Forty-First Spell: Pellets and Facts

The next day, Haru attended a few classes with the other Secondary Students. Normally, these classes were held on Saturdays. But since the last two Saturdays had been taken up by a festival and a field trip, it forced the teachers to move their classes to Sunday instead.

So Haru had enough time to meet with Ryosei Maki and tell him about his new uwabami friend Heshi. Ryosei smiled at the small white snake with the black stripes, but she seemed nervous when he moved his hand along her body. From there, Ryosei gave Haru the items he needed to take care of Heshi from a pouch full of dried mice carcasses to a bonsai tree that had a big enough hollow for Heshi to nestle inside. Haru then set these things up next to his things in the Boys' Dorm of the Byakko Wing.

"I don't know how I felt about that man," Heshi whispered to Haru from inside her bonsai tree hollow. "Something didn't seem right."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," Haru said. "He acted strange during the first class I had with him where he killed a yokai that attacked me."

"Was it a bad yokai?"

"Sort of. It was a kamikiri."

"A hair-cutting yokai? That doesn't sound like much of a threat."

"Well, it did try to cut my ankles before lunging at my face. But I think Ryosei overreacted."

"Haru!" Cheng said, coming into the room he and Haru slept in with four other boys on flat futon beds. "Were you making weird noises just now?"

"Oh, I was just…talking to my new snake familiar," Haru said. "Her name is Heshi."

"Heshi," Cheng repeated, looking inside the hollow where Heshi poked her little head from. "Where did you get her?"

"At Mount Ōe," Haru answered. "I found her when I went looking for Hikari after she got separated from us following the oni attack."

"I'm surprised you got permission to take her home," Cheng remarked. "You never know when one of these forest snakes might be a snake yokai in disguise."

"Uh, right," Haru laughed, hoping Cheng wouldn't question him further about Heshi.

"But she is very cute," Cheng said. "I hope you take good care of her, because I'm going to make sure you do!"


Two weeks later, the Spring Semester Final Exams were underway.

"In this Remedial Kampo Final, you will each have to make a Healing Pellet—or Rokumigan," Midorime said to Class 110B the first day of Finals Week. "You may use the Kampo Herbs and Spices book to find the recipe and the tools available here. The effectiveness of your pellets on these patients will determine whether you pass or fail."

From a woven basket, Midorime produced small birds and fruit bats that were either very ill or badly injured.

"No one at this school has deliberately harmed these animals for this exam," assured Midorime, seeing the nervous looks on everyone's faces. "Our groundskeeper, Higa-San, found them while he was checking the outer edges of the Cloud Forest to make sure the Wards were still working. He doesn't know who or what hurt them, but he's investigating the matter as we speak."

"But why do we have to heal them?" Seita asked. "Shouldn't that be Kagaya-Sensei's job since she's the Care for Magical Creatures teacher?"

"It's because she has her hands full with her classes that she can't tend to these animals right now," Midorime answered. "So consider this exam a favor for her."

After that, everyone got to work preparing their Healing Pellet Kampo. The ingredients consisted of foxglove root, cornelian cherry, matsumoto wood fungus, and water plantain. Instead of grinding the ingredients into a fine powder, the students mashed them into a gooey substance before rolling it into small digestible pellets. Each student then walked up to the front of the class and fed a pellet to each injured animal.

While Haru's fruit bat looked much better after eating his pellet, Nayu had a hard time feeding her pellet to an Ōkumo Storm Petrel chick before it spit the pellet out. Seita, on the other hand, didn't bother to catch the fledgeling red-footed booby bird he tried to feed his pellet to as it flapped around the classroom terrorizing everyone. Once Midorime got the booby bird settled, Gyoku fed his pellet to a sparrow with a broken wing which healed up instantly.

"Very impressive, Wataka-Kun," Midorime complimented. "You have the makings of a Healer with that kind of talent."

"Thank you, Midorime-Sensei," Gyoku said humbly.

"And you did quite well, Ryuji-Kun," added Midorime. "So I will award the Byakko Clan five points for the success of Ryuji's Healing Pellet."

Following a round of applause from the younger students and Nayu, the Remedial History of Magic Final started. It consisted of Ishi-Sensei asking each student a question which they had to answer with a historical fact. Each right answer from a First-Year Secondary Student earned a point for their Clan, but for every wrong answer they lost a point.

"HOW DID OROCHIMARU KIDNAP PRINCESS TAGOTO?" Ishi asked Haru.

"Well, he poisoned Jiraiya and Tsunade while they were sleeping. Then he took off with the Princess," Haru answered.

"CORRECT! ONE POINT TO BYAKKO!" Then Ishi turned his rock body to face Seita. "WHO WAS RIKIMATSU A DISCIPLE OF?"

"Jiraiya," said Seita. "Rikimatsu was also the one who used Tengu Magic to fly all the way to India to bring the antidote that healed Tsunade and Jiraiya of Orochimaru's poison."

"RIGHT! TWO POINTS FOR GENBU!"

"Two points?" Haru exclaimed. "Seita only answered one question."

"HE GOT A BONUS POINT FOR THAT EXTRA FACT HE GAVE AT THE END, RYUJI," Ishi explained before looking at Nayu. "WHICH FAMOUS WITCH OR WIZARD IS DESCENDED FROM RIKIMATSU?"

"Um, Abe no Seimei," Nayu guessed.

"WRONG! IT'S OUR OWN HEADMISTRESS ANZU DŌMEKI! ONE POINT SUBTRACTED FROM BYAKKO!" Just then, the crowing noise from Dōmeki's yatagarasu rang out causing Ishi to tally the scores for everyone in the class.

"SINCE RYUJI AND FUMITO GUESSED EIGHT OF THE TWELVE QUESTIONS RIGHT, THEY'VE EARNED A TOTAL OF EIGHT POINTS FOR THEIR CLANS!" Ishi declared. "BUT RAKKASHI ONLY GOT FOUR QUESTIONS RIGHT, SO FOUR POINTS WILL BE SUBTRACTED FROM BYAKKO!"

"Guess you should have studied more," Seita taunted after Ishi had dismissed the class.

"I'm sorry, Haru," Nayu apologized with her head lowered.

"Don't worry about it!" Haru insisted. "We still have time to get back those lost points for Byakko during the rest of the finals. So don't give up, Nayu!"

"Okay," Nayu nodded. "I won't!"

To be continued…