“You’re interested in White Dove’s curses for… academic reasons.” Professor Lugon arched a doubtful eyebrow up at me, looking my purple robes up and down. “Riiiiiiight. What questions do you hypothetically have?”

Okay. In hindsight, being a high level healer asking about Immortality curses was a little more obvious than I thought. Extra-so if people regularly consulted the professor.

Given his reaction, the cat was already out of the bag, and I doubted he’d look favorably upon me if I endlessly danced around the truth we both knew.

“Alright, fine, yes, I’m wondering about my own curse, and portions of it.”

Professor Lugon immediately held up his hand, avoiding his majestic set of antlers.

“I do not want to know the full content of your curse. When it inevitably gets out, as all such things do, I do not wish for you to place the blame at my feet. Far too many students have come back, attempting some measure of petty revenge for believing that I have violated their trust. No more. Please speak in abstracts.”

I hesitated, my carefully organized list of questions shredded to pieces.

Somewhat. I’d just need to modify a few words.

“White Dove seems to give multiple examples after each part of her curse. Do they mean anything specific?”

Lugon shook his head.

“An excellent question, I didn’t think you’d ask! No, White Dove is simply attempting to, as best as I can tell, invoke despair. The specific examples are all possible, but are not prophecy or a look at the future. Indeed, you can think of them as helpful cautions as to what might happen.” He peered at me, clearly waiting for my next question.

The backhanded compliment grated, but, well, elf. They believed, deep in their bones, that they were better than everyone else, and we poor little elvenoids needed their help. Which, admittedly, he was giving. But heck, even the word elvenoid was vaguely insulting.

Accurate, and a word everyone was on board with, so it was useful for good communication, but the etymology was irritating.

The examples thing was nice, and something I was already starting to realize. I could move through crowds, occasionally getting ‘buffeted’ by someone who’d eaten apples recently.

“Sorry, I’ve got a specific word I’d like to ask about. White Dove used partake. Does that mean anything specific?”

Lugon grimaced.

“That depends on far too many factors for me to properly comment on. A significant aspect of it is your native language, your mother tongue, and the language you speak in. Some are lucky for all three to be the same, but not always. Words have different meanings and connotations. Partake in High Elvish means something subtly different from the same word in Hakka, which has dozens if not hundreds of meanings to every syllable, and Tilan has such specific definitions that curses given in the language tend to be incredibly narrow and precise. White Dove generally gives her strongest curses in that tongue, but I digress. Languages and Curses is the course to take if you would like to know more. Generally, broadly, and do not quote me on this, partake in High Elvish means to use in the customary manner. Context depends. Partaking in hunting is different from partaking in drinking water, and there are further definitions depending on the tongue.

“What does the next night mean to you?” That part of the curse was easy enough to modify. Lugon didn’t want specifics, and flipping day to night was easy enough.

“Once again, this is cultural. When does night begin? Is it at the same time every day? Is it when the sun touches the horizon? When it is halfway down? When it is fully gone? When the last light dies? Does the change of the season change when night occurs? If you are the fastest runner in the world, does sprinting to meet the night count? Can you hide behind a mountain to bring on the night quicker? Some self reflection is required, and depending on the severity of the curse and the penalty, some experimentation may be required.”

I wanted to groan at White Dove’s curse. I knew exactly when it was the next day. Not only was it an apple a day keeps the doctor away, but the third part was clear. I’d be refreshed at dawn.

I had to wonder if other people’s curses were as ironically well-tailored for them as mine was, or if White Dove had given me extra attention for granting it to a dozen other people first.

“Right, next question…”

“You’re sure about this?” Iona asked.

I nodded. My curse was both harmless enough, but had a knowledge-heavy component to it, that I wanted to share it with Iona. If we were going to be spending tons of time together - decades, centuries, or more - it was important that Iona knew.

“Yeah. Half the point of getting cursed now was I could use the School resources to help me figure out my curse and the limits of it.”

“Brrrrrrpt!!!”

“Oh pshaw. You only want to drink gallons of apple juice, don’t lie.” I teased Auri.

“Brrrpt!” She adamantly shook her head.

“And eat apples.” I corrected myself.

“BRPT.”

Auri puffed up and proudly confessed that, yes, those were her goals. I rolled my eyes.

Iona and Auri left, off to acquire as many apple-based products as reasonably possible, and were back in short order.

