"Company Quartermaster-Sergeant Kristof Woodwalker of D company in 1st Battalion to be more precise. But with us being prisoners of war our ranks don't matter much amongst ourselves. Looking at you, you seem rather young, I guess you must be a private or corporal since you were wounded."
"Sir, how long has it been since the battle? It can't have been too long since we seem to be camped somewhere between Elmden and the fort."
"No need for the sir kid, and shouldn't you introduce yourself before asking questions? Heh, don't stress about it kid. And you are right, its not been to long, if I recall correctly we are on our fourth day here, but I haven't wandered outside the tent too often after experiencing their 'welcome'. Though I wish at times that they would move some of the worse screamers to different tents."
"Sorry sir for my rudeness. I am Private Alexander of Tiramdal. Glad to hear its not been longer than that. Do you know why they haven't continued to push? Seem kind of weird for them to set up a seemingly large camp in this position."
"Well Alexander of Tiramdal, I think they might be waiting to link up with some of the other forces invading us. I would also recommend you not to introduce yourself as being from Tiramdal in general, most people will take you for a backwater ignorant idiot. If you want to claim association with the Duchy of Holther it might be better to claim being from either Holt or Bers. Though I can't really see why you would take pride from being a 'Holtherer'. Also just stop with the sir already, as I mentioned what does rank mean between prisoners, especially wounded prisoners?"
"Sorry. I will keep that in mind. That remind me, I heard someone shouting 'mage' just before we got hit with some artillery or something. I was just mishearing right? There isn't such a thing as magic right?"
"Hahahaha, right… right… You are indeed from Tiramdal, or maybe from a place even further away from civilization. It wasn't artillery, it was a fire ball as if sent by Tirmandar himself. Manage to overhear some of the Miran soldiers talking about it. Turns out the mage was Grand Magus Alice Firestorm, Colonel of the Mirran Army. Gods damned woman. I think she enjoys killing people from Verenden. From what I heard about the last war against Miran, 30 years or so ago, she massacred Wilden, a city that used to be to the north of Elmden. And not enough with that she is like 80 or something years old, though she supposedly looks barely older than 30."
Hearing this Alexander just stared in shock at Kristof. Magic was real. Just that fact made him almost miss the rest of what Kristof had said. Did that mean that the dreams he had about the monastery, reading and nuns using magic was something more? Surely not? It must just be his mind being influenced in some way by the fact that he was reincarnated with his previous memories into an entirely different world.
"….d. Kid! You still there?"
"What? Sorry, it's just magic. Magic is actually real. Wow. I… I just… Wow… Do you know if anyone can learn it?"
"Pfft, how would I know kid? Have you seen anyone of the soldiers use magic? Shouldn't the fact that you didn't know about it before now explain that? Sure we have mages in Verenden but that fucking Duke of Holther and that bastard the Duke of Derter have managed to somehow secure a law that only allows their duchies to have mages. And they can refuse to supply them to the king! And basically any information about mages is kept quite secret."
This wasn't really the answer Alexander had hoped for. What if he could become or could have become a mage? How fucking awesome wouldn't that be? But learning about the state of mages in Verenden, or at least what was known about them in the army, didn't really sound like something nice. Seemingly being under the control of dukes who kept their people technologically suppressed and illiterate. And the fact that they could even do that at all when they supposedly controlled mages ment either their mages agreed with them for some reason or they were controlled quite harshly.
Not that any of that mattered. He was a prisoner of war at the moment. All he could do was stay in this tent and heal. Sure he could try walking around out in the camp again, but as he had experienced and now been warned, it didn't really sound like a good idea.
"Well kid, I see you have some thoughts going through your head. I just going to head back to my own bunk and get some sleep, nothing much to do here but talk and sleep. But if you want to talk, me and some of the other concious soldiers normally hang around over there during the day."
Kristof pointed towards were the largest group of concious soldiers sat and talked before heading towards one of the empty field beds. Alexander nodded to him as he left. Alexander was also starting to get tired himself and decided that he might as well sleep. Laying down in the bed he quickly fell asleep.
The sleep itself was quite peaceful. There wasn't any kind of weird dreams. For that matter he couldn't remember any dreams when he woke up. So he might as well not have had any at all.
What he woke up to wasn't anything different than the day before. Mostly just someone that had started screaming from the pain. And his own pain had also started coming back. Doctors went around again and injected most of the soldiers with drugs to alleviate the pain.
The doctor that came to Alexander turned out to be the one that had talked with him yesterday.
"How is the pain today? Any new problems?"
"No sir, no new problems. The pain isn't too bad with the drugs, but without them it feels like my body is on fire or is melting."
"Glad to hear you don't have any new problems. As to the pain it makes sense that it feels like you are on fire. Most of your body has experienced either third or fourth degree burns. From what we could tell some of your body fat and muscle have been burned severely or burnt up entirely. To be honest we were shocked to see you alive. More shocked still that you woke up yesterday, after only four days. And still you are not in severe pain even whilst under the influence of drugs. You were luckier when it came to the bullets that hit you. You only got hit by two bullets and both entered and exited cleanly. Only going through your left forearm and hand."
Alexander could only stare at what he was being told by the doctor. How the hell was he alive? From fire safety courses and such that he had taken during his previous life he hadn't even heard of fourth degree burns. And he was almost certain they didn't have proper disinfection methods at the current level of technology. Not being able to properly disinfect burns was, if he recalled correctly, one of the leading ways for burn victims to die. Which led him to his other question, how could he move is left arm, hand and fingers without any problems if he had suffered two bullet wounds?
"Sir, are you sure it was that bad? And are you sure about me suffering those bullet wounds? I can move my left arm and such after all."
Alexander demonstrated this by lifting his left arm, moving his forearm, hand and making a fist.
"Yes I am su.. What the? How are you able to move your hand? I would have been surprised if you could have done that in perhaps a month, but immediately? Follow me, I need to check under your bandages."
The doctor turned immediately and headed for the tent flap before turning around and waiting for Alexander. Alexander quickly rose from the bed to follow the doctor. He was rather curious himself to see what was under the bandages. Before being told how bad he should have been hurt, he had only imagined some second, and perhaps third, degree burns.
They both exited the tent, Alexander following close behind the doctor. The doctor immediately headed for the main road. Once they hit the main road he turned towards the centre of the camp. Whilst they were walking they met a group of patrolling soldiers. The doctor said something to them in Lareen and they filed in behind and besides Alexander.
Once they reached the centre of the camp, which was occupied by a large purple tent. There they turned to left and headed down the main road crossing the camp perpendicular to the one they came from. At the same time one of the soldiers that had joined them split of and headed for the purple tent.
They continued walking for another minute or so before reaching another set of white tents, though these were spaced further apart. The doctor headed for the second tent in from the road. Indicating at the same time for Alexander to immediately join him. Looking at the soldiers Alexander didn't even think about not following the command.
The inside of the tent appeared more like a office than anything else. Bookshelves had been set up along one wall of the tent and a desk occupied the middle of the room. There was a pair of simple wooden chairs in front of the desk and a more comfortable chair behind it. On the opposite side of the tent from the shelves was a simple examination table. The doctor went around the desk and sat down in the comfortable chair and indicated for Alexander to take a seat.
"We will be waiting for one of my colleagues and a nurse to join us before starting."