1st Maelach of Ausiriel Year 1237

Petrasha's POV

" Damn it!" I yelled, right after we entered the door, we are hit by a stray bullet that comes from where Bell is! I am not sure whether it is Lucy's luck or what, but she just had to be hit by said bullet in the leg! Not to mention... it is a freaking anti-mana bullet!

Lucy is currently on the group, grabbing her leg while writhing in pain. Amy and May had no idea what to do except to try to comfort Lucy. Christine even froze on the spot!

Even if I did not witness first-hand a person getting hit by anti-mana, just the description is enough to make a grown man get scared... and now it is happening in front of my eyes... on one of my best friends... no... my sister...

I can see it... I can see mana starting to gather up inside Lucy... the anti-mana is attracting even more mana into Lucy's body... at this rate, she will get mana poisoning in just minutes... and mana berserk coming shortly after...

" Lucy! Use your spells! Release the mana! Just do whatever you can to waste the mana inside your body! You need to get the mana out as fast as you can!" I yelled at her while trying to help her cast magic.

" Wind blade... wind blade... wind blade..." Lucy heard me and began to continuously use magic onto the stone walls... but it's not enough..., The magic that she is using is too weak to use up all of the mana building up... 

" Bell, wha-" is what Amy said before she was forcefully pushed away from Lucy.

" No... no... this can't be..." Bell said as she kneeled in front of Lucy, her voice shaking from the shock. 

" Lucy... I am sorry, please forgive me..." Bell towards Lucy. 

" ᚠᛟᚱᚲᛖᛞ ᚢᚾᚲᛟᚾᛋᛁᛟᚢᛋᚾᛖᛋᛋ, target Lucy," Bell chanted and Lucy went unconscious... what is that spell??? It's too short!

And then she did something imaginable. She cut off Lucy's leg... leaving Lucy in even bigger pain though she is currently unconscious to feel it.

" BELL WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" I yelled to her.

" I am trying to save her! This is the only way!" Bell retorted. What do you even mean by saving! You directly cut one of your friend's legs!

" This is not helping! Stop this madness at once Bell!" I yelled at her.

" Shut up, you don't even know what the hell should you do in this situation! So shut up and watch!" Bell said as she stored Lucy's leg into his storage.

" ᚨᚾᛏᛁ ᛒᛚᛖᛖᛞᛁᚾᚷ, target Lucy," Bell chanted out yet another short spell. I am not sure why, but every time she would chant the spell in the magic language and then call out the target in English. Yes... English, not Zars, not any other language but English, a language that isn't even native to this world... it seems this time, the spell stops Lucy's bleeding... at the very least we don't have to worry about blood loss now...

" Say... Petrasha..." Bell suddenly call for me.

" What do you want," I replied her, still not satisfied at what she has done to Lucy.

" Remember to get her an artificial leg alright?" Bell said. The hell do you mean. What do you even mean by that, you are the one who robbed her leg from her!

" ᚨᛞᚹᚨᚾᚲᛖᛞ ᛗᚨᚾᚨ ᛋᛁᛈᚺᛟᚾᛁᚾᚷ, source Lucy, target Belgrynd," Bell said yet another chant that does not make sense... wait... target Belgrynd? Bell herself is the target this time? What does it even mean!

" Hey, Bell! What do you mean by target yourself! What is that spell even!" Amy shouted out to her, but it seems that Bell isn't even going to respond!

" Wait... this is..." Christine mumbled. Huh? What?

" This is bad... Petrasha! Get Bell away! Make her stop that spell!" Christine yelled this time.

" What do you mean it's bad? I don't understand?" I answered her.

" Bell is trying to absorb the extra mana within Lucy's body to herself! I don't know how well does dragon reacts to extra mana, but I sure don't like it if Bell went berserk!" Christine explained. What? Bell why would you do this! Urgh!

