Elmo was confused. First he'd been asked to check the stats of a shadow that had passed and now he was being asked to check the stats of some rocks that were merely, almost supernaturally, different. He wouldn't mind being able to take some of those rocks with him, but it felt like it would be wrong to do so, so he hadn't bothered even trying to take a small pebble.
The request sounded reasonable, but at the same time, he couldn't help but feel that he shouldn't spend his MP on something so frivolous. Like seeing what kind of stats he could find out from rocks. It really wouldn't cost that much MP, it just somehow felt wrong.
Elmo couldn't put words to why he felt that way, just that something inside him was resisting that idea. Which he also couldn't help but wonder why that was. Typically he probably would have checked, if only to learn what they were made up of. Like if they really were a mixture of crystals and gemstones or if there was something else about them entirely.
Elmo looked at Kim, as if he thought that maybe she'd help get him out of this predicament he found himself in. Like she'd tell Jonas that they should just continue on and not worry about those rocks. That they had other, more important things to worry about.
"Elmo? What'd the spell tell you?" Jonas asked, snapping Elmo out of his daze.
"What?" Elmo asked absently, blinking as if he just walked into the sunlight from a dark room.
"Elmo, are you okay?" Elin asked, looking rather worried.
"Yeah, I am," Elmo replied absently, "but what do you mean, 'what did the spell tell me?' I haven't cast it yet."
"You did cast it," Kim said. "Then you stopped and started looking around like you didn't know what was going on."
Elmo looked back towards the rocks again and was surprised to see a window disappear. A window he recognized that had always appeared when he'd cast his View Stats spell, which was just a little different from when he checked his own stats.
The biggest problem was how he couldn't remember casting the spell in the first place. It merely seemed like Jonas had just asked him to cast it, but that window clearly showed that he had done more than think about it.
Elmo looked back to the others, feeling a more than a little troubled at this turn of events. Part of him wondered if this was what those who had been under the enchantment of the armor they'd gotten from the orcs and had been controlled by Aquis. If nothing else, it felt a little disorienting.
"I guess I cast it, but I don't remember casting it," Elmo muttered, not sure what else to say.
"Want to try it again?" Jonas asked.
Elmo looked at Jonas, his vision starting to become a little blurry. "I-"
+++
Elin tried catching Elmo as he collapsed. However, she didn't have the strength to keep him from actually falling, and her catching him merely made her fall with him.
The landing wasn't painful, but she could tell that Elmo was out cold. She wasn't sure what had happened, but it was clear that something had happened.
"Elin, you okay?" Kim asked, somehow already helping her back up while Jonas checked on Elmo.
"I'm fine," she assured Kim. "But what happened?"
"He's out," Jonas reported. "While I thought we could continue on for a little longer, I guess this will be as good fo a place to wait as any."
"Did we bring a tent?" Elin asked, suddenly wanting to be naked and in Kim's arms.
"Nope," Kim replied immediately. "We can only carry so much, and tents would prevent us from carrying that much more food."
Elin sighed. While she and Kim could just do their thing behind some rocks, she preferred the privacy of a tent. Where no one would be able to see them enjoying each other's bodies.
"Elin, would you check to see if you can find anything wrong with Elmo?" Jonas asked. "Just to make sure that there's nothing else wrong with him?"
Elin sighed. Not only was she not going to be able to enjoy Kim's body, but now she was having to check on Elmo, when he probably just got too excited or something. She felt that this was more of a pain than anything else she'd had to do so far.
While she liked being around Elmo, she didn't care for taking care of him like this. They had similar thoughts about this world when they'd talked sometimes during meals, but it wasn't like she felt like she was his servant or anything.
Still, as the 'healer' of their group, which was how Elmo had put it, making sure that everyone was fine was still her responsibility. No matter how inconvenient it was or how annoyed it made her at any particular moment. Like this one.
"Assess," Elin said in a monotone, wishing that she wasn't the only one who could do this right hten.
As the window opened up in front of her, she was a little surprised at what she saw. Aside form the expected state of unconsciousness, it showed that Elmo was fighting a magical attack. While her spell didn't give her any more information than that, she couldn't see the harm in trying to use her magic to help against whatever was going on inside Elmo.
"Treat," she called out, this time putting more emotion into the words.
