Yarra’s Adventure Notes
Chapter 564 - 32 Dust of Rebirth_1

Chapter 564: Chapter 32 Dust of Rebirth_1

The box gradually opened, revealing the inside. A stone statue, dressed in dwarf clothing, lay within. The statue bore an almost identical resemblance to a living creature, its eyebrows clear, every hair visible, its hands folded protectively over its chest. Yet, without Bart’s words, no one would have thought it was a living being. Despite its striking human-like appearance, its whole body held the unique cyanotic white of marble, and to touch, it felt cold and hard, as a rock would. There were no signs of life, no rise and fall of the chest. Even with Bart’s prior explanation, the girls remained skeptical, for the statue seemed like an exquisite sculpture, and all senses told them that was all it was.

Fortunately, Pannis had mentioned a heartbeat. The girls listened intently, and sure enough, every minute or so, a faint heartbeat sounded from the statue’s chest, which was undeniably the best proof.

"Is this Councilor Cella?" Catherine eyed the stone statue, "The dwarfs’ talent is truly wonderful. If I were the enemy, I wouldn’t believe this statue is Councilor Cella, even if I saw it with my own eyes."

"This is Lord Cella." Even facing a stone-like Cella, Bart maintained his respectful demeanor, naturally bowing to the statue before turning and saying, "I don’t know how to heal Lord Cella. After all, I’ve never seen dwarves perform magic on a petrified person. But I believe, Priestess, you should understand better than me."

"How could I?" Lina scowled, "I’m not a dwarf, so naturally, I wouldn’t know how to cast spells on a stone statue. But I think, as she still has the essence of a living creature, I could try to cast a divine spell directly on her. Perhaps it’ll work."

Lina leaned towards the box, looking at the statue of Cella within. The statue was strikingly lifelike, even the wrinkles on her face and the long beard beneath her chin were clearly visible. Judging by the statue’s outward appearance, Cella was quite advanced in age, but her aged face expressed a sense of kindness, which made people naturally feel close to her. After observing for a while, Lina finally decided to give it a try. She picked up the silver book of spells, flipping page by page until she found the one she was seeking. Pointing her finger at the page, she started to recite a prayer. As her prayer echoed, a faint green light gradually gathered around the statue, forming a glowing halo as if the statue itself emitted it.

The light kept flickering around the statue, and after five minutes, it showed no sign of stopping. Bart’s face, however, was filled with increasing joy. This scene showed that although Lina was just attempting, her divine spell indeed took effect, which meant everything was moving in the right direction, and his Lord Cella finally had hope for a cure.

Only after ten minutes did Lina close her spell book, letting out a long sigh, "What a strange poison, it’s so challenging to dispel. Fortunately, I’ve finally got rid of all the toxins. It’s because her energy is completely unusable, and it even interferes with the divine spell of toxin removal, otherwise, it should have been faster."

"So is it done now?" asked Catherine, "Do we just need to wait for her to wake up?"

"No," Lina shook her head, "When I was dispelling the toxins earlier, I checked and found her internal injuries are severe. Although she has turned her skin and muscles into stone, the inside of her body remains flesh and blood, the wounds are lethal. It’s not just superficial damage. I found out that when transformed through this talent, physiological functions like heartbeat, breathing, and blood circulation slow down dozens of times. Luckily, she timely became a stone statue through the Petrochemical Technique, and thus was able to solidify the blood flowing out of her internal wounds. Otherwise, I’m afraid she couldn’t have held on till now. I’m going to start healing her internal injuries now. But this time it’s difficult, ordinary divine spells won’t work, we have to use the Dust of Rebirth."

The Dust of Rebirth is the most powerful healing divine spell cast by the priests of the Goddess of Love before advancing to the Legendary Rank. It’s believed to revive even those on the brink of death. Of course, casting such a spell takes a heavy toll on the caster, draining all mana and vitality of a Gold Rank priest in peak condition. Even Legendary Rank priests, with their far superior mana storage and vitality strength, could only cast this spell three or four times at most.

"In the holy name of the Goddess Denia, bless the children of God." Lina’s face was full of holiness, the Sinner’s Mark on her forehead radiant. With her chants, she gently waved her hand, and a handful of white sand was thrown out, evenly sprinkling on Cella’s stone body. "Miracle, Dust of Rebirth."

In an instant, the others seemed to experience an illusion, a pair of loving eyes appeared in the air above Lina’s head, their gentle gaze passing over Lina and focusing on the stone statue of Cella. Under that gaze, the statue suddenly radiated a vigorous vitality, seeming like it would come to life any moment. Of course, this was just an illusion caused by the life force gathering inside the statue.

