"If you guys have played in the water enough, it's time to come back and enjoy the food!" Hearing Lia's shout from afar, Rio glanced towards the hill and nodded his head.
"Okay..."
He stopped creating tsunamis to drown the two pitiful guys in front of him.
Link and Liam finally got to heave a sigh of relief; they collapsed in the water and started to float like a dead body.
"Ugh, if only Lia had said that a bit earlier... I am totally exhausted now..."
Both of them ended up fainting from exhaustion.
Rio's eyes twitched seeing the two pretending to faint like that; in the end, he grabbed one of their legs each and dragged them to the hill as if he were dragging a sandbag!
"Er, are they okay?"
Lia glanced at the two guys who Rio was dragging all over the ground and asked Riya in a voice of concern.
Riya, who was still busy nibbling on candies and enjoying the warm sunlight, finally noticed that Rio had brought Link and Liam to her side to heal them back to consciousness.
Many people have a misconception that healing magic can't actually heal someone who's at full HP.
But that's not true.
A healer can do much more than that; they can cause a healing magic overload in the body of a person, and the excessive healing will cause the body of the person to blast like a balloon!
Alternatively, a healer can utilize healing magic to restore a person's lost energy or mana by infusing them with their own energy.
Before Riya could get up to heal the two, Rio brought out his sword and put its tip on Link's back.
[Elemental Sword Art: Healing Type: Mana Distribution!]
Rio tried to imitate Riya's method of mana distribution, but it was very weak, and his proficiency was very low.
Riya, who saw that, shook her head and squatted down beside Link before saying,
"No, no, you are wasting too much excessive mana; that's not the way... Let me show you..."
Riya placed her hand on Link's back as Rio withdrew his sword.
Then she showed how to do it more precisely and without losing excessive mana.
Her control over the skill was so insanely precise that a rare look of shock appeared on Rio's expressionless face.
"You are indeed quite good at this, Riya Sensei..."
Rio also squatted down and observed her skill more carefully.
[Sword Intent!]
Rio covered his finger with sword intent by assuming his own finger as a sword and then used 'healing type' just like Riya explained.
Seeing that drastic improvement, Riya nodded with a smile over her face,
"Yes! That's the way, and now concentrate the mana on the tip of the finger and then spread it all over the nervous system while maintaining minimal touch with the skin!"
The moment Rio made a mistake due to being less proficient, Riya easily solved it, and her healing magic was so strong that it easily overpowered Rio's.
'This is just insane... Her healing magic is so d*mn strong, it's like my healing magic is like a worm and hers is like the gigantic mountain supporting the dome of heavens!'
As long as it's about healing magic, Rio can't beat Riya at all; even if he made a horrible mistake while trying to heal, Riya can solve it in a matter of milliseconds.
'No wonder she forced the 'world' itself to bow in front of 'Will'; the 'law' of 'healing' didn't choose her... She forced it to acknowledge her!'
There are always exceptions to everything in the world.
It doesn't matter if your talent is too low and weak to accomplish anything. It doesn't matter if the 'laws' of the 'world' don't want to favor you.
With your determination and 'will,' you can indeed bend even the 'laws' of the 'world' and force them to 'acknowledge' your brilliance.
Riya would have never received the 'Heart of Eternal Nirvana' under normal circumstances. But the fact that Zach died under her care and the fear that she might not be able to save Link if something similar happened to him one day pushed her to work hard.
That fear of losing Link pushed her to improve, and with her 'will' she forced the 'Law' of 'Healing' to acknowledge her! This is how she got the legendary ability she now has.
In other words, even without the legendary ability, Riya was already overpowered in terms of healing skills, and now that she has it, it's impossible to compete with her in this field. Rio's healing skills are like those of a novice in front of her 'World-class' level skills.
"I admit defeat; you are the best Riya sensei; I can't defeat you..."
Rio shrugged his shoulders and stopped competing with her as it was pointless; it's like trying to break a diamond with a fragile egg.
A happy smile appeared on Riya's face after hearing those words.
