Natalu

Natalu is the Emperor of Zol whose choice to accept unfamiliar medical knowledge brought a personal recovery into conflict with the religious authority governing Zolian medicine. After Limuelle and Hohsalle cured his wife, he trusted their expertise; the resulting dispute between the emperor and the priest-doctors helped make Otawalle medicine both coveted and officially heretical.

Identity and Medical Authority

Zolians revered physicians as “the fingers of the god,” and the priest-doctors of the Pure Heart Creed treated medical practice as inseparable from divine teaching. When they judged an illness incurable, accepted practice was to leave the patient in the hands of the god and use only medicines intended to ease their death. Natalu’s response to his wife’s illness departed from this established course: he was decisive and open to new ideas, and refused to abandon hope when she became gravely ill.

His Wife’s Recovery

Having heard that Limuelle and Hohsalle had saved other patients with the same disease, Natalu summoned them to treat his wife. His advisers strongly opposed their involvement because they considered Otawalle remedies heretical, but the emperor proceeded despite that resistance. The two physicians cured his wife completely. Her recovery established the basis for Natalu’s lasting trust in Limuelle and, by extension, in Hohsalle, and gave their medical knowledge a high-profile demonstration within the Zolian court.

Conflict with the Priest-Doctors

Impressed by the physicians’ skill and knowledge, Natalu asked them to remain at the palace and teach the priest-doctors what he regarded as the superior medical science of Otawalle. The palace doctors reacted with fury, and their association clashed with the emperor. The dispute quieted only after Limuelle and Hohsalle declined the offer to stay; their refusal ended the immediate confrontation but did not undo what their treatment had set in motion.

Legacy and Significance

News of the cure spread through the empire, and nobles whose conditions the priest-doctors had declared incurable began covertly seeking Otawalle physicians. The priest-doctors warned that straying from the true path would bring the empire to ruin, while the Pure Heart Creed remained the fabric binding the sprawling state together. Neither Natalu nor the aristocracy could openly oppose the doctors’ authority. A decade after his wife’s recovery, Otawalle medicine was still officially branded as heresy, even as the choice that Natalu had made—seeking possible healing rather than accepting certain death—continued to shape private medical decisions.