Chapter 78: Saint Hilarius Hospital (10)
— Valisera’s POV —
I pressed my trembling, blood-soaked hand hard against my torn side. The jagged wound was deep, dangerously close to my vital organs, but the "Elixir of Dawn’s Tears" already flowing through my bloodstream began its miraculous work immediately.
It wasn’t a gentle healing. Supreme potions never are.
Cells began dividing, mutating, and fusing at a manic, unnatural speed. It produced a hot, vibrating buzz beneath my skin, making my blood literally boil as it fought to knit the shredded muscle tissue back together. It felt as though a million microscopic fire ants were crawling inside the open wound, stitching my flesh with threads of pure, agonizing heat.
"Local anesthesia failed. The patient is resisting the procedure with unexpected biological strength. I observe accelerated cellular regeneration..."
The Surgeon’s cold, synthetic voice sliced through the heavy air, completely devoid of frustration or anger. To it, my survival was merely a fascinating variable in a complex equation.
The suffocating cloud of pulverized concrete and dust finally began to clear, pulled away by the disrupted ventilation system.
The Surgeon stood at the very bottom of the massive thirty-meter crater I had created.
Its eight mechanized spider legs were embedded deep into the reinforced concrete, acting as heavy-duty shock absorbers to stabilize its massive frame and prevent complete structural crushing under my gravitational pull. Its terrifying black chassis was covered in deep scratches, and one of its six surgical arms extending from its spine hung loose—twisted and sparking with broken hydraulic cables—but it was far, far from dead.
"Accelerated cellular regeneration will inevitably prolong the organ extraction process," the Surgeon added, its mechanical head tilting slightly. Its glowing laser eyes shifted from a clinical blue to a deep, murderous crimson.
"Adjusting parameters. I will increase the amputation rate."
It charged at me.
The speed of its massive frame defied the fundamental laws of physics. It didn’t just run; it fired its hydraulic pistons and launched itself like a heavy artillery shell.
In a fraction of a second, the battle violently shifted from a calculated long-range magical engagement to a brutal, close-quarters clash—bloody, lethal, and devastatingly fast. The sheer kinetic energy of our collision created shockwaves that shattered the remaining intact glass in the laboratory. To Aiden’s fragile human vision, watching from the corner, we were nothing more than chaotic flashes of blinding white laser and deep black ether colliding in midair.
The Surgeon used its razor-sharp spider legs to leap, skewer, and rebound off the vertical walls and the dangerously unstable ceiling, turning the entire vast laboratory into a three-dimensional web of mechanical death. It attacked from impossible, gravity-defying angles.
"Die, you mechanical parasite!" I roared, my silver hair whipping wildly around my face.
I unleashed successive, rapid-fire waves of spatial fractures. My hands moved in a blur, commanding the dark ether.
The heavy air tore apart with jagged black lines, shrieking as if I were slicing through a massive, invisible canvas.
But the machine’s quantum processor was terrifying. It weaved, ducked, and contorted its heavy frame between the spatial tears with millimeter precision.
Two of its rotating, diamond-tipped bone saws closed in on my face, buzzing with a deafening screech. I was forced to abandon my spatial attacks and instantly condense gravity at point-blank range, forming a dual-layered shield just inches from my eyes to repel them.
Kraaaaaaanch! Zzzzzzzzzzzz!
Every single collision between my invisible gravity shield and the hyper-rotating bone saws generated massive showers of golden sparks that lit up the dark, dusty laboratory. The grinding sound of metal trying to saw through absolute gravity was enough to tear a human eardrum.
In one fatal moment, the Surgeon’s AI exploited my total focus on deflecting the saws. It calculated my blind spot and launched the arm carrying the "hydraulic acid syringe" from a low angle, completely below my line of sight.
I only noticed the shift in the air a microsecond before impact. I looked down and saw the thick, reinforced steel needle—half a meter long and glowing menacingly with a highly corrosive green liquid—heading straight for the femoral artery in my left thigh!
I had absolutely no time to weave the ether to form another shield.
If that massive needle pierced my flesh, it wouldn’t just wound me. It would inject a liter of concentrated, magic-laced sulfuric acid directly into my veins. My internal organs would dissolve into a bloody puddle from the inside out in seconds—even the supreme elixir in my blood wouldn’t be able to save me from total liquefaction!
Operating purely on adrenaline and suicidal instinct, I dropped my stance, raised my bare left hand, and desperately grabbed the thick steel needle mid-thrust!
Tssssssssssssssss!
The sheer kinetic friction between the highly condensed dark ether wrapping my palm and the incoming, high-speed steel needle generated immense, burning heat. The metal hissed and warped under my grip.
I stopped the deadly tip exactly one centimeter from the fabric covering my thigh. My muscles screamed from the exertion of holding back a hydraulic press.
"Surgical error detected. Target interception," the Surgeon commented coldly, its crimson eyes staring blankly into mine.
Before I could crush the needle in my hand or snap the mechanical arm, the Surgeon ruthlessly pressed the hydraulic discharge trigger located at the base of the arm.
