Chapter 27: Operation
When Celme got around to Nomad’s back, Valens finally placed his hand on Nomad’s skull, then paused at the warmth around his bones. It was different from how cold and lifeless a Skeleton’s bones felt. A Lifeward painted the Resonance of his anatomy in his mind. Mana was coursing underneath the solid bones, sprawling from the Heartstone like a web of veins that reached every bit of his bone frame.
Then he gazed down. There, the strong core of Nomad stood in all its glory. Unlike a Skeleton’s rotten core, this one was shaped like a real heart, arteries worming through it and pulsing with a strong beat, creating the set of unique frequencies that belonged only and only to Nomad.
And it was being fed by a lifeline.
He paused at the sight of it. The lifeline was bound to the left atrium of the heart just like how a Skeleton’s source thread was bound to its rotten core, but this one pulsed at each beat of the heart, and more importantly, he could see where it led. Its tip forked out into five threads that grew thinner as they wound toward the chest, their tips ending just an inch underneath the outermost layer of the Heartstone.
These look like… pipes? They’re sucking ambient mana from the air, sending it down to the left atrium. The mana is already clean, so there’s no need for any lungs to clean it. There’s another pipeline over the right atrium too, but it's dormant. Is that an artery under that part? But why? And it leads to… what is this sphere?
Valens frowned at the black, lusterless sphere that appeared in his sound vision. It was cocked underneath the Heartstone, was slightly larger than a nut, but had two different arteries bound to it. One of them led to the right atrium, and the other one was bound into the left atrium just like… a lung.
What’s the point of it, though? There’s no venous blood to cleanse. And I feel a presence there, hidden somewhere deep inside. Can’t reach it with a Lifeward, though.
It was likely something similar to the situation around his own chest cavity where the System stored the mana he’d gained from killing things.
“Be quick,” came Celme’s voice, anxious. “They won’t let you keep at it much longer. Do it now, or leave it.”
Valens gave her a nod, and gazed at Nomad, sweat trickling down his brows. “I’m ready. Let the fog in.”
“Are you sure?” Nomad asked, shuffling uncomfortably over his knee. “Once I let the fog in there’s no turning back.”
“Either you’ll do that and give me a chance to try this, or you’re going to get back to your chief and you’ll become one of those mindless men. Take your pick.”