No More Regrets!

8 - Curses & Their surprise.

It was a hard few weeks. Bianca didn't let go of the sorcery book, she kept it for weeks. Far longer than she had said. I was looking forward to moving forward in Sorcery. I wasn't sure how she would read it, since it was in Japanese, but I hoped she would give it back soon enough.

Despite those difficult weeks, after we exorcized the curse, the school's sports team began to play far better, we won matches left and right. Which meant that I had to retract my statement about our school lacking skill.

I guess the curse hindered their ability to train and play.

Because they began winning after my exorcism, the school became full of people who came to see me after class to help them with things.

"So, can you help me, Nico?" One of my classmates, Mila Rose, stood in front of my desk and put two 10 dollar bills. I glanced back at her.

"I'll check it out, but it could just be something else." I didn't accept any form of money until I was sure what I was exorcizing was a curse. Pushing the money back into her hands, I informed her of that. She nodded and led me to her dorm room.

She said she'd been feeling tired all the time, despite going to sleep early, her grades were taking a dive because of it. She couldn't pay attention in class and took constant naps. Curses that make your body feel lethargic existed, getting cursed sometimes meant that the curse slowly fed off your vitality until you died.

Mila didn't have any dorm mates -- she was lucky, mine sucked. I kept telling my dorm mate to stop putting his clothes on my bed for storage, but he never listened.

The lack of dorm mate meant the room was empty, and full of her things. It was messy, but nothing compared to my room on a Saturday afternoon. I opened the curtains to let the light in and tried looking for curses.

There were your average Flyheads* here and there, but that was normal inside a school this strict. I looked around for Residuals, they were pieces of cursed energy left behind by cursed spirits and cursed sorcerers after cursing someone. I couldn't see any.

It could mean that the curse I was facing was a master at clearing their tracks, but simultaneously that seemed unlikely. I opened the small fridge inside her room -- she was definitely loaded, because the school did not install fridges in the dorms. There wasn't much inside.

"What do you usually eat?" I closed the fridge and began looking through the trash. I took off the lid, and looked inside. I saw several different packages of food. Sandwiches, noodles, some burgers. She ate take out food a lot.

"Juuust vegetables, why? Does eating some foods attract curses?" She asked, slurring her speech from exhaustion while looking over my shoulder. I glanced back at her, then back at the ingredients and contents table in the food items.

"You're not lethargic because of a curse," I concluded, letting the food packaging drop back in the trash can. I got up and looked at her while jotting down a few things on a piece of paper, "you're not eating enough vitamins. Magnesium, Iron, vitamin B. Eat some more beans, bananas." I handed her the paper and then walked out. "Or eat from the school cafeteria."

I closed the door on my way out. Mila opened the door and caught up with me before putting her hand on my shoulder. It lightly brushed against my neck as she tapped my shoulder, it was cold.

"W-wait! It can't be the vitamins, it has to be something!" She said, the people in the corridor turned to look at us and I stared at Mila, speaking about her eating habits in public felt like a bad thing to do. I walked with her to the library, and we whispered about her thoughts.

"Well?" I asked, leaning back on the chair.

"Haven't you noticed? Lots of people have been feeling bad lately. They're getting sick easily, feeling down on energy. It's not just me." Mila explained. I hummed and crossed my arms, it could just be a flu, I doubted it had anything to do with a curse unless it was a Flyhead.