The concentrated, highly corrosive green liquid surged violently from the tip of the needle—not to inject me, but to spray like a high-pressure hose of burning acid directly across my exposed leg and lower abdomen!
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"
This time, the scream that tore from my throat was completely uncontrolled. The pain instantly surpassed anything I had ever experienced in my long, bloody life.
The acid didn’t just dissolve my synthetic clothes. It instantly melted through them and began eating my flesh alive! I felt the agonizing sensation of the chemical devouring my epidermal layer in a split second, burrowing deep into the raw muscle tissue of my left leg. It produced a loud, disgusting, sizzling sound, like raw meat thrown onto a white-hot grill.
Thick, toxic green smoke rose from my melting body, carrying the heavy, nauseating, and sweet smell of my own burning flesh.
Immediately, the supreme elixir pumping through my blood began fiercely fighting the foreign chemical.
My mutated cells aggressively healed the tissue—and the acid instantly dissolved them again. They healed, and they melted.
A brutal, agonizing biological war was happening inside my very flesh at the exact same second! My nervous system was overloaded with conflicting signals of extreme regeneration and extreme destruction.
The sheer, overwhelming physical pain blurred my vision, turning the entire laboratory into an absolute, hazy red. My legs gave out.
I fell heavily to one knee into the sticky pool of blood and water, gasping violently for air. My crimson eyes shed hot, involuntary tears from the sheer, mind-breaking agony.
Hahahahahaha...
Suddenly, the dark, ancient laughter of the cosmic entity—the parasite bound deep within the darkest corners of my mind—echoed clearly. It wasn’t a sound; it was a heavy pressure on my sanity, reveling in my absolute suffering.
Do you see? the entity whispered, its voice dripping with cosmic malice. Your pathetic, fragile human body is being torn apart and melted by a mere mechanical toy! Break the chains, Valisera... stop resisting. Let me take control of the wheel, and I will turn this arrogant machine into scattered scrap metal in a single second!
"Shut up... I won’t give you... control!" I hissed through tightly clenched teeth, biting down so hard my gums bled, nearly cracking my own molars from the immense pressure of the pain.
The Surgeon, however, didn’t wait for me to recover my breath or win my internal mental battle.
It took immediate, calculated advantage of my kneeling, compromised position. It raised its most lethal weapon—the massive "laser scalpel" arm—high into the air, bringing it down directly toward my exposed neck to sever my head from my shoulders in a single, clean surgical motion!
My left side was paralyzed by the acid still relentlessly eating through my leg muscles. I couldn’t raise my hand in time. I couldn’t weave the ether.
And in that final, fatal fraction of a second—
"Die, you cursed nightmare!"
A hysterical, tear-torn, deeply human scream rang out from the far side of the ruined lab.
It was Aiden.
Aiden—the coward who had been hiding behind the rubble throughout the entire catastrophic battle—now stood on his trembling, weak legs. He was pointing both of his holographic projection gloves directly at the Surgeon.
Aiden didn’t just cast a spell. He poured every last drop of his remaining ether, pushing his A-rank core to the point of shattering, into a single, massive illusion!
Suddenly, rising from the bloody, torn remains of the chimera corpses, an entity of absolute dominance materialized.
"Kaiser Dravion" rose!
It was a perfect, terrifyingly realistic illusion of the transcendent, absolute ruler of Elysium. The sheer aura the projection emitted was heavy enough to make the air vibrate.
The illusion charged at the Surgeon with blinding speed, wielding a massive broadsword forged of absolute, blinding light!
The Surgeon’s advanced sensors instantly detected an immense heat signature and highly concentrated ether radiating from the approaching figure—Aiden had brilliantly replicated the Kaiser’s exact energy output using a highly complex weave of visual, auditory, and thermal deception.
The blinding laser scalpel stopped its descent mere millimeters from my exposed neck!
The ambient heat of the stalled blade instantly burned away strands of my silver hair, leaving a searing trail of heat against my skin.
The Surgeon, hard-coded to constantly assess and prioritize threat levels, instantly classified the approaching "Kaiser illusion" as an S+ Rank existential threat. Its AI overrode its current execution protocol and instantly turned all its weapons, lenses, and sensors to intercept the transcendent illusion!
The laser scalpel swung in a wide arc, piercing directly through the Kaiser’s chest.
There was no resistance. The majestic illusion of Kaiser Dravion instantly flickered, glitched, and shattered into thousands of harmless, glowing blue pixels of dust, leaving the massive Surgeon standing completely exposed in empty space.
"A-rank visual and thermal camouflage detected. Error in threat analysis," the Surgeon stated in its monotone voice. Its six glowing red laser lenses snapped with terrifying, mechanical speed toward the dark corner of the room.
There stood Aiden, gasping violently for air, his gloves smoking. His eyes rolled back as he completely collapsed to the cold ground from severe ether exhaustion, utterly defenseless.
"Diagnosis: external interference actively disrupting the primary procedure.
Treatment: immediate and permanent removal of the intruder."
The Surgeon completely ignored my kneeling, bleeding form. It used its powerful hydraulic spider legs to launch itself like a massive, black metallic arrow... heading straight toward the unconscious Aiden!