Chapter 1691
Chapter 1691 - 1687: Competition among Healers
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7 min read
Some say that war is a grand stage that brings death... This is no rumor, for when you truly step onto this grand stage, your life may no longer belong to you.
"...No hope, next."
Lu Ping’an was reassigned again, despite his repeated requests for frontline warfare duties, he still spent most of his time on the medical front.
His healing methods were one of the few that could instantly snatch back Quasi-Gods’ lives... But still, many warriors’ lives fell directly through his hands, leaving him in a particularly foul mood.
"...Is this a Curse? Or what?"
Lu Ping’an’s "Postponed Payment" could phase "Life’s wounds" over time, restoring the injured on the plane of World’s Reason.
Previously, it was effective for virtually any wound or disease; looking back now, it seems the "difficulty" he faced back then was too low.
Top Professionals could be regarded as an accumulation of a "Little World"; when they truly fight desperately and lose their existence fighting against the Divine Kingdom, all Lu Ping’an can heal is their "Life".
The rest that’s lost is gone for good, and preserving the Avatar’s life doesn’t seem all that significant.
What’s more frustrating is that after losing most of an existence, it’s like directly unraveling the reins binding the "Contamination," with loss of control becoming a matter of time.
Lu Ping’an could forestall the Erosion of Contamination, but with "balance" already shattered, death merely comes a bit later.
And this is just one of many troubles, like the unfortunate soul in front of him who is even saddled with the enemy’s "Curse". Even after Cutting, it can’t be peeled off; it’s a matter of dying sooner or later.
"...I’ll take two."
It seems that Lu Ping’an’s greater role is to stabilize the injuries to go down fighting together.
Lu Ping’an helplessly lifts his head... the array of new screens now exceeds a thousand, and most of the calculators and intelligence officers are showing Blood-silk in their eyes, not daring to close them.
It has now been the twentieth hour since the war began, with double-digit losses among Top Combat Powers, Mortals, middle-level professionals, and Top Professionals are all dying.
The attrition continues... without any clever strategies, the battlefield naturally becomes a head-on, exhausting battle to the death.
Whoever falters first loses everything.
"...Next." Since he has been assigned tasks, Lu Ping’an quietly carries on.
In terms of healing, the human side is clearly much stronger.
On one hand, because Dragon Moon Island’s combat is centered around high-level Life powers from the Linnu Force, with many high-level life series, and a substantial number of middle-low tier life series Healers, combined with the Way of Life contributed by Lu Ping’an and his own "Miraculous Hands for Rejuvenation," as long as the wounded can leave the battlefield alive, the healing rate is very high.
On the other hand, it’s quite outrageous...
"They seem... not to have Healers?"
"...We’ve captured some. Prisoners say their Witch Doctors are adept at bloodletting and limb attachment therapies. If a part is damaged, it can be attached and pieced together; however, Witch Doctors are rare and mainly part of the tribal leadership."
One aspect of mature civilizations is the increasing prominence of those "unrelated to combat" professions, most straightforwardly in the ratio of population to professional doctors and hospital beds.
Clearly, with the Octopus Tribe following a feudal system, healthcare is essentially the wealth of the lords, with no chance of being widespread among the lower-rank Soldiers.
Thus, a mere gunshot wound, or a "dirty bomb" injury that could be survived by timely amputation, could take away the life of a middle-low tier Fishman.
As the war dragged on, those with superior logistics gradually gained the advantage, yet Lu Ping’an truly felt no reduction in the enemy’s numbers.
Whether high-level or mere fodder, the enemy seemed to have an endless supply of military force.
And at this time, Lu Ping’an was also exposed to the enemy’s madness... he witnessed with his own eyes how they "cured" their Awakening Disease.
Awakening Disease causes a patient to awaken an alternative self, vying for control of the body, ultimately producing a two-headed monster waging an internal battle to the death.
This is a kind of "Newborn" Life Blessing, an extremely difficult "Malicious Disease" to resist.
Theoretically, there are no suitable healing methods, just as you cannot resist your own "growth."
The treatment methods known by Lu Ping’an involve cutting off the affected area as soon as the illness manifests... but this also greatly weakens one’s vitality.
The most malicious aspect of this blessing is that, as a blessing for Lu Ping’an, it is effective even against high-tier life, and if a Rule-level lifeform is not careful, it can be afflicted, leading to severe vitality loss even after bone extraction treatment.
But now, Lu Ping’an saw the treatment effects....
"They’re really harsh to their own people...."
They had already obtained the "Antidote" from prisoners, but in reality, it could be a fatal "Poison."
That was a potent "Dream-Entering Demon Drug," which seemed to subtly involve a nightmarish Deity of the Fishmen, forcing users to confront themselves within a dream... the two newborn souls would meet in the dream, fighting and devouring each other, leaving only one soul remaining.
This was not treatment at all, because there was a high chance the victor was the intelligence’s advantaged newborn, but as the conflict was on a spiritual level, the integrity of the body could be largely preserved.
In reality, this was not friendly for the "patient," as the old being originally had more than fifty percent chance of survival with home-field advantage, but now it’s said to be less than forty percent. The newborn soul not only knows your information but is also more pure and persistent, easily gaining an advantage in the spiritual struggle.
In actual combat, Lu Ping’an personally saw "infected" individuals being rushed by superiors, forced to take the drug.
This is just one aspect... Compared to the resources and time it takes to save a Fishman of middle-level combat power, it is more efficient to recruit another one in their own homeland, and this kind of "treatment method" can preserve the combat power of the afflicted to the greatest extent, naturally leading to its forced promotion.
"Although they act inhumanely, this seems to indicate they have adapted to the environment of the original entity, and moreover, their Deity is now able to intervene in this world."
As far as Lu Ping’an’s own encounters were concerned, the attacks by Fishmen surrounding Dragon Moon Island never ceased.
Looking at the condition of the corpses and prisoners, although they were riddled with diseases and would not live long, the actual situation was much better than three years ago; they were gradually overcoming the Poison Sea.
The only small consolation was that the new reinforcements entering through the Plane Gate seemed not to have inherited this "Resistance."
But clearly, time was no longer on humanity’s side. As more Deities gain the ability to interfere in this world, and more Fishmen adapt to the local environment, human lifeforms of the land will find themselves in a complete encirclement and deadlock.
And at that moment, accompanied by a violent earthquake, the operating room went dark as power was lost.
Although power was restored the next instant, Lu Ping’an raised his head and sensed something wrong.
"A top combat power has arrived... I’ll go have a look."
— End of Chapter 1691 —