Chapter 118 Fourth Tier of Mental Power
The crystal core felt cold to the touch, yet it faintly emanated a chaotic, chilling, yet powerful spiritual energy. She gripped the crystal core tightly and sat cross-legged beside the spiritual spring.
The county town was not large, with only a few scattered ordinary zombies and this fourth-tier mental zombie. There was no trace of other second-tier or third-tier mutants. Now that I think about it, it's probably not that they didn't exist, but that they had already been hunted down by this zombie that was good at mental attacks, and their crystal cores had been absorbed by it.
It is precisely through this predatory growth that it was able to evolve to the fourth tier on its own in a relatively remote county town. As a result, the energy contained in its crystal core is far purer and more domineering than that of an ordinary fourth-tier zombie, especially in terms of mental power.
Ruan Ning took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and activated her water-based supernatural power technique, while slowly extending her mental energy toward the black crystal core in her hand.
Upon first contact—
"Buzz!"
A violent, sharp mental energy, filled with countless chaotic fragments and cold malice, poured into her sea of consciousness like a black flood bursting its banks, flowing wildly through her mental energy links!
"Ugh!" Ruan Ning groaned, her face turning deathly pale instantly. Veins bulged on her forehead, and her body trembled slightly uncontrollably.
This was not merely an energy surge, but also accompanied by fragments of the zombie's chaotic consciousness: endless thirst, a craving for flesh and blood, the pleasure of killing, and a cold, pure desire for destruction.
These negative fragments, like countless tiny icicles, pierced her mental world, attempting to pollute and tear apart her consciousness.
She gritted her teeth and calmed her mind, focusing all her mental energy on guiding the relatively pure energy portion into her own supernatural energy cycle along a specific route, especially nourishing and impacting the core of her mental energy.
The process was extremely painful. It felt as if countless hands were tearing at her mind, or as if she were being plunged into an abyss of alternating ice and fire. The rich spiritual energy in the space and the aura emanating from the spiritual spring beside her became her only support and backing.
Time passed in the silent, fierce struggle. The light of the black crystal core gradually dimmed, and the gray mist flowing inside was drawn away bit by bit, merging into Ruan Ning's body. Her aura was initially chaotic, even occasionally overflowing with cold, malevolent energy, but gradually, it began to become solid and profound, and her spiritual power was tempered and expanded little by little in the pain.
Sweat soaked her clothes, but was quickly evaporated by the spiritual energy in the space. She focused all her will on guiding, absorbing, resisting, and purifying.
In this perilous post-apocalyptic world, strength is the most fundamental guarantee of survival. She must become stronger faster.
The space was utterly silent, save for the gentle flow of the spiritual spring and the fluctuating aura emanating from the seated figure. A silent yet extremely dangerous process of absorption and transformation was quietly underway.
After an unknown amount of time, the pitch-black crystal core in Ruan Ning's hand completely turned into dust and disappeared between her fingers.
She opened her eyes, and deep within her pupils, a faint hue of water and silver seemed to intertwine and flow, vanishing in an instant. An unprecedented clarity filled her consciousness.
His mental strength finally broke through, and he officially entered the fourth stage.
With a slight thought, she left the spatial dimension and returned to her hotel room. Outside, it was still a deep, stifling night. But at this moment, in her perception, the world was completely different.
Without needing to concentrate, the outline of the entire county town was clearly "reflected" in her mind's picture, as if a veil had been removed.
Scattered zombies wandering the streets in the distance, mutated insects and rats rustling in the corners of the ruins, the arc of the wilderness wind blowing through the withered grass in the distance... she could capture and distinguish every subtle energy fluctuation and trace of life, as long as she wanted.
This is a prototype of a near-omniscient perspective. Although its scope is still limited to the county town and maintaining this state requires a huge amount of effort, it is far superior to the third-order version.
She pushed open the door and walked down the stairs. The breathing, heartbeats, whispers of everyone in the hotel, and even the "sounds" of the chaotic virus and life energy fighting within the wounded became clearer and clearer.