They managed to find six different varieties of apple, a slice of apple pie, apple sauce, apple chips, apple juice, apple cider, and a cider donut. On the weirder side, they also managed to find soap, shampoo, perfume, and candles that all claimed to be apple-scented. A more practical set of items that Iona found were potions, apples occasionally finding their way onto ingredient lists.

“Right. I think we should start with the least offensive items first, and move on. The moment I can’t touch you anymore, the rest of the items are hard to experiment with.” I told Iona.

“Brrrpt?”

“You are a good backup, but I’m not even sure if it applies to phoenixes eating things. How weird would it be if I couldn’t approach an animal because they’d eaten an apple?” I said. Being around horses would be weird, even though apples were usually just a treat for them.

“Brrrpt, brpt!”

I smacked my forehead.

“You’re right! I should totally visit Bridget later!” Bridget, Auri’s main teacher and one of the ‘lower education’ teachers, was a dryad. Specifically, an apple tree dryad.

“Potion first?” Iona suggested, already having uncorked it, and more importantly, getting us back on task.

“Potion first.” I agreed, Iona taking a sip.

“Anything?” She asked, and I waved my hand towards her.

“Nope, that’s fine.” I confirmed. Iona took a deeper sip, and I waved my hand near her.

“Still nothing. I’m going to hold off on trying it myself for now.” I said. “Candles next?”

Candles, soap, shampoo, and perfume each did absolutely nothing. I had a brief flash of panic when I realized that I was inhaling the candle smoke, but Iona nicked her finger with her knife, and I was able to heal it no problem.

“Nobody will be able to burn a ton of apples and smoke me out.” I was satisfied by that discovery and realization.

“Assuming the [Candlemaker] put real apples into the candle, and isn’t just calling it apple-scented, or making it smell like apples with a skill.” Iona rebutted.

I clicked my tongue. Damn. Iona was right.

“Brrrpt?” Auri asked.

“You can burn some apples at a point, yes.” I told her.

“BRRRPT!!!” Nothing Auri liked more than being told ‘yes, please, commit arson.’

“Oh, hang on, dumb thought.” I got up and walked next to the apples. Nothing stopped me from doing so. I went to pick one up, just barely stopping short of touching it. Nothing.

White Dove hadn’t said anything about not being able to touch apples, but it was worth a quick check.

“I think… let’s check the cider donut next.” We’d gotten through all of the apple-derivatives, time for the apple food itself.

“Down the hatch!” Iona chomped down on the donut, eating it in two clean bites.

I waved my hand at her.

“Huh. Okay, weird, that doesn’t count.”

“Apple pie next?”

I winced.

“I know that works, because that’s the original thing that stopped me. Let’s do…”

“BRRRRPT!”

“Alright, fine, we’ll do apple juice.” The words weren’t even all the way out of my mouth before Auri had completed a perfect swan - errr, phoenix - dive into the juice.

I tried to move my arm towards Auri, and couldn’t.

“Right. It applies to you, but maybe because you’re considered intelligent? I dunno, I’m going to have to find a horse or something.” I said.

Iona grabbed a few of the apple chips, and I wasn’t able to approach her either.

“Best guess. Anything that’s a, uh, half step away from apples also counts.” Apple juice, apple pie, apple chips - all of them were practically apples, while the cider donut was processed quite a bit before arriving at its final form.

“Fairly generous.” Iona commented. “What’s next?”

“Well, let’s see what I can do.”

I moved back across the room, then tried to approach Iona. When I got near - about two meters away - it was like I just couldn’t move forward. I could think about it, I just couldn’t get my body to act on my thoughts. Iona took a step towards me, but nothing changed. I still couldn’t move towards her, but it wasn’t like I was being pushed away. I tried to speak, but only some garbled syllables came out. She lifted a finger to slowly poke me, and I took a step backwards. A second step, and I was out.

Critically, I could also speak again.

“Alright, it looks like I can move away from someone who’s eaten an apple, but I can’t move towards them. I’m guessing a side effect of that is I can’t speak well. My tongue can move away from you, but not towards you, and that’s just weird.” Interestingly enough, I could still breathe, even if it caused my chest to expand towards the forbidden person. This curse was gentle. Then again, I could hold my breath for literal hours. Not being able to breathe was an inconvenience, nothing life-threatening.

