"Captain!!"
The moment he was back on board, the ship's doctor's shriek nearly deafened Bellamy.
"Don't yell so loud, I'm not dead yet." Bellamy was currently covered in blood, with a massive, gaping hole in his chest – a truly terrifying sight. But in truth, his injuries weren't fatal.
The unique nature of a Spring-Man meant that Bellamy could survive even if he lost his heart. The heart is one of the most vital organs in the human body, its primary function being to pump blood throughout the system. For anyone else, losing a heart would be an absolutely fatal injury. But Bellamy was a Spring-Man; he didn't even need his heart's pumping function. Any organ in his body, even the blood vessels themselves, possessed immense elasticity. If his heart couldn't work, Bellamy just needed to transform his blood vessels into springs. The natural contraction and release of these springs would generate enough force to replace all of the heart's functions.
This was something Bellamy himself had only discovered after his heart was pierced. If he hadn't suffered such a severe injury, he might have gone his entire life without realizing this characteristic of a Spring-Man. Since Bellamy, the Spring-Man himself, had only just discovered this, there was no way Onigumo could have known this secret. After critically injuring Bellamy with a single sword strike, Onigumo had once believed the battle was over. He had exposed such a large opening precisely because his guard had been momentarily lowered.
After reassuring the ship's doctor with a few words, Bellamy pressed down on his own chest. "Contract!" Cough, cough! A mouthful of blood gushed uncontrollably from his mouth. "Captain!"
Seeing Bellamy's face turn pale, Muret was beside herself with anxiety, practically jumping up and down. Bellamy waved his hand, signaling that he was fine. He had just forcibly constricted the blood vessels around his heart to prevent new blood from flowing in.
"Get ready for open-heart surgery, immediately." Onigumo's sword strike had taken at least a couple of pounds of flesh from Bellamy's chest. Bellamy had used Life Return to forcibly repair a small portion, but the remaining core part couldn't be handled so recklessly. The heart wasn't muscle; its internal structure was extremely complex and couldn't be haphazardly repaired.
"Drake, it's all up to you now." Once the surgery began, it wouldn't be easy to stop. "Leave it to me, Captain." Drake maintained his usual taciturn demeanor, yet this very manner inspired exceptional reliability.
The earlier cannon fire had punched several holes in their ship. Boatswain Ross was leading men in emergency repairs. The storm was intensifying, with monstrous waves crashing against them one after another. Lightning flashed across the sky from time to time, momentarily illuminating the heavens. A fierce battle had just ended, yet far from being out of danger, Bellamy and his crew had plunged into an even more perilous crisis. If the ship capsized at a time like this, even Bellamy wasn't confident he could survive.
Everyone's fate was now in the hands of First Mate Drake. Drake felt the pressure on his shoulders as heavy as a mountain. "I must get everyone out of here!"
Fortunately, their vessel this time was a large sailboat. A larger ship often meant better stability and less likelihood of capsizing. This commandeered large sailboat was very well-crafted; at least it hadn't shown signs of breaking apart in the storm. As long as Ross could patch all the holes, Drake was confident he could steer them all to safety.
"Hurry up, Ross!"
In the cargo hold below deck, Ross was leading all the Clone Soldiers and the two apprentices, desperately trying to plug the breaches. The Marine cannons were truly formidable; a single hit immediately blasted a large hole in the ship's hull. Such breaches were virtually impossible to fully repair while at sea. All Ross and the others could do was fill most of the gaping holes to prevent seawater from gushing in uncontrollably.
"Faster, don't stop!" The water level in the cargo hold had already risen to over a meter high. If it rose any further, they wouldn't even have a place to stand. Luckily, the Clone Soldiers were all around two and a half meters tall. However, the two youngsters, not yet adults, were struggling.
Seeing this, Ross quickly assigned them other tasks. "Go get some buckets and bail water out, quickly!" But the ship was currently rocking violently up, down, left, and right. Carrying buckets to pour water overboard was an extremely dangerous task; a single misstep could send someone into the sea.
Mani looked at Ross, seemingly wanting to say something but hesitating. Ross knew exactly what she was thinking. "If you want to live, then get your ass moving!" Still so precious about her life at a time like this. No wonder the Captain said she wasn't cut out to be a pirate. "All of you, run!"
Under Ross's furious roar, the two apprentices grabbed small wooden buckets and began to run desperately.
In a quiet little room, Mia and Muret had finally completed their preparations and began Bellamy's surgery.
"Captain, are you sure you don't need anesthesia?" The thought of having one's heart cut open and then stitched back together was horrifying enough.
Did Bellamy want to experience such pain? Of course not. But this surgery required him to assist with Life Return and his Devil Fruit ability. Otherwise, with Mia and Muret's current medical skills, it would be impossible to perfectly repair his heart.
"Get me a bottle of strong liquor." The heart couldn't be cut off from blood flow for too long, or it would necrotize.
Bellamy gulped down a mouthful of strong liquor and let out a harsh, turbid breath. "Begin."
The two women looked at each other and nodded. "Then we're starting. You have to endure it, Captain."
The sharp scalpel cut through Bellamy's skin. His blood-red heart was completely exposed to the air. Looking at this organ, half of which was shattered, they couldn't help but suck in a cold breath. It was unimaginable that the Captain could still be alive and kicking with his heart in such a state. At this moment, they couldn't help but wonder: was their Captain truly human?
" Don't just stand there stunned. Cut away the dead flesh first."
Astonishing pain caused countless beads of sweat to form on Bellamy's forehead. This feeling of watching his own heart being cut open was truly indescribable. Such pain and torment could already be considered a horrifying form of torture.
Bellamy gritted his teeth hard, watching the two women meticulously remove the necrotic parts of his heart and clean out the intact chambers.
At this point in the surgery, relying purely on medical skill was no longer enough. A large piece of tissue was missing from the very center of the heart. Next, Bellamy himself needed to perform the repair.
"Life Return!"
Under the infusion of life force, flesh began to grow back on the heart, bit by bit. But this wasn't enough; Bellamy needed to clearly understand how this flesh was growing.
"What is the structure of this part of the chamber?"
And so, Bellamy, while questioning the doctors, meticulously repaired his own heart.