On top of that, the Chaos would also devour the mana she had used, forcing her to cast the tier five spell again. If she used too much darkness, instead, the other life forces would react to the threat by sharing part of their energy with the Abomination to protect it.
The slightest mistake would just make the situation worse, requiring Solus to spend more mana than what she absorbed from the geyser.
'You did enough. Now get some rest while I continue the procedure.' Phloria said.
She could see thanks to Invigoration that Solus was on the verge of collapsing due to mana abuse. Solus had yet to recover from the damage that Lith's Abomination form had inflicted upon her.
Using so much mana while in a debilitated state had caused the black scars on her stone body to spread dangerously close to her life force.
'I can still go on and you never performed Body Sculpting on Lith.' Solus said, yet she was so weak that Phloria needed but a gentle push to force Solus's spells to back away.
'You're right, I didn't, but I've watched you long enough to understand what you are doing and why. I know I'm no genius healer, but I'm more than capable to buy you a few precious minutes of rest.' Phloria said.
'Let's see. It's all a matter of balance so what if instead of treating the Abomination side like a parasite I consider Lith's life forces akin to three warring states? They are at battle with each other, but they always reacted in unison when perceiving a common threat.'
Following that reasoning, Phloria performed cuts even smaller than Solus's, but each time she provided the other two life forces with part of her vitality. The approach allowed her to weaken the Abominatio side from three fronts at the same time.
Every time her Scalpel struck, it created an opening that the human and the Beast sides exploited to suppress the Chaos energy with minimal side effects on Lith. Phloria's technique allowed her to keep stabilizing him at the same pace as Solus despite the gap in their healing skills, but it also drained huge amounts of energy.
Unlike Solus, however, she could regain it by using Invigoration and she could perform the procedure without burdening neither of her companions. Solus appreciated both Phloria's help and ingenuity, using every second she got to reconsider her treatment.
At the same time, thanks to Lith's situation improving by the second and the rest, her stone body had almost fixed itself, allowing her to channel most of the world energy into her spells rather than to keep herself together.
'Phloria's treatment is foolproof but it consumes too much energy to be effective whereas mine is more efficient but it's also more dangerous. At least whenever she makes a mistake, Lith's condition doesn't improve but it doesn't get worse either.
'Maybe I can fuse the two methods into one.' Solus thought.
She reduced the number of cuts she performed at the same time and used the remaining mana to fuel the other two life forces as soon as she made sure to have destabilized the Abomination side.
This way, not only did she decreased the risk of mistakes by using less darkness energy, but she also made each cut last longer. The constant pressure exerted by the other two life forces kept the Abomination from healing, making it gradually lose ground until it was a perfect sphere again.
'Okay, Tista, it should be safe to let go of the human side now. With the Abomination under control, we can finally treat his injuries without our healing spells being absorbed.' Solus said via their mind link.
The moment Tista dispelled the barrier of light and earth magic that insulated Lith's life force, his external wounds started to close at a speed visible at the naked eye. All cuts disappeared and even his maimed wing regenerated until he returned whole.
"Did you do that?" Tista asked Phloria, too tired to sustain the small damage that the mind link inflicted them with each thought they shared.
"No, I thought it was you." Between their earlier spar and the healing, Phloria had used Invigoration so many times that the breathing technique had almost no effect.
They both looked at Solus for an answer, but now that Lith was out of danger she finally looked at them with mana sense. Their bodies were on the verge of collapse due to mana abuse and their cores ran on fumes.
To make matters worse, both girls had too much of Solus's mana coursing through their bodies because of the prolonged use of the mind link during the procedure.
'Damn, I talk too much.' Solus thought. 'Thank heavens I wasn't alone. I wouldn't have been able to handle that kind of wounds on my own, not even at the cost of my life force. I wonder what the heck has just happened.'
The answer was actually simple, yet exhaustion kept the three girls from thinking straight. Lith's wounds had remained opened despite Olua's and Bodya's best efforts because his Abomination side had hogged all the light energy that entered his body.
Now, however, with the balance almost restored, the human and beast side had squeezed part of the excess energy the Abomination still had, forcing it to heal Lith. This way they had fixed their body and further depowered the Abomination.
Two birds with one stone.
"I'm impressed, kid. Despite your young age, you managed to solve a problem that I couldn't even understand." Olua offered Tista her hand, who only shook it after making sure that Solus had slipped back at Lith's finger.
"It was all teamwork." She half said and half panted.
The Roc had seen the mind link with Life Vision, just like she could see that Tista could barely stand. Olua gave her as much vitality as she could spare while Bodya did the same with Phloria.
"Do you need a ride home?" The Nidhogg asked.
The reply came in the form of Solus opening a Warp Steps leading to their building.
"No, thanks. I would like to chat a bit, but my big brother needs rest and so do we." Phloria carried Lith in a princess carry, being careful that his wings didn't touch the edges of the dimensional corridor.
Bodya would have loved to exchange his communication rune with Tista, but unfortunately, no dimensional item was so big that it could fit his beast form and not impede his movements.
Belonging to the bloodline of a Guardian meant to inherit their power along with all the troubles of finding the massive amount of resources that their huge bodies required to make proper equipment.
"I'll drop by later to see how Scourge is recovering, if it's not too much of a bother." He said with a charming smile.
"Sure, see you tomorrow." Tista was too tired to realize the implications of his words or even to notice that Bodya was still stark naked. She replied out of habit, only wishing to reach her bed and not to get up for a few days.
"I'm not an expert on Emperor Beast, but that one sure looks nice. I never thought you would flirt on a patient's bedside, let alone your brothers." Phloria said with a chuckle as soon as the Steps closed behind them.
