"Garrett, what are you playing with?"
A delicate face, both charming and angry, peeked out from the door frame. Garrett didnāt turn his head, but slightly raised his chin, pointing at the box in front of him:
"This."
"Hey! I want to play too!"
Cirella happily jumped over. She picked up the box, looking left and right, without hesitation, she poked the first gem.
ā¦A dragon.
Itās good enough that she didnāt pry off the gem.
Garrett sighed slightly, watching Cirella spread her fingers, tapping those thunderballs as if playing the piano. Pop! Extinguished! Pop! Extinguished! Pop! Extinguished!
The first levelās thunderballs emerged one by one, from slow to fast, rising straight up to floating erratically. The slowest came out every two to three seconds, the fastest every 0.5 seconds, lasting about 10 seconds.
Garrett had already practiced three rounds, each time becoming frantic in the final stages, sweat pouring from his forehead. Meanwhile, Cirellaās fingers flew, pressing one, extinguishing one, pressing one, extinguishing one, easily and joyfully, completely enjoying herself.
"Hey, Garrett, this is fun!" Cirellaās eyes sparkled:
"Whatās next? Press the second one?"
"Yesā¦ press the second oneā¦ take your time, Iāll go read the booklet the teacher gave us againā¦"
To be honest, the small booklet thrown by the Lord of Thunder and the whack-a-mole game box really had outstanding effects. After practicing for just a week, Garrett went from being frantic in the first level to steadily passing the third level.
Honestly, the game box made by the Lord of Thunder was quite playable:
The first level had only one ball at a time, but in the second level, two or three, three or four balls emerged. They merged, repelled, circled each other rapidly, always presenting new and varied challenges.
Constantly new and never repetitive, deeply embodying the essence of random generation. If you reacted slightly slower, it would explode in your face.
After mastering the contents of the first chapter of the booklet, Garrett could calmly press and extinguish each ball. Even if the thunderballs intertwined, only a millimeter apart, he could extend his mental power, envelop, and extinguish themā¦
What does it mean to enter the narrowest gap without thickness? This is it.
By the third level, the thunderballs were no longer spherical but various geometric shapes like discs, fans, and spirals. After struggling through this level, the fourth gem lit up, and a feather floated out of the petalsā¦
A feather!
The quill was curved, the barbs crisscrossed and forked, and the barbules were long, slender, and delicate!
Garrett tried to envelop the entire feather with his mental power, but it still exploded; even when wrapping each barb, it exploded; only by quickly extending and enveloping each barbule in an instant, could it be quietly extinguishedā¦
Countless feathers exploded before he managed to handle one. Garrettās forehead was already covered in fine sweat.
At this time, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight feathers floated before him, countless feathers exploding on himā¦
Fortunately, I wore the shielding suit.
Foreseeing this.jpg
Garrett wiped his sweat with his mental power, extinguished the fourth gem, and tried again. This time, he successfully extinguished the tenth feather as it floated out.
Trying again, oh no, regressed to the fifteenth feather!
Trying againā¦
"Hey, Garrett! Youāre almost burnt to a crisp!"
Garrett hid inside the shielding suit, letting the thunder feathers crackle on him, showing a helpless smile to Cirellaā¦
Anyway, after two weeks of intense practice, Garrettās proficiency in mental power had greatly improved. Although he still couldnāt pass the fourth level, he was only one step away from the final stage where the feathers were most densely packed and moved most erratically!
Now when Archmage Norwood pulled out silver threads with his mental power, Garrett could do the same, pulling molten glass with his mental power, quickly and evenly coating it. Together, they could make a shielding suit in just one hour.
Then, wear it and continue getting blasted. A shielding suit, under such high-intensity training, could last about two days.
It was extremely grueling.
After two weeks of hard training, Garrett finally stood at the operating table again. In front of him lay a 200-pound pig, ready for slaughter, tied spread-eagle.
Garrett held the scalpel himself, cutting a 4.5 to 5 cm incision along the transverse line at the base of the pigās neck.
After cutting through the dermis layer, he carefully used a mithril knife, always ready to activate healing spells, to dissect the deep tissues layer by layer until reaching the loose connective tissue under the platysma muscle.
"Garrett, what are you doing today?"
Cirella stood opposite him at the operating table, handing him the scalpel, controlling the Mageās Hand to pull hooks, adjusting the shadowless lamp, and curiously asked. Garrett slightly raised his head, his eyes crinkling under the mask and surgical cap:
"Iām trying to use mental power to guide protective energy to cover the brachial plexus. If the brachial plexus can be handled, the spinal nerve roots should also be manageable."
"Ohā¦"
Cirella answered softly, then grimaced. When assisting Garrett, she had studied the anatomy charts; the brachial plexus was a complicated mess.
