Microstructural Reaction and Gamble

After still more pointless bickering, they dissected one of the two corpses with this feature on the island. This one had lower-quality armor compared to the other one, which meant they could afford to lose it.

When they excised the part of the body that housed the structures, they found that the structures were all copies of one another that behaved like the links of a chain. They were shaped like diamonds with an intricate web of magic inside each one.

This magic didn't repel unaffiliated magic, so it kept its temperature and shape like it normally would and acted just like any other part of the flesh. After several experiments, they could not find the structures' purpose. They were far more complicated than anything they could make by a long way.

The only thing they could definitively conclude was that it would activate when exposed to a certain acidic chemical, which they supposed to be stomach acid. Combining this with the information that Damon had, they decided it was safe enough to go through with it.

August would consume the flesh surrounding the C3 vertebra of the other corpse.

First, they decapitated it with Damon. Then, learning from their mistakes and no longer treating a great sword like a fine instrument, they spent another day developing a spell that would serve as a scalpel.

It was difficult to make and couldn't be stabilized yet, meaning that it required concentration to keep active, but it was extremely accurate. Then, they cut up the stump of a neck, trying to get at their target. After over an hour, they finally managed to extricate their target successfully. They minced it up so that it could be swallowed and put it in August's mouth alongside copious amounts of water.

August hesitated here before Damon prodded him, "The quicker you do it, the easier it will be."

August scowled. 'Shut up,' he thought.

The interior of another neck met the interior of his own. He had swallowed all of it at once, nearly causing him to choke. He nearly died anticlimactically, but it made it through after being lubricated with so much water. Then, it reached his stomach and reacted violently.

August braced himself for what would come, hoping that there would be no pain and that whatever would happen would happen easily and quickly.

Damon kept watch, surveying August's interior and hoping to intervene, should it react unfavorably. They had deemed it safe, but they still didn't know exactly what this would do.

As Damon watched the flesh enter August's stomach, he noticed the structures inside transform themselves, unfolding time after time and abandoning the flesh, searching for something inside August. They were far faster than anticipated. Even if Damon wanted to intervene, he couldn't.

When it rose to his neck, as they expected it might, it reacted with the structures that were already embedded inside August's neck. They hit the structures inside August and made them unfold and welcome those from the piece of flesh that August had swallowed.

Then, the edges began to meld together before being taken inside and enlarging themselves to accommodate the new magic. While what had been inside August had covered half of the perimeter of his vertebral column before, it now encircled that one vertebra entirely before expanding downwards a small way.

Then, it stopped expanding, now modifying its interior instead. All the while, August felt something shooting through him. Flashes of cold and pain appeared wherever the foreign bodies traveled before being followed by immense heat and an internal ache.

Where they had stopped, he felt intense freezing pain, paralyzing him for a short while before the magic's internal modifications destroyed the nerves that were exterior to his spine. He lay in pain while his body repaired the internal damage.

Damon began his verbal analysis, "Well, that was interesting. The magic seems to be able to enlarge itself when provided with more of itself, allowing a seemingly rigid structure to adapt and grow. But can it adapt to something else? What else can it do? What else is it compatible with, and what makes it compatible?"

"Uurgh," August groaned. "Shut up, man!"

"Could we adapt it to our own spells? Could we make more of it ourselves? How can it perform such a complicated task using so little magic, and how can it stabilize itself like that?"

"Shut up! Oww," August whined. "Why didn't you stop it?"

"Why would I stop it? It didn't do anything unexpected. We just didn't know that it was designed to hurt whatever it passed through. Besides, I couldn't do anything, even if I wanted to. It was too fast for me to do anything."

Damon continued his analysis, "What about its origin? If we knew where it came from, we could use it better... Is it really natural? It's hard to believe that something so complicated could be made by nature."

Damon questioned, "So, who really made it..." August whined in the background, still in pain. Damon continued, ignoring August "...and why did they make it?"

After an hour of August's whining and Damon's contemplations, August had recovered enough to act normally again.

"What do we care who made it? I just want to go somewhere else... I wanna go home."

"How?"

"I told you what I wanted. I didn't say I had a way to get what I want."

"We do have a way, August; you were supposed to tell me the obvious answer, magic. If you want to go back, then we need to explore this as much as possible. It's the only thing I know of that can do anything even remotely similar to what brought us here."

"That's why you like it so much? It's not just latent pyromaniacal tendencies?"

"Of course not! I care because it can get me a new body and it can get us back. I need a new body, and I need one soon. I'm already going crazy. Insanity is worse than death. It is a more perverse form of subjugation than anything else because you are a slave to yourself without even knowing it, and you can never set yourself free."

"August, promise me, if I go over the edge before we find a way to get me a new body, you must kill me. I've had a lot of time to think, and the product is a hatred for my fate and a resolve to escape it above anything else. I will sacrifice anything if it means that I can escape."

August sat in silence, not understanding why they differed so much already. They would grow less and less alike as time went on, but it wasn't supposed to happen so quickly.

"Is extended sensory deprivation that bad? Bad enough to commit suicide? Really?"

"Yes, August, it is. Even an hour is worse than anything