“Can you keep moving towards me if you’re already in motion?” Iona asked.

“Let’s find out!”

We positioned ourselves, and I pitched myself sideways, falling like a tree.

“Timbeeeeeeeer!” I cried out as I collapsed sideways, straight through the ‘no go’ zone. I needed a better word for that.

Iona caught me and gently lowered me to the ground.

“Looks like you can move through the field, just can’t control yourself.” Iona said.

Interesting. Being stopped from controlling my body in certain ways was annoying, but I didn’t run the risk of going from 500 mph to 0 when in an all-out sprint and hitting someone who’d eaten an apple. Otherwise it’d be like hitting a brick wall, except a brick wall would be more yielding and forgiving than an impenetrable force field.

Or hell. As I leveled and grew stronger, the change in momentum would get even larger.

Iona sat down on the couch, putting her legs on my back.

“I’m curious, can you escape when someone’s doing this?” She asked.

I quickly ran through a dozen different actions in my head, my body not responding to any of them. Physical movement was right out, although I could deploy my butterfly wings.

[Channeled Blink] was up next. I focused, trying to teleport away from Iona. A few seconds of charging later, and I repositioned.

Minus my clothes.

“Huh.” I said as I looked around. Iona lifted an appreciative eyebrow.

“What’s up?” She shamelessly looked me up and down, in spite of seeing me almost every day.

“For some reason it never occurred to me that I could reposition my body when blinking. I started off lying down, but I blinked to a standing up position.” Something I should’ve tested, but I’d always gone from standing up to standing up or lying down to lying down.

“What’s next?” Iona asked.

I eyed the apples with trepidation.

“Well, let’s see what they do to me.”

I tentatively reached out a finger - left pinky, I could afford to sacrifice it - and tentatively touched a green apple.

Nothing happened.

I moved over and touched a red apple in the same way.

Nada.

“Well, this isn’t nearly as bad as I thought it could be.” I grabbed the apple with my hand and picked it up. I tossed it up and down experimentally a few times.

The apple was just an apple. Nothing was happening, besides gravity insisting that the apple go down.

“Brrrpt?”

“Not time for the arson experiment no.” I said, then thought about it.

Next was trying to injure myself with the apple, then eat the apple. Seeing what apple-smoke did to me was before eating the apple… but yes, I wanted to try to injure myself with it first. It would be optimal to eat the apple an hour before dawn, if I could accurate predict WHEN that would be. Damn flying island. It was fun at first, but it was getting real old.

“Smack me with the apple?” I asked Iona.

“Where?”

I thought about it.

“Left foot.”

Iona smashed the apple down onto my bare feet with barely a moment’s hesitation, putting significant force into the blow. It was needed with how reinforced my body was.

The poor apple never stood a chance. For lack of a better word, it practically disintegrated, small chunks and mash flying off in every direction. Iona quickly stepped back two elegant steps, removing the ‘no movement’ zone.

“Yeowch!” I complained, grabbing my foot and hopping on my other one. “That hurt!”

I hadn’t felt pain like this in ages. [Center of the Universe] had been dulling and translating my pain.

“Fuck fuck FUCK!” I continued to hop around the room. “She didn’t say anything about them hurting! Just no healing!”

“Your skill is part of your healing class.” Iona pointed out.

I had quite a few choice words for White Dove, and it wasn’t like I was trying to stay on her good side anymore. I’d been cursed, it was done and over with, I could cuss her out to my heart’s content. Doubted I’d make any soldiers blush, I’d heard most of the insults from them in the first place!

I looked at my foot. Iona had controlled her strength enough that she hadn’t broken anything, but I had one hell of a bruise. My healing magic wasn’t doing a thing to it. I tentatively poked at it, to see if there was anything special about it.

Nada. Just a bruise.

“Can I make a suggestion?” Iona said.

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“What happens if we cut off your foot?”

I held up my hand.

“I am all for it, but maybe when you’re not filled with apple-repulsing power?”

“Why don’t I nick an ear to see if me eating apples empowers me? Worst-case, you get to wear more earrings for a few hours?” Iona suggested.

My eyes widened.

“That’s brilliant! Go!” I promptly threw myself onto the sofa, a ready and willing patient for Iona’s proposed plan.

A quick prick of my ears showed a nice aspect of my curse - people who’d eaten apples weren’t specially empowered against me.

