Chapter 23 (part 2/2) - The Trap

  Forgetting the trauma he had gone through was not simple. The only reason Vincent was able to endure the fear of touching an artery was that the previous pain had been so brutal that his mind had dissociated from the sensation to protect itself. It also helped that he had lost part of his memory during the spiritual energy surge.

  “Okay, everyone ready?”

  The trio of husks nodded. All of them were in position. The nervousness was evident on their faces, and Ben looked like he was about to faint, as if he were the one about to touch the artery.

  Vincent slowly brought his hand closer. Arteries radiated energy even without contact… if one was sensitive enough to perceive it. With every centimeter he advanced, he could feel the energy pricking against his gauntlet, though fortunately much of that “radiation” was absorbed by the silver threads woven through it.

  The energy within an artery was not uniform. It carried heavy intentionality, a dense “life” of its own. Ambient energy was usually dispersed, floating in the air in search of something to cling to, but the energy flowing through the arteries was different. The spiritual current rising from the heart carried consciousness, the seed of life of future resurrects, souls attempting to return to the material world in search of a body. That was what made it so dangerous… so corrosive.

  An artery had to be treated like a high-voltage cable. Once touched, it could lock you in place, could char your hand if there wasn’t a sufficiently large sink to absorb its flow. This time, Vincent had taken countermeasures. When he made contact, he did so first with his index and middle fingers, their tips protected by silver spirals designed to mimic his meridians. As before, even if he tried to control it, the energy was too violent to tame without first channeling it into a stable conduit, a body with intention. The first contact was always brutal… but this time it was not his flesh that received it.

  The energy rushed directly into the silver channels and reached the absorption circle almost instantly. The energetic resistances slowed the initial discharge, converting the first surge into heat and redirecting the excess toward the accumulation crystal at Vincent’s wrist. All of it happened within a fraction of a second, just enough time to synchronize the rhythm of the magic circulating through the gauntlet with the flow within Vincent himself.

  “Ah! He touched it!” Charly shouted when he saw Vincent’s hand against the artery. “Ben, be ready!”

  The first contact had passed, but that did not mean they could relax. All of them tightened their stance, watching Vincent’s face for any sign of agony.

  The gauntlet was working perfectly, almost too well to be honest. All the excess energy was being funneled into the accumulation crystal, but Vincent knew it would fill up soon. When it did, the entire load would fall onto the resistances. If they failed, it would be the same as touching the artery with his bare hands. If he wanted to tame it, he had to begin actively absorbing its flow. Taking advantage of the slowdown provided by the gauntlet, he gradually began circulating the spiritual energy through his body.

  Slowly… don’t let it stagnate… keep it moving.

  It did not take long to guide it through his entire forearm. His meridians were small, but they were healthy, and he could control them. The energy climbed up his arm to his shoulder, then crossed through his heart toward the diaphragm, where he distributed it to the rest of his body. The central meridian cluster lay in his stomach, and from there he could spread it evenly.

  At first, before attempting to dominate it completely, he allowed a faint current to flow naturally, careful not to overload his channels. Only after filling all his meridians and familiarizing himself with the texture of that energy did he begin absorbing beyond his normal limits.

  “Guys… the accumulation crystal will fill up soon, and there’s a limit to how much I can store in my body,” Vincent muttered without breaking his focus on the artery. “I need one of you to give me your hand so I can discharge it… you have to trust me.”

  “T-touch you now? But the other resurrects…” Charly protested, aware of the rumors. “You atrophied their meridians…”

  “That won’t happen. You have to trust me.”

  Charly hesitated for a moment. What Vincent was doing was extremely dangerous for anyone inexperienced… but it was also a way to demonstrate loyalty. If he wanted to keep earning money, he had to play along.

  “Fine. I’ll trust you,” he said, extending his hand. “What do I have to do?”

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  When their hands met, the injection of energy was neither immediate nor hostile. It was careful. Vincent was in control and would not allow him to be harmed. At first he merely “presented” the energy at the surface of his skin so Charly could absorb it, and when Charly signaled that he could handle it, Vincent began feeding him magic slowly.

  He did not need to guide it through Charly’s body, but he did so anyway, because that was the true purpose of the experiment. Handling energy externally was far more difficult, and even more so within another body, where it became tainted by conflicting intentions. For his plan, he needed to master that flow. He needed to be capable of invading another body.

  “Hey… what are you doing? I can handle it myself,” Charly said when he felt Vincent taking control of his internal flow. “Careful, you’ll mess up my arm.”

  An arm… that’s all I can control for now. If I try this on Takkio, I might not even reach past his forearm.