They arrived at the isolation area on the east side of the first floor. The woman on night watch had red and swollen eyes and quickly stood up when she saw Ruan Ning. Ruan Ning waved for her to be quiet and her gaze fell on one of the rooms.
Inside lay one of the women who had been bitten the most severely; the wounds were on her shoulder and neck, she had a persistent high fever, and the skin on her bound wrists and ankles had been chafed raw by the strips of cloth from her unconscious struggles.
In Ruan Ning's perception at this moment, a fierce battle was unfolding within the woman's body: her own faint but tenacious light of life and consciousness was being frantically besieged and devoured by a violent, chaotic, and corrosive dark energy, which was probably a mental mutation caused by the zombie virus.
The dark energy, like boiling sludge, twisted and spread, attempting to completely pollute the last vestiges of light.
The process of turning into a zombie is essentially the complete erosion, transformation, and eventual annihilation of one's spiritual power by the virus, leaving only a remnant driven by primal appetite. Ruan Ning clearly "saw" this process.
She sat down on the chair next to the bed.
Without hesitation, she slowly extended her spiritual power—now more refined and flexible, possessing the stability of a fourth-order being and a trace of the purifying and soothing properties unique to water—like the finest surgical thread, carefully avoiding the raging dark energy, gently touching and wrapping around the woman's fading glimmer of "self."
Then, I started to sort things out.
This is not a cure, but more like providing a piece of driftwood for a drowning person, or shielding a dying flame from the raging wind.
Her spiritual power gently guided the glimmer of light to gather, dispelling the darkness and filth clinging to it and severing the chaotic tentacles that tried to assimilate it.
The process is extremely delicate and mentally taxing, requiring absolute focus and control. The slightest mistake could not only trigger a backlash from the dark energy, but also cause secondary damage to the already fragile mind of the injured person.
Time passed second by second.
Fine beads of sweat appeared on Ruan Ning's forehead. The woman's struggles on the bed gradually weakened, her rapid and painful breathing slowly calmed down, and the abnormal flush on her face began to fade.
Most noticeably, in Ruan Ning's perception, the faint light representing her self, though still weak, was no longer flickering; instead, it had stabilized and even brightened slightly.
"The fever...it's gone down?" The woman standing by murmured in disbelief, her hand trembling as she touched the injured woman's forehead. Tears welled up in her eyes. "It's gone down! It's really gone down! There's hope! Juanzi is saved!"
Ruan Ning withdrew her mental energy, feeling slightly tired, but her eyes remained calm. Effectively, by regulating and stabilizing the injured's mental energy and enhancing the resilience and clarity of their "self," she might increase their success rate in resisting viral erosion and ultimately activating their special abilities.
This method is extremely risky, and only someone who has just broken through to the fourth level and reached a new level in controlling mental power can try it.
Without lingering, she got up and walked to the other injured person in the next bed.
That night, Ruan Ning shuttled between several isolation rooms, meticulously and mentally exhaustingly addressing the mental state of each seriously injured person, especially those who had been bitten and were on the verge of mutation.
Everyone's situation is different. For some, the effects of the treatment are obvious, the high fever subsides quickly, and they fall into a peaceful sleep; for others, the effects are minimal, the backlash of the dark energy is still fierce, and they can only temporarily stabilize the situation.
By the time she finished, the sky was already turning gray. Ruan Ning was pale, her mental energy greatly depleted, but her eyes remained clear. She returned to her room and calmly addressed Sun Hong, who had followed her throughout, witnessing the entire ordeal with eyes filled with shock and hope:
"That's all I can do. The battle between the virus and themselves is not over yet. Whether they can pull through depends on their own will and fate."
After saying that, she pushed open the door, went inside, and closed it.
In the hotel corridor, Sun Hong and several other women responsible for care stood silently for a while, looked at each other, their eyes still wet with tears, but with a heavier, more real hope than before.
They turned around and returned to the isolation rooms with even greater determination to continue their vigil.
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