Second Life as a Soldier

Eleanor POV

Edward walked away, leaving me alone with the soldier he had brought.

Looking at him more closely, I realized he was wearing House Petrae’s colors.

Unable to hide my surprise, my eyes widened.

“Ummm...” I stammered.

I was not sure what his name was. The way Edward had casually handed him the pen and paper, I had initially assumed he was just some young private under his command.

“Leif,” the soldier introduced himself with a smile.

“Are you from House Petrae?” I asked hesitantly.

Father had warned me multiple times to control my tongue if I ever met House Petrae or one of their retainers. As a knight household, we were technically under House Petrae’s jurisdiction, and they could demand soldiers from our house in times of need.

“Yes, I am a retainer,” Leif replied. “But currently, I am just a student at Avalon Knight School.”

That shocked me even more.

He held a position high enough that he should not have been working under me. If anything, I should have been the one following his orders.

“I-if you want, you can take charge here. I will start recording the details,” I said.

I had no interest in giving him command, but Father was injured, and Edmund was too young to deal with House Petrae. I did not know what kind of connection this soldier had with them, and offending him could bring unnecessary trouble to my house.

Thankfully, he just waved his hand dismissively.

“I don’t know how to do whatever you are doing. All I know is how to fight. Also, if Edward finds out I did not do what he assigned me, I will never be able to live it down.”

He said it casually, as if that was the most natural thing in the world.

But from his tone, one thing became clear.

Edward and Leif were friends.

I wanted to ask more questions, but we did not have time for that.

I started organizing the crowd while also providing Leif with a small table where he could sit and write.

“Mr. Leif,” I said.

He looked uncomfortable with the way I addressed him, but he did not comment on it.

“Can you please record two separate lists? One for people who are missing, and one for volunteers. Note down the details Edward mentioned.”

He nodded.

“Samuel, Edwin, George,” I called, turning to three young men who were helping me organize the crowd. “You all know the Delicious Boar tavern, right? Go there and bring me some carts. I will cover the expense, so do not worry about that.”

The three of them nodded.

“I also have a very important task for you.”

After hesitating for a moment, I continued.

“I want the three of you to take your friends from the orphanage and recover as many bodies as you can from the rubble.”

Before they could say anything, I added, “I will pay each of them five silver”

Their hesitation vanished within seconds.

Without another word, all three of them ran in the direction of the tavern.

When I had first joined the administrative department, I would never have given this kind of work to fourteen or fifteen-year-old boys. But later, I learned that the reality, my life and theirs were different.

Samuel, Edwin, and George came from the slums, and most of their friends were part of gangs. For them, seeing dead bodies was nothing new. They never told me directly, but after working with them for the last six months, I knew some of their friends had even killed people.

After an hour or two, the entire crowd was organized and the number of volunteers had increased significantly, we even found four people who knew how to read and write.

I assigned them the task of making lists and recording details, taking some of the burden off Leif and increasing the speed at which we could speak with the struggling people gathered here.

Finally, when I had a little free time, I approached Leif.

Several questions had been bothering me.

Standing beside his small workstation, I hesitated for a moment before asking, “How do you know Edward?”

While Leif took information from the person standing in front of him, I wondered how someone from House Petrae had met a normal Royal Army sergeant.

Also, now that I looked at his handwriting, it was far too crude for someone who had received training in a count’s house.

Then, with one sentence, Leif answered all of my questions.

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“Oh, I was with him in the Royal Army training camp,” he said. “Only after a year of serving in the Royal Army did I become a retainer of House Petrae.”

“And how did Edward learn how to control crowds?” I asked.

Now that I had time to think about it, I found Edward’s way of handling things far more effective than I had first realized.

When he arrived, I truly needed help with the crowd. After seeing my strict father in such a terrible condition, then walking here and seeing the pain these people were in, I had been more scared than I had ever been in my life.

When Peter left me here alone, that fear had only grown.

So Edward’s arrival had felt like a godsend.

Even then, I had not trusted him to know how to handle a crowd.

But he had not just handled the crowd.

He had handled me as well.

When he arrived, he did not take control. Instead, he asked for my opinion and then, in a subtle way, suggested improvements to my plan. Later, once I regained my bearings, he left me in charge.

Leif finally looked up from his paper and glanced at the crowd.

“I don’t know,” he said. “He did spend a lot of his time studying. More than anyone else in the camp.”

Then he turned to me.

“Also, you know he became a sergeant before the age of seventeen, right? He has been a sergeant for almost two years now, and he is soon to become a lieutenant. I am sure he learned most of it on the job.”

I nodded.

I knew Edward was younger than Peter, but I had not known he was this young.

Edward was even younger than me by one year.

Peter had also forgotten to mention that Edward was already on track to become a lieutenant.

Edward POV

As I walked toward the school, I heard someone calling out to me. Then I sensed someone running toward me from behind.

“Sir! Sir! Sir Soldier!”

A middle-aged man rushed toward me, looking desperate, tired, and afraid.

Will moved to stop him, but I grabbed his arm, allowing the man to approach.

