Eighteen Minutes

Riyue's words struck like a bolt of lightning. Tsunade's body stiffened as she snapped back to reality, lifting her head to stare at him in a daze, her eyes filled with confusion and a flicker of inexplicable hope.

"Y-you, what did you say?" Tsunade asked.

"[Shadow Clone Technique]!" In one breath, Riyue manifested five shadow clones. The six Riyues immediately split up, pulling out scrolls and various tools, erecting a temporary tent, and setting up an emergency operating table in a flash!

"Dan Kato-sensei can still be saved! How many minutes has his heart been stopped? One minute? Two?" Riyue's gaze was resolute, sharp with an unquestionable intensity as he asked, quickly assessing the activity of Dan Kato's cellular tissue.

"One minute and thirty seconds..." Tsunade said, her voice heavy with despair as she shook her head.

"That's fine. Generally, brain death occurs eight minutes after the heart stops. But Dan-sensei is a Jonin; his body has been tempered through years of training, and he is skilled in the Spirit Transformation Technique. He possesses far greater physical and spiritual energy than the average person. This means his cells are incredibly resilient, and we can conservatively estimate the time before brain cells begin to die is extended to twenty minutes." Riyue explained rapidly to the group while moving with lightning speed.

"Dan-sensei's heart has stopped, so there is no blood pressure, which significantly slows down hemorrhaging. This is actually the fastest time to repair internal organ and vascular ruptures!"

"You mean..." Tsunade was stunned. Most people would desperately try to stop the bleeding to prevent the heart from stopping, but this was taking advantage of the cardiac arrest to perform repairs. This audacious idea seemed... feasible! But was it possible to pull off now? Was there enough time?

"Then, let's gamble on these eighteen minutes! We will suture the wounds, repair the organs, and restart the heart within eighteen minutes! Everyone, come and help! I am performing emergency surgery! I need your full cooperation for this to succeed!" Riyue said sternly, his hands moving with impossible speed.

The three onlookers stared blankly at Riyue and his clones as they coordinated with practiced, swift, and precise movements. Shaking off their shock, they immediately stepped in to assist.

Riyue used the Gentle Fist to strike several acupoints on Dan Kato's body, blocking the flow of blood from various wounds and slowing circulation. The group moved Dan Kato onto the makeshift operating table and cut away his clothes, revealing a body covered in a dense, shocking web of wounds.

Meanwhile, after the shadow clones intubated Dan Kato, they began oxygen administration. Riyue splashed disinfectant directly onto Dan Kato's body, while another clone began blood transfusions and fluid replacement. The tent had been sterilized, and the six Riyues, wearing surgical gloves and masks, raised their hands and approached Dan Kato.

Sixteen minutes left!

"Tsunade, you've already repaired many arteries; now you are responsible for the kidneys and other major vessels! Especially the arteries! I will handle the heart, and the clones will repair the liver and spleen! Ignore all other wounds for now. Begin immediately!"

As he spoke, Riyue performed a pericardiocentesis on Dan Kato's pericardial cavity to buy time for the thoracotomy and cardiac repair, then used a scalpel to slice through the skin of Dan Kato's chest. Simultaneously, his clones cut open the skin of the abdomen.

As Riyue used an electric scalpel to rapidly cut through the chest muscles and a bone saw to crudely but quickly split the sternum, his clones opened the abdominal fascia, muscles, and peritoneum. The abdominal cavity was filled with blood, and the internal organs and vessels were severely ruptured. The clones began using large syringes to extract the pooled blood, while another clone began suturing the liver wounds.

Tsunade quickly placed her hands on Dan Kato's waist, her Mystical Palm Technique glowing bright green as she began treating the kidneys. At the same time, her other hand, guided by Riyue's Byakugan, repaired vital vessels, especially the arteries. Any wounds that couldn't be healed in time were treated with hemostasis, while Riyue's clones used chakra needles to carefully cauterize bleeding vessels.

Ten minutes left!

