Fantasy Clinic: Chronicles of a 3rd-Rate Doctor-Chapter 42: Echoes Beyond the Walls

The clinic was quiet in the early morning.

Steam rose from the kettle in the back room. Cai sat beside the window, scribbling symbols onto scraps of paper—Root echoes, still lingering in his nerves. Sylas worked silently, pouring fresh antiseptic into new glass vials. Veyra swept the floor, though her eyes kept drifting toward Elric's desk.

He hadn't moved in hours.

Elric's journal lay open. The pages were covered in diagrams: root systems, human anatomy, and something new—a branching pattern that looked like veins and language.

Lira appeared in the doorway.

"You didn't sleep."

"No," Elric said, not looking up.

"You're expecting someone."

"Yes."

---

Outside the Capital

Dust kicked up behind three horses as they raced toward the outer gate.

The lead rider wore black leather, no crest, no colors. Behind him rode a man and woman—healers by trade, scouts by necessity. The messenger slowed only when the capital came into view.

"We're late," one of them said.

"No," the lead rider muttered. "We're right on time."

---

At the Clinic

The door opened with a quiet knock.

Elric stood before anyone else could.

Three riders entered. Dust-covered. Wary.

"Doctor Elric?" the lead asked.

He nodded once. "You came a long way."

"We came because our people are dying," the rider said. "They forget names. Their limbs stop responding. They speak words they never learned. Some start repeating memories that don't belong to them. And one girl swore the trees whispered in her dead grandfather's voice."

He unrolled a scroll.

A map. Drawn in haste.

On it: blackened zones near the border. Villages marked with faded circles—like veins spreading outward.

Veyra moved beside Cai. "It's another sickness?"

Cai didn't speak—but his gold-lit eyes flared faintly.

"I saw it," he whispered. "Burning forests. Ash in the lungs. Faces forgetting themselves."

The rider stepped back. "We brought this in secret. The Council has ignored every request. People say they've sent no help because we're outside the Core districts."

Elric stared at the map.

"They're not infected," he murmured. "They're overloaded."

Lira frowned. "With what?"

Elric answered slowly.

"Memory."

--- ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom

Council Hall, Same Day

Lady Virella paced.

Chancellor Morian read the report in silence.

"Six settlements affected," he murmured. "And they're asking him to solve it."

Virella slammed a palm on the table. "He caused this!"

"No," Morian replied. "We did. He merely exposed it."

He looked up at her.

"Send no troops. No Circle. No threats."

"Then what?"

Morian closed the file.

"Send silence. Let the world choose who it trusts."

---

Back at the Clinic

Elric rolled up the map.

He looked at Lira, then Sylas, then the three strangers.

"You came for help."

The lead rider nodded.

"Then we go," Elric said. "No more thrones. Just medicine."

Lira stepped beside him. "We're leaving the city?"

"We're going to the source."

He turned to Cai.

"Can you still see it?"

Cai's golden gaze met his.

"Yes," he said. "And it's screaming."

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