By the time Billy sat down to begin the healing attempt, there was only an hour left before the tutorial ended. He asked Mia to turn off all notifications and then settled down into his meditation.
Once he was in his trance, he focused on mapping all of his meridians.
“Ok, Billy, you need to first use your healing meditation and air mana to strengthen all of the pathways. Once that is done, use void healing to create a small pipeline through the centre of each of the meridians.”
Trying to use healing mediation purposefully was difficult enough. His mana synesthesia helped, but he struggled to maintain the process over the full length of his meridians. He knew that without his increase mental stats it would be a futile attempt. Eventually, he managed to encompass all of his pathways. He drew air mana from outside and slowly used it to strengthen the outside of the meridians. The air mana created a small film of air around.
He maintained his breathing as a few times he lost control of the air mana and had to start again. If that happened in the middle of this process, his meridians would be destroyed.
Eventually, he had it in place and found that holding it there was easier than forming it in the first place. Now for the dangerous part. Air mana was willful at best. Void healing mana was unstable and wanted to corrupt or erase everything it touched. It also fought against his control.
Billy steeled his will. He slowly etched the line of void mana through one meridian after another. His mind was tiring, but he fixed his purpose in his heart. He would not be stopped. The passage of the void mana burned through his meridians and the clutter of chaotic mana that blocked his channels.
Finally, the line of void mana threaded all the way through. His mana synesthesia was sending him strange messages – the corruption from the void mana was seeping out. He needed to move fast to limit the damage. Corrupted mana channels had a different danger.
He settled into a rhythm of just monitoring. Despite the risk,s this could not be rushed. The next stage was to slowly expand the thread of void mana to make a narrow pipe. Through the pipe, healing mana would be pushed. The concept was like a blood transfusion – remove the old blood and replace it with healthy blood. For the best results the mana should be a mixture of air, fire, and void. That would not only aid in the healing process but also improve his affinity.
He used a woven thread of air, fire, and void, similar to when he had tried healing himself. Getting the flows to work together was the hardest part. Once the process started, it was just a matter of maintaining focus. Billy stubbornly held on to the flows of mana, slowly increasing the radius of the void pipe.
His mind was now swimming in fatigue, and he was not sure how long he had been doing this for. The void mana was increasingly becoming more difficult to hold as the radius increased. Tendrils of void mana started to seep through his control. He could feel the whole pipe slowly unravelling.
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Just a little longer, he thought. He must be nearly there. His mana synesthesia was sending a whole host of warning messages. Realising that he could not hold on any longer, he allowed the void mana to dissipate but maintained the air mana. The healthy mana started to flow through his meridians. At first, it was sluggish, but then it increased in speed, clearing away more of the chaotic mana.
Billy let go and lay back, his body and mind quivering in exhaustion.
“Well done, Billy,” Mia said. “You are nearly fully healed.”
“Nearly,” he muttered in reply.
“It was better than I expected. You will be able to use your meridians now at a low level. The rest of the healing can be done using healing meditation over a few more days.”
“So, I can cultivate?”
“At a lower level, yes.”
“And the void corruption?”
“To be expected.”
“Can that be healed?”
Mia was silent for a long while. “That is uncertain. Void mana is part of you now.”
Billy sighed. He was not sure if things were better or not.
He opened his eyes to find the others staring at him.
“Hey there!” he said weakly.
“You owe my one silver,” Trevor said to Lorna.
Lorna just grunted.
“Hey, Billy! How are you feeling?” Su Li said.
“Like shit!”
“Oh Billy! Your eyes! What did you do?”
“My eyes?”
“They’re black – totally black.”
Billy lifted his hands to his face.
“Oh, and your hands.”
He looked at his hands. They were streaked with black veins.
“Yay!” he said.
“Well, get up,” Lorna said. “What is done is done. The tutorial ended hours ago. We have no time for lying around feeling sorry for ourselves.”
Billy snorted. He levered himself up. His body has regained some energy, although his heart still hurt. Once he had stood, he checked his notifications. It was simple indeed.
“Has anything else happened?” he asked.
“It was very quiet,” Yuki said. “Too quiet. But now…”
“Now?”
Lorna stepped forward, her eyes dark with urgency.
“Come with me.”
She led him through the dense trees, the air thick with the scent of damp earth and rotting leaves. When they reached the edge of the marshes, she stopped abruptly.
“Look.”
A sea of skinks and various varieties of giant frogs surged through the reeds, their bodies frantic as they fled—scales glistening, limbs thrashing. The ground trembled with the force of their escape.
“What are they running from?” Billy asked.
“Don’t talk. If I say run, run.”
They moved further along the edge of the marsh in the opposite direction to the fleeing creatures. Once more, Lorna stopped. She lifted her hand and pointed.
For a few heartbeats, Billy saw nothing—just the swaying reeds and the churned-up muck of the fleeing creatures. Then his breath locked in his throat.
There, half-submerged in the marsh, something huge moved. A hulking, moss-scaled behemoth, its armored bulk the size of a camper van, dragged itself forward with deliberate, ground-shaking steps. Every footfall erupted in a spray of black ooze, the stench of rotting water thick in the air.
Billy’s pulse hammered as his [Analyze Creature] skill flickered to life.
[Mirefang – Level 30]
The readout was pitifully sparse. No weaknesses. No habits. Just a name and its level.
The beast stopped.
Slowly, its massive head swiveled—yellow eyes, slit like a viper’s, staring directly at him. The Mirefang’s jaws gaped wide, revealing rows of serrated teeth, and its roar split the air, a sound like tearing metal.
"Run!" Lorna shouted.