Rushing to the scene of the explosion there are bodies strown out across the floor. I see a servant that mans the front door just standing bloody and beaten but staring off into the distance like he isn’t here at the moment.

I… First things first search for essential people and ones that need help.

Searching over the survivors I see a couple that look like they need medical attention but what stops me is seeing the arrival of Su. She beelines straight for a hunched over form… I didn’t even recognize them without their mask and how mangled they are until I notice Su crying over their form.

“Xin… Xin dear stay with me… please please just stay with me.” She… that’s the most emotion I’ve ever heard in her voice… I rush over to her side. She looks up at me. I can see the desperation in her eyes… I…

Ding~

A notification… not the time I’ll check it later…

“Xin! You’re going to be okay the young lord is here to save you… Please Jiang please save him.” Looking down at Xin It’s the first time I’ve seen his face… I don’t know what he looks like though because of the amount of blood and skin that looks burnt off.

“I’ll… I’ll try…” Using treatment to detect severity I see he’s… he’s too far gone I… It’s… No I’ll try anyways.

“Let me see him Su… I need to make sure to close his wounds and… Uh we need… Ah! Get a stretcher come back and we need to get him to my lab…” Looking down at his body missing a few parts… “Get someone to carry a few of the dead there as well…” She looks almost confused for a moment before nodding and disappearing from her place. It’s probably the fastest I’ve ever seen her move.

In the meantime, I just start trying my hardest to keep him alive… Looking around there are other people that need my help but… I don’t know them. I could have saved 6 maybe 8 others but I’m staying here to save Xin… While wrapping his wounds quickly and keeping pressure on the largest gash I feel a tingle in my hands as I hear another Ding~ for a notification…

Not the time to check those…

But as I’m keeping the pressure it’s… odd? He seems to relax slightly under my pressure. I see a timer pop up in my vision for 1 minute… What? Pulling my hands back he’s not quite breathing better but he’s not getting any worse… The bleeding stopped but so did his eye movement…

Mental self-checks our most recent notifications.

New Story quest: Revive Xin

Okay probably not that but it’s a quest so it’s possible… Next notification.

Skill: Treatment+ level 100

Description: wounds treated by you heal 5% faster per lvl.

Lvl 25: Improves treatment effectiveness by lvl% (example binding a wound decently would make it well bound to prevent bleeding. Or something that would only help with partial recovery of functionality will improve the amount recovered by the % more amount. Kind of a nebulus odd skill.)

Lvl 50: Approximate proper treatment. (Essentially while looking at an injury know what method would work best based on current known knowledge and accessible materials. Whether it’s within your ability or not does not matter to the skill.)

Lvl 75: All harm caused by a treatment heals naturally to perfect health rather than become permanently harmed due to the treatment.

Lvl 100: Stabilize, by pressing both hands against a target after a rudimentary treatment they become stabilized for one minute. Target can still die in this time from injuries, but they will not bleed, poisons do not progress, and organs do not require oxygen or blood for the duration. Target must be willing to receive aid and mentally shuts down for the duration.

That’s useful! Stepping up with slightly wobbling feet I make my way towards the next patient. Soon after Su comes in and see’s me not next to him and a mixture of fear and anger flashes.

“He’s fine! Well! Not really still take him to the work room I stabilized him for about 30 more seconds!” I quickly go around using stabilize on everyone present. Trying to save as many as I can as Su rushes out of the room with Xin in her arms. I follow behind carrying a body.

Su kicks in the door to my crafting room.

“Where do I put him?” She all but yells.

“In the center!” As she does so, I toss the other body parts in the circle as well. Going to the desk I grab another project… The beating heart. Transmutation circles heavily depend on symbolism… So, I’ll just have to make sure I do everything I can.

I place the heart on top of Xin’s chest. The muscle trying to keep beating. That’s when I realize that Wiggles is also still on my shoulders from when I was holding him in my room… I look down at the diagram on the circle… the snake curled around the heart of the person… It hurts… but I want Xin back more… I gently curl him around the heart that is resting on Xin.

“Wiggles… be good… Stay!” I choke back tears as I back away quickly. Su is looking from the side obviously not understanding what is happening… her mask off… NO! stop getting distracted just work!

“I’ve got this… I… I won’t let him die!” I smash my hands down on the two circles for my hands… The circle lights up in a blazing white and black smoke surrounding the circle… that’s not supposed to happen… A slit down the middle forms from the whispy black smoke which opens up to an eye… it begins to rapidly dart back and forth looking at each of the people present. First towards Xin then me then Su… She seems frozen… like she’s not-

My thoughts are interrupted by a pull… Looking down my hands are seized by the black wispy smoke, and I feel my feet and hands yanked into the circle, falling forward into the eye… I close my eyes for a second expecting an impact but when I open them again, I’m in front of my door… The door inside my mindscape but… What? I’m the physical body? I shouldn’t… how? How the hell am I here?

