Yugo, convinced that something dangerous was about to happen, shouted at everyone to retreat as far as possible, even if it meant abandoning the bodies that were being removed.
He himself picked up a piece of gravel and threw it with all his might in the direction of his group of 'friends'. He transposed himself onto it, then incanted a triple barrier, which instantly drained him of a large part of his energy.
At that very moment, a beam of black light cut across the entire esplanade, and went on to explode further in the background. Yet, even though the explosion was a long way off, its shockwave was felt right across the entirety of the esplanade — now being used as a battlefield.
"W-What... was that ?" asked Lavitha, her voice full of fright.
Nobody immediatly answered, because nobody really knew what just happened.
"I don't... know... but if... if it were... to happen a... second time, we'd be... in huge trouble!" Yugo finally replied, as struggled to keep his balance despite being crouched on the floor, panting as if he'd run a marathon from one end of Merina County to the other.
He tried as hard as he could to get back on his feet, but faltered.
'I've no energy lef—'
As if to finish and confirm his thought, the barrier disappeared like an evaporating liquid, as he breathed harder and harder.
A sudden headache assaulted him so violently that his entire body trembled and he let out a little scream of agonising pain. He grabbed his head, his vision becoming blurry, and his strength leaving his body as if it was a liquid flowing from an open tap, which prevented him from gripping his sword properly.
The young man suddenly spat out blood and began coughing heavily. His back was dripping with sweat despite the cold night temperature, and he suddenly turned pale.
When Lavitha touched him, she almost immediatly withdrew her hand, for the young man's body was so feverish that it was burning hot. Yet despite being engulfed in a feverish state, Yugo didn't seem to realise it himself.
Doctor Tory immediately forced him to lie down, all the while Yugo still kept asking question as to what happened, his mind still not comprehending what was happening.
She took a case out of the bag hanging on her back and picked up a sort of thermometer, which she forced into Yugo's mouth.
"Rickard, Mr Mayor... grab him by the arms and hold him down with all your strength."
They complied without even trying to ask what was going on.
Yugo, on the other hand, tried to resist, claiming that he was fine, and that it was probably due to excessive use of his Kilith.
But just then, a coughing fit a coughing fit seized him and blood spurted again from his mouth.
"Shut up and stay calm! Or you'll die!" interrupted the doctor, in a hurried, extremely worried, voice.
The announcement of Yugo's life on the line sent a shiver down the spine of everyone present, making the two men hold him even tighter than they already were.
Tory removed the thermometer from the boy's mouth and looked concerned when she saw the reading on the thermometer's small screen.
"41° fever and 6% control! That's not good! He's having a rupture in his Kilith's circulation vessels!" she exclaimed.
"What should we do? How can we stabilise him?" cried Lavitha in a panic.
"We'll have to bring his temperature down as quickly as possible, and stabilise him manually with a transfusion of internal Kilith!'
"Transfuse me with Kilith?!" Yugo exclaimed.
"Yes! But no more talking! The slightest expenditure of energy can be fatal in your condition." insisted the doctor in a serious tone.
He obeyed immediately, and let himself be restrained.
The doctor turned to the others present.
"We need a large quantity of water, which I could use as a cooling source to lower his fever. There are pools over there, that should do the trick!" she said, pointing to the springs.
The others looked in the direction of her finger and gulped in chorus.
"That-that's a bit...."
"No time to hesitate, we must do it!" Aleone added with determination.
The others nodded in agreement.
Doctor Tory began to think about the situation, firing up her brain at full speed to find a solution to the various problems they were facing.
While the two operations were not in themselves very complicated procedures, they nevertheless had to be carried out with a fair degree of meticulousness — and in this case with a great deal of caution — so as not to miss the timing which linked the human body to the circulation of Kilith, because a body which was too weak during a Kilith transfusion let the energy fluid flow like an open tap.
On the other hand, a body that was too resistant made it difficult for the operation to proceed smoothly, because it had antibodies that devoured the particles of the alien Kilith — alien because it had been transfused from the internal circuit of another person.
