The doctor stood paralyzed for a moment, the empty pewter basin still clutched in his hands. He looked from my pristine, unscarred hand to the discarded leg brace, then back to my face. The shock in his eyes slowly transitioned into a profound, weary sense of relief.
"In all my years as a practitioner of the celestial arts, I have never seen a constitution like yours," he breathed,
The doctor wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. He let out a long, shaky sigh, his shoulders slumping as the tension of the last three days finally bled away.
He straightened his robes and offered a formal bow, his voice regaining its professional warmth.
"Well, since you are both a hero of this manor and have... miraculously seen to your own recovery, you have been a great help to this infirmary. I am the only healer in this town who possesses the gift of healing magic, and my mana was nearly spent trying to keep you stable. You have made my job far easier than I dared hope."
He gestured toward the door, where other wounded townsfolk were likely waiting.
"Consider your stay and my services fully compensated. I will charge you nothing. It is the least I can do for the girl who stood against the guild."
A small, genuine smile tugged at the corners of my lips… the first real smile to touch Roxy's face since the world turned to ash. It wasn't the jagged, predatory grin of the hero, but something softer. Something human.
"Thank you, Doc," I said softly.
The doctor nodded, offering one last look of wonder at my regenerated limbs before turning to leave. As the heavy oak door thudded shut behind him, the room returned to the quiet hum of the flickering candles.
I stood there in the center of the room, feeling the phantom weight of the missing eye, but the strength in my legs was undeniable. I was no longer a patient. I was a weapon that had been reforged in blood and kindness alike.
Snow watched me from the bedside, her expression a mixture of awe and protective sorrow. I looked at my reflection one last time… the girl with one green eye and a story written in scars. The recovery was over. Now, it was time for the hunt.
I took a seat on the edge of the pallet, the newfound strength in my leg feeling strange yet welcome. I turned my gaze to Snow, my one good eye filled with a lingering dread for the others who had been trapped in that nightmare.
"Snow, what happened to the others? Maine... and the Calico brothers? Did they make it out?" I started, my voice steadying.
Snow sighed, her expression clouding with the weight of the news.
"The truth is difficult, Roxy. After the incident, the Calico brothers decided to leave Town Allure immediately. They've returned to their family residence in Caria. They were all badly hurt, but Calix... he suffered the most. As the only true adventurer standing in that kitchen, he took the brunt of the violence. He's alive, but he suffered severe blood loss. It will be a long time before he picks up a blade again."
I closed my eyes for a second, picturing Calix's brave, desperate stand.
"And Maine?"
"Maine is safe, White managed to pull him to safety before she collapsed. He escaped with only minor injuries and is currently alive and well, though shaken to his core."
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. But as I looked around the stone infirmary, I realized something was missing.
"The manor... what of the house?"
Snow's face fell. Her face says it all. It was a face of guilt.
"The manor was burned to ashes, Roxy. The Guild's fires took everything. The rescuers were lucky to pull you and White from the burning building just before the roof came down. Because of that, we are all currently living at an inn that Lord Phillip recommended. He's looking after the survivors, and the rest of the household members are staying there now. There is a room waiting for you, if you wish to join us."
The image of the manor… the hallways where I'd walked, the kitchen where I'd fought, and the basement where the maids had perished… engulfed in flames felt like a final, cruel punctuation mark on the night.
I stood up fully then, testing the balance of my regenerated body. I appreciated the offer, but the thought of being surrounded by the reminders of that night, even in the safety of an inn, felt suffocating.
"Thank you, Snow, but don't bother with a room for me. I still have my own household available in town. I'll head there to recover properly."
Snow looked like she wanted to protest, to keep me close where she could watch over me, but she saw the resolve in my green eye. I was a survivor with my own path to walk.
"I understand, just know that our doors are always open to you, Roxy. You saved my family. You will always have a place with us."
I turned away from the window, the weight of my decision settling comfortably in my chest. While the inn offered companionship, I needed the silence of my own walls to process the hollow ache where my eye used to be and the new, dark power humming in my veins.
"I'll be going then, tell White... tell her she fought well. Tell her we're even." I nodded
Snow watched me with a lingering concern, but she nodded, respecting the distance I was putting between myself and the tragedy.
"I will tell her. Take care of yourself, Roxy. The town feels different now. Be careful who you trust."
I stepped out of the infirmary, the cool night air of Town Allure hitting my face. The streets were quiet, the usual midnight bustle dampened by the news of the manor's destruction. I pulled the hood of my cloak low, concealing the bandages over my right eye.
Walking felt strange. My leg was perfect… stronger, even… but my depth perception was skewed. The world felt flat, a two-dimensional stage where I had to relearn how to navigate the shadows.
The heavy door of the Rynd household creaked shut, sealing out the cold night air of Town Allure. For a moment, I just stood in the entryway, the familiar scent of beeswax, dried lavender, and old parchment wrapping around me like a ghostly shroud. This was home. Or at least, it was the place that used to belong to a girl who had both her eyes and a soul that didn't feel like jagged glass.
