Locked and wounded. (A Hololive fanfic)

Chapter 2: A birthday present.

(Arato POV.)

It's been two days since I pulled Sora out of that hellhole that is the slave trade, another two days left before her birthday.

In the past 48 hours, I can safely say I've made some progress on trying to get her to open up to me, not great progress but progress nonetheless. Sadly though, trauma remains a major obstacle, holding a conversation with Sora without her trembling from fear is... Really difficult, let's say. I also have to warn her about every movement I'm about to do otherwise she'd flinch.

Can't give up though, progress IS being made, while I haven't heard her speak yet, she can now comfortably answer yes or no questions from me, as well as the fact she's more comfortable around me in general.

Still, one major issue remains in my list of worries about her.

I was working on a patient diagnosis at my office when I heard Sora coughing loudly, loud enough that I could hear it from downstairs, that could only mean one thing. Curse of Mortis is showing its side effects on her again.

Luckily there were no patients around at this time, meaning I was free to leave my desk, after flipping the sign on the door from "Doctor is in." to "Doctor is out.", I went upstairs.

"Sora? Are you okay?" I called out.

Once I got there, I found her lying on the sofa, sweating profusely and letting out the most raspy coughs I've ever heard. I then moved in front of her, got down on my knees and held her hand, I could see painful looking swells on her neck highlighting her lymph nodes, buboes, nasty stuff.

Now what's the problem here? Sora is currently showing symptoms of the black death, also known as the bubonic plague. This is a side effect of the curse of Mortis, every once and a while, the victim may suddenly show extreme symptoms of the bubonic plague, it could last a few seconds, minutes, or hours before it subsides, the victim may be doing perfectly fine in one second, and then they could have painful headaches, coughing, and buboes in the next. These symptoms also don't respond to treatments for the black death, meaning the victim has no choice but to endure the symptoms until it stops.

Luckily this imitation of the black death isn't transmittable, meaning Sora could cough on me without much concern, apart from the fact its still pretty nasty to get coughed on.

After a few seconds, Sora finally stopped coughing long enough for her to look at me.

This poor girl... She deserves none of the suffering she's experiencing right now, fortunately I have a way to stop that, the symptoms I mean.

I smiled at her before I closed my eyes, focusing my magic once again as my hand that is gripping Sora's palm started to emit a purple light.

This episode seemed more severe than the last, as it took more of my energy than expected but eventually, Sora's symptoms subsided, I'm not sure how long it was supposed to last, but I do know that I most definitely cut it short. She'll be fine now until the symptoms randomly show up again.

"There, all better." I tell her. "Go back to sleep if that's what you were doing."

I then stood up, letting the cute maid get some more rest. She deserves it, and needs it. It was only then that I realized what time it was, I was working beyond closing time, so I finally closed down the clinic for today. And that's when exhaustion dawned on me.

When I got back upstairs, I gently crash landed on the Sofa that Sora was resting at, careful as to not wake her up, not really doing anything, just watching over sleeping beauty to make sure I'm there incase she gets another episode of symptoms.