F Grade Healer Becomes Strongest Biomancer-Chapter 58: Arise

Mio

The elf had been faster than anything Mio had ever fought.

Faster than Mori. Faster than the daemon. Sixteen kicks in four seconds, armless the whole time, and she’d never seen a single one coming. The woman had taken her apart like she was made of paper — ribs, spine, knees, sternum. Clinical and efficient, a veteran dismantling a child.

If the woman had wanted her dead, she would have died three times over before she hit the ground.

But she hadn’t finished it.

Why?

The question sat in her chest while the fire roared. The oil from the convoy had spread further than she’d thought — half the clearing was burning now, black smoke climbing toward those three wrong moons. The woman had walked into the flames like she was going home. No answer came. No answer would ever come.

[Status: Grievous Wound — Healing Negated (0:09)]

Nine seconds. The elf had known. Had told her to breathe, to wait, like she’d done this before. Like she’d killed healers before and knew exactly how long their wounds took to fade.

Breathe. You have nine seconds.

Mio counted.

One. Two. Three.

Blood in her throat. Her lungs weren’t filling right — ribs broken, something punctured. Every breath was a wet rattle.

Four. Five. Six.

The fire crackled. Ash drifted past her face. Somewhere in those flames, a woman was dying so Mio could live.

Seven. Eight. Nine.

[Status: Cleared]

Her hand slammed against her chest.

[Vitalize]

The jolt hit her like a defibrillator — green light flooding through her ribs, knitting bone, forcing her lungs open. She gasped and choked and gasped again, and this time the air actually went where it was supposed to.

[HP: 147 → 567]

Not enough. Her vision was still swimming. She cast again.

[Vitalize]

[HP: 567 → 987]

The wet rattle faded. She could breathe without drowning. Her fingers twitched.

[Vitalize]

[HP: 987 → 1,407]

Her fingers unclenched from the dirt. She could move her legs. Could sit up, maybe, if she tried.

[Reservoir: 3,058 → 2,758]

She lay there, staring at the sky with its three wrong moons. The white one, the red one, the one that looked like a swollen grape. They stared back.

Then the fire crackled.

Ding.

[Engine: Objective]

Eliminate hostile: 1/1

The notifications came without asking.

[Level Up: 24]

[Level Up: 25]

[Level Up: 26]

[Level Up: 27]

28,000 bloom flooded into her Reservoir like a dam breaking. The woman who had beaten her and walked into the fire rather than finish what she’d started.

[Reservoir: 2,758 → 30,758]

The system didn’t know about mercy. It just saw a corpse and did the math.

[Chimera]

Cost: 30,000 Reservoir

[Yes / No]

Mio sat up. Her ribs ached but held. She looked at the fire.

The woman was in there somewhere, burning. The one who’d killed champions before and couldn’t kill another. The one who’d told her to breathe and then walked away.

And it cost thirty thousand. Almost everything she had.

She thought about refusing. Letting the woman rest. Not turning her into another six-inch figure perched on her shoulder like a trophy.

But the woman had chosen to die. Had chosen Mio over herself. Had given her nine seconds and a chance.

If she refused, what was that worth?

[Yes]

[Chimera claimed]

[Reservoir: 30,758 → 758]

The fire shifted.

Something moved in the flames — a shape, small, walking out of the blaze like it was nothing more than warm air. The fire parted around her and didn’t touch her.

Six inches tall. White hair flowing behind her, longer than her body. Yellow eyes that caught the firelight and held it, predatory even in miniature.

Two toothpick-sized daggers at her hips. The same scale-wrapped handles, shrunk down to match. Two tiny arms where the real one had lost both. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

The little elf looked up at Mio. Didn’t speak. Just tilted her head, the same way the real one had before she’d drawn her blades. Sizing her up. Deciding something.

[Chimera Acquired: ???]

Dormant Form: Companion

Active Form: —

[Lore: ???]

Her name was taken. Her sins were not. She walked into the fire because she was tired of carrying them.

The chibi elf studied Mio for a long moment. Then she scrambled up the obsidian arm and perched on her shoulder — the left one, opposite where Can once sat.

She had a knight once, and now an assassin.

Mio didn’t know what to say. The little elf didn’t seem to expect anything.

[Status]

HP: 1,407/3,024

Reservoir: 758/337,500

VIT: 144

STR: 68

AGI: 44

INT: 29

SPR: 33

[Unallocated Points: 20]

Twenty unallocated points. Blood money with a cleaner interface. She hadn’t earned a single one.

And four levels for not dying. The woman got nothing for letting her live. What kind of system rewarded that?

The elf on her shoulder shifted. Mio couldn’t tell if she was looking at the status screen or through it.

Later.

Everything later.

[Time Remaining: 45:13]

Fifteen minutes. She’d walked into a world that wasn’t hers, killed three people, and claimed the corpse of a woman who’d shown her mercy.

The bone-white door shimmered back into existence ten meters away. Good job, you’ve become a murderer thrice over. Now come back home.

She hated that.

Mio stood. Her knees wobbled. The new weight on her left shoulder shifted to compensate — the elf’s tiny hands gripping her collar for balance.

One step. Two more.

The door was right there. She just had to reach it. Nana was on the other side. Ivory. Why did she trust her sister with some ancient being?

Her legs gave out on the third step. She pitched forward, arms wheeling, and tumbled through the threshold into darkness.

The parallel world disappeared. The three moons, the ash, the fire still burning where a woman used to be.

All gone.

[Nested Incursion Cleared]

Mio tumbled out the doorway, landing on her ass.

"Ow."

She opened her eyes. She was back in the living room.

Two faces perked from the couch. Brown and violet.

Out the door, she heard a familiar, cold voice.

"Time’s up."