How did it turn out?
Adders are not necessarily a death sentence. My toon got mauled by an adder on his first day, but I got lucky sleeping it off.

Animals wander very strategically, and mauling happens often. If you really wanted to save your guy, your best bet would have been to check if anyone in the Realm chat had any spare medicine, but you would have needed to know where your province's thingwall is in order to teleport to anyone's charterstone.