Supreme Magus novel Chapter 128

The moment Lith collided with the spatial crack, he knew that something horrible would happen. Twisting and turning his body despite the blinding agony, Lith managed to use air magic to avoid crashing head first against it.

But with the little margin he had, and the feeble energy he managed to muster, avoiding the fissure entirely was impossible. His left arm penetrated it up to the head of the humerus, giving him the feeling that someone had thrown a massive boulder from a cliff, but not before gluing his left hand to it.

It was like every single cell in his arm had been put into a blender filled with gasoline and a flint. It stretched endlessly in the deformed space, appearing and disappearing multiple times from different spatial cracks, before they finally closed down under the effect of Linjos’ artifact.

The result was that both Lith and his left arm were finally free from the dimensional vise. But while he was still where he had fallen, the arm was about twenty meters (66’) away, cleanly cut from the shoulder with inhuman precision.

Lith’s world turned red when his mind went beyond the pain and the blood gushing out of the stump, realizing what had happened. No matter how many times he had mentally simulated the event in the past, the shock of the amputation almost overwhelmed him.

Almost.

Emitting an outraged roar rather than a scream of pain, Lith used what energy he had left to stop the bleeding, before his body collapsed due to the accumulated damage.

The group had stopped in its tracks since their friend had been knocked down by a tower shield, ripped off the hands of his owner by the same explosion that turned it into a deadly bullet.

While the others ran to his side, Phloria turned back, sprinting to the severed arm and storing it in her dimensional amulet as fast as she could.

- "According to my father, reattaching a limb is much easier than regrow it. The important thing is to preserve it in the best conditions possible. A dimensional item is the ideal solution, since it will not rot or degrade as long it’s in there." –

When Quylla reached him, she thought it was already too late. Despite being only partially healed, the stump bleed too little, and she was unable to feel a pulse.

If Lith was really dead, she would have been forced to attempt a resuscitation manoeuvre (AN: like CPR), even at the risk of further compromising his body’s integrity. But if there was even just a spark of life, she knew, or better she firmly believed he would have made it.

- "Damn diagnostic magic! It’s too slow!" – She inwardly cursed, taking out a small mirror from her dimensional amulet, and putting it in front of his mouth and nose. The glass fogged up, giving her hope.

"Yurial, you heal him. You have already given him too much energy, we cannot afford anyone passing away. Friya, enhance his life force, I’ll keep him stable."

Quylla’s task was the hardest. She had to use diagnostic spells to find the most damaged organs, and then alternate healing and energy infusion without compromising the others’ work.

Too fast healing would kill him, he was too weak to endure more strain. Too much energy would kill him too. If the heart suddenly started pumping fast, Lith would either bleed out the countless open wounds or die due to organ failure.

But if they acted with too much caution, his body would simply collapse. It was like a game of Jenga with cracked crystal pieces. One wrong move would mean the end, with no chance for a do over.

First, she finished mending the severed shoulder, then she harmonized with her friends’ spells, fixing whatever mistake they made in the heat of the moment. Unlike her, they had no real experience as healers.

And to make things worse, their first patient without any Professor’s supervision was a close friend. Inwardly, all the three of them just wanted to run away crying from that hellhole.

They were already tired from the dimensional magic lesson and the nightmare born from it. They had been on the edge all the time, believing that every second would be their last. And when finally everything seemed to be over, they had been forced to stare death in the face.

It was still morning, but it felt like a week had passed. The only things that kept them together were rage and stubbornness. Rage coming from the frustration of being constantly swept around by forces beyond their control, and the stubbornness that made them unwilling to yield at any cost.

Alongside them, a silent but invaluable fourth player was fighting with everything she had. Solus had been constantly expending her own energies to keep light fusion active, after Lith had lost consciousness.