Alchemy Commission.
Healer Jiao Ling's brows drew together tightly, her expression grave and unyielding.
"We must perform an emergency thoracotomy at once to remove the bone fragments lodged in your organs."
As she studied the interior of Kanzaki's body through the diagnostic lens, disbelief washed over her. The fractured ribs had already begun regenerating, yet countless sharp shards had driven straight through his lungs. Even more unsettling, the wounds had fused seamlessly with the broken bones, as though the lungs and ribs had always been meant to grow together.
"I have practiced medicine for more than two hundred years," Jiao Ling murmured, voice laced with quiet astonishment, "yet this is the first time I have encountered anything so bizarre. How did this happen?"
"Personal constitution," Kanzaki replied evenly. "My regenerative abilities are quite strong."
"Even with powerful regeneration, this should not be possible," Jiao Ling said, clearly puzzled.
The regenerative capabilities of Xianzhou natives varied, but no matter how exceptional one's physique, the body was still bound by basic biological principles. It sought to heal while rejecting harm. A blade left embedded in a severed arm would prevent the wound from closing around it.
Yet Kanzaki's body defied every natural law.
Despite the questions swirling in her mind, Jiao Ling's hands moved with steady precision. She prepared her surgical tools and reached for the anesthesia.
"There is no need for anesthesia, Healer Jiao."
"…What did you just say?"
"No anesthesia."
Jiao Ling stared at him, momentarily stunned. "Are you joking? I have no interest in operating on fully conscious patients."
Kanzaki remained perfectly calm. "If I lose consciousness, you will not be able to complete the surgery."
"What do you mean by that?"
He offered no further explanation. Instead, he reached for a scalpel on the nearby tray and drew a swift, clean line across his own chest.
Before Jiao Ling could stop him, the wound began closing at a visible rate, flesh knitting together with terrifying speed.
The sight sent a cold shiver racing down her spine. For one fleeting moment she seriously considered alerting the Ten Lords Commission.
Could he have been corrupted by the Borisin?
"I have not fallen to the wolves," Kanzaki said, as though reading her thoughts. "Once the bone fragments are removed, you will still need to conduct a thorough post-battle examination. Do not waste time."
If this were not a mandatory procedure for Cloud Knights, and if they were not forbidden from performing self-diagnoses, he would never have come to the Alchemy Commission in the first place.
"…Very well. Try to endure it."
Jiao Ling had witnessed countless strange cases over her long life. She drew a steadying breath, pushed aside her lingering doubts, and made a clean incision into Kanzaki's chest cavity. With careful precision she gripped the first protruding bone fragment with her forceps.
"Don't bother being so delicate," Kanzaki said evenly. "Just pull them out directly."
The casual order nearly made her drop her instruments.
"You…"
The sheer audacity of his words left her speechless. The rest of the question died in her throat.
She had truly never witnessed such a procedure. It violated every medical protocol of the Alchemy Commission and defied all common sense.
"Just treat me like one of the Abominations of Abundance," Kanzaki continued. "That way you will finish faster. Do not worry. I will be fine. There is no need to hesitate."
"…Understood."
Jiao Ling had lived for more than two hundred and fifty years, yet never in all that time had she encountered a patient like this. A man so gravely wounded, yet urging her to move with less caution and greater speed. It was utterly perverse.
In the end she extracted a total of nine bone fragments from his body. Throughout the entire agonizing process, Kanzaki's expression never once changed.
What horrified her even more was that the wounds required no stitching. Less than thirty seconds after the final fragment was removed, the gaping chest cavity had already sealed itself completely, returning to its original state.
She wanted to ask whether he was truly still one of the Xianzhou.
"Of course I am."
"I have never seen a Xianzhou person like…" Jiao Ling trailed off. Only her wide, bewildered eyes showed above her mask. "Wait… how did you know what I was thinking?"
"Because it was written all over your eyes."
Jiao Ling fell silent once more.
Yet when their gazes met, her confusion transformed into a whirlwind of emotions. Thirty percent bewilderment, thirty percent suspicion, and forty percent sheer disbelief, as though she were staring at a ghost.
