All My Summons Become Divine Girls

Chapter 281: A Blade for a Child

The red classification pane widened while Hajin turned from the treatment yard toward the clinic’s reinforced inner ward.

One ceramic angle unfolded inside the spent violet barrier, drawing mana from a channel whose owner lay dead outside.

It entered the clinic wall through the same crossing where Vella’s golden treatment web had passed during the assault.

"Seal every door without touching the inner cots," Hajin said, forming Aegis across the windows, "the spell is inside our defenses."

Militia guards closed the rear passage while orderlies moved standing patients away from every wall plus partition.

Aria divided her warning into separate panes, tracking the planted caster, his dead channel, plus the remaining assault ledger.

[ Prior clinic assault accounting ]

[ Hostile dead: 17 ]

[ Hostile captives: 7 ]

[ Unaccounted attackers: 0 ]

The delayed spell belonged to the rear-left caster Vella had killed, leaving no hidden twenty-fifth fighter beyond the clinic.

"Its charge survived the caster," Aria said, enlarging the ceramic pattern, "the lattice stored instructions before his channel collapsed."

The sigil crossed beneath the clinic plaster and unfolded again inside the inner ward, becoming a narrow blade without a hand.

Lana stood beside the registry crates with Ash against her leg, keeping both children behind the ward’s central partition.

The wounded child on the nearest cot was Mera, the youngest serious patient carried from Loccy’s western wall.

Bandages covered her lower ribs, where Vella’s treatment seal held damaged vessels around a fragment awaiting safe removal.

The blade turned above the partition until its point aligned with the faint golden residue around Mera’s injury.

"It followed my healing route," Vella said, reaching the inner doorway, "the caster marked whichever patient carried the weakest stabilized pulse."

Her violet mana did not answer when she raised one hand, leaving only golden light gathered across her fingertips.

Hajin placed an Aegis plane across the blade’s path before its point could clear the partition.

Ceramic mana struck the plane and shattered, scattering pale fragments that vanished without crossing toward the cot.

Another blade formed beyond that plane from a second folded joint hidden inside Mera’s treatment residue.

It appeared closer to the cot, proving the weapon rebuilt itself along the marked route instead of passing through Aegis.

Hajin crushed the second edge between two Aegis planes, then enclosed Mera inside another barrier.

The third ceramic edge formed within that protected surface before the barrier finished closing around her cot.

"The attack is not crossing your shield," Aria said, marking seven angular joints, "each position contains another stored manifestation."

The third blade began moving while Vella reached the cot and pressed both golden-lit hands over Mera’s bandages.

Golden mana reinforced the girl’s vessels, slowing the blade whenever its hidden route encountered Vella’s touch.

"I can remove the treatment seal," Vella said, feeling the fragment beneath her palms, "but her damaged vessel opens with it."

"Keep the seal," Hajin said, compressing Aegis around the third edge, "tell me where the hostile route separates."

He broke that manifestation between two barrier planes, then watched a fourth assemble beside Mera’s shoulder.

The weapon had crossed half the ward without passing through a doorway, wall, barrier, or living attacker.

Divine Eyes followed its ceramic structure backward through the borrowed golden residue toward the dead caster’s original seam.

The hostile line braided around Mera’s treatment seal at every joint, sharing the same path until both entered her wound.

Hajin could cut the entire braid with Divine Sever, although the strike would also remove the seal holding her vessels closed.

The Chains remained stored while no safe cutting point appeared between the hostile pattern and the child’s body.

"There is no clean separation near the cot," Hajin said, breaking the fourth blade, "find where it copied the treatment route."

Vella shifted one hand toward Mera’s spine, testing each golden strand while maintaining pressure around the buried fragment.

The fifth blade formed beside her wrist, forcing Hajin to curve Aegis between its edge and Mera.

It scraped across the barrier instead of breaking, fed by the remaining charge inside three unopened joints.

Hajin opened a second Ring around his right forearm, increasing the pressure until ceramic fractures crossed the weapon.

The blade broke under Aegis, but the sixth joint began unfolding beneath the cot’s metal side rail.

"Five manifestations consumed," Aria said, shifting two red markers forward, "two stored joints remain inside the treatment seal."

Lana moved the registry evacuees through the opposite partition while keeping one hand locked around Ash’s coat.

Ash ignored the moving adults, watching each blade form closer to Mera with his unblinking gaze fixed upon the route.

"Ash stays with me," Lana said, lifting him against her chest, "finish moving the patients before he follows someone through a wall."

He placed one small hand over her marked wrist, where the corrupted core’s lash had targeted her during the vanished Gate.

The unknown designation beside his name pulsed across Hajin’s interface without opening another remote record.

[ Unknown Designation response detected ]

[ Range: local ]

The sixth blade rose from beneath Mera’s cot, turning upward toward the golden seal below her ribs.

Hajin caught its flat between two Aegis surfaces while Vella lifted Mera without disturbing the buried fragment.

The trapped blade bent until its point faced away, then broke when Hajin closed both Aegis surfaces across its flat.

The final joint formed inside the golden light between Vella’s hands before the ceramic fragments vanished.

No barrier plane fit between that edge and Mera without enclosing part of the child’s open treatment path.

"I need one pulse to move the seal," Vella said, tightening both hands, "break the blade when the golden line shifts left."

Hajin held the final edge motionless against Aegis pressure, waiting for Vella to expose a separation Divine Eyes could follow.

Her exhausted golden mana contracted around Mera’s wound, drawing one strand away from the ceramic braid for less than a heartbeat.

The blade turned with that movement, preserving its connection while forcing its point closer to the child’s ribs.

Vella could maintain the wound or displace the target, but her touch-range healing could no longer perform both actions together.

Hajin increased Aegis pressure until cracks covered the final edge, yet each fracture leaked stored fire toward the treatment seal.

Destroying it at that distance would send the caster’s remaining charge through Mera before Vella could close the vessel.

Ash twisted free from Lana’s grip during the pressure change and vanished from beside the registry crates.

He blink-stepped onto the cot rail between Vella’s arms, placing his small body beside Mera’s bandaged ribs.

"Ash, come back," Lana said, reaching across the partition, "that is not something you can touch."

Ash raised his right wrist toward the ceramic point while Hajin kept the fractured blade trapped between Aegis surfaces.

A broken curve of pale light appeared around the child’s wrist, matching the failed orbit Hajin had recorded near the Gate core.

The shimmer reached forty-one percent of a circle before its forward edge separated into drifting geometric fragments.

[ Local orbit formation: 41% ]

[ Classification: incomplete ]

The ceramic blade entered the partial shimmer, losing speed without stopping or breaking against the unfinished curve.

Ash planted both feet on the narrow rail and kept his wrist raised while pale fragments scattered around him.

The blade continued advancing through the incomplete light, and Ash refused to move away from its point.