Chapter 95 – Thoughts and Work (2/2)

The woman nodded, giving me the final confirmation.

I moved my hand lower down her body and pushed a pair of fingers inside of her.

(Now that I think about it, this is the first time I've touched a woman here.)

I hadn't even touched myself there as of yet, and despite that, the first time I inserted a part of my body inside of a woman's nether region was not my own, but another's despite having the same equipment.

(There's probably a ton of things that I don't know about my own body, now that I think about it.)

I've never really made any time to explore my own body. Initially I spent all my time fighting monsters and making everything I needed to make my life easier. And after I met Alicia, my life was spent mostly for her sake.

(Well, it's not like I can investigate when anything I do would be exposed immediately to a little girl.)

Despite that, it wasn't like I really regretted anything, but I did lack experience when it came to a lot of things. I only had theory to go on and lacked a surprising amount of life experience.

(But almost every day I've been getting tons of experience in every conceivable field lately.)

Maybe someday I'd have some experience in almost every field?

It was an interesting thought, but I could only do what I could, and right now that was performing an abortion with next to no knowledge on how they were performed.

Once I pushed my fingers in as far as they could reach, I invoked [Lunar Magic] to extend my shadow further into the body, exploring the shape, then penetrating through the uterine cap. Once through, I prodded the cavity within, exploring the shape and identifying what I could feel to the best of my limited abilities.

I latched to the sole unusual protrusion I could find and removed it out of the body and into my hand and pulled my hand away.

Averting my gaze from it, I incinerated the tiny bulb of flesh I had extracted before cleaning it with some water and returning my fingers inside the woman's body.

This time I applied some healing magic in case I did some damage before pulling out once again.

Staring at the woman's status screen, her HP dipped by a single point during the extraction before it was restored back to full from my healing spell.

I next went through her data once more and confirmed that the second core file was now gone. It seemed like everything went as planned.

[Can you check to make sure that the core file is gone Alicia?]

But no matter how much I was sure that the file was now gone, I wanted a second opinion. I had promised a proper abortion to the best of my ability, and I didn't want to tarnish that promise by not taking every reasonable precaution I could to make sure it worked.

[I don't see it. I think you did it Scarlet!]

But unlike the little girl's glee at my success, I didn't really feel good about it, but it couldn't be helped. She probably didn't really understand just what it was I had done.

”It looks like the abortion was a success. It will take a bit of time for your body to finish the process and you might not feel well until then, so for now, rest.”

”Thank you, so much.”

The woman's face looked a little pale, but she lowered her head in gratitude before moving away. Her hand kept touching her belly like she expected to find something.

(Or maybe she could still feel the aftereffects of my probing?)

I needed to be even more careful. I was dealing with some quite sensitive organs after all.

In the end, I had performed six more abortions. All of them successful.

Three people though, it turned out, didn't need abortions in the first place. They had missed their periods, but weren't pregnant.

It was probably caused by the intense stress of being trapped here as a prisoner, but I didn't know. I'd never had a period in the first place, so I couldn't relate nor understand.

That said, even amongst such a small sample size, we did find out something interesting. Not all the pregnant people had a second core with data inside. Two of the seven women had empty cores in their data sheets.

If that meant that there was a delay between pregnancy and having a soul being inserted into the body, then I had a way to in for Alicia.

But that said, that was only saying if that was the way we would do it.

In the end, I couldn't stop hesitating on that one bit.

Having someone impregnating me and carrying the baby, Alicia, to term still made a shiver run down my spine.

I didn't know if I could go through it.

After everything was said and done, I distributed the clothes I had found.

Despite my best efforts though, almost nobody found a set of clothes that fit. Pretty much everyone's clothes were either too long or too tight for them, but fortunately there were a few seamstresses in this group.

I felt a bit bad about making them work on those scraps and my old clothes before, but things turned out quite well instead. They were able to adjust my clothes to fit the first few people and thanks to that work, they were able to get used to the crude tools I had provided and were able to adjust the new clothes much faster.