I limped further into the foyer, my boots clicking softly on the polished wood. The nostalgia was a physical weight… seeing the coat rack where I'd hung my cloak after a peaceful walk, the small table where I left my keys. It all felt like it belonged to a different lifetime.
"Roxy? Is that you?"
A soft, melodic voice drifted from the kitchen, followed by the quick, rhythmic patter of light footsteps.
Mya emerged from the shadows of the hallway. Her cat-like ears twitched atop her head, and her long, sleek tail lashed with sudden anxiety. As a cat demi-human, her senses were far sharper than any human's, she must have smelled the iron of the infirmary and the lingering scent of smoke on me long before I stepped through the door.
"Roxy, you've been gone for days, I was so… "
Mya froze. The words died in her throat as she stepped into the moonlight filtering through the window.
Her golden, slitted eyes widened in absolute horror. She saw the heavy bandages covering the right side of my face where my eye had been. Then, her gaze traveled down to my left arm. Though the skin had healed through the blood consumption, the trauma had left it looking wrong, mutilated and scarred, the muscle memory twitching with a ghostly pain that no amount of regeneration could fully erase.
"Oh, gods... Roxy..." Mya whispered, her voice trembling.
She reached out a hand, her claws reflexively retracting in grief, but she was too afraid to touch me, as if I might shatter into a thousand pieces.
"What did they do to you? What happened at that manor?"
The sight of her… the one person who represented the "normal" life I had lost… broke the final dam inside me.
The Hero of Town Allure, the gold-ranked, the cold vengeful hunter… it all evaporated. I wasn't a monster at that moment. I was just a girl who was tired, broken, and half-blind.
"Mya," I choked out.
A sob, violent and raw, tore its way out of my chest. I collapsed forward, my knees hitting the floorboards with a dull thud. Mya was there in an instant, her small, warm arms wrapping around my shaking shoulders, her soft fur pressing against my tear-stained face.
"I tried... I tried to save them, "The maids... they're all gone. And I'm... I'm not whole anymore, Mya. I can't see... I can't unsee what he did…"
I wailed into her neck, my voice cracking with a depth of agony I hadn't let myself feel in front of Snow or the doctor.
I clutched at her clothes with my scarred left hand, weeping for the girl I used to be, for the eye that would never see the sunrise again, and for the horrific silence of the manor's basement that would haunt my dreams forever. In the quiet of the Rynd household, surrounded by the ghosts of my past, I let myself finally break.
Mya's grip tightened around me, her small frame shaking with a violence that matched my own. She buried her face into the crook of my neck, her tears hot against my skin. Her cat ears were pressed flat against her skull, and her tail curled tightly around her legs… a posture of absolute, crushing defeat.
"I shouldn't have let you go alone, I knew the manor felt wrong. I saw the way the shadows moved in that part of town, Roxy. I should have been there. I'm a beastkin... my senses... I could have heard them coming. I could have helped you!" Mya sobbed,
She pulled back just enough to look at the thick, sterile bandages over my right eye, her golden eyes swimming in a sea of regret.
"If I had been there, you wouldn't be... you wouldn't have lost... and the maids..."
The mention of the maids sent a fresh spike of ice through my heart. My mind flashed back to the basement… the sight of Kiera's apron stained dark, and the way Sinel's hand had looked so small and pale in the dirt. I saw them not as corpses, but as the people who used to bring us tea and laugh at Mya's antics.
The weight of their silence was a physical pressure on my chest.
"Mya, look at me! Look at my eye. Look at what he did."
I whispered, my voice trembling as I forced myself to be the strong one. I used my scarred left hand to gently lift her chin.
Mya flinched, a fresh wave of sobs breaking through her.
"I'm so sorry, Roxy. I failed you."
"No. You didn't fail anyone. Dominik is a monster that even the gods couldn't predict. If you had been there, I would have spent the whole night trying to protect you, and maybe we'd both be in that basement right now."
I pulled her back into a hug, stroking her hair with my good hand.
"It's not your fault. It's not Snow's fault. It's his. Only his."
I closed my one good eye, leaning my head against hers. I could still see the maids' faces in the darkness of my missing eye, a permanent gallery of the lives I couldn't save. But as I held Mya, the guilt didn't feel like a poison anymore… it felt like a vow.
"Don't carry his sins, Mya. I'll carry the memory of the maids. You just stay here... stay safe. Stay the one thing in this world that hasn't been touched by his rot."
We sat there on the cold floorboards of the Rynd household for a long time, two broken girls holding onto each other while the ghosts of the manor watched from the corners of the room. I was comforting her, but in the quiet of our home, I realized the truth: the girl who had left for the manor was dead. The one who returned was something else entirely, and she had a debt to settle in blood.