Elmo started to convulse and Elin thought for a moment that she'd screwed up and should have done something different, even though she couldn't think of what else she could have done. It was another of those moments where she couldn't do anything more and was left feeling completely helpless.
She looked helplessly at Kim and Jonas, hoping that somehow they might have an idea of something to do, but she could see on their faces that they were as helpless as she was. Which only fueled her own anxiety.
Turning back to Elmo, she was about to try something else when he suddenly calmed down and opened his eyes slowly. Elin felt an immense relief at the sight of this, unable to stop from letting out a deep sigh of relief. Somehow Elmo was able to survive whatever had affected him.
"What happened?" Elmo asked groggily. "I feel like I've been run over by a steamroller."
"Not sure what happened, just that Elin saved you," Jonas answered succinctly.
"Elin?" Elmo asked, sounding a little confused. "Who's Elin?"
Elin felt something grab a hold of her heart, scared that Elmo would forget about her because of whatever had happened to him. She couldn't say why, but the thought of him forgetting her made her feel more panicked than any of the times she'd thought about how if they were able to get back to their worlds that she wouldn't be able to be with Kim anymore. She had always thought that being with Kim was the most important thing for her, but now she couldn't help but wonder if that was actually the case or not.
"You don't have to-" Elin started to say, not wanting Elmo to worry too much about it, even though she felt like her heart was being squeezed to a paste as she spoke, but then was interrupted.
"Yeah, I remember now," Elmo said, sounding like he wasn't even aware Elin was trying to say something. "I was looking at the stats of the rocks when everything went blank."
"Did you see anything about the rocks?" Jonas asked, eliciting a glare from Elin.
Jonas seemed only concerned with those rocks that had felt otherworldly, but Elin felt like he should at least let Elmo rest peacefully. Even Elin wasn't sure what exactly had happened or even how he'd been attacked, but whatever he saw should be something they got to after Elmo had had a chance to rest.
"Yeah, I saw something," Elmo said, his voice breaking, making Elin suddenly think of getting him some water to drink.
"Here," Kim said, holding out the waterskin she'd been carrying as Elin started searching through her pack to look for hers.
Elin watched in dismay as Elmo took a drink. She couldn't say why, but it felt like Kim had stolen something from her. She didn't know what it was, only that the chance was gone now. Which left her feeling miserable.
When Elmo took the waterskin away from his mouth, he let out a breath, looking incredibly tired. To the point Elin couldn't help but use her Assess spell on him again, only to see that he was just flat out tired. Whatever had been affecting him had somehow drained both his MP and stamina.
"I don't remember much of what I saw about the rocks, just that they're alive and don't like sound. They're also sensitive to magic being used near them, especially when they're the target. They aren't hungry right now, but that will change if nothing dies around them for maybe twenty years," Elmo said, his voice just above a murmur. "If we had said anything when we were around them, they would have killed us, but only because that much onise somehow hurts them."
Elin waited a minute for Elmo to say anything more, until she realized he had fallen asleep.
"Well, at least now we know what those were," Jonas mused.
"What good does that do us," Elin snapped, feeling like she'd somehow let Elmo get used.
"Well, it tells us that we need to kill them, regardless of how beautiful they were," Jonas answered flatly.
"Why?" Elin asked, unable to get anything else past her throat.
"Because they seemed to be heading the direction we came from, right?" he asked, drawing a small nod from Elin. "Well, just think who is past there? Who would likely get slaughtered by those rocks?"
Elin didn't need anything more to be said. She understood exactly what Jonas was getting at. The people who were in Kim's army. The people that had accompanied them when they left the king's palace.
"How do you plan on killing them?" Kim asked, though she didn't seem like she was concerned with the potential victims of those rocks.
"By merging with the shadows and using my dagger to make enough sound to at least hurt them a lot," Jonas answered.
"Won't you had get harmed if you stick it out of the shadows?" Elin couldn't help but ask.
Jonas shook his head like she should already know the answer to her question. "Who says I have to have my hand leave the shadows with the dagger? I'll just chip away at the if I can't use it like a tuning fork."
Elin wasn't sure what to say, and looking at Kim, she could tell that Kim wasn't going to say anything either. Although, Kim didn't look like she cared as much as Kim, either.