At the same time, I resumed the expeditions as well.

Though it was closer to tourism at this point, I did as promised and escorted triple-sized groups to sunbathe in the open room upstairs.

That woman as well, the one that had started to act on her own lately, ended up coming as part of the first group to everyone's surprise.

Since that was the case, we got the others to come as part of the later groups as well. With some luck, lots of positive stimulation could help them recover all their minds.

Unfortunately, aside from the one who was already starting to respond properly, they wouldn't even walk on their own so I had to carry them myself. Nobody else could do it with how much their bodies have weakened.

But this one seemed to have been making incredible progress recovering her mind.

While her eyes stayed unfocused and she barely made any sounds, much less speak, she did assert her desires, however little there were. It was unfortunate that her desires mostly manifested as wanting to stay close to me whenever possible.

Epione had to pull her off of me on more than one occasion and stay by her.

She had become the de facto caretaker for her when I was busy cooking or doing something else.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing though, was the fact that I was so limited in what I could do for her and the others like her. The others would most likely do fine as long as they got a bit of support for the short term but those six that couldn't even properly feed themselves due to the mental scarring they had suffered through needed intensive and long term care.

They simply had no life without someone there to take care of their every needs until their fragmented minds stitched themselves back together.

Over the next few days, I did what I could to take care of each of them. Together with the others who took it upon themselves to help care for the ones who couldn't care for themselves, we fed them, we bathed them, we handled every need that they had.

(I wonder if this is how it's like working in a nursing home?)

While I couldn't help but consider all the parallels, I doubted that most people needed this much care in a nursing home. Only a small minority was this badly off in a place like that.

(But I wonder if they'd be able to take care of these girls until they can get back onto their feet?)

I had the benefit of a decent group to help things along for now, but giving intensive care for a handful of days was completely different from doing it for an unknown amount of time. It was possible that some of them might need help for an indefinitely amount of time.

Simply put, there was no way to know when they'd recover until they showed significant signs of making progress.

(At least one of them looks like she might get better soon.)

Once again I combed the woman's hair with my fingers as she slept with her head resting on my chest.

This time she even managed to put both arms partially around my waist.

If this wasn't progress, I didn't know what was.

(But still...)

[Alicia, you've been pretty quiet lately. Is something up?]

[...Once we take these people back to the village, we're going back home right?]

[That's right.]

[Just the three of us?]

[Yea...no wait, there was that Magni as well, so it'll be the four of us.]

[And nobody else?]

[Is there someone you want to bring back with us?]

[No!]

The force the little girl put into that one word struck me as a bit odd. It wasn't like her to do such a thing. At the very least, it was unlike anything I had seen before.

[Is something the matter Alicia?]

[...We'll be together forever, right?]

[Hmm? Of course.]

At the very least until she was old enough to grow independent. It would be a lonely time for me, but I would be there together with her until she decided it was time to fly the coop.

[Forever then.]

I couldn't help but imagine the warm smile Alicia had at that moment.

Ninetailed_Furball

Hi everybody! It's your usual furball!(/◕ヮ◕)/

Sorry this chapter ended up being late. I'm trying my best to not make it a habit, but it seems like I've been failing at it. m(_ _)m

Also this chapter ended up quite a bit less fluffy than I was hoping. The abortion scene ended up taking quite a lot of of space compared to what I had imagined.

Or rather, pretty much everything this part of the arc has been like that. (Ｔ▽Ｔ)

Well, I hope everyone has been enjoying it despite that though! ∩(·ω·)∩

In other news, it's been sounding like a lot of people have been getting tired of all the isolation.

Personally, I don't like going out much so things at home hadn't really changed much. Work's been hectic, but not too terrible since we've gotten used to the new changes.

But it's times like this that everyone needs to stay vigilant! It's when you let your guard down before things have definately returned to normal that a second wave starts.

Keep calm and keep your distance! ?

And wash your hands.

Stay safe! (≧∇≦)/