" Bell stop this at once! What do you even think you are doing! Are you trying to kill yourself?" I yelled to her as I tried to drag her away from Lucy. Sure losing Lucy is hard, but it is definitely not worth losing Bell too! 

" ᚨᛞᚹᚨᚾᚲᛖ ᛈᚱᛟᚲᛋ ᛁᛗᛁᛏᛃ ᛒᚨᚱᚱᛁᛖᚱ, target Belgrynd, ᚨᛞᚹᚨᚾᚲᛖ ᛋᛟᚢᚾᛞ ᛒᚨᚱᚱᛁᛖᚱ, target Belgrynd," Bell chanted yet another two spells on herself again. This time it seems to be a barrier since all of us cannot even get close to Bell anymore! Just what is she thinking! She knows the effect of anti-mana! She cant be this oblivious to its downsides! So why even!

---

Belgrynd's POV

" Lucy... please forgive me... Please don't hate me for making you lose a leg... I didn't want to but it's the only way to save you... unlike you, I can handle the anti-mana a few times... I won't die from this, but you will, so please forgive me..." I said to Lucy who is unconscious, and to myself, convincing myself that this is the best choice. I know by doing this, Lucy would not be able to walk for a long amount of time, at least until Petrasha made a prosthetics for her, but at the very least... I won't lose a friend... not after we finally reunited...

Mana siphon should be finishing soon. The mana in her body should be stable now... I'm glad Lucy...

" ᚾᛖᚷᚨᛏᛁᚹᛖ ᛖᚠᚠᛖᚲᛏ ᚾᛖᚷᚨᛏᛁᛟᚾ, target Lucy." I had to use this type of magic. It is not the typical magic in this world, I am not even sure where is it from... I just somehow know it... it uses the same language as the one used here, yet it is used differently. The only downside of this magic... is that it does not use the ambient mana... it uses one's own mana... and because I am still not familiar with it, the consumption of it is immeasurably high... it is only thanks to the mana siphon that I still have enough mana to hold through...

" Urgh... Bell?" Lucy woke up... thank god... 

" You are fine Lucy, you're fine..." I said to her as I hugged her. Thank god that she is safe...

But for me on the other hand...

AM counter 14 (-1)

Might not be fine...

---

Lucy's POV

What's going on? I remember getting shot and passed out... and when I woke back up, I saw Bell saying that I'm fine, then passed out on me... 

" Bell! What do you mean by that! Tell me! Bell!" I yelled at her, I even shook her violently, yet she isn't even responding to me. She is still alive that is for sure, but she isn't reacting to me at all.

I look around and saw the others are trying to hit an invisible wall, trying to come to us. Did Bell set that up?

It is then I heard the sound of something breaking. 

" Finally! Lucy! What happened to you both!" Petrasha rushed to me while yelling that. 

" How should I know? I am the one that should be asking that! All I remember is passing up and then wake up like this! I rather want you to explain to me why the hell is Bell like this?" I asked them. Like hell would I know what is going on! 

" Rather than that, don't you feel like something is missing... like for example... a leg?" Petrasha asks me. Huh? What do you mean missing, and why a leg...

" Why am I missing a leg? What I remembered is getting shot! Not getting amputated!" I yelled at them. What is this... why did I even lose a leg? How even?

" You got shot in the leg by the humans... to save you from getting mana poisoning... Bell cut off your leg to prevent even more mana from gathering within you. She then somehow absorbed all of your excess mana... which somehow ends up like this... " Christine explained it to me... so the 'you're fine ' that Bell said... means that I no longer have any danger of getting mana poisoning... but instead, it is Bell who has the danger of getting mana poisoning now...

" But... rather than mana poisoning... Bell looks more like mana exhaustion... and very severe exhaustion on top of it..." Christine added. Huh? How? If she had absorbed the excess mana from me, how did she even exhausted her mana? From what I remember, her mana pool should be larger than the total of Amy, May, and Petrasha. 

" How is it going... What happened here?" Piths came over. So the army arrived huh...

