Chapter 1705: Fighting Poison with Poison
When Samantha placed the hypnotic mask on Safah’s face, he could still clearly see his muscles tensing, the gangster boss instinctively refusing to enter a state of being at anyone’s mercy.
He was the only one who would be so troublesome. A normal patient certainly wouldn’t overthink things. What doctor would harm their patient during surgery?
As I thought this, a chill ran down my spine. I suddenly realized I had taken things for granted. The doctors in this world didn’t have such medical ethics.
Amelia had told me before that unscrupulous doctors would specifically select patients with no family or friends to practice dissection and surgery on, and then sell their organs to other clinics.
As one of the controllers of the black market, Safah must have known about such things. It was no wonder he was uneasy. And knowing the risks, the suspicious man still chose to accept treatment, showing he was determined to trust me.
As the hypnotic mist was slowly pumped into the mask, Safah’s consciousness grew hazier. Finally, he closed his eyes and began to breathe evenly.
Samantha didn’t delay, immediately using her tentacles to lift him and place him prone on the operating table. She then attached an oxygen tube and started an IV drip with life-sustaining liquid medicine. Blood plasma was also prepared.
The upcoming surgery was quite difficult, requiring a large incision. Moreover, Safah was so old. Although his body was still relatively fit, he might not be able to endure the surgery.
Amelia stepped forward and pulled open his hospital gown. This gown was actually prepared for today’s surgery, completely cut open at the back and only tied with ropes at the top, middle, and bottom.
“Hiss!” Looking at Safah’s emaciated back, I gasped. There were horrifying, twisted scars, looking as if the flesh had been gouged out. There were also ordinary knife scars, and even scars left by whips and clubs.
It seemed his life had not been smooth. I had thought that although Safah was disabled and living on thin ice, he himself had never been in danger. Now it seemed that was not the case. These wounds all indicated that he had been in grave danger at those times, any one of which could have been fatal.
“I saw them yesterday. Very rich experiences, Parul. What do you plan to do?” Amelia showed no signs of being frightened, as she had seen many horrific wounds.
“I’ll do it in stages. First, I’ll start with the back of the head, connecting to the brain nerves. Then, I’ll open the back. After transplanting each segment of the spine, I’ll implant one. I’ll do it in three stages.” I drew several lines on Safah’s back, dividing it into sections.
This was essentially like burying wires in the ground. First, dig a segment and lay the wires. Then, as you dig the next segment, you fill in the previous one. The advantage of this method was that having simultaneous wounds would keep the overall incision smaller, reducing the chance of accidents or worsening of the condition.
Of course, it was also precisely because I had the Life Elixir that I could do this. A normal surgeon might only be able to stitch as they went, unable to achieve complete healing like I could.
“Starting with the most dangerous part. Good. I like doing that too. If we fail from the start, there’s no point wasting time later. Since you watched the Mechanical Church doctors’ treatment process, I’ll follow your lead,” Amelia said with a smile.
“Alright, I’ll make the incision then.” I raised my Scalpel and surgical scissors and began to cut. Amelia stood beside me, holding tweezers and gauze to assist me.
Safah was not difficult to cut. He was not a warrior, just an old man at the end of his days. His skin was not tough, and his muscles were not firm. He was much easier to work with than soldiers whose flesh and skin were as hard as wood.
Also, he was thin, with not much fat. His arteries were clearly visible, not interfering with the surgery. Of course, to ensure no mistakes, I used my God’s Eye at full power. This position was too crucial; even the slightest error could be fatal.
As expected of an old person, not much blood flowed. This was also partly because I deliberately avoided most of the blood vessels; only some capillaries were cut.
Amelia wiped away the blood around the wound with gauze and pulled back the skin and flesh next to the incision with tweezers, saying to me, “Your incision is really small. Is it minimally invasive surgery again?”
“He’s old, and his back can’t take a large opening,” I replied concisely, my tools already prying at the bones.
“This job involves a lot of work and intricate details. Are you sure you can complete it entirely externally?” Amelia asked, as it was a procedure to connect along the entire spine from head to toe, only making small incisions, which would be quite difficult to operate.
“No problem. It’s like threading a needle. Hand me the artificial nerves.” I held out my hand, and Samantha handed me the artificial nerve bundle that had been prepared long ago.
It was a bundle of thin wires, shimmering with a soft glow on the surface, appearing semi-transparent. Upon closer inspection, it was formed by a large number of artificial nerve wires strung together, about a meter long.
It was slightly longer than Safah’s body. After all, the original owner of this artificial nerve, a warrior from the Mechanical Church’s Guardian Army, was a well-built man over two meters tall. But it wasn’t a big problem; this artificial nerve was quite malleable and could be shaped.
“If you’re fine, then I’m fine too. Do you need me to cut off the necrotic nerves?” Amelia asked, wearing a portable microscope on her left eye and eager to assist.
My plan was to pry open the space between the skull and spine, insert the artificial nerve here, connect it to the brain nerves first, and then connect it downwards. This first step was the most dangerous and required the highest precision.
Some of the necrotic nerves still had a connection to the brain nerves. They were very dangerous; even the slightest carelessness could lead to cutting the wrong, healthy nerves. Moreover, they were all connected, making them difficult to distinguish. However, Amelia was completely confident she could do it without a single mistake.
“No need. I have my own methods, and they are safer.” I took out a petri dish. Amelia already guessed half of what I was going to do upon seeing it.
“The germ therapy again? What kind of germ are you using this time?” Amelia asked. She didn’t particularly like using germs as an aid, as it made her feel it was beyond the scope of medicine.
But I was a pragmatist. Before every surgery, I would first prevent germs from harming the human body to avoid wound infections, or I would absorb them if these germs themselves could trigger an immune system response.
If it were for the purpose of training my medical skills, I wouldn’t mind doing it myself. Even if germs could solve it for me, when lives were on the line, I would always choose the safest and most reliable method.
For instance, when I encountered the patient with liver cancer before, I actually ordered the germs to kill all his cancer cells, and I didn’t need to operate at all. But I still performed surgery, leaving the remaining diffused cancer cells for the germs to handle.
I opened the petri dish and said, “There’s a saying in the East: Fight poison with poison. This is the culprit that caused his paralysis: the poliovirus.”
