Yulysion ducked as low as possible to reduce the impact of his steps on Max’s body as he ran swiftly through the forest. She clenched her jaw, suppressing the chatter of her teeth caused by the chill she was feeling and the agonizing pain she felt on her limp shoulder. It crossed her mind that it would have been better if she lost her consciousness. However, she couldn’t let herself succumb into it, there was the possibility that she might never wake up again.
“Here!”
Garrow, who was running ahead of them to scan the surroundings, waved at them and yelled. As they approached him, Max could see through her cloudy eyes that he was pointing towards a small cave hidden among several large, misshapen trees. He spread his cloak on the ground for Max and Yulysion gently placed her on it as if he were handling precious, fragile glass. However, no matter how careful he was, her entire body was still screaming in pain, it felt like she was being lowered into fire. Max bit into the fabric she was pressing on her nose to stop the bleeding and sweated profusely. Seeing her in excruciating pain with even the slightest movement, Yulysion grew more and more distraught.
“Garow, w-what should we do? I think we need to realign her shoulder…”
“Neither of us knows how to do that. If we don’t do it right, we could break her bones or make the pain worse. Let’s just put a splinter on her shoulder so it stays in place.”
Garrow knelt beside her and tore his cloak lengthwise. “Please bare it for a moment. This might hurt a lot.”
Max looked at the boy in terror as he reached for her arm. Leaving her shoulder hanging as it is was already more than painful, what more if someone touched it? Max was terrified but there was no other way. Garrow carefully lifted her arm, folding it in front of her body and securing it with the cloth, tying it in place to keep it from swaying. Max bit her lip so tight that it bled. The pain was so immense that she couldn’t even breathe. Seeing her wither in agony, Yuysion hurriedly pulled the bags they brought with them off his back.
“Please hang in there, there must be some recovery herbs in here.”
He searched frantically through the bags and pulled out a packet of medicinal herbs. Looking at the handful of herbs, Max’s eyes softened and she removed the wrinkled clothing she was pressing against her nose to stop the bleeding.
After roughly wiping the blood from her face, she opened her mouth and Yulysion crumbled the dried plants into her mouth. Max chewed the bitter herbs and forced herself to swallow them, yet the action caused an inexplicable stinging sensation in her chest. Unable to suppress the nausea caused by the pain, Max hunched over and vomited the nasty herbs next to her.
“M’lady!”
The pain in her ribs, which were already painful, throbbed even more excruciatingly when she threw up and engulfed her. Yulysion wept helplessly seeing her in such a disastrous state.
“I’m s-sorry m’lady, I was useless…”
“This won’t do. We’ll risk being found by the monsters, but we must make a fire. Her body is dropping temperature. I think her mana depletion is causing her to get worse.”
“I-I’ll make the fire!”
“No, you must keep watch. You are more perceptive than I am.”
Max wiped the vomit from her mouth as she dazedly listened to the boys’ conversation. Garrow wrapped her body with the cloak that he had placed on the floor to keep her warm and went to collect firewood. Yulysion also quickly removed his own cloak and leaned down to wrap it around her. Then, his body suddenly stiffened. Garrow stared, frozen in fear at the possibility that something else had gone wrong.