" Long story short, some humans fled, most killed, none of the captives killed... except some injuries... which you can see here..." Petrasha explained to Piths.

" So... I guess I will tell my men to help the captives back... do you need some help getting those two back?" Piths asked us before telling his men to assist the captives. I saw Petrasha shaking her head, telling Piths to go on and do his stuff.

" Christine, you said that Bell is having mana exhaustion right?" Petrasha asked which Christine nodded.

" To be honest, I also don't know much about mana exhaustion. I only know that once someone used too much mana, they will become unconscious so that their body can regain their mana. How long they will go unconscious depends on their surroundings and also themselves. Some people are more efficient at regaining the lost mana while some might not. A high elf like me would need an average of 15 hours and 30 minutes to regain all their mana if we somehow emptied it." Christine explained. 

" Huh, that's oddly specific. Did you exhausted your mana before?" May asked Christine, which immediately look away and pretend that she didn't hear anything. You did exhaust your mana before, did you...

" Anyways, I would suggest bringing Bell to Heart Forge... since not only there is a lot of mana there due to the mana activity, but also near to where we usually stay. If things get really worse, we could even get Karsityr to help out. Though I am not sure how willing will she be since she doesn't really interact with others much. Or maybe Petrasha could ask her old man to help too." Christine suggested. It is a sound plan... as currently, Heart Forge is the nearest place that has a higher mana concentration. The next one would be the Dryad's grand tree or the silicoids settlement. 

" If that's the case why not we stop by Edolophine first? I think it's best that I head towards Old Man to check him up... he might also know Bell's condition. It's just a slight detour too." I suggested to them. In which they all nodded. But the problem is... how do I tell the old man what happened...

" Say, is it possible that we get a wagon from Piths? I don't think any of us are able to carry Bell and me for such a long time." I said.

" True... You rest here for a while ok? I will tell Piths about this... don't force yourself Lucy-nee..." Petrasha said before heading towards the gate. The other captives are also slowly being escorted outside of this cave. Most of them just directly went past us without saying anything, but occasionally, there would be some who stop for a while and look at Bell and me.

It is then two young catkins, one boy and one girl, along with what I assume their mother came.

" What happened to big sis?" the young catkin girl asked.

" Nothing really, she is just exhausted. She will be fine soon." Amy answered them.

" Really? Thank goodness. Big sis is really brave there saving us..." this time it's the catkin boy saying it.

" I guess so..." May said there.

" Without her... my boy and girl wouldn't even be here... she saved them when they took these two as hostages... Please... tell her that, without her, we wouldn't even be here..." the mother said as she brought the two younger catkins out. I guess they only saw Bell as the hero huh, makes sense though. I almost contributed to nothing, in fact, I made Bell suffer... 

*sigh*

" What's wrong Lucy, why are you sighing?" Amy asks.

" Well, I lost a leg, made Bell exhausted while doing nothing. I can't even shoot as Petry does..." I said while patting Bell's hair. 

" That's not true, it's because of you that we scared them away. Not to mention, your leg is an accident. Nobody would think that they will shoot this far of a target when Bell is literally right in front of them. This is all an accident alright? That guy is just lucky that he managed to get a shot. Not to mention, the bullet only barely hits you, a little more and it hits the ground and none of us will get hurt. It is just a lucky shot, Lucy. Stop blaming yourself ok?" Amy said as she hugs me... 

*sigh*

" Alright alright... but you better carry me back though... I'm not really in the condition to walk back home... and well... I haven't told the old man about our stuff yet... so you might wanna prepare." I said to her while hugging her back.

" Freaking normies..." I heard May saying something but it's too soft that I can't hear what she's saying... oh well...

" I already told Piths to lend us one of their wagons. For now, we have to squeeze with the captives first but once we are back... oh... Christine, May... help me a bit and get Bell to the wagons please..." Petrasha told the other two. Thanks...