  Vincent let go of Charly. The test was almost ready. Now he just had to see how much he could endure.

  “Okay, everyone focus. I’m about to do something stupid. Positions!” He ordered, drawing their full attention back to him. Ben tightened the rope, and Charly gripped the stick. They were ready.

  The gauntlet’s battery was nearly full, and he did not want to overstrain it. He needed part of its capacity in case something went wrong. Besides, the crystal had been expensive. He could not afford to break it. Without relying on it, he would have to circulate the energy through his own body. A massive current rushed through his meridians, more than he could properly handle, but that was a necessary step for the experiment.

  As he exceeded the limits of his channels, they began to tear. The pain started to build… and that was precisely what he wanted to measure. He needed to know how much energy he could steal from an artery before causing damage that even his basic potion could not repair. He needed to know how much he could endure before losing consciousness.

  Come on… just a little more…

  The internal damage surpassed the pain threshold he thought he possessed. It was now or never. Until this point, he had only been circulating the energy internally. What he truly needed to do was close the circuit by touching the artery with his bare left hand. If he failed to emit enough magic from his palm, the current would surge inward all at once and shatter his meridians.

  “Stay sharp!” Vincent shouted to the trio. He raised his free hand to show them what he was about to do and brought it closer to the artery. “On my signal!”

  Without the gauntlet’s protection, the violent energy nearly atrophied his hand instantly… if not for the fact that Vincent was already actively emitting energy. He managed to press his entire palm against the artery, releasing in one brutal instant all the energy he had accumulated, plus the charge stored in the battery, plus the current still entering through the gauntlet.

  One, two… three seconds. That’s all I can manage.

  “Now!”

  Ben pulled the rope at the same moment Charly struck his hands apart with the stick. Vincent was yanked backward, a surge of agony racing through his entire body. He had circulated more energy than his body could withstand, and that final discharge left his arm numb and nearly senseless.

  Tammy rushed forward at once and poured the liquid into his mouth. In his current state, he would have been incapable of moving on his own. The potion had a limit to its effectiveness, but since the damage was so recent, it acted with far greater potency, sealing the internal fractures almost instantly… almost.

  “You’re insane! If you’d done that alone, you’d be dead!” Charly scolded.

  Ben nodded repeatedly while Tammy kept making sure he swallowed everything.

  “That’s enough. I don’t need more,” Vincent said, pushing Tammy and the bottle away from his face.

  He tried to stand on his own but needed help. The trio watched him recover in astonishment. They had just seen him circulate the energy of a fairly large artery with a bare hand. For a husk, that was an incredible feat, even if it had only lasted a few seconds.

  “You’re crazy! What was that even for? You won’t train fast enough to defend yourself, even if you can draw energy from an artery,” Charly protested.

  “I can’t tell you the full plan…” Vincent replied in a tired voice. His body still ached. “If you know what I’m going to do, you could become targets.”

  The trio immediately understood what he meant.

  “For now, let’s just focus on making money. I’ll finish what is probably the last batch of vaporizers for you to sell… come back in an hour.”

  The husks nodded, still worried about his condition. Once they left the bathroom, Vincent slumped against the wall, along with the fading hope that his defensive plan would work. The strain had been excessive. His body was not prepared for that level of stress.

  At first, he had planned to absorb energy into his body and be ready to release it upon contact with Takkio. Maybe, with some luck, he could atrophy his meridians and scare the others off. But as things stood, he could not endure that amount of energy for more than a few seconds, let alone keep it circulating through an entire conversation until the right moment arrived. And after discharging it, he would be left severely damaged and unable to move, hardly an intimidating sight.

  I’m thinking about this the wrong way… I’m not a lion. I can’t face him like that. I’m a spider… I need webs. I need venom…

  Vincent looked around. He had already considered that possibility before. That was why he had Edgar’s burner and the necessary herbs prepared, along with the books. But he hesitated to resort to those methods. He had to weaken them, create his own window of opportunity, disorient them enough to be able to touch them and atrophy their meridians. But executing that plan would not be clean.

  There’s no way to administer a poison directly without them noticing… unless it’s in the air… and I’m exposed too.

  He had to weaken them, block their meridians enough to incapacitate them, poison them… but he also needed a way to protect or cure himself quickly in case he was affected. Time was short, but now he had the gauntlet. He could prototype rapidly.

  The vaporizer, the gun, the alchemy kit… with what I already know, I can counter any toxin if I act fast. It can’t be liquid. It has to be instant delivery… I need to create a potion inhaler.