Strongest Incubus System

Damon did not make it to his room.

Ester forced him into the infirmary as soon as they crossed the mansion gates. He tried to argue that he could walk on his own, but Vorn’s lines still appeared above his collarbone whenever the root inside his chest pulsed. The physician ignored every complaint, cut away part of his torn shirt, and pressed three needles around his shoulder before he finished his first sentence.

"That was unnecessarily aggressive," Damon murmured.

"You allowed the mark to reach your neck."

"I was busy."

"Nearly dying is not an occupation."

"I disagree."

Ester turned the fourth needle.

Damon closed his mouth.

On the other side of the infirmary, Jian Li lay inside a containment circle. The white marks had retreated from her neck, but still covered almost her entire arm and part of her chest. Her breathing was irregular, and every heartbeat caused small lines of ice to appear over the bed.

Jian Yue remained beside her.

He had not moved away since they arrived.

Su Lan and Bao Ren guarded the door while Mei slept sitting on the floor, hugging her knees as though none of it were urgent enough to keep her awake.

Elizabeth entered several minutes later, accompanied by Aria and Celina. The Baroness’s clothes were intact, but dried blood covered one of her gloves.

Damon looked at her hand. "Did you kill the man from the box?"

"No."

"Then whose blood is that?"

"His."

"That did not answer the question."

Elizabeth removed the glove. "He tried to strangle me using an employee seal. I broke his nose."

Aria placed a new folder on the table. "Twice."

"It was necessary."

Damon looked toward Ester. "See? She hits people too."

"Elizabeth does not have a mark approaching her brain."

"Yet."

Elizabeth ignored both of them. "Mu Qing is imprisoned in the underground wing. Without the artificial structure, she can barely remain conscious. Yun Shuo and Shen Yu have been separated. Han Ruo remains unconscious."

"And the other suspects?" Damon asked.

"Eleven captured. Two disappeared during the evacuation."

Celina opened a map of the arena. "One left blood near the eastern corridor. The other used a false medical staff badge and left with the wounded."

"Then at least one remains inside Mirath," Damon concluded.

"The gates are closed," Celina replied. "No one enters or leaves without direct authorization."

Damon nodded, but his attention returned to Jian Li. The root inside her no longer tried to reach Mu Qing, but it remained active. Losing its external destination had only caused the fragment to concentrate again on the body it occupied.

"How long?" he asked.

Ester examined the symbols around the bed. "If the circulation continues this way, perhaps two days before it reaches the heart permanently."

Jian Yue became still. "You said it had retreated."

"It retreated because Mu Qing lost the connection. Not because it decided to stop."

Damon observed the cold channels beneath her skin. He now knew the root sought a destination whenever threatened. Mu Qing had cultivated her own body to receive it. Without that path, any attempt at extraction could push the fragment toward Jian Yue, Su Lan, or Mei.

"We need to create a false destination," Damon said.

Ester looked at him. "Explain."

"Mu Qing used the artificial body as bait. The root tried to abandon Jian Li because it recognized a more suitable circulation."

"You want to build another body?"

"No. I want to build only the circulation."

Aria approached the bed. "A path without a host."

"Exactly."

Jian Yue frowned. "Once it realizes there is no body, it will return."

"Not if we close the passage behind it."

Ester crossed her arms. "You are describing the removal of a conscious root using a false labyrinth."

"Mu Qing spent four hundred years teaching the fragment to follow human channels. We will use that."

"With what?"

Damon looked toward Heshan’s triangle, now stored inside a box covered in seals. Then he looked at the transparent sword seized in the arena.

"The triangle calls. The sword cuts connections. The guardian’s fragment recognizes the challenge."

Jian Yue understood before the others. "You want to use all three pieces at once."

"One to attract it, one to separate it, and one to prevent the root from choosing another host."

Ester did not appear convinced. "And who will sustain the false circulation?"

Damon remained silent.

She narrowed her eyes. "No."

"I did not even say anything."

"You intend to use your own Heavenly Ice Body."

"It can create cold channels without depending on the root."

"And it is also the most compatible structure in this city. If anything goes wrong, the fragment will enter you."

"Then it cannot go wrong."

Ester held his face with one hand and turned his head until the lines near his neck were exposed. "You are already carrying a memory, a complete root, a body still integrating, and a mark constructed by Vorn. There is no room to place anything else."

"I am not going to place it inside me."

"That is exactly what you said before allowing Mu Qing to touch your chest."

Damon pushed her hand away. "If we do nothing, Jian Li dies."

Jian Li opened her eyes.

Her voice emerged weakly. "Then let me."

Jian Yue turned immediately. "No."

"You heard the physician."

"I also heard Damon."

She looked at him. "You owe me nothing."

"I am not doing this because of a debt."

"Then why?"

Damon took several seconds before answering. "Because everyone who touched this root decided one life could be used to sustain something else. Mu Qing used conductors. Heshan wants to use you. Seraphine would have used anyone compatible. I am tired of that logic."

Jian Li held his gaze, but did not answer.

Mei raised her head from the floor.

"The man from the sword said there is another way."

Everyone looked at her.

The girl rubbed her eyes. "He is irritated because you keep planning without asking him."

