system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[The Inheritance Cycle] Selena using the word 'heal' to kill.

So it was mentioned that Selena, Eragon's mother was once taught the word for 'heal' in the ancient language and pitted against a bunch of deadly assassins. She managed to defeat them by healing them of all that drove them to kill. However if she was proficient enough in magic to do that, surely she had to know quite a bit of the ancient language. Why didn't she just use another way? The only thing I can think of was that some kind of restriction was imposed forcing her to use only the word for heal. However then why wasn't that specified? saying that she was 'taught the word' seems to imply she didn't know the ancient language, in which case her proficiency in magic seems absurd.
gpt
Magic in Alagaesia is somewhat intent based. It was linked to the ancient language so you couldn't get a result that contradicted what you said, but the intent of what you were trying to do still matters. The implication in the book seems to be that Selena didn't know more than the word for heal, but it's possible that with the right intention and concentration, that word could be used to have an effect that seems counterintuitive as long as the caster sees the link between what they say and what they want to happen.