"Ah, Blaze. You actually came?"

Standing behind a desk in the command office was commander Mavuto. He seemed somewhat surprised that I came.

"I don't think I had any other choice."

"As a matter of fact, you did. You could have chosen to stay behind in Sachiru town."

"Wouldn't that get me killed for treason?"

"You are living in a territory where prowess in battle has a great influence on your social standing. I don't think anyone would have wanted to cause trouble for you."

"Wouldn't that mean that most strong individuals could opt not to come here to the battlefield?"

"Yes. Although most people show up anyways, since the army pays them a very reasonable compensation, and they are naturally eager for battle."

I'm starting to see some of the flaws in the law of this Demon King territory now.

"Besides, this freedom of choice only applies to the strongest person in each town. So long as someone stronger exists, people generally fear being forced by that person to do things."

"But I'm physically weak, though."

"Your ability to use magic and your victory over the delinquents in town already made the townsfolk agree that you are the strongest person around."

"Is that why general Batinu came to my shop in person to tell me I was conscripted?"

"Yes. Everyone else in town is afraid of you, and she was the only high ranking officer willing to travel from another town."

"…"

I reckon I could have beat up that fairy girl, but the fact that she held a high position in Badoth government would probably leave a very bad stain in my reputation. At least now I know why everyone in town was suddenly so nice and respectful of me: so long as they feared me, it was better to remain on my good side in order to avoid trouble and possibly be able to ask for favors later on.

"In any case, I apologize for bringing you into something major again without letting you know beforehand."

Commander Mavuto was really apologetic for some reason.

"It's fine, I wanted to explore a new town at some point anyways."

I may have felt slightly annoyed, but I absolutely must not let myself show any signs of discontent to the person that pays me a huge daily wage.

"I'm not expected to fight for the army, am I? I might have defected over to this side, but I feel very uncomfortable with the idea of having to blast people I might have once known to smithereens…"

"You don't have to worry about that. You're a mage, so you can help Batinu in the field hospital."

"Are you… sure about that? I may be an alchemist, but I don't have a lot of medical knowledge. It might even be a problem since I'll be tending to people of other races."

"Again, you won't need to worry. You'll be assigned an appropriate task."

"Alright then. By the way, what about the supplies I normally provide daily? Will the army be fine with not having any extra supplies?"

"About that, I have been ordering supplies in excess to prepare for an incident like this, so we should be fine with not receiving any more items for the next four or five days."

"Oh, okay."

"In fact, there are two things I'd like to request of you, now that you are here. The first request is that you keep the amount of items to craft and send here the same as usual."

"And the other request?"

"Every sixteen days counting from today, go on a four day vacation somewhere outside town. That way, the army can get rid of overstocked supplies, and it gives you a good reason to avoid getting conscripted again since nobody would know where to find you."

"Wouldn't that just give me a bad reputation? I feel like staying put in Sachiru town would be a better idea."

"Most people outside of town don't know that you can fight, so they would assume that there was some mistake in the selection process for choosing someone physically weak."

"If you say so…"

Sometimes I get the feeling everything was too good to be true. I didn't detect any magic being used on me, so I know this isn't a dream or the effects of some mind manipulation spell. Maybe being… unique in this territory had perks that I wasn't aware of.

Oh well, I'd better not question things any further.

* * * * *

The field hospital was a series of twenty adjoined military tents, located slightly under one kilometer away from the border. I felt somewhat concerned: wouldn't this distance be almost in range of a catapult launch? It was probably deemed as an appropriate distance for quickly transporting and treating injured soldiers, though.

I could get a good sense of the urgency when I stepped foot in the hospital perimeter. Nurses were shouting out nonstop.

"Someone get a recovery potion, hurry!"

"I need a medusa to come for a surgery!"

"Quickly move this patient to tent number 5!"

"Running low on bandages!"

The hospital staff consisted of fairies, vampires, medusas, and a pair of trolls.

The vampires, a race of humanoid creatures with bat-like features that nourished themselves by sucking blood, were in charge of blood transfers and sealing wounds.

