"...tsk… oh, come on, you're so good with cold and snow but you couldn't have put it on ice while I worked?"
"...wha…? I.. Should I have…? It's cold anyway..."
Upon closer examination, the nurse clicked her tongue and asked grumpily, making Rotsard let out a shocked gasp.
"Well… depends… While it will make the severed body parts last a lot longer… It also can lead to frostbite and tissue death, making it kind of a double-edged sword. But it's definitely a good short-term solution."
The nurse tilted her head with hesitation before declaring with confidence.
"Huh… so that's how it works for normal people…"
"By the way… did you know that your blood is basically dead?"
Rotsard furrowed his brow, deep in thought… when the nurse dropped a rather concerning piece of information!
"From what I can tell, it doesn't even move that much… but since you're still alive that means that something else took over its functions."
"..."
As the woman was fixing the bones, nerves, muscles, and blood vessels in place in Rotsard's left hand so that the magic of healing crystals wouldn't weld them to the wrong spots, she also explained, causing his eyes to almost bulge out from shock.
"If I have to guess, that something would be your mana. And what I mean by that is, you should definitely stay away from any artifacts and spells that could disrupt your flow of mana… or you might just end up dead. I'm serious."
She added with a grim look in her eyes, making sure to keep eye contact with the yellow-eyed boy so he would realize the severity of his state.
"...I will keep it in mind…. Also… I would appreciate it if you would keep that one a secret too, Miss, umm…."
The bleached-blond-haired youth gulped down his saliva before nodding and then adding after an awkward pause.
"Chloe. No family name, since their remnants are quite certain I'm already dead, and I want to keep it that way."
The woman responded with a shrug.
"...is that a secret for a secret kind of thing…?"
"It might be. But I still won't tell you that surname."
Rotsard asked, and the woman responded with a shrug.
"Alright, let's bandage you up."
"...huh…?"
Some time later, after using several healing crystals to speed up the recovery process, nurse Chloe declared while returning to Rotsard's bedside with a whole armful of bandages and gauze, making Rotsard stare at her in shock.
" The stitches are fine, but you have to keep in mind that your hand and arm were cut clean off. Even though the healing crystals connected it all, all of that good work can be undone with enough of an impact or even reckless movement! The more support the better, not to mention you should stay in bed for at least a month, preferably up to half a year to be sure…"
"Well, that's a shame. I can't be bedridden at all, and preferably I would like no bandages to show to others that there's anything wrong."
But Rotsard merely shook his head and said with a stern expression…
"You can't be serious."
To which the nurse responded in a scolding voice.
"The wounds just need to be protected, and the parts kept together, right? I could mask it with a disguise spell, but then I would still need to change them and stuff... Would this work instead?"
"!?!?"
Rotsard furrowed his brows and ended up closing his eyes... the next moment, a circle of light spread out from beneath him and ephemeral wings hovered over it, causing the baffled Chloe to just stare at them with her mouth agape.
Then, a layer of ice grew directly on top of the stitches connecting previously severed parts of the bleached-blond-haired youth… and then sprouted out thorns or rather fangs that dug into the flesh on both sides, firmly locking everything in place.
As the previously clear ice clouded, the wounds and stitches got hidden perfectly, leaving only what looked like particularly shaped accessories that wouldn't be considered to be in good taste.
…but that certainly took care of both conditions spoken by Rotsard, the wounds were covered, and the parts were kept together, and the next moment the circle and wings of light were gone…
"It will work because I'm highly resistant to cold."
"...why are you hurting yourself even more…?"
Rotsard nodded to himself, raising his left hand to his face to admire the result, but the words of nurse Chloe were as far from encouraging as possible.
She sounded deeply upset while looking at all the spots where the ice bracelet's fangs were stabbing into the youth's flesh.
"...because no matter what, I have to keep up appearances so everything can go smoothly…"
"...eh…?"
Her words made Rotsard flinch and lower his head before muttering bitterly and causing Chloe to let out a shocked gasp.
"Don't mind me. I'm just… dealing with a little bit more than anyone could guess just by looking from the outside. It's nothing, really."
And yet, the next moment Rotsard perked up and smiled brilliantly towards the confused woman.
"You did a really great job, Miss Chloe. Thank you very much, but it's time for me to go. It's almost time for the lectures so I need to change."
"!?!?"
The way Rotsard started to act, sent chills down Chole's spine. The bleached-blond-haired youth behaved as if his limbs hadn't been cut and just barely reattached without any anesthesia, but he was able to smile so brightly and sound so genuinely carefree that Chloe's brain didn't want to accept him as human and was sending distress signals for her to run away.
If not for the fact that he was careful not to move his arms too much, or rather, at all, even she wouldn't be able to tell that something was wrong.
"Thank you once again, and have a nice day."
"..."
Rotsard's body flashed with bluish-white light, and he returned to being a scrawny, bleached-blond-haired youth and got off the bed. He nodded at the speechless nurse one more time and then simply left the private room and the hospital wing altogether.
"...Ch-Chloe…? Is he gone…? Wh-what was wrong with that guy!? How did he get his hand and arm cut off!?"
After a few moments, when it was certain that Rotsard was gone, the same new nurse who had fainted at the sight of the patient, peeked into the private room where Chloe was still sitting with an upset expression and asked nervously.
"It would be best if you forgot about all of that. Nothing happened."
"???"
Chloe took a deep breath and responded, confusing her colleague, while a certain grayish white bird with black stripes across its eyes and wings landed by the window to peek inside, overhearing the last bit of the conversation between nurses, but unaware that it missed the most important part.