The Jonin on the side watched in astonishment as Riyue's clones rapidly sutured the liver wounds. His fingers danced, needle holders and sutures weaving together as if playing a high-tempo piece of music. The clone responsible for passing instruments did so with flawless accuracy, not wasting even half a second. The main Riyue and his assistants opened the chest even faster, as if several lead surgeons were operating at once; their coordination was nothing short of perfect.

Tsunade, using the Mystical Palm Technique with both hands simultaneously, was burning through massive amounts of chakra. Sweat poured down her face as she gritted her teeth: "If I keep this up, the kidneys and damaged arteries will be repaired in about seven minutes. Hold on, just hold on!"

Riyue's main body used a retractor to open the chest and cut open the pericardium, revealing the heart. It was a complete mess, half-submerged in blood, with six ruptures.

Six minutes left!

"Keep time for me. A six-minute countdown, every fifteen seconds. Beginning cardiac rupture repair!" Riyue said to the Konoha Jonin nearby while checking the heart's condition and clearing the pooled blood.

"O-okay." The Jonin, stunned by Riyue's dazzling technique, nodded hurriedly.

"Five minutes and forty-five seconds!" Riyue began repairing the ruptures on the heart wall. There were six in total, and he quickly sutured the first one. With extreme knotting techniques, the thread flew through his fingers like a high-speed game of cat's cradle—the technique was crude and concise, but reliable.

"Four minutes and thirty seconds!" Riyue cut the thread with scissors; the first repair was complete. At the same time, the liver sutures were finished, and the clones began repairing the spleen.

"Three minutes and thirty seconds!" The second cardiac rupture was sutured. Tsunade successfully repaired the kidneys, and the arteries were finished.

"Tsunade, help me with the spleen with everything you've got!" Tsunade immediately focused all her energy on the spleen, working alongside Riyue to repair it.

"Two minutes!" the Jonin shouted. The third major cardiac rupture was sutured. Riyue's hand speed increased again; he was racing against the Grim Reaper!

"Thirty seconds left!" The fourth rupture was successfully sutured, and the spleen repair was finished!

"Faster, go faster!" the Jonin thought, his hands unconsciously clenched tight.

"Fifteen seconds!" There wasn't enough time for the fifth suture!

"We're running out of time!!" the Jonin couldn't help but shout in despair, sweat beading on his forehead from the tension.

"Damn this time! Slow down, will you!!" another Jonin cursed, his palms turning red from the force of his grip.

"Is it still not enough? The heart damage is too severe; even with my Mystical Palm Technique, it would take twenty minutes to finish the repair... If the heart can't be repaired, everything is in vain... Damn it!" Tsunade's heart sank, her voice trembling.

Give us more time! Was it all going to be for nothing?!

Tsunade felt as if an invisible hand were squeezing her heart. Riyue glanced up at her briefly; there was no sense of helplessness in his eyes, only calm, unshakeable confidence.

"Zero seconds!" the Jonin called out the final time, his voice weak.

The time hit zero. At that very moment, Riyue reached out and grabbed the heart!

"Initiating cardiac resuscitation!" Riyue's hands were small, so he had to use both to grasp the heart and perform manual cardiac massage! The benefits of the earlier acupoint strikes became immediately apparent: blood circulation was concentrated within the intact vessels with minimal bleeding, and oxygenated blood began to flow to the brain.

"This is?!" Tsunade was stunned. It was a technique to mimic the heart's beating by squeezing and massaging it to restart the rhythm. But the key was that Riyue's hands were pressing directly onto the wounds he hadn't had time to suture, plugging the bleeding.

"Did he calculate this from the start—using his hands to plug the wounds while restarting the heart? Did he choose to suture the areas his fingers couldn't reach first?" Tsunade was dumbfounded. Such a bold, masterful technique was godlike... but it was the only way to save Dan Kato.

"This move will work! It's one of the life-saving trump cards of cardiac surgery! Dan Kato-sensei, come back to life! Wake up!!" Riyue thought, his hands rhythmically and calmly pressing and squeezing the heart. He repeated the motion, each one simulating the normal contraction and relaxation of the heart. It was like massaging a newborn baby, coaxing it to wake.