The medusas, a race capable of petrifying their targets by channeling vitality and mana into their snake-like hair, were responsible for anesthetics and pain relief.

The fairies, who mostly acted like doctors, were handling first aid, surgeries, and potion usage.

Finally, the trolls were assisting with transportation of patients and medicines.

This hospital had a surprisingly efficient system in place.

"Security! Enemy intruder spotted!"

As soon as I stepped inside one of the tents, a fairy doctor yelled for the trolls once she noticed me. It's rude to assume any strangers coming inside are hostile, you know!

...Oh wait, they were fighting a war against the human army of Kitrod. Of course they'd mistake me for an enemy.

"Wait! Commander Mavuto sent me here to help!"

"He knows the commander's name! It's an enemy spy!"

I suddenly felt a very large hand grab hold of my back.

"I'm not a spy! Please call general Batinu over, she knows me!"

I started to wonder whether general Batinu's visit yesterday was a coincidence or not. Commander Mavuto said that she was the only person willing to travel from another town, but I felt like they foresaw an incident like this happening.

"What's with all this ruckus?"

"General, this person claims that you know him."

"Oh, good afternoon, Blaze."

"See, she knows me!"

The troll that was grabbing hold of me finally let go of his tight grip.

"Did the commander send you over?"

"Yes."

The fairy that mistook me for an enemy earlier profusely apologized after seeing Batinu greet me.

"Are you able to use healing magic?"

"No."

"How's your physical strength?"

"Weak."

"Then… I suppose the only thing I can ask you to do is help with first aid and administering potions. All the potions we're using were made by you, so I think you should be able to know what and how much to use."

I really expected her to nervously stutter again like yesterday, but she looks a lot more confident now. Maybe she was too focused on her job to think about social matters.

"Alright. By the way, what happened to you? You were a nervous wreck yesterday."

"W-was I? I guess I'm too committed to my job. Once I'm focused on treating the soldiers, my mind usually stops thinking about social matters."

"Well, I think it's cute that you have both a serious and a klutzy side."

More so because she looks like a child dressed up as a nurse and playing doctor, but I can't really tell her that. I'd probably be branded as a lolicon if I did, even though she was probably older than me. Her face turned slightly red after hearing my comment, though.

"R-right, please g-go to tent f-fifteen."

Looks like I managed to interrupt her focus and turned her into a nervous girl again.

Tents number fifteen and sixteen were where injured soldiers were brought in and waiting for surgery. To get to there, I needed to cross through four other tents from where I currently was.

"Transport! I need five more regeneration potions!"

"Two arms and one leg! Call a vampire over as well!"

"Medusa to table four!"

One of the tents I cross handled surgeries. It was something I really wish I hadn't seen. What the staff primarily handled in the surgery tent were amputations and transplants. Injuries that were deemed too serious to treat would result in soldiers getting amputated, with the medusas temporarily petrifying the soldiers to minimize their pain from getting amputated, and the vampires closing up wounds. Amputations were expected in a warzone, since time consuming treatment would prevent doctors from getting to other wounded soldiers. What really shocked me was the process of performing transplants.

The wounded soldiers didn't seem to mind getting amputations performed, since their missing limbs would soon be replaced with new ones. Several doctors and nurses were chopping off limbs or collecting body organs from zombies inside the field hospital, then transferring those parts over to soldiers that needed them. The zombies didn't seem to be able to feel pain, and their regeneration rate was naturally high, so with a regeneration potion consumed the zombies could quickly regrow their missing parts in half a day to a day. While there was relatively little blood spilled in the process, just the thought of casually chopping off limbs to attach to another person greatly bothered me.

Needless to say, I rushed out of that tent as quickly as possible to get to the next one.

My destination, tent number fifteen, was one of the few tents where casualties from the battlefield would first be brought in. The trolls were making every effort possible to bring all the soldiers onto a bed or to any place on the ground where a stretcher could be placed, while the fairies were frantically assessing the seriousness of each casualty to determine where to move the soldiers next. To prevent getting distracted, the fairies would occasionally call in some medusas to numb the soldiers' pain so they would not loudly moan.