Damon looked toward the box where the guardian’s fragment remained stored. "Then ask."

"He does not speak to me while he is sealed."

Jian Yue carefully opened the box. The white metal appeared between the cloths, covered by a thin layer of ice.

Mei approached and placed her hand beside it without touching.

For several seconds, nothing happened.

Then she frowned.

"He said the challenge is not removing the root."

Damon waited.

"It is returning what was taken without offering another person."

The sentence caused Xue Lian’s memory to react.

There was no complete vision. Only the sensation of ice-covered hands pressing against the ground and currents of energy returning to the earth.

Damon looked toward Jian Li.

"The root does not need another body."

Ester understood. "It needs to return to the place from which it was taken."

"Heshan," Jian Yue said.

Damon nodded. "Mu Qing created hosts because she wanted to control the fragment. But the root originally sustained the valley. It has a connection to the altar."

Celina remained serious. "How many days away is the valley?"

"Eight, with fast mounts," Bao Ren replied.

"Jian Li does not have eight days," Ester said.

"We do not need to take Jian Li to Heshan," Damon replied. "We need to open a path to the altar."

Jian Yue shook his head. "The lake collapsed. The entrance is buried."

"Yun Shuo managed to activate the triangle inside Mirath. That means the connection still exists."

Aria looked toward the stone structure. "Then the object does not only call the root. It also points toward the altar."

"Probably."

Elizabeth placed both hands on the table. "We need confirmation before using this on a person."

"Mu Qing can confirm it," Damon replied.

The former disciple was brought to the infirmary some time later, restrained to a chair and surrounded by four guards. Without the artificial body, she looked too fragile to pose a threat. Her silver hair had lost its shine, her skin was wrinkled, and her eyes now carried an ordinary gray tone.

Even so, she looked at Damon with contempt.

"Did you come to finish what you started?"

"I came to ask about the altar."

Mu Qing smiled. "Then you still do not understand."

Damon placed the triangle on the table.

The smile disappeared.

"This remains connected to Heshan," he said. "Yun Shuo used it to call Jian Li’s root. You used the same connection to prepare your body."

Mu Qing did not answer.

"Can the fragment be returned through it?"

"The altar was destroyed."

"I did not ask whether it was intact."

She looked toward Jian Li. "If you return the root now, the valley will consume her. Four years without nourishment made the channels unstable."

"Then we stabilize them first."

"You lack the knowledge."

Damon placed the transparent sword beside the triangle. "I possess your tools."

"Tools do not replace four centuries."

"You spent four centuries building a method to steal the root. Not save it."

Mu Qing pressed her lips together.

Damon approached. "The sword cuts the artificial circulation. The triangle opens the connection. The guardian’s fragment prevents transfer into another body."

For the first time, she showed genuine surprise.

"Who told you that?"

"The man you abandoned before the door."

Mu Qing looked toward Mei.

The girl stuck out her tongue.

Damon continued. "How long does the path remain open?"

"A few seconds."

"How many?"

"Seven, if the altar still possesses a core."

"And if it does not?"

"The root returns to the host."

Ester became serious. "That could rupture her heart."

"It could," Mu Qing replied.

"How will we know whether the core exists?" Elizabeth asked.

Mu Qing looked toward the triangle. "Activate it without a host. If the central symbol turns white, it exists. If it turns blue, Heshan is dead."

Damon extended his hand.

Ester caught his wrist.

"I will activate it," Jian Yue said.

Mu Qing laughed. "The triangle does not respond to you."

"Why?"

"Because your blood belongs to the Open Door. The conductors were chosen from another bloodline."

Everyone looked toward Yun Shuo, who was not there.

Damon understood. "We need him."

Yun Shuo was brought in shortly afterward, one hand still bandaged from the frostbite. When he saw Mu Qing, he became motionless.

"You are alive."

"Unfortunately for you," she replied.

Damon placed the triangle in front of him. "Activate it."

Yun Shuo observed the guards. "And if I refuse?"

"Then Jian Li dies, Mu Qing remains useless, and Heshan never receives the root."

The choice was not really a choice.

Yun Shuo pressed his palm against the symbol.

The stone lines lit up.

Blue at first.

Jian Yue lowered his head.

Then the center changed.

A small white light appeared inside the inverted circle.

Mu Qing lost her expression.

Damon saw it.

"The core still exists."

Yun Shuo began trembling. "That is impossible. The rivers froze."

"The core is weak," Damon replied. "Not dead."

He looked toward Jian Li, then at Ester.

The physician remained clearly against the procedure, but she was already calculating positions, timing, and risks.

"We are not doing this now," she decided. "First, I stabilize her heart. Then we test the connection using a minimal amount of the root."

Damon nodded.

Jian Li closed her eyes again, exhausted.

Mu Qing observed the glowing triangle with something close to fear. For four hundred years, she had believed only her artificial bodies could keep the fragment alive.

The altar still waited.

Heshan did not need another sacrifice.

It needed someone to return the root without trying to possess it.

Damon looked toward the white glow at the center of the stone.

Xue Lian’s three doors seemed to continue teaching the same lesson, even far from the fortress.

The cold had never belonged to whoever could hold it.

It belonged to the place where it was meant to return.

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