Etzel Deymar had acquired an A-Rank summon.
This was, objectively, an excellent development.
There was only one problem.
Etzel was bleeding on him.
Dark Knight looked down at the red drops striking one polished silver gauntlet. Then he looked at Etzel.
Etzel followed his gaze. "Oh."
His shoulder had apparently decided that surviving the Graveglass Reaver did not exempt him from blood loss. "Right."
DK rose from his kneeling position. The movement was smooth. Too smooth. One moment he was kneeling. The next, he stood at his full height, shield on one arm and sword at his side as though the transition between the two positions simply hadn't required effort.
Etzel noticed something else. DK was tall. Not ridiculously tall. Just tall enough that Etzel immediately resented having to look slightly upward at his own summon.
DK's eyes moved over him. Shoulder. Ribs. Hands. Face. Back to shoulder.
"You are injured."
Etzel glanced at the dead Graveglass Reaver. Then at the shredded remains of his backpack. Then at the blood running down his arm. "I noticed somewhere between being thrown into a tree and bleeding."
DK did not smile.
Etzel waited. Nothing.
"That one was better in my head."
"You need treatment."
"I have a first-aid kit." Etzel looked toward the contents of his backpack scattered across the forest floor. A roll of gauze had landed beside a bush. His water bottle was several meters away. One of his knives had disappeared completely. The first-aid kit lay upside down beneath a fern.
Etzel pointed. "Technically, I have several pieces of a first-aid kit."
DK walked toward it. "Sit."
Etzel blinked. "Was that an order?"
DK stopped. For the first time since appearing, uncertainty crossed his face. "I..." His brow furrowed. "I believe so."
Etzel grinned. "Interesting relationship we've got here."
"Sit."
"Definitely an order that time." Etzel sat. Mostly because his ribs agreed with DK.
He leaned against a tree while DK collected the scattered medical supplies. Etzel watched him. There was something deeply strange about seeing a warrior in full plate armor picking antiseptic wipes out of dead leaves.
Stranger still was the way DK examined everything. He turned the sealed dressing once in his fingers. Read the label. Looked at the adhesive. Then seemed to understand what it was for.
"Have you used one of those before?" Etzel asked.
"No." That answer came immediately.
DK knelt beside him. "Take off your shirt."
Etzel looked at him. "You're moving very quickly for a relationship that's barely five minutes old."
DK stared.
Etzel sighed. "Nothing?"
"I do not understand."
"That's going to make this either much easier or much harder." He carefully pulled his shirt over his head. Pain stabbed through his shoulder. His breath caught.
DK's expression changed instantly. "Do not move the arm." The uncertainty was gone. His voice became clipped. Precise.
He pressed two fingers carefully around the wound.
Etzel hissed.
"Deep laceration. No obvious fracture." DK moved to his ribs. "Tell me if breathing becomes difficult."
"It's already difficult."
DK's eyes sharpened.
Etzel raised a hand. "Because it hurts. I can breathe."
DK pressed carefully along his side. Pain flared. Etzel swore.
"Bruised. Possibly cracked."
"You sound very confident for someone who doesn't know his own name."
DK's hands stopped. Silence.
Etzel immediately regretted saying it. Not because DK looked angry. He didn't. He looked at his own hands. The blood on his fingers. The bandage. Then back at Etzel's wound.
"I know how to treat this."
"Apparently."
"I know where the wound is dangerous." DK's voice had gone quieter. "I know how tightly to bind your ribs without restricting your breathing. I know how to recognize internal bleeding. I know how to tell whether a blade has damaged a tendon."
He stared at the dressing in his hand. "I do not know why."
Etzel's smile faded. DK looked almost offended by his own knowledge. As if his body were keeping secrets from him.
Etzel leaned his head against the tree. "Well."
DK looked at him.
"Until we figure it out, I'm voting that knowing how to stop me from dying goes in the useful category."
A pause. Then the corner of DK's mouth moved. Barely.
Etzel pointed at him. "I saw that."
"Saw what?"
"Nothing." DK began cleaning the wound.
Etzel discovered that antiseptic had survived the apocalypse specifically to hurt people. "Ah—"
"Hold still."
"That is an unreasonable request."
"You fought that creature."
"Yes."
"You can survive this."
"The creature didn't smell like a hospital."
DK paused. This time Etzel definitely saw it. A tiny smile. Victory.
"You're learning."
"I fear I may be."
DK finished dressing the wound with the efficiency of someone who had done it hundreds of times. Perhaps thousands.
That thought remained with Etzel. He watched DK secure the final bandage. The man's hands never hesitated. Not once.
His memory was gone. His knowledge wasn't. At least not all of it.
Which raised a rather significant question. What kind of life taught someone to treat sword wounds so naturally that forgetting his own name couldn't erase it?
Etzel decided not to ask. Not yet.
Instead, he summoned the interface. DK's information appeared.
SUMMON STATUS
DETAILS
Name
Dark Knight
Rank
A
Potential
SS