what that means first part means. Any ideas? At least the evil mind control part is obvious. At this point, it doesn't even phase me."

<Yes, actually. When the Ledger says 'bond' like that, it always means the same thing. It had similar wording in my Leadership,> Keelgrave said helpfully. <Let me think… early levels you can expect an awareness of where your links are, and their general state. That'll have a range, starting low, but it can get pretty big. Eventually. it'll grow until you can communicate. Simple at first, but enough time should bring it to something like what we have.>

Symon scratched at his faint chin stubble thoughtfully. It was fairly simple, but had a lot of potential utility. More importantly, it had no noticeable drawbacks and wouldn't force him to change the way he healed. He was always pretty bad at maintaining awareness of what his friends were doing mid-combat, tending to overly focus on his opponent and ignore the others.

This was something he just needed more experience to fix, but telepathic communication with the whole group would still be very helpful. It didn't provide anything to directly help him fight or survive, but he also needed to take into account that this choice could shape his next evolution. If he took Web of Life now, what would he get on the Second Step? It was just a guess, as no one could perfectly predict the Ledger, but it seemed reasonable to assume that ranged healing or some way to render them immune to his draining was on the table.

After all, his bond with Keelgrave meant the spirit was no longer automatically targeted by the threads. Would it work the same for this ability?

Of course, there was that whole hypnosis thing, but he wasn't forced into using that. He knew himself, and trusted that it would only be used for good. Or never, which he found more likely. Maybe it could be helpful for therapy?

[ Idealise Evolution: Maker's Mark.

Your Will gains more influence over the definition of an Ideal State. ]

Oh.

Ohhhhh.

That was very helpful. Not necessarily the ability itself, but the information it provided. He'd long suspected that something exterior to the vitality guided it and gave it knowledge of what to heal, but he'd never had the chance to properly test it and put his theory into words. He'd first noticed it when healing the Dumosans, that his healing left scars behind, but not to the point of impeding mobility.

Meanwhile, his own wounds, as well as Entisse's, had all vanished without a trace. Scars were a point of pride for them due to their differing culture and individual perceptions, while Symon and the elf would prefer not to have them. For that matter, Symon was still very pale despite the constant attacks from the suns, while the Dumosans were as tanned as when he'd first met them, if not more so. He figured this was due to his own perception of sunburn and tanning, in particular, the influence his illness had provided on his subconscious.

If I have to pick between skin cancer and being a little pasty, then I know what I'm choosing.

This revelation wasn't much of a surprise to him, being something he'd suspected already, but there were even more details crammed into that little sentence.

For one, it revealed that he already had control over the 'ideal state' that his healing returned someone to. The word 'more' implied he already had some influence. Further, it told him that this was based on his Will attribute. This meant he still had a way of improving his control over this, simply by training his Will. It was also one of his fastest-growing attributes, as it was linked to the manipulation of his draining and healing abilities he was using nearly constantly.

He could probably do some neat things by picking this evolution, but he could accomplish similar things just by training a stat. It was better to spend the evolution on something he couldn't gain naturally. Besides, while there were some things he might like to use it for — could he use it to grow his muscles, or to stop his magic from blatantly de-aging the elderly? — they were more minor benefits in comparison to some of the other choices. Well, maybe he could grow dragon wings or something…

Now, he had to make a decision.

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