Winding under the skin and deep between muscles, just a glance made her dizzy, definitely not something she wanted to memorizeā
Garrett wanted to challenge this?
It was extremely troublesome!
Garrettās hands were steady. Cutting, pulling, blunt dissection, he moved along the platysma muscle, upward and downward, reaching the midpoint of the posterior edge of the sternocleidomastoid muscle above, and the superior border of the clavicle below. While separating, he carefully extended his mental power, slightly moving forwardā
The Mageās Hand, following the guidance of his mental power, morphed and moved, snugly wrapping the cutaneous branch of the supraclavicular nerve.
"Cirella, electrode!"
"Got it!"
Two electrode needles with wires trailing behind them accurately touched the cutaneous branch of the nerve. Garrett closely watched the electrode needleās point, expanding his mental power to feel the currentā¦
Hey, nothing!
Great!
"Cirella, Iāll continue cutting; when you see these nerves, probe them with the electrode needles! Ready, watch if my protection is in place!"
"No problem!"
Cirella rubbed her hands together. Garrett focused, cutting along the posterior edge of the sternocleidomastoid muscle, fully isolating the scapular hyoid muscle in the fat pad;
Using the Mageās Hand to grasp the cervical transverse artery and vein in the deep layer of the fat pad, cutting them;
Separating the deep tissues, extending above the intersection of the phrenic nerve and the C5 nerve, and below to the tendinous insertion of the anterior scalene muscle; exposing the anterior scalene muscle on the inner side, and isolating and protecting the phrenic nerve running on its surface, while exposing the middle scalene muscle on the outer side;
Isolating the C5 nerve root, protecting the phrenic nerve running diagonally across the C5 nerve root, and the small branches from the phrenic nerve to the C5 or from the C5 to the phrenic nerveā
"Cirella!"
"Coming!" Two electrode needles, under Garrettās guidance, danced on each nerve. The phrenic nerve, C5 nerve root, C6, C7, C8, T1ā¦
Part of the ventral ramus of the fifth cervical nerve and the ventral ramus of the sixth cervical nerve formed the upper trunk of the brachial plexus; the ventral ramus of the seventh cervical nerve formed the middle trunk of the brachial plexus; the ventral ramus of the eighth cervical nerve and most of the first thoracic nerve formed the lower trunk of the brachial plexusā¦
Cirella was dizzy from watching. When memorizing the anatomy charts, she managed to remember them; but during the surgery, she couldnāt tell what she was cutting. Muscle? Blood vessel? Nerve? She couldnāt even identify the piece of meat the retractor was pullingā¦
The only thing she could confirm was, hmm, this piece of meat is lean, that piece of meat is a bit fatty.
Cirella steadied herself, deciding not to worry about what was what, focusing on following Garrettās actions. As Garrett separated, Cirella controlled the electrode needles to probe:
"No problem, no problem, still no problem! Garrett, youāre amazing!"
Garrett smiled at her, the surgical instruments continued to fly. Cutting, separating, protecting; cutting, separating, protectingā¦
"Ah, so denseā¦ so manyā¦"
She complained softly. Garrett said nothing, only used the Mageās tricks to stain the muscles, instructing Cirella to meticulously pull apart the muscle bundles of the scalene muscles:
Deep to the scalene muscles, parts of the nerve fibers of the anterior, middle, and posterior trunks of the brachial plexus interwoveā¦
Garrett slightly focused his mental power. It flowed like water, guiding the protective energy of the Mageās Hand, flowing over the nerve fiber plexus. Not missing a single strand.
After the teacherās devil training, after training to envelop three or four feathers and each floating barb in a blink, just the brachial plexus nerves? Childās
play!
If needed, I can cover all major muscle bundles and blood vessels in an instant!
Here we go again!
Garrett wielded the scalpel, dissecting the left pig leg all the way to the trotters, the various branches of the radial, ulnar, and median nerves. After dissecting the left side, he moved to the right. After practicing thoroughly, he stretched his arms and let out a big yawn:
"Ahā"
The surgery took four hours! Even though many times he used mental power and the Mageās Hand to replace the surgical instruments, avoiding constant bending, his lower back was still exhausted!
Next time, I can try guiding healing energy with mental power to envelop the nerves and blood vessels. This way, it can block the scalpel and bone cutters, and even if thereās slight damage, it can be healed in time!
"Cirella, thank you! Todayās work was perfect!"
"Of course! With my help!āMOSS! MOSS! Help us, take the pig to the kitchen!"
Two invisible servants responded, lifting the pig and carrying it away. Soon after, Bernard rushed in, complaining right off the bat:
"Boss, next time you do surgery, could you be gentler with the goodsāor at least heal them before killing? Originally, we couldāve stewed a nice pork knuckle and trotters, but after your cutting, we can only stew meat chunks!"