“Sir, my child. No, a lot of injured people were taken to Healer Antony, and most of them are not in any condition to be brought to the school. We were barely able to take them to the healer’s house. Moving them again could kill them,” he said.

“You were telling me something about your child,” I said, my eyes fixed on him.

“H-he is also there. The place is too crowded now, and he might not get any treatment before it is too late,” the man said, tears gathering in his eyes.

“Lead me there.”

All three of us followed the man as he led us farther down the street.

On the way, I expanded my senses while also scanning for exits. I did not doubt his words, but it never hurt to be cautious.

I let my guard down a little when I saw the situation in front of the healer’s house.

The crowd here was growing angry.

The house was small, and far too many people had gathered around it. Just outside, I could see twenty to twenty-five injured people, with more still trickling in. Some limped toward the place on their own, while others were carried on wooden planks.

An elderly man stood at the door, blocking the entrance.

“I am telling you, I do not have the ability to treat this many people. I am already running out of herbs and space—”

The elderly man stopped the moment he saw our group.

“Healer Antony, Lady Eleanor is not handling the healing, but this soldier might be able to help,” the man who had brought us here said.

All eyes turned to me.

Looking over the crowd, I said, “The school will be the central place for healing. Those who can walk, and those who are not seriously injured, make your way there.”

Then I turned to the healer.

“I can provide some herbs, but even my stock is limited. I am a healer, and my skills should help with treatment even without herbs. I would like to examine the seriously injured people first.”

Antony nodded. “Come in.”

But before I could move, the crowd surged in front of me, blocking my path.

“Look at my leg!”

“My shoulder is injured!”

“No, look at my brother! He is unconscious!”

Several people began shouting at once, each demanding to be treated first.

Some of them were badly injured, but from what I could sense, none of them felt like they would die because of those injuries.

I released my mana and activated [Battlefield Command].

“Let me say this once,” I said, my voice cutting through the noise. “I have checked most of you here. None of you are likely to die within the next hour. The same cannot be said for the people inside.”

Then I stepped forward.

“Now make way.”

This time, I did not wait for them to move on their own. I pushed through the crowd and entered the healer’s house.

I had already tried to sense the condition of the people inside, but once I got closer, I activated [Triage Ward (UC)] to get a proper reading of their status.

Out of the fifteen patients lying on the floor, four were in critical condition.

One had a puncture wound in his stomach, with a wooden pole still sticking out of him. Two had deep wounds and were struggling from heavy blood loss—One of them was a teenage boy—The last was a woman who had lost an arm, and her heartbeat was already faint. She, too, was mostly dying from blood loss.

The man who had led us to the healer’s house rushed over and sat beside the teenage boy.

I checked my mana.

MP: 2700 / 3312

I had more than enough.

“Healer Antony, prepare the others so they can be transported to the school. I will take care of these four.”

I passed him some of my herbs, then dragged the wooden planks my patients were lying on closer to me.

I activated [Triage Ward (UC)] again and began supplying [Vital Restoration (UC)] to all four of them, just enough to keep them from dying.

Then I looked at Will and Eliza.

“You two go to the school. Organize it and divide it into three areas. One for patients with severe injuries, one for minor injuries, and one red zone for people who will die within thirty minutes without treatment.”

Without waiting for their confirmation, I turned my full focus back to the patients.

I maintained one mana thread of [Vital Restoration] for each of them, with the thickest flow concentrated between the brain and heart. From previous treatments, I had learned that enriching the blood with mana could improve oxygen supply to the organs, allowing patients to survive longer even after severe blood loss.

The first patient I treated was the woman who had lost her arm.

She was the closest to death.

Instead of using physical thread, I used mana threads. By combining the effects of [Vital Restoration] and [Triage Ward], I could make those threads far more effective than normal stitches when it came to closing wounds and slowing blood loss.

Within ten minutes, I closed her wound. If she survived the next thirty minutes or so, she should be out of danger, and my skills should recover her vitals enough for her to survive on her own.

I turned to the other wounded patients and carried out the same treatment.

Then I turned to my final patient.

His vitals were the strongest, but his injuries were the most severe.

His spine was in contact with the pole, and the lower part of his lung and stomach had been punctured. Taking out the pole would make things worse very quickly.

So I waited ten more minutes.

By then, all three patients I had treated had recovered enough to survive without my constant support.

Only then did I take a deep breath, grip the pole, and pull it out.

The moment I did, I threw my skills at him. I even used herbs to accelerate the healing as much as possible.

I closed the wound quickly and formed mana stitches, but removing the pole had torn open a large vessel near his spine. The pole had been the only thing slowing the bleeding.

Now that it was gone, he was losing blood faster than I could stop it.

For a second, I thought I had stabilized him. His breathing steadied, and his pulse became clearer.

Then his pulse began to fade.

I poured more mana into his blood, trying to keep his organs alive, but nothing worked.

I kept sending mana into his body.

I kept trying to force his heart to hold on.

Then it stopped.

For a few seconds, I just stood there, unable to process my failure.

It was not the first patient I had lost.

But for some reason, losing a civilian hit harder.

Or maybe it had been so long since I had failed like this that I had started believing I could treat any injury placed in front of me.