"Look at that, they are having a family dinner" Michael evilly chuckled looking at the orb before him. Noah's eyes flickered, indicating Noah trying to take back his body.
"By destroying the ship, you guardians made it personal. So what if I take something you love Noah? For example, your little sister" Michael slowly, just very slowly moved his finger to snap.
"Stop," Andreas said as his shout shook the entire room.
"Get this through your thick skull Andreas, you cannot stop me. I will warn you only once, back off or everyone you care about will die. You guardians say I'm bad, trust me, I'm the worst"
As he said, Michael snapped, willing the system to teleport him back to Abyssal. Michael wanted to confront him more but he could feel the dizziness overcoming his senses due to the blood loss. Considering Andreas was a 6-star Alchemist, Michael didn't dare to use APD. The Supreme Guardian would have recognized the healing potion, connecting the dots between Ghost and Lucifer.
The tight armor kept the blood loss minimal yet after a time, he had to leave the ship. It was also one of the reasons Michael left the ship without beating the crap out of the guardians when they were unconscious. After Noah's body was overtaken by Andreas, his power skyrocketed from Core Formation stage two to Fusion Stage level 10. He knew he would not stand a chance fighting the Supreme guardian with his current status.
Fortunately, he had Spyders in Noah's home to blackmail the Supreme Guardian. Else, Andreas wouldn't have let him leave without a fight.
With a last glance at his Silent Reaper sinking into the sea, Michael teleported to the Abyssal. His heartfelt heavy seeing his ship sink.
******************************************
"Human!"
The moment Michael appeared in the darkroom, he heard the panic-stricken voice of Gaya. Azazel quickly waved his hand as the room immediately lightened up to reveal blood-soaked armor.
Gaya's eyes watered up as she pulled off Michael's skull mask. His face was pale, blood trickled down from his nostrils.
Everything hurt. Their head hurt, their chest hurt, their feet hurt. A sharp pain struck their chest from deep within him. He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath. Perhaps if he could shift his focus away from the pain to Gaya's face, it'd be easier to manage.
He took a deep breath and shifted their focus, determined to swallow the pain and keep going. Activating the APD, he struggled onwards, only to stumble on Gaya.
"Ghost!" she caught him as Nightmare wrapped his wings around him to steady Michael. Tears were rolling out of the dragon's eyes. Vedora walked away from Michael's bed to give him space to lie down.
A sharp pain struck his chest from deep within. One hand wrapped around Gaya's shoulder while the other clasped his chest in agony. The pain subsided at times, only to flare up again and with seemingly increased intensity. It'd probably take a simple and obvious decision to either give up or keep going at this point, but that decision just didn't seem to come.
It became harder and harder to swallow the pain, to ignore the sensations and the voices telling him to stop. On any other day, he would have used a healing potion to heal himself, but not today. The arrow pieces inside his body stopped the healing potion from healing him.
"My lady, quickly remove his armor" Azazel instructed Gaya. Nightmare helped Michael lie down on the bed. Soon, the white mattress turned red in his blood.
"Why aren't you using the healing potion!?" She ripped off Michael's armor to see two wounds on his chest and one in his shoulder. She poured the healing potion into the wounds after taking a potion from her space ring.
"You...need...to(cough)" Michael tried to inform her about the arrow pieces inside his body yet when he tried to talk, he started to cough up blood.
If it wasn't for the APD injecting him with a healing potion, he would have lost consciousness completely.
Seeing the blood coming out of his mouth, her mind went blank.
"There's something preventing the healing potion from healing him" Since Nightmare could see the energy flow with his eyes, he noticed the energy coming from the healing potion getting sucked by something inside Michael.
"Then you need to cut him open and get it out," Sarba said as the other two heads nodded.
"Yes(cough)" Michael coughed before clenching her hand tightly.
"What?! No no i... can't"
"You have to, my lady. The rest of us don't have hands like you"
"He's a dying bitch, do as we say" Ayag jumped between Michael and Gaya to shout at Gaya. Nightmare saw a dagger materialize in Michael's hand.
