I Reincarnated as an NPC Witch

What Must Be Done

Lavena looks out from the window in the tower of the wizard. She can see Abigail among the crowd in the distance. “Yes, Crocus the Floral Witch.” The wizard looks at the window in excitement, “If you have her, why did you ask for help? You have the ace of the witches, she can solve your problems really quick!” Wren looks at Keeana, “Is Crocus outside?” He whispers as Keeana nods, “She was caught up in the crowd when we arrived. She said that we should follow you here. I am sure she could keep the crowd of people busy. Our appearance in the town and their excitement about us could have slowed us down. I am glad that Crocus has a better reputation here.” Wren looks at the wizard, “We must be in Pacuvinium, aren’t we?” He looks back at Keeana. The girl’s eyes widen as she checked her map once more, “Right.” She looks at the semi-blurred and ragged letters on the map, “Pacuvinium, how did I not able to read that word? I must be so tired.”

“The Floral Witch doesn’t have any assistance to offer you? That’s strange.” Lavena sighs, “She does have a plan to help the count up. But, she needs to brew a potion to do so. It was an urgent thing for us.” She turns to the Count and kneels beside him. She touches his right arm and checks its temperature. Her face lightens up as she turns her head to her friends, “The Count, his right arm is not in a freezing temperature anymore.” They all approached her as Winsel kneels at the other side of the count, double-checking her claim. “No…” He said as he checks his neck but his mind changed when he felt the temperature of Count Alzrus’ right arm, “Huh.” He looked at the Count. “That’s an interesting change.” He looks at the wizard, “You may have helped him quite a bit. Not fully but there are some significant changes that may help Crocus brew something for the Count.”

“I am glad to hear I helped! I am not really sure that anything would do for him but this man here pleads for my assistance. I can’t simply deny such a polite request.” The wizard approaches him, “Because, to be honest with you, such magic is a rare encounter. Especially in our continent with no big lands of snow. The fact that almost no people live in the mountains explains that as well. If there are some, they will be ogres and dwarves. As far as I know, these species aren’t known to adapt to the magic abilities of places. Ogres rely on their strength and dwarves with their weird technology. I supposed you have not encountered dwarves, aren’t you?” Lavena shakes her head, “I believe the bandits we encountered aren’t dwarves. Unless they are pulling tricks under their sleeves—well, in this case, robes—I am fairly certain that we have not angered such sly beings. As someone who encountered those rebels, I will know when it’s them. But, I guess it’s not far-fetch that they will develop an arrow that could freeze someone internally.” She pulls out the crystal ice arrow from Keeana’s quiver and gives it to the wizard.

He cautiously accepts the weapon and observes it. “Such a peculiar thing. But, alas, even my grimoire who has seen a lot of wars and diseases, that has been passed to many hands of magical practitioners, and revised by my great family of wizards, doesn’t have anything to help you. I guess my family has not been traveling out of the continent a lot. Although, the lack of said magic in these lands means we don’t need cautionary measures and cures for it. But, that ideology backfired to us.”

The door creaks a bit that caught all of their attention. In the door was Abigail with the goblin companions of the wizard. She was still ruined with all of the runnings but she seems much more tired than before. “M-miss Crocus…” He bows on her. Such action didn’t surprise Abigail with the crowd she had to manage outside. She looks at her friends, especially Keeana. They seem to know what the look means, they need to explain everything to her. “This is a special day! I am surprised that the chieftain didn’t invite you yet to his house. It’s a great honor for you to walk in my house and even my special magical room!” Abigail forces a smile on him, “It’s nice to meet you too.” She said as she closes the door behind her. “Is Count Alzrus okay now?”

“Well, there is some good news for his situation, Miss Crocus. I wasn’t expecting such a change in his curse right now but it seems he's right arm heated up a bit. As opposed to the numbing cold earlier when you touch him. But, alas, he’s not fully cured yet as you all wanted to.” He holds his staff closer, “I apologize but I have nothing for this man. I know he’s a ruler but I have nothing to help him. At least for now.” Abigail approaches the Count that was laying on the ground. “It’s fine, at least there’s some progress towards his recovery.” She sighs as she looks at her friends, “What now?”

“Well, about your potion…” Keeana rubs her arms, “I think you need to do that now and in a hurry.” Lavena looks at the wizard, “Maybe you could do that spell to him if his situation worsens again?” He nods, “I could but with moderate consumption. I also need to see what helped him. If it’s the one with the fire crystals, I am afraid that I could only do it once. It’s pretty hard to get another batch of these crystals since it was just recently delivered to me. I didn’t know I would need it a lot since winter is not yet approaching. So, I only ordered a few. They are pretty expensive especially with the business I have, which I have so many competitors in and out of the town.” Suddenly, there was a bag thrown at him which he successfully caught with his hands. “There, that’s yours.” Catrina said as Lavena looks at him, “Where did you get that?”

