The doctors showed up a few minutes later to get everyone for their morning treatments, which were mostly psychological, but Doug needed to have the internal wounds under his ribs checked to ensure they had healed properly, and Karl needed to have his arm checked as well.
The concussion treatment mostly fell under psychological evaluations, other than the first scans by the clerics to ensure that the healing spells hadn’t left any lingering pressure or pooled blood inside his brain that might cause a stroke.
“Well, it looks like the physical damage to your head has healed well, but after healing magic is used, the areas can be tender and sensitive for a while. The rest of your body looks like it is doing well, though I see that you had some recently broken ribs that were also set with magic, so you should avoid taking any more hits to the area for the next month, just in case.” The Doctor began after the scan.
Karl chuckled, and the doctor shrugged. “Whether anyone actually follows our recommendations or not is an entirely separate matter from the fact that we give them. Logically, they are healed, and they should be as strong as ever, but the nerves in the area remain sensitive, as they remember the damage. So, we recommend not to take more injuries in the near future, as it can lead to phantom pains and other psychosomatic effects, which are nearly impossible to cure.”
Karl nodded. “That makes a lot of sense. The whole body can be trained, so if your body remembers constantly being in pain, then it will be trained to respond with pain.”
“Exactly, but you Elites all abuse your bodies constantly. When you get to my age, all those old injuries add up, and you end up slow and nearly crippled without doing anything at all. That’s why the hospitals still encourage the Elites to take care of their bodies. I know that none of you are old yet, and with the advanced healing abilities, and superhuman bodies, you might never be as old and slow as a cleric like me, but you will still feel it in time.” The Doctor warned him.
“Don’t worry, Doc. I am listening. It might not be possible to avoid all injuries, but you already know that here at the Veterans Hospital. I will do my best to avoid allowing the injuries to stack up, both on me and my beasts. I wouldn’t want to hinder their growth with battle damage.”
The doctor nodded, more concerned about Karl than about his pets. But if that was what it took to get the Elite to take the medical advice seriously, then that was what he would go with. Too many of them didn’t take their lives seriously enough, in his opinion.
Of course, that had always been a problem with soldiers, according to a doctor.
“Alright, we’ve finished with the concussion and the rest of the body, let’s see that arm.” He announced.
Karl took his arm out of the sling, showing off the smoothly stitched seam, where they hadn’t taken Lotus’ handiwork out yet. She hadn’t sutured him like a doctor, she had sewn him back together like she was fixing a blanket, with crossed running stitches.
The doctor smiled and shook his head. It was very neatly done, and he had no doubt that whoever had done this was a very skilled crafter, but if it got snagged on something, it wouldn’t just tug one stitch free, it was all connected.
“First, I will remove the stitches, and then cast another healing spell, to ensure that the last of the damage is repaired. Then we will have to scan the bone. For Elites who have undergone treatments with various magical remedies, their bones can be quite different from a standard human physiology, so I need to do an intense scan to see what I’m working with and how well it has healed.” He explained.
“Oh, I can do the stitches, if you’d like.” Karl offered.
“You can do them?” The doctor asked. Karl activated [Flaming Body] on his arm, and burnt the stitches away instead of coating them, then used [Refreshing Lightning] to push the inner parts out for the flames to burn them away. When he was done, there wasn’t a mark on his arm. There wasn’t any hair either, but that was just a minor miscalculation on what the flames would burn.
“Well, that is unexpected. Do you have some sort of healing ability as well? I don’t see any scabbing or scars left from the repair, and the fact that it healed without scarring is incredible.” The doctor asked.
“I have a regeneration effect on the barrier that I use, but it has taken a lot of healing along the way. One of my beasts has a minor healing spell, [Healing Splash]. It’s not up to the standards of a healing cleric, but it’s good for closing small wounds.” Karl explained.
The Doctor smiled. “That spell is often underestimated. It’s a healing liquid, and it will continue to work for a few seconds after contact if it isn’t washed away. It’s primarily used through an IV or multiple needle injections, to heal damaged veins.”
Karl had never considered that. Healing the inside of a person wasn’t easy with most magic, as he had learned. But if you could just fill them with a healing liquid, it would do the job much more effectively. Introducing it into the blood would let the body circulate it everywhere, healing whatever it touched.
Of course, Remi wasn’t a doctor, and neither of them knew how to set up an IV, or even find a vein with a needle. But that wasn’t the point. The point was that they had a skill that would make it possible for the real healers to do better work.
Remi considered the implications for a moment. [Emergency response snake. I even come with built-in needles.]
Karl burst into laughter, and the doctor gave him a look that said he was going to send him for another psychological evaluation.
“Sorry. Remi, the Spirit Snake Shaman that has the Healing Splash ability, pointed out that she comes with built-in needles if the spell is supposed to be directly injected.” Karl tried to explain.
The doctor’s face went blank for a second, and then he also began to laugh.
“The thought of a snake biting you to inject a healing spell is just so ridiculous that I can’t help but laugh, but it would actually be incredibly effective if they could avoid poisoning you. Their fangs are made for the precise and rapid injection of liquid into muscle tissue.” The doctor stammered.
Then he paused. “So, you have multiple voices in your head all the time?”
Karl made a noncommittal gesture. “There are four beasts linked to me, but they’re not always sharing everything. It’s more like, when they want to talk, I hear it, and vice versa.”
The doctor made a note of the description before continuing.
“That has to be distracting in combat. How do you deal with that?”
Karl shook his head. “Like anyone else, when there’s actual fighting going on, there is no time for talking. They comment with vital information, kill celebrations, and confirmations that they heard directions. But none of them is really a chatterbox.
If they could talk to more people, I suspect that Thor, the Lightning Cerro, might be. He loves people. Especially people who will rub his head.”
Thor was nodding enthusiastically in his space. If he could talk to more people, that would be outstanding. He had a whole lifetime of things to tell them that Karl already knew.
The doctor cast a spell over Karl’s arm, and then focused on his magic for a few minutes as he examined the formerly wounded limb.
“I think that it’s good to go. The healing spells bonded the bone properly, and I don’t see any unhealed secondary fractures or floating bone fragments. Those often don’t heal properly. From today, you should be able to remove the sling and begin to use the arm again, just take it easy.
As we talked about, all the nerves will either be somewhat numb or oversensitive. It will just take a few days for them to adjust again.
Now, we can start the grip tests, to make sure that everything really is functioning properly.”
Those tests of manual dexterity, grip strength and fine motor skills took them right until lunch, when Morgana came to come get Karl so they could get to know each other before the afternoon classes.
He had basically skipped the entirety of his Academy Education, and Colonel Valerie had tasked her to get him up to speed on all the things he would need to know as a Commander.