“About that foot?” Iona suggested.

I’d come to terms with myself a while back about how minor self-mutilation wasn’t harm. My healing instantly snapped everything back while I felt no pain. I wasn’t about to start throwing myself into woodchippers to try and level up though. I had some standards.

The earring experiment suggested that there would be no issues. However, how it interacted with the bruise was going to be interesting.

“Do it.” I clenched my teeth and watched my foot get cleanly sliced off, instantly popping back into place.

Without the bruise.

Iona had moved away after chopping my foot off, giving me full motion again.

“Auri, could you do the honors?” The words were barely out of my mouth before my old foot was ashes. Leaving biological waste lying around was just plain rude.

“Next experiment…”

“BRRRRPT!”

“Alright, fine, burn the apples. We need a lot of smoke…”

The experiments continued, the three of us testing the limits of my curse.

Smoke made me cough a bunch, but otherwise didn’t cause any issues. Iona eating an apple wore off, somewhat predictably, at dawn. The color of the apples in question didn’t matter - green apples were just as problematic as red apples. Crabapples didn’t count for whatever reason. Me touching or juggling apples didn’t cause any issues, I had to eat the apple - or apple-derived product. Apple juice, apple pies, etc., were all off the menu.

Unfortunately, it seemed like ‘partaking’ had a generous definition. Simply passing my lips disabled my healing until dawn, and the School’s island flying all over the place kept changing when that was. Occasionally we would fly into the rising sun, and my curse would be over quickly. Otherwise it seemed to try and stay in the light or darkness, and I’d be in trouble for an extended period of time.

“Basically, if you’re ever in trouble, fly east.” Iona summarized. “Make things wear off faster.”

Partaking of apples in non-conventional ways didn’t count, but I wasn’t about to start regularly…

Honestly, the less said about partaking of apples in unconventional ways the better. It wasn’t like I got any flavor or nutrition out of it.

As for creatures causing issues, it was only creatures the System deemed as ‘intelligent’, in other words, those that came up with [Mage], [Artisan], etc. when [Identifying] them. Bacteria eating apples didn’t count, which made sense - otherwise I wouldn’t be able to approach any apples. Horses, and more importantly, Fenrir, could eat apples and wouldn’t cause me a single moment of concern.

My shield was worthless against apples. Even a lightly tossed apple went straight through my shield like it wasn’t there - except it also left a perfect apple-shaped hole behind it. Appleseeds were just as bad as apples. I wasn’t quite willing to test a lethal dose of cyanide derived from appleseeds to see what would happen, but I suspected it was too far removed from apples to count.

Poisons mixed with apple juice probably would. Again, not an item I was willing to test, and my LD-50 on poisons were wack in the first place with my biomancy.

Iona wacked me a few time with a club made out of apple wood, which didn’t do a thing to me. The leaves were equally mundane. Only the fruits themselves caused issues.

I was happy that we’d crossed Modu off our potential list of places to go. Accidentally eating an apple, then needing to wait months before the next dawn? Yikes.

I wasn’t able to experiment with illusions or perspectives, but the island’s non-stop flying did let me experiment with timing. In short, whenever the dawn occurred, I was good, no matter if it was three hours since the last time I’d experienced a sunrise, or thirty.

The biggest issue that came up was ‘oiling’ weapons with apple juice. Iona’s blade, dipped in apple juice, caused injuries that didn’t respond to my healing. It also didn’t respond to [Cosmic Presence] boosting my innate healing rate, and I’d cheated and skimped a little when making my biological modifications. Iona had proven earlier with the bruise on my foot that other injuries could ‘overwrite’ the injury, at which point I was healing a ‘mundane’ injury.

The other critically important aspect was eating apples. If enough less-processed apples made it into my food, my healing would be disabled, and I’d be relatively easy pickings.

My dramatically improved senses helped with avoiding apples. I could figure out the ingredient list of a stranger’s breakfast simply by passing them on the road. Figuring out what was in my food was trivial, unless some powerful skills were brought in against me. I doubted anyone would be able to casually slip me some apple without me knowing.

I was pleased with my efforts to keep my curse a secret. As long as nobody knew my aversion to apples, I was safe. The moment it got out, I was potentially in trouble.

After all.

White Dove had armed the world with a way to kill me.