“I have that all the time, Lavena. Don’t you remember? We just got lucky these past few weeks that we stumbled upon towns that we are either incredibly famous on or the leaders have a debt to us. Besides, the man deserves it. He bought us more time.” She looks at the wizard, “So, we will buy his services.” The wizard’s lips curved a bit, “Thank you for these. I supposed I need to accept it, it’s a wonderful blessing after all.”

“I guess we could stay somewhere in here. We will hire your services once more if needed.” Lavena gestures Wren to pick the Count up the floor. “We will be heading now. We are going to find someplace to stay. Thank you for the small help.” Keeana smiles, “A small yet hugely appreciate, Mister…?”

“Dewin the Wizard, call me as you may please.” He smiles at her. “Nice to meet you Mister Dewin! And thank you for the kind help you have given to us.” Yris looks at him, “I should be the one thanking you.” Everyone looked at her, her face was ruined with the crying she’s been having for the past couple of minutes. “Thank you for helping my father in the way you can think of. It’s excruciating for me to watch him suffer under this curse—whatever is this pest. Don’t worry, when we get home, I’ll pay you more than we could at this time.” She looks at Catrina, “I am in your debt.” She sighs, “Thank you once more, I hope you could help him again if that’s what needed to be done.”

“Don’t worry, young lady, I would try to help him the best way I can.” Abigail looks at them, “We should go now, we have no time to waste.” They all bid their farewell as Dewin escorted them out of his house. “I wish you well!” He said as they find some inn to stay. With their popularity, especially Abigail’s, it was not difficult for them to get an inn. All of it was vacant and with their presence there, the owner declared the inn close for the vacancy until they leave the town. Abigail immediately went to her room and throws herself on the bed. Suddenly, her chest glows as Teria pops off it gracefully. She was shocked that she was in a necklace this whole time. She didn’t even notice her in the past couple of hours. “Teria!” She exclaimed as the fox hops to her and she gave it a big hug. “I didn’t know you were in my wand necklace!”

Teria happily squeaks as she squeezes out of her embrace. She hops on the bed and looks at her. She starts squeaking as she suddenly became a mist once more and approached her chest. She became yet another necklace on her chest. But, this time, it was much more festive than her moon necklace. With the robe, she has, Teria as a necklace would be mistaken by a design of the robe with the Wisteria leaves of the necklace. It fades out again as Teria hops out and sits in front of her. Abigail giggles as she pets the small hyper fox that Teria was. “You just make my day brighter, don’t you?” She laughs as Teria happily squeaks.” Abigail places her in front of her as Teria sits, looking at her.

Her smile slowly fades as she sighs. She looks around the room she’s in. She pulls out her potion book from her bag and places it on the bed, flipping it open. Teria lays herself beside it. She started skimming through the potions in the book. “I hope there’s something remotely close to healing the count. I hope something that could help Count Alzrus exists. I don’t want to get myself in trouble.” She said to herself as she searches through the table of contents and flipped through the pages, hoping something could help her. She jumps page to page, checking the contents of the titles out that’s fairly decent for a cure in some kind of a frozen curse. But, she found but false hope in these pages of the book. Everything she gets excited about just fades into disappointment to see what’s their purpose. “Are you kidding me? There’s no single thing in this potion book about some kind of defrost drink?” She groans as she grabs her spellbook to check if there’s any spell that could help her.

Just like the potion book, nothing of use was found in the spellbook. Both of the books she trusted in this journey failed to help her. She looks at Teria, “What should I do now? Is the Count’s situation helpless now?” She sighs as the idea of using her elevation of access pops out of her mind. Abigail shakes her head, “No, no. I shall not a***e this power. Especially using it to something fairly new to the game. A mechanic that’s freshly implemented. I know The Gemini doesn’t know or even remember what these books have but they know what they don’t have. One of them is something to do with the curse the Count is under right now.” She sighs as Teria tries her best to comfort her owner.

Abigail looks at Teria with confusion in her eyes and fear in her face. “I don’t know what to do, Teria. I don’t really know. I am torn. I have reasons not to do that yet I have good reasons to do it anyway.” She sighs as she embraces her pet fox. She closes her eyes for a bit to calm herself down. It was just what she needed to decide her next decision. “There’s no wrong with trying… Right?”