"You, the human there! Can you help with injury assessment and first aid?"

"I think so…"

"Just shout out what you need. One of the nurses here will help if possible."

I've faced opponents of the same race as most of the soldiers here back when I was an adventurer, so I think I should be able to tell whether one was badly injured or not. Whether or not I could perform first aid on them was a different matter, though. I'll just assess injuries as asked and let someone else handle the first aid. Probably.

"Incoming!"

Two stretchers were placed down near me, so I went over to take a look.

The first stretcher had a goblin who took a couple arrows to his legs. He had no visible wounds on any other parts of his body, so I judged this a minor injury. He probably didn't need any kind of intensive treatment.

"Could someone pull out the arrows on this soldier and bandage him, please?"

After hearing someone acknowledge my request from somewhere in the distance, I headed to where the other stretcher was. There was a winged gargoyle lying on it, who had several arrows driven into his wings and several cuts across his torso and arms. My best guess as to what happened was that he was shot down while in the air, then slashed by some swordsmen on the ground. Gargoyles normally had dark, stone-like complexions, but this one had a much paler colored face, so I judged this as a potentially serious case of blood loss.

"Any vampires available, please stop this soldier's bleeding as soon as possible!"

A vampire who came over to the soldier I took a look at just now apologized to him and quickly ran over to where I was.

"Please help stop the bleeding in the torso and left arm first. Don't pull out the arrows yet, since they're acting as plugs for now. I'll go get some bandage."

"Got it."

It was a rather bizarre sight in which the male vampire would bite over where the slash wounds were, and the bleeding there would stop. Apparently there was some sort of venom in the teeth of vampires that affected the flow of blood in the body. I figured it was somewhat painful, but the gargoyle was already unconscious from all the bleeding so it didn't really matter.

After looking around for a while for what I needed, I came back to the stretcher with two rolls of bandage, a speed boosting potion, and a minor regeneration potion. I handed both rolls of bandage to the vampire.

"Thanks for clotting the blood. Could you also help bandage the torso?"

"Sure... Oi, what are you doing?"

I took hold of one of the arrows stuck in the gargoyle's arm and pushed the tip in a little bit deeper, then pulled it out. The vampire looked a bit confused after seeing me pour some of the speed potion onto the deep cut that I made.

"Speed potions speed up the body's processes, so I'm pouring some of it directly into his veins so it can get to his heart more easily. If his blood circulation can speed up just a little bit with the potion effect, he might regain consciousness and be able to drink this regeneration potion. You already stopped his bleeding, so increasing his body's blood circulation probably won't cause any to spray out."

"Huh?"

The vampire had a completely dumbfounded look on his face. I looked around the tent and noticed that some of the hospital staff around me who heard what I said were also gazing at me with dumbfounded looks.

…Please stop staring at me. It's embarrassing.

The silent stares continued as the gargoyle let out a slight groan and his body twitched a little.

"He's regaining consciousness!"

As soon as the vampire shouted that out, all of the staff members who were staring at me started clapping, then went about talking to other hospital staff.

"What's going on?"

"You just showed us something amazing!"

"What? Did nobody know you could use potions like that? Did everyone think you could only consume potions orally?"

"Yes. Please teach us more amazing things about potions!"

The vampire's eyes sparkled as he said that.

Come to think of it, commander Mavuto did say most people in Badoth territory couldn't comprehend the basics of alchemy when I first came here. Maybe that was part of the reason why the hospital staff didn't know potion usage wasn't just limited to oral administration, even though they used them frequently.

"Uh… Sure. I'll figure out if there's any special knowledge you all don't know yet and show you that. But for now, please keep an eye on this soldier for a minute or two to make sure his wounds don't reopen, then give him this regeneration potion before going back to your other patient."

Apparently news about what I did spread like wildfire across the field hospital, and the mortality rate for the rest of the day dropped significantly when other nurses tried the same thing.

Everyone treated me like I was a great sage. It felt nice.