In short, this operation was similar to a blood transfusion, but where one had to be neither too much nor too little.
In addition, there was another major problem: not only was time running out, but they had to find a way of lowering the boy's body temperature - as the doctor had said - as quickly as possible.
But how to do that, in circumstances such as those in which they currently found themselves: in the middle of a confrontation with a hellish creature that fed on negative Kilith, and could therefore regenerate; but also and more importantly, in a context where the only sources of water were close to the aforementioned creature.
So the question remained: how to get some cold water from the pools without dying stupidly from the Negacion's blows?
They all exchanged furtive glances, unable to provide the slightest answer to this most complicated of questions.
The question remained unanswered, creating an almost palpable tension in the air.
But then, the knight-banneret suddenly spoke up.
"I can go and... get some water..."
Faces lit up, but as he continued, everyone's worried expression returned.
"But we still need a container. Do any of you have anything that could be used as a bucket or something?"
They looked at each other, faced again with another difficult question to answer.
Luka suddenly shouted in his little voice.
"Over there, the hollow bit of car!" he said, pointing to the coolant tank, cut along the length, of one of the cars that had its chassis open.
"Yes, that's it! Well done son!" exclaimed Rickard.
Without a moment's thought, and above all without anyone being able to foresee or stop him, the mayor went to get the object, avoiding in the process, with an unexpected roll of his own, a piece of debris that was flying in his direction — thrown by the beast still in the demolished cathedral, which was trying to defend itself somehow with its tail.
He grabbed the tank, clutched it with all his strength and ran in the direction of the small group.
Once he had brought the tank back, he handed it to the knight, panting greatly, as he was clearly a stranger to physical activities as intense as this one.
"Now... it's up to... you!"
Willfors took the object and immediately ran towards one of the pools, which was a little away from where the monster was, but was nevertheless within his range of action.
As he raced towards it, soldiers from his unit helped him cut a path through the debris, and when the monster tried again to bury them under a shower of rubble, one of his lightning spells shattered the huge boulder that was heading towards his troops, reducing the debris to dust.
The monster jumped back onto the esplanade and made a quick but clumsy spin, swinging its tail at the pests standing in its way.
Willfors concentrated his kilith in his feet to absorb the shake, and narrowly avoided the animal's long appendage with a slide he wouldn't have thought himself capable of in other circumstances, then continued on his way.
The knight found himself in front of the pool and set about filling the container. However, the monster had started wagging its tail again, which for some reason had become slower.
'It's getting even weaker!'
He hurried to fill the object and resumed his run towards his point of origin, arming himself with particular care and remarkable precision of movement, to avoid spilling the water and having to repeat the operation, which was already delicate given the present circumstances.
This attention made him look almost like a tightrope walker whose life was hanging by a thread — except that it was Yugo's that was really at stake, and of course his own too if the monster touched him, but the young man was the top priority — which slowed him down considerably.
Nevertheless, he managed to return to the column where the "main group" was gathered, with the help of the citizens and the other knights, who, despite not understanding what was happening, came to his aid and covered him, some with their shields, others attacking the creature to create a diversion.
Putting down the large tank, filled with the life-saving water, he retreated to observ ethe battle, and the doctor immediately dipped a cottony cloth into it, which absorbed a vast quantity of the liquid, while she herself circulated a little of her Kilith in it.
She pulled out the cloth, but instead of the water flowing abundantly, or at least dripping down, it emanated an almost icy coolness, and hardly a drop fell from it.
She tore the cloth, which seemed to be getting closer and closer to freezing, into two equal parts.
"Lavitha, take these and apply them to his forehead, horizontally, and to his navel, vertically. But be careful to press down hard enough, stabilising the strips, because it's imperative that his temperature drops before we start the transfer."
The young woman complied, placing the two strips of cloth as indicated and pressing down with all her might, yet her hand were a bit shaking.
The sight of blood was the reason behind it. But she reafirmed her resolve and strenghten her grip on the strips.
'I must save him !'
She had to, this time.
Tory repeated the operation and entrusted the new pieces to Luka.
