The First Surgery (Please Vote)

Seeing the Mind Core's "green rating," Rein looked again at the woman who could die at any moment, and the struggle on his face stiffened.

He could doubt his own judgment, but the Mind Core had never been wrong.

Rein had thought that, over the past year since crossing into this world, he had learned to become cold and numb.

He could now plunge a dagger into an enemy's throat without blinking, then stab them again to make sure.

But clearly, that was not the coldness of someone who had lost his humanity. It was merely the instinct to survive and defend himself.

"Heh, fucking conscience."

Rein mocked himself inwardly, but still walked over. Just as he would have tossed a sausage to a filthy, scrawny stray cat in his previous life, he decided to go take a look.

He did not approach immediately. Instead, he carefully used a branch to lift the black cloth mask from the woman's face.

She had classic Western features, so exquisite that there was not a single flaw to be found.

Though her face was bloodless, she was still breathtakingly beautiful, like a sleeping beauty beneath a glamorous filter.

A flicker of admiration flashed through Rein's eyes, but he did not stare for long.

His gaze moved downward as he carefully examined the woman's attire. After considering it, he moved closer, checked her pulse and body structure, and found no strange features such as bone spurs or a tail.

Only then did he finally confirm that she was truly a normal human.

Looking down again, he saw scarlet blood continuously seeping through the clothing over her chest.

Clearly, her injuries were severe.

If he did not figure something out, she probably would not survive.

Save her?

Or not?

Rein frowned and sank into thought.

But then he realized that his hesitation did not matter at all.

With injuries like these, whether he could save her with his half-baked surgical skills was another question entirely.

Since he had to remain here until dawn anyway, after a moment's thought, Rein decided to find something to do on this already restless night.

Treating it entirely as practice, he took surgical instruments from his Storage Ring and began.

First, he spread out a thick cashmere ground mat, then lifted the unconscious woman and placed her on it.

She was not light, which meant she was a Transcendent.

After awakening, a human's muscle fibers and bones became far denser. The stronger the Transcendent, the heavier they were.

He used surgical scissors to cut down from her collar, exposing the wound.

Just as he had expected, the woman wore nothing underneath. Even lying flat, her snowy breasts rose into proud peaks, possessing a breathtaking fullness.

The scissors continued downward, stripping her completely bare.

After a careful examination, it was clear that she had more than one injury.

Rein's expression turned grave. Looking at the wound in the center of the blonde woman's chest, a mark that seemed to have been left by a beast claw, he muttered, "With injuries this severe, an ordinary person would have died a hundred times over."

The wound was deep, and blood flowed from the claw marks.

Even stranger, tiny beads of blood seeped from the pores near the wound.

This was not an external injury. It should have been a "continuous bleeding state" caused by some kind of Transcendent power.

That strange power had also prevented the wound from healing, slowly devouring her life.

Rein gently touched the skin around the wound, then felt along her limbs. The abnormal sensation quickly allowed him to judge the general extent of her injuries. "Three broken ribs, a comminuted fracture in her left arm, and damage to several internal organs. Surgery is needed immediately."

He had read quite a few medical books these past days and could roughly distinguish basic injuries and treatment procedures.

But theory was theory. When it came to actually doing it, Rein had no confidence at all.

If he operated, this woman might be cut to death by him.

But if he did not operate, she was doomed anyway.

She could die either way. Trying at least gave her a sliver of hope.

Rein raised an eyebrow and calmly made the first incision.

If he killed her, he would just treat it as practice.

Other than practicing on dissected corpses, this was Rein's first time cutting into a living person.

He took out that set of fine surgical instruments and began the first surgery of his life in this remote wilderness.

Debridement, disinfection, suturing, setting broken limbs.

He remained utterly focused throughout the entire process, suturing the internal organs, blood vessels, nerves, and finally the skin.

As he operated, he recalled the records in the medical texts.

With a scalpel in hand, Rein skillfully entered the intensely focused state he usually had while practicing. It was as if the person before him were only a corpse, and nothing could distract him.

Time passed without him noticing.

About two and a half hours later, the wounds had been sutured.

The operation was perfect, at least by the standards of an apprentice surgeon like Rein.

As for the mysterious Transcendent power eroding the woman's body, that was beyond his current abilities.

Setting down the needle and thread, Rein looked at the woman before him, who probably still would not live until dawn, then selected two healing potions and injected them into her.

"I've done everything I can. Whether you live or not depends on your own luck."

Only after doing all this did Rein let out a breath.

After bandaging the wounds with gauze, he took out a cashmere sleeping bag and wrapped the blonde woman in it, covering her beautiful, graceful body so she would not die too quickly from losing body heat.

With nothing left to do, Rein looked at the unconscious woman with a complicated expression as his thoughts raced.

Who exactly was this woman?

Why had she appeared alone in the wilderness, gravely wounded?

After the injections, the blonde woman's breathing remained weak, but her vital signs gradually stabilized.

Firelight flickered in their eyes, casting both faces in orange-red hues.

Rein frowned and thought for a long time, but found no answer. Finally, he sighed softly. "Forget it. I'm leaving at dawn anyway. Why think so much?"

He closed his eyes to meditate, then drifted through the night in a daze.

The bonfire beside the camp was nearly burned out when Rein was awakened by the chirping birds of morning.

He opened his eyes. The dense fog had thinned somewhat, and sunlight gradually pierced through the mist, driving away the night as brightness returned to the land.

The three Canine Rabbit corpses had gone completely cold, and the morning wind pouring into his collar woke him fully.

Rein turned his head. Not far beside him, the woman wrapped in the sleeping bag like a cocoon slept soundly.

Everything that had happened last night had not been a dream.

He walked over and touched her forehead. She had a slight fever.

"Huh, she actually survived? Heh, at least my potions weren't wasted."

Rein breathed a sigh of relief.

Though her breath was weak, the woman's face had finally regained a little color.

After considering it, he directly opened the sleeping bag and checked the healing of the wound on her chest.

The more Gene Chains a High-tier Extraordinary unlocked, the stronger their body's self-healing ability became. Combined with the perfect surgical sutures, this had accelerated the wound's recovery. Of course, the healing potions had also played a crucial role.

In short, the woman had survived. Her wounds had not become infected, and she was recovering quite well.

After examining her, Rein took out a fever-reducing potion and planned to inject it into a vein in her arm.

"Whether you can survive after this is up to you. After this injection, we'll part ways."

Holding the syringe, he muttered to himself.

The woman would probably not wake for quite some time, but that was no longer his concern. After he left, whether this unconscious woman was found and eaten by magical beasts of the wasteland or caught by her enemies was none of his business.

He knew his limits. He was only a rookie who had just entered the Transcendent realm, with no ability to protect a gravely wounded woman in the wilderness. Nor did he have any obligation to do so.

He had done everything he could. That fucking conscience had finally quieted down.

Now that it was daylight, he intended to leave immediately.

But the moment he gave that injection, something unexpected happened.

Perhaps the pain of the needle had awakened her. The blonde woman before him, whose eyes had been closed, suddenly opened them. Driven by instinctive danger, she seized Rein's wrist with lightning speed as he administered the injection.

Her grip was like an iron clamp, squeezing hard enough to make his bones crackle with pain.

Then their eyes met again.

Seeing the cold, blade-sharp gaze in her eyes, Rein felt that things had become even more fucking troublesome.