In truth, such terrifying regenerative power was not entirely unheard of among the Xianzhou. Those who had completely succumbed to mara and lost their sanity sometimes displayed similar monstrous healing.
But if Kanzaki had truly fallen to mara, the judges of the Ten Lords Commission would have taken him away long ago.
No… she still needed to perform a full examination.
After every major battle, Cloud Knights underwent rigorous checkups, especially to detect any trace of mara corruption.
A Cloud Knight Vanguard who had lived for more than six hundred years sat squarely in the highest-risk category.
The post-battle examination was a meticulous process that usually required multiple healers working together. When all the tests were finally complete, however, the results fell into two simple categories.
Excellent.
Or no risk detected.
Mental state: Excellent. No signs of mara corruption.
Physical condition: Excellent. No hidden injuries remaining.
The only notable issue was fatigue, which was completely normal after such an extended campaign. It would have been far stranger if a Cloud Knight were not exhausted after months of warfare.
"Lord Kanzaki, if I may ask… is this constitution of yours something you were born with?" Jiao Ling finally gave in to her curiosity.
"Acquired."
"How did you acquire it?"
In response, Kanzaki showed her a recording from one of his training sessions.
The footage captured the massive fists of an Aurumaton Gatekeeper slamming down on him again and again. Jiao Ling watched in stunned silence, unable to tear her eyes away even long after Kanzaki had left the room.
Only one word echoed through her mind.
Insane.
Just who in the world trained their regenerative abilities in such a brutal manner?
Even a masochist would kneel in terror at the sight…
===
Outside the examination room, Xueyi and Hanya had been waiting patiently for quite some time.
The three of them boarded a star skiff, but they were not heading home. Their destination was the Cloud Knights' military encampment.
Along the way the atmosphere inside the skiff grew heavy and somber.
As Kanzaki's personal guards who had accompanied him throughout the two-year expedition, the sisters understood better than anyone why he was so strict with Jingliu.
And why he so often appeared heartless.
Even though that heartlessness existed only on the surface.
During this latest campaign they had successfully eradicated a large tribe of the Blackclaw Hunting Pack and captured its Nest Father alive.
Had the expedition ended there, it would have been considered a resounding victory.
But then they crossed paths with the current Borisin war leader, Ussa.
The Divination Commission's foresight was not infallible. The warning arrived too late, forcing the expeditionary force into a direct and brutal confrontation with Ussa himself.
Ussa had not brought a massive Borisin army, yet the potent wolf-toxin pheromones he released proved devastating. The Cloud Knights suffered heavy casualties beneath their influence.
Normally every Cloud Knight carried a spirit-cleansing pill to suppress the panic and disorientation caused by Borisin pheromones.
Yet the pill's effects were nowhere near strong enough to counter the toxin released by a Borisin war leader.
If Kanzaki had not launched a fierce assault on Ussa, drawing both the war leader and his Thousand-Wolf Guard away from the main battlefield, the entire expeditionary force might have been annihilated.
No one knew exactly how Kanzaki had managed to bisect Ussa's massive form at the waist while surrounded by the elite Thousand-Wolf Guard.
But Ussa had survived.
His guards sacrificed themselves in suicidal waves to buy time, allowing them to carry his upper body onto a Beastship and escape.
The numerous wounds covering Kanzaki's body were the price he had paid in that desperate, bloody struggle.
By the time he returned to the main battlefield carrying Ussa's severed lower half, the expeditionary force was being overwhelmed.
Fortunately the sheer terror inspired by the sight of their leader's mutilated body caused many enemies to falter. Even so, the casualty reports after the battle were difficult to accept.
Seventy percent of the fallen were young Cloud Knights with insufficient combat experience…
As their Vanguard, Kanzaki carried the heavy burden of having failed to protect those who had placed their lives in his hands.
Yet without him, they all would have perished.
It was not his fault.
This was likely also the reason he remained so strict with Jingliu, refusing to let her casually join a Vanguard on dangerous expeditions.
Thinking back on everything that had happened, Hanya spoke softly.
"Lord Kanzaki… why not tell Jingliu the truth…"