"As for you, Luka, do the same but with his two shoulders, OK?"
The little boy nodded, his eyes filled with a flame of extraordinary determination.
At the same time, Doctor Tory tore off a small section of her blouse and tied it to Yugo's arm, who was beginning to sink into a state of near unconsciousness.
When she heard the boy's breathing weaken, the doctor pulled on his conjunctiva and examined the movements of his eye.
"Damn it! He's getting weaker!"
The announcement panicked Lavitha, but she pulled herself together and pressed the strips.
Doctor Tory took out a syringe, injected it with a more or less translucent greenish liquid and poured it into one of Yugo's veins.
The boy's breathing stabilised in a few seconds, and she took a second syringe from her bag. Into it she pumped a sort of more or less viscous, bluish-coloured liquid, which she injected into Yugo's neck.
She waited ten seconds and then touched the young man's carotid artery. His condition seemed to have stabilised.
...He was unconscious but no longer in imminent danger of death.
Without wasting a single second more, she put the thermometer thingy back into the young man's mouth and waited for the beep to sound.
She smiled.
"We can get some Kilith into him, his body is responding well to the inhibitors, and his temperature has started to drop!" Tory said.
"I want to do it!" said Aleone, stepping forward.
She crouched down next to the young man and smiled as she looked at him, then redirected her gaze to the doctor.
"If it wasn't for him, we wouldn't be here, and I'd also almost certainly have died in the explosion that brought that monster back..."
She gulped while lowering her gaze to Yugo's face.
"It's because I fainted that he must surely have used his energy to get us out of the cathedral... So I want to help him!"
The doctor looked at the woman sympathetically, but shook her head.
"I understand you, but from the marks on your body, I deduce that the Kilith circulating in your system at the moment is partially corrupted."
She squeezed the mayor's wife's arm affectionately.
"You can endure this Kilith and will be able to live almost comfortably with it, but for him it would be like filling his body with poison. Especially in his condition." She added, staring into Aleone's eyes.
The mayor's wife lowered her head and clutched the clump of dark green grass at her feet, which almost blended in with her dress, expressing her frustration and helplessness.
Karlen came to stand by his wife's side and stroked her shoulder affectionately.
"She's right, darling. We all understand you, but... uh... there's not much you can do."
They all looked at each other.
"Let me do it then!" exclaimed Rickard.
The doctor wanted to object, but he didn't give her the chance.
"From what you've said, he absolutely needs Kilith, so why not use mine. Besides, he already received my energy when we were at the refuge, so I think it can be done!"
Tory thought for a few seconds, but when she looked at her patient's weakened body, she resigned herself.
So they began the transfer.
She used two long tubes, each end of which she attached to what appeared to be transparent crystals, the inside of which contained a yellow pearl in one, a blue one in the other, and a red one in the third.
Placing one crystal on Rickard's chest, the second on a small tray she took out of her bag, she proceeded to put down the third crystal on Yugo's chest.
"Breathe slowly, relax and concentrate on visualising the transfer of energy, from your internal circuit to Yugo's."
"My internal circuit?!" asked Rickard, not at all used to this.
"Yes! To put it simply, imagine water slowly flowing through your body, and concentrating at your navel, then moving from your navel to your chest, and then to your right arm, and finally from your right arm, to Yugo's left arm!"
Rickard did as he was told and concentrated as hard as he could.
After a few seconds, the crystal on his chest began to glow, and the energy emanating from it passed through the tube until it reached the crystal in the middle, which also lit up.
Finally, the crystal on Yugo's chest also began to glow, and his body, until then quite pale, gradually began to regain its colour.
The operation lasted several minutes, during which they miraculously did not suffer any attacks from the monster, which was probably absorbing negative energy while being continually harassed by the brave resistants.
But when things seemed to be going smoothly, Yugo suddenly started to violently cough, even letting out little jets of blood.
Tory rushed to his side, and raised his head a little.
"There's something disrupting the circulation!"
Lavitha, seeing the blood now staining Yugo's chest and her own hands, flinched at the memory of Dhelan.