Bart was nearly dancing with joy, as what Lina had done was beyond his expectations. According to his original plan, he only wanted Lina to help remove the toxins and give Lord Cella a simple treatment. After all, petrification isn’t a cure-all, it slows down bodily functions rather than completely freezing them. If sustained for too long, wounds may still worsen and even lead to death. Therefore, he had hoped that after Lina’s initial treatment, Lord Cella could hold on for a longer period, at least until he could rush back to Grand Highland City. But he never expected that this priest, bearing the Sinner’s Mark, would casually use a spell like the Dust of Rebirth. As a dwarf, who took the Earth Goddess as his secondary faith, Bart had a certain understanding of the types of divine spells of the goddess’s priests. He was very clear about the difficulties and effects of casting the Dust of Rebirth. So when he heard the name of the spell, he knew Lord Cella would not only be saved but also possibly recover quickly. In this case, the Petrochemical Technique lasted only three short days, which didn’t harm Lord Cella’s body as much as he had estimated.

The greatest weakness of the Petrochemical Technique is its side effect, which places a considerable burden on the body of the spellcaster. For every additional day the spell is maintained, the spellcaster will require an additional one to two years of recovery after the spell is lifted. Thus, curing Councilor Cella ahead of schedule would allow her to recover a year earlier.

The white sand in Lina’s hand seemed infinite, constantly being sprinkled over Cella’s petrified statue. As more and more sand was scattered, the silver-white light emitted from the statue grew brighter and more dazzling, like a rising silver sun on the horizon. Vivian, sensing this, consciously waved her hand, throwing out a Mithril disc engraved with an array, setting up a defensive measure to conceal traces and block the line of sight from the outside. If she hadn’t done this promptly, the entire camp might have been alarmed by this silver sun, leaving no secrets to keep.

"In the name of Denia." Finally, the sand formed by the divine spell in Lina’s hand ran out, and she clasped her hands together chanting aloud, "Element of life, show your power here."

The invocation was followed by the sudden recession of the silver light as if the sun had suddenly disappeared from the sky. However, everyone could clearly see that the silver light hadn’t vanished into thin air but had radiated at the fastest speed into the interior of the statue, completely absorbed by Cella’s body. Inside the statue, out of sight, the life energy brought by the silver light was silently repairing Cella’s damaged body.

After all this, Lina sighed heavily and took several steps back, coming close to falling. Catherine stretched out her hand to steady her in time, whispering, "Are you okay, do you need to sit down and rest?"

"Not for now," Lina shook her head, "The energy consumption was greater than I imagined. I had to use three Dusts of Rebirth to gather enough life energy for her recovery. I don’t know if it’s because her injuries were too severe, or the petrification not only lowered her internal bodily activity to a minimum but also affected the effectiveness of the divine spell. Either way, the treatment was tough. Luckily, we’ve ascended to the Legendary Rank; if it were two months ago, I wouldn’t have been able to cure her."

"It’s probably due to the Petrochemical Technique." Pannis handed Lina the Vitality Recovery Potion Vivian had given him, explaining quietly, "Her injury couldn’t be that severe. If someone was wounded to the point where they need three Dusts of Rebirth to be healed..."

"They’d already be dead," Lina nodded, "So I found it strange, wondering how the energy could be exhausted so swiftly."

"Mr. Bart." Freya’s gaze moved from the now dimmed statue to Bart, who was continually praying to the gods of fire and forging, and pointed out, "Now that she’s healed, how do we awaken her? If we can’t wake her up in time, treating her now is pointless."

"Ah?" Bart was taken aback. He’d never considered this issue. In the past, if anyone in his clan used Petrochemical Technique, they were sent to the Temple of the Earth Goddess for treatment and only brought out when they had recovered from the petrified state. He had never used this ability, and neither had his companions, so he had no idea how to awaken person petrified by the Petrochemical Technique.

Seeing Bart’s reaction, Freya sighed, completely despairing of Bart’s ability to think on his feet. Vivian chuckled at the side, patting Freya in sympathy.

"Huh?" Vivian was about to comfort the despaired Freya when she suddenly exclaimed, pointing at the statue, "I think we no longer need to worry about how to wake her up, look!"

A string of crackling sounds came from inside the stone statue, and a large number of cracks appeared on its originally smooth surface. As the cracks multiplied and grew denser, covering the entire surface of the stone statue, they suddenly erupted to all sides. A great deal of rubble and dust rose, obscuring the space around the statue. (To be continued. If you like this work, welcome to qidian.com to recommend, vote, and support. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile phone users can read at m.qidian.com.)