"Hehe, you are a hundred years too early to be competing with me, dear disciple!"
Seeing that the competition was over, Link, who had already woken up, grumbled in an
annoyed tone,
"Will you two stop treating me like a lab rat now? Just heal me already! Or are you two making fun of me on purpose!"
Link glared at Rio and gave him death stares, but Rio just shrugged his shoulders.
Riya hurriedly healed Link and Liam both back to full consciousness after that while saying,
"Actually, you have quite the resilient and strong body, Link; if they had such a strong practice dummy back at the training center's, the newbies would have had less trouble practicing their skills..."
Link didn't know what to say to those words; sometimes Riya is so overprotective of him that he feels embarrassed, and sometimes she's so nonchalant that he feels that she loves her candies more than him.
He's just too confused about her mood swings and has already given up on understanding
them.
"By the way, what do you use for practicing your skills normally, then in those training grounds specially made for healers?"
Liam was quite curious about it, so he asked with a look of curiosity on his face.
Hearing his words, Riya tilted her head and said,
"Of course, we use dead bodies! Well, newbies mostly use monster corpses, but then they slowly shift over to human bodies eventually!"
After saying that, Riya hurriedly put a hand on her mouth as if she just realized what she said.
"Ah! It was supposed to be a secret, but I accidentally leaked it! Forget I said anything!"
Link and the others felt so awkward after that they dared not ask any further about this
matter.
Only now do they understand why the academy trains healers in separate, specially made
training halls.
They are literally dealing with human corpses there; such things can't be shown to every random person.
Such bodies are willingly donated by all types of people for the sake of 'Humanity', so it's not
illegal.
You sign a contract before death, whether you want to donate your body or not after your death. Your family gets a ton of money in return, so many people actually do it for the sake of
their family.
Moreover, the healers are asked to never talk about this matter to others, and they are asked
to sign a contract to never reveal about this.
Riya has the 'Heart of Eternal Nirvana' and protection of the 'world' itself; thus, any binding contract on her is completely 'void' and 'ineffective' on her.
She's free of any constraints placed by the 'laws' or the 'contracts'; that's why she was able to say it out loud without any restriction.
If she was bound by a contract, she wouldn't have been able to say this information out loud, as the contract would have prevented her from saying it.
In fact, she's so 'Free' that she herself doesn't know she was supposed to be restricted by the
contract.
"Er.. well, it may seem shady, but everything about it is completely legal; this kind of thing is regulated by the top healer's guilds, and they have to make reports to the SS-rankers so they
can't do bad things..."
"And by coincidence, Link's father is in charge of keeping these guilds in check, so there's no
way they can do anything bad..."
Only after hearing those words did everyone feel a bit relieved.
After all, if it's Ashtel Rex who's in charge of it, there's no need to worry about anything going
wrong; everyone knows he's good at dealing with stuff like this.
...
After a while, the group calmed down and stopped worrying too much about this matter.
In the end, it's all for the sake of training new healers who will ultimately go on to save more
lives anyway, so it's fine.
The group sat down together to enjoy the food they brought with them.
Link was sulking from all that beating he received, so Riya fed him with her clumsy hands and
made a mess out of everything.
Nonetheless, the time spent on this peaceful picnic was something that the group will always
remember.
The joy of sharing meals with the comrades who fight alongside you through all types of difficulties-this is truly a unique experience.
After the picnic, the group went on to visit more places in the Dragon Valley in the next week
or so.
Selain's plan of enjoying fun times with friends finally came true, and she also got herself a
ton of memories of times spent with friends who accepted her for herself, not for her status as
a princess.
Time passed in that peaceful bliss, and days went by in a flash just like that.
Finally, it was time to go home.
{After all, a journey is not all about destinations; it's always about returning home safely at the end of
it.} (Source: Trust me bro...)
...
...
Author's Notes.
Yo! It's your beloved author here!
Well, it was a wonderful trip, but nothing's better than your own home.
Question of the day.
Will you miss the Dragon Valley once this arc is over?
(Tell me your thoughts in the comments)
By the way, don't forget to use those power stones!!