"Come on! It has to work!" one ninja gritted his teeth, his forehead soaked in what might have been rain or sweat.

"Push harder! Just a little more!" another Jonin's hands were trembling from the tension.

"It can be done, it must be done!!" Tsunade's expression was grave, her heart pounding in sync with Riyue's compressions as she continued her healing at full power.

"Come on! Start beating again!!" Riyue shouted in his mind!

Suddenly, Riyue felt a faint tremor in the heart muscle beneath his palms, like the movement of a fetus—weak, but carrying a stubborn spark of life. Riyue stopped the massage.

"Dan?" Tsunade stared intently at the heart, breathless. Everyone present watched the heart, the silence so profound that time itself seemed to have frozen.

Slowly... the heart gave a gentle beat...

"Success! The heartbeat has returned! Phew..." Riyue let out a sigh of relief as the heart continued to beat steadily. Riyue immediately set to work repairing the remaining damage to the heart while it was still beating.

"It really... it worked... Dan... that's wonderful... truly wonderful!" Tsunade froze, then broke into a radiant smile of pure joy. The heart that had been hanging in her throat finally settled; the relief of regaining what was lost, the complex emotions after such a rollercoaster, and the lingering fear beneath her overwhelming excitement left her breathless.

Tears flowed uncontrollably once more. Tsunade covered her face with her hands and slowly retreated to the edge of the tent, unable to stop herself from sobbing quietly, "Wuu, wuu-wuu..."

"A miracle... is this a miracle?" The two jonin watched the scene in astonishment. Once they realized what had happened, they excitedly hugged each other. "That's great!" "It worked! He was saved!" "Yeah!!" "Truly a miracle!" Swish! Five of Riyue's Shadow Clones turned their heads simultaneously to glare at them sternly. The look that told them to be quiet made the two men quickly cover their mouths and return to their posts, standing guard obediently.

Tsunade cried by herself for a while, then silently wiped away her tears, suppressing the agitation in her heart. Her gaze became incredibly firm as she returned to the operating table.

Riyue let Tsunade release her emotions while he continued the surgery, suturing the final two wounds on the heart. There were still many injuries to treat and a large number of fractures that required surgery. Seeing Tsunade return so quickly, Riyue thought to himself, She adjusted herself that fast? She really is a strong woman.

Tsunade continued to use the Mystical Palm Technique to repair the injuries to the internal organs and the various gruesome wounds, with the most important task being the treatment of the broken bones. The two of them remained busy; after several hours of emergency treatment, Dan Kato was finally pulled back from the jaws of death by Riyue and his companion. He remained in a deep coma, temporarily out of danger, and required intensive care, blood plasma transfusions, and various medications.

Riyue was finally able to catch his breath. Tsunade sat nearby to rest; the intense battle followed by the prolonged use of medical ninjutsu had drained her chakra, leaving her utterly exhausted.

The two jonin remained silent, though their hearts were racing with excitement. What they had seen today was far too shocking. A man who had already died, whose heart had stopped and whose body had been mangled, had actually been brought back to life. Was this child a god? How could he possess such medical skills? It completely shattered their common sense.

Saving Dan Kato was the result of the full cooperation between Riyue and Tsunade. It was the combination of their exquisite medical skills, the guidance of Riyue's Byakugan, and the powerful restorative capabilities of Tsunade's Mystical Palm Technique that had pulled Dan Kato back from the brink of death. Lacking any one of these, they would have likely failed.

It had long since turned dark, and the rain outside had stopped. Riyue and the others decided to return to the camp immediately, as the vicinity was not safe. The two jonin carried the stretcher with the unconscious Dan Kato, while Tsunade and Riyue guarded him on either side, moving quietly toward the camp.

Everyone remained silent along the way. One reason was that they were exhausted from the brush with death, and since they were still in Hidden Sand territory, they had to remain stealthy. Another was that the group had witnessed a desperate, limit-defying rescue and were still too shocked to process it. Furthermore, each of them had their own private thoughts.

In this manner, they did not return to the camp until late at night, where they placed Dan Kato into the medical station for proper monitoring.