Chương 53: Severing Threads

Adolin sat inside Lira's room. It had been cleaned since the day before. The smell was gone, replaced by the scent of flowers. Or something similar. He wasn't entirely sure what it was, and at the moment, he didn't really care. There was a far more pressing issue at hand. Helping Lira overcome her addiction. He had spent enough time thinking it through to realize it wouldn't be as simple as he had first thought. There was still corruption lingering inside her core. He had already confirmed it with Analyze.

If he left it alone, the cravings would eventually return until her core managed to rid itself of the corruption naturally. But that could take years. And worse, it would make her dependent on him. He didn't want that. The problem with his earlier estimate was that he had based it on the drugs from his old world. But the corruption here was different. And the more he learned about the corruption in the north, the more convinced he became that the two were connected somehow. He was still going to cure her.

He just wasn't entirely sure if he was capable of doing it yet. If he could get information from the church about how they treated cases like this, fixing the problem would probably be easy. But there was almost no chance they would willingly share that knowledge with him. The first thing he needed to determine was whether the corruption inside her core could actually be removed. And if it couldn't, then whether its influence could at least be slowed down. The mind spell he had planned would still work regardless.

So even if he couldn't completely cure her now, once he understood the corruption better, he eventually would be able to. There was also the corruption inside his own core, and Edrin's. He still had no real idea how to deal with either of them. There were spells capable of purging corruption completely, but he was nowhere near strong enough to use them yet. Lira sat down beside him on the bed. Thankfully, she hadn't mentioned yesterday at all. In fact, she seemed to be in a surprisingly good mood.

"So," Lira asked, "how is this going to work?"

"Well, it's a spell that will make you forget everything connected to the drugs," Adolin said.

"The sensations, the cravings, the emotions tied to them… all of it." He paused for a moment before continuing.

"There's a small chance it could affect other memories, too. Mostly ones closely connected to the addiction itself. But it should be enough to stop the cravings and the withdrawal." Lira listened attentively, slowly nodding along as Adolin explained everything.

"Are there any side effects?" she asked.

"A few possible ones," Adolin admitted.

"You might feel disoriented for a while afterward. Headaches, too, depending on how deeply the memories are tied together." He hesitated briefly before continuing.

"And there's always the chance that some unrelated memories connected to that period disappear as well."

"Will I know which memories will be lost?" Adolin shook his head.

"Can I lose the memories with you?" Adolin shook his head.

"No. And even if you somehow did…" A faint smile appeared on his face.

"I can just give them back." Lira lowered her gaze, quietly thinking it over. It took her a while before she finally answered.

"Okay," she said softly. Then she looked back at him.

"I'll be completely healed afterward?"

"I'm not completely sure," Adolin admitted.

"There's a chance the cravings could return someday. But even if they do, it won't be as bad as it is now." He leaned back slightly before continuing.

"But there's still a small amount of corruption inside your core. If I'm right, that corruption could eventually bring those feelings back."

"I could also be wrong," he added.

"Nothing might happen at all. But either way, I'll still need to purge the corruption once I learn how." She nodded and gave him a small smile.

"That's good enough for me." This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Adolin stared at her for a moment before letting out a quiet breath.

"Alright," he said as he extended his hand.

"Let's get started." Lira took his hand. The first thing he wanted to do was get over with the mind spell; it would take him some effort and concentration to get over it. So he didn't want to waste any mana in case anything went wrong. He cast Mind Cleansing and closed his eyes, focusing on the mana within the spell. It was far more complex than any spell he had used since arriving in this world. The spell required constant manual control to function properly.

Without it, there was a very real chance of wiping a person's entire mind instead of only the targeted memories. Thankfully, he had enough experience with the spell to trust himself not to make that mistake. His vision changed, and suddenly he found himself standing in complete darkness. Then, one by one, lines began appearing around him. Some were thin. Others thick. Their colors varied endlessly as they spread through the darkness like an infinite web. This was how the spell represented the mind to him.

Thoughts, emotions, memories, instincts—everything woven together into countless interconnected strands. And it looked different for every person using the spell. It all depended on their view of the world, their experiences, and the knowledge they possessed. Adolin disliked using the spell because it showed the most private place a person possessed. And every time he cast the spell, he was invading it. Now came the difficult part. Choosing which memories needed to be purged.

The lines stretched endlessly before him, beginning only a few steps away and disappearing into the darkness without end. Each line represented a memory. The thicker the strand, the more important the memory was. Or the more influence it held over the person. Using the spell for the first time had been difficult. But this was far from his first time. The brighter strands usually represented happy memories, while the darker ones were tied to pain, fear, grief, or hatred. It gave him a place to start.

Once he located enough of the memories connected to the addiction, finding the related ones became much easier. He walked forward, searching through the countless strands for one of the darker memories. The easiest one to find would be the withdrawal Lira had suffered through the day before. He stopped in front of a thin strand. It was dark, but not too dark. Which meant that, despite everything, Lira herself didn't see the memory as one of her worst. He had a feeling this was the memory he was searching for.

There were several other dark strands nearby, but those could easily be tied to the day they arrived at the village and witnessed the destruction there. Now came the next step. He needed to see the memory himself to make certain he wasn't touching something he shouldn't— the worst part of the spell. Adolin took a slow breath and reached out, touching the strand with his finger. The memory flooded into him instantly. Fragments of scenes flashed through his mind. Pain. Cravings. Desperation.

It only took him a second to confirm what it was before he immediately pulled his hand back. He shook his head and moved deeper through the strands. The next section was easier to pass through. There were still some dark strands scattered around him, but most were bright. Those were the days after he had found and healed Lira. He continued farther in until he reached a strand so bright it was almost white. And beyond it— Almost everything turned dark. A few strands still carried faint traces of lighter colors.

Adolin moved through the strands one by one, carefully familiarizing himself with the memories he needed to purge. It took him more than twenty minutes. By the end of it, he no longer needed to inspect every strand directly. He had seen enough to recognize the patterns. The emotions tied to them. The way the related memories connected and clustered together. Now he could follow the strands naturally. And there was only one thing left to find. The beginning. The day it had all started.

He found the strand some time later. It was dark. Which meant the day Lira first took the drug hadn't been a happy one. That alone suggested she probably hadn't taken it willingly. Adolin stared at the strand for a few moments before finally reaching out and touching it. The moment the memory started flowing into him, he pulled his hand away. That was enough. He no longer needed to see it to know this was the starting point. And he certainly didn't want to witness the rest of it.

He took a deep breath and let the spell do its work. The strands began to shrink. Small fractures spread across them before pieces started breaking away and dissolving into nothingness, like ash carried off by the wind. One by one, the memories connected to the addiction disappeared from the endless web. It was done. Adolin slowly opened his eyes. His vision spun as a pounding pain struck his head. Mind magic was not something a person could use without consequences.

Thankfully, the backlash was minor compared to what could happen with a failed spell, but the headache would likely stay with him for the next few hours. He ignored it and looked at Lira. She was holding her head, a grimace visible on her face. The caster wasn't the only one who suffered the consequences of mind magic. He spent the next hour with Lira until he had recovered enough mana to cast a spell to dull the pain. Only then did he leave the room. Adolin didn't waste any time returning to his own room.

He dropped onto the bed and closed his eyes. The pounding in his head refused to fade. He tried to fall asleep despite it, but without much success.