She began to tremble, far too affected by the sight of the bloody liquid. The nightmare that had taken place just a few hours earlier came back to her mind like a sledgehammer and she withdrew her hands from the strips of cloth.
Again, Yugo coughed, this time so hard that the crystal on his chest fell and the flow of kilith stopped.
"Lavitha... He'll die if you stop the cooling and interrupt the transfer!" urged Doctor Tory.
"I-I... I can't... I can't..." Lavitha sighed, her voice shaking as the pain resurfaced in her heart and mind.
Her hands were far too shaky for her to remain stable.
Aleone intervened.
"I'll do it for her."
She pressed down on the bands, and set about stabilising them as much as possible.
As for Tory, she quickly got out a glove and a scalpel, which she used to make a cut in Yugo's chest, just below where the heart was supposed to be.
Carefully slipping her finger in, she closed her eyes.
As she concentrated on the flow of the Kilith's now jerky circulation, as well as the heartbeat and the general reaction of her patient's body, Tory suddenly felt a sort of subtle pulsing mass, somewhere in the flesh, at the level of the third rib.
"There! there's a clot"
Picking up the scapel again, she made a deeper incision, enlarging the wound.
She took a small needle with a hollow tip — and also a hollow interior — which she infused with her Kilith, and attached the other end to a kind of balloon, then passed it through the slit.
Tory wasn't a specialist in surgeries involving the manipulation of internal Kilith, but when it came to more traditional surgeries, she knew what to do. And above all, she had a duty to succeed in this case, whatever the current conditions.
The needle reached the vein and ruptured the clot. The blood circulated through the needle and poured into the balloon.
After that, she used the same needle and made slow but precise movements, as if she were sewing the vein. Of course, she wasn't. She could not.
Tory tried to concentrate as hard as she could. Her tongue sticking out and stuck between her teeth was evidence of that.
A drop of sweat trickled from her forehead to the bridge of her nose, then landed on the tip of her left nostril. Before it could fall, Lavitha, who had regained control of herself, wiped it away with the tip of her finger and took a piece of her long dress to sponge the doctor's sweaty forehead.
She blew out her breath, visibly exhausted by the immense stress to which she was being subjected in such a short span of time. Then she went back to work.
Once her Kilith stabilised the vessel, she took out the needle.
Placing the bloody needle on the tray containing the yellow crystal, Tory quickly took a strip of gauze from her bag, removing the stained glove beforehand, and passed the strip over the boy's wound.
She then took a vial of reddish liquid and poured some of the contents over Yugo's wound.
The doctor cut away the excess gauze and applied her kilith with her bare hands, then bandaged the whole thing with a roll of medical cloth, which she passed over the entire surface of the young man's chest, carefully placing it in a way that would not disturb Aleone or Luka.
Then she stopped and looked at the other persons around her and—
Nodded.
"We can resume the transfer!" she said, smiling nervously.
Tory replaced the crystal on Yugo's chest and ordered Rickard to resume his operation.
Lavitha, feeling ashamed of having given in to panic in this distressing situation, lowered her head and took Yugo's hand, squeezing it tenderly.
"It's... not your fault"' said Aleone, looking at her.
"It's just... I..."
As if to interrupt the self-flagellating words that were about to come out of the young woman's mouth, Tory squeezed her shoulder affectionately, and smiled at her.
She nodded and patted Lavitha on the cheek.
When the glow of the red crystal grew brighter, they turned their attention back to the operation.
Doctor Tory put the thermometer back into the patient's mouth.
As soon as the beep resounded, she withdrew the object and examined it.
A broad smile spread across her lips, her face simultaeously taking on an expression of deep relief.
"His condition is nearly stabilised, and his temperature is back to normal!" she exclaimed with a sigh of relief.
The little group immediately felt better, and the atmosphere significantly lightened.
They were all relieved, although the situation was not one in which they could really be too happy.
Tory, who was most involved in this operation, felt her nerves give way, and looked at yugo's resting face. A smile birthed itslef on her lips, tears welling in her eyes.
'Thanks for being alive!'