He picked up the dagger before handing it over to Gaya.
"What if...what if he died?" Gaya sobbed. She never felt her body shiver like this before. Her brain completely stopped working as the fear of losing Michael hit her to the core.
"He will if you do nothing" Cain, the blackhead said, breaking his silence.
Michael quickly paid the system to light up the places in his body where the arrow pieces were stuck. Gaya was not a doctor to operate the arrow pieces out. Therefore, he helped her by lighting up the arrow pieces' locations in his body.
"What's happening?" She was stunned to see the skin near the wounds radiating a golden light from within.
"The arrow pieces" with the help of the golden light, she saw the pieces stuck inside him.
As she was moving her shaking hands towards the wounds, Michael's eyes started to close.
"Lord Nightmare, keep pouring the healing potion into his mouth" Azazel flicked his wrist as the healing potions Michael kept on his workbench flew directly into Nightmare's hands.
Quickly the three heads of Vedora pulled out the corks of the healing potions.
"Please...please don't leave me," Gaya cried. The lump in her throat prevented her from speaking loudly. Gently she placed the dagger on the wound to cut.
She could feel the energy pulses coming from the broken arrow pieces. In a blink of an eye, she felt all kinds of emotions like sadness, grief, anger, and resentment.
"Please hurry my lady" Azazel rushed her. She wiped off the tears from her face. Finally, she overcame her emotions realizing the dire situation. Her hands stopped shaking as she made the first cut.
Immediately blood splashed out from the wound. The piece of the rune on the arrow pulsated energy that kept gushing out Michael's blood.
"There it is," Nightmare noticed a broken three-inch arrow piece in the wound. It was glowing dimly.
"Argh"
"What is that?" Ayag noticed a silver tool appear in Michael's hand again. It looked like scissors in Gaya's eyes. The cut was only an inch wide. Therefore, if she tried to pull out the arrow piece by hand, it would do more damage. When she saw the tool, she knew how to use it.
"Don't...cry…(cough)" Michael opened his eyes with great difficulty. He couldn't even move a muscle in his body.
"I'll be...fine" finally Michael let out these words with a gentle smile before closing his eyes.
"I won't let you die" Gaya pulled out the broken arrow piece straight away without wasting any time.
The moment the broken arrow piece exited Michael's body, the healing potion took effect. They saw the wound rapidly closing. It did not even leave a scar. Seeing the wound close up gave her the strength to move to the next wound.
************************************
Almost half an hour later, Nightmare sighed a sigh of relief. All the wounds in Michael's body completely healed up. He was peacefully sleeping on the bed. With the help of Azazel, they changed the bloodied sheets and Michael's clothes.
Everything in the room had been changed except for Gaya. She was staring at Michael with a bloodied face and hands. No one could tell what she was thinking. She just stared at Michael in silence.
"I'll go something for you to eat," Nightmare said hovering in front of her.
"Yes," she nodded as Nightmare left the room to go collect some fruits in the dark forest.
"Go make sure this place is secure" Gaya ordered Azazel who was standing behind her. Her eyes were fixed on Michael.
"As you wish, my lady" after Azazel disappeared, she looked around the room. After seeing no one in the room, she made her way towards Michael's workbench.
There was a hint of resolution could be seen in her eyes like never before. She sat on the chair, taking out a parchment and a quill. Tears flowed onto the parchment while she was writing. Almost after ten minutes, she closed the parchment. Michael was oblivious to what's happening around him as he was peacefully sleeping. He did not even notice Gaya placing a parchment beside him with the earpiece he gave her.
"Goodbye human" she gently kissed him on the forehead. Everything they went through flashed across Gaya's eyes. What she decided to do wasn't easy. Her heart bled just to think about her decision. For almost a year, she had never left his side. Even when he was in the Nether Realm or treacherous ocean, they kept in touch through the earpiece, It never felt like they were apart.
Her smile on the face contained an immense amount of sadness.. After kissing him again on the forehead, she left the room.