It took Kenny several minutes to regain his strength, and he wasn't exactly fresh afterward.

  "It's not just exhaustion," he said. "It was so hard to concentrate, and I was seeing black spots for a while."

  "I'm going to heal you back," I said. "Don't worry, you'll feel like new."

  "No, No," he waved me down. "We have to be efficient about this. We have to plan it out."

  "You're right," I said. "We need to know if we can heal only the body or even a single wound."

  "Not only that," he replied. "We made a lot of assumptions here. We need to get rid of all the unnecessary stuff," he pointed at the ground. "The first thing that needs to go is the temple. We didn't even use the right one, and it will be a whole different game if we can Heal outside."

  We made our plans and went outside. I wasn't a stranger to the scientific method. I went to school like every else, but planning experiments for something explicitly supernatural felt out of place. If it can be repeated at will, we'll be able to depend on it. Hell, if it was impossible to sleep, we would have to rely on something like this.

  We slowly walked out of the plaza, noting the bustling activity near the growing ramp, and turned a corner behind one of the closest unattended buildings. When we ensured there were no people or ghouls in sight. We continued to experiment.

  It didn't take us long, ten minutes at most. And yet, while I still felt reinvigorated physically, the clarity and freshness left me by this point. Whatever Kenny did, it was not the substitution to sleep the witch made it out to be.

  First, we had to try it without all the most likely noise. We were outside the temple and decided to try to recover only Kenny's life force.

  It took him several tries to manage a nick on his skin, and I was quick to draw the Ankh on his hand. We already knew the placement of the symbol was insignificant since he used the one we drew on my hand to Heal everything.

  "Do you accept this blessing to recover your life force?" I asked him.

  "Yes," he accepted.

  "This Ankh was drawn with your blood and my saliva. It represents life," I said, touching the symbol.

  "I use some of my life to bless you," I proclaimed. "Be restored."

  I finished with a prolonged measured blow on his symbol. It was a hard feeling to describe, a mentally draining exercise that made me feel lessened for it.

  I stopped blowing when Kenny lifted a hand.

  "Did it work?" I asked. I felt the drain, but it did not guarantee success.

  "Yeah, It felt like getting slapped awake or chugging coffee," he answered. "Could be addictive. We should be careful with this."

  This was a huge win. We now gained the ability to Heal outside of the temple.

  I was in awe. Not only miracles or magic were possible. I had this miraculous ability—me. It was unbelievable, and there was much more to come.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  ***

  We continued our work, resting between each try, and still, we were both spent by the end.

  Kenny managed to Heal himself. Then I succeeded in treating separate wounds.

  The Ankh could be drawn using anything. We didn't have to use bodily fluids for it. The symbol was not strictly necessary but made the spell easier. We could use a stone with the sign to Heal without drawing it on the body.

  The patient's permission was only needed when casting on each other; without it, the effect was severely weakened. Same with touch.

  The most selective of all was the ending. The command to be healed could be whispered, which didn't change the result. Willing the effect silently was strenuous and barely worked, but it was possible.

  After that, only the trigger remained. Blowing on the symbol or whispering to it worked like pouring water. It was seamless and gradual. However, using the command itself as a trigger, a snap of the fingers, or a clap, was worse. The effect was more abrupt, harder on the caster, and felt more wasteful.

  We were absolutely exhausted, but we had the framework for future spells.

  Consent from the target, a symbol of the effect, the intent to use life force, the command, touch, and the trigger.

  Out of all of them, only the use of life was missing on our very first try, we were so close, but it took us so much time to get to it. It was also the only thing essential for the spell. All of the others only made the magic more manageable and potent.

  "We must thank Victor," Kenny remarked. "His description was so good, we actually managed to repeat it."

  "I still can't believe I can use magic," I said. "He only missed the life-force aspect, and he couldn't have known it either way. And oh, how I wish we knew the spit wasn't necessary. I feel so stupid for trying with it so many times," I chuckled.

  "I still don't understand the Ankh," Kenny complained. "It represents life, so do we use it for any spell that uses our life? Or maybe only the spells that affect life?" he continued to ramble. "What even gives it the meaning of life? How many people need to recognize the symbol to give it meaning?"

  "Whoa, hold your horses there," I said. "I wouldn't risk casting anymore without rest. You need to find a way to write down all your ideas, or your head will explode," I joked.

  I was very thankful to Kenny, but he needed to be more careful. It took some persuading to make him stop earlier. We didn't know what would happen if we used too much of our life. We could die for all I knew.

  "I have just the idea for next time," Kenny said. "You'll only have to heal a small cut up to three times at worst, and we will have another piece of the puzzle."

  "What piece exactly?" I asked.

  "I can tell you only after you do it. That's part of it," he said.

  His enthusiasm was infectious, which made me curious, but I was serious when I decided to stop. So It'll have to wait.

  We were walking beside the colonnade when I noticed his silver tray.

  "Didn't you try to sell it?" I asked.

  "Nobody wanted it," he shrugged. "I just left it here when I saw you talk to Victor."

  I got an idea.

  "Let's go talk to the witch," I proposed.

  He looked at me questioningly.

  "We won't tell her we figured out her trick," I warned him. "But we need to get as much as we can from her. Anything she lets slip, we may be able to use."

  I picked up the tray. "This will be our gift to her. Who doesn't like silver?"

  "We need to ask her about the Goddess," Kenny suggested. "And how she knows when it's dawn."

  "We'll ask her to teach us to heal," I said.

  "Why?" He asked. "We already know that."

  "Just to see what the price she puts on that information is," I said. "We'll know her better for it."

  Kenny hummed thoughtfully.

  "Chin up. We're going to make a new friend," I joked.