Looking around… the door looks a little different now… It’s still decorated with all the knowledge of biology that I know but it’s almost like a picture made up of words and smaller pictures it looks like a circle with 4 circles within it in a square shape. In the center rather than a blank spot is a shape that looks like a soul with a snake eating its tail over its heart…

“Where… am I?” looking side to side I can see my mental library off in the distance… But I don’t feel my mental self either… Did I die?

“You’re an interesting one.” I jump slightly, turning towards the voice I see a solid white form only distinguishable from the solid white of the mindscapes space by a dark mist that seems to hover around them. They have no facial features except for a large mouth that’s far too large…

“I feel the presence of others here… how interesting…” Their eyeless form seems to look off.

Okay… maybe this is a god? “Uh um yes… who.. who are you?” They seem a bit happy chuckling to themselves… okay this is creepy.

“I’m glad you asked… I’m called by many names, I’m the world, I’m the universe, I’m god, I’m truth… I am all, I am one. But… for some reason… I am not you. Interesting… What makes you so different Jiang Du?” The form raises its hand to point at me. I freeze… I feel like a gaze is staring down at me like something is enveloping my very existance and looking through it.

“Hmm you have dared to knock on the door… Now, the door is open.” Turning towards the door behind me… It slowly groans open. Separation of the soul in the middle perfectly down the middle to see the same large eye as the floor before staring at me. Wispy smoke bellowing from the side that look like… little hands? They start to reach out for me…

Panicking slightly, I start to move away from them but no matter how far I move I’m still the same distance from the door. “You can’t run away from yourself… Is this not what you wanted? Isn’t this why you knocked on the doors? The knowledge to save your precious friend? Many have tried but it, none have succeeded until now.” I begin screaming as I feel the small hands seem to tear at my hands as they forcibly pull me towards the door.

“Don’t worry… You will soon see the truth…” Pulled back into the door I watch as the white vanishes before me as the large doors slowly close…

I feel like I’m falling? Being gently carried down by thousands of small hands that force my eyes wide and skitter across… no inside my flesh?

All around are the memories of this life… every one of them but deeper than that… I see lessons basic chemistry really… Then I see secrets… I see… a connection made between the elements and Chi… I see more and more and more and more until… I feel like a…

I’m back outside the door again… out inside the white space.

Looking around the same form as before sits across from me.

“How was it?” They smile… Turning back towards the door… I can’t tell what’s even on it now… I… I saw so much…

“I think… I think I understand now… Humans… everything life… There’s more information in there? Can I see more?” I gently slide my hand down the door feeling the tiny itching in it’s form.

“No can do… you’ve already paid a hefty toll as it is. Normally the one that does this doesn’t even succeed. You brought them back but… just barely.” Toll? What do they mean toll?

“What do you mean?” They start cackling.

“Oh my? It seems you aren’t aware…” a small burst of transmutation lightning creeps up my hands starting at the tips. Everywhere it crawls my flesh starts to unravel… It doesn’t hurt… but it's hard not to panic at the sight of it.

“What the hell?” Looking up at them where my flesh is unraveling it’s clinging to their form… my hands slowly moving to become their own.

“Ah… not quite enough yet. You wish to see and create with your own two hands…” I feel the lightning arc up my neck and see it start to move in on the edge of my vision before everything goes dark.

“There we go… Now everything is paid in full! Nothing in the world is free, It’s the law of equivalent exchange! Isn’t that what your kind follow?” I… I can’t see. Just as I hear the end of their statement, I feel the pain assault me. It comes from both my arms I feel myself tipping forward and try to catch myself only for my face to hit the floor. I… I can see but not through my eyes… Thankfully I can still see-through unseen eye but…

“YOUNG LORD” Su runs up to my side cradling my form fussing over the amount of blood pouring from me.

“Young lord I’ll… I’ll stop the bleeding…” She starts treating my wounds. My… well sight? Turns its attention towards the form of Xin… breathing on the floor. Thank goodness… It wasn’t all for nothing… I hope? I should check but i can't get up.

“Did… Did I save him?” I manage to croak out. Su looks very worried glancing over at Xin’s form. “Yes, young lord you did.” She wraps a bandage around my eyes and maintains pressure on my stumps…

I feel another notification go off but i'm too mentally exhausted to check it.

All of this because of a jealous sibling?

You know what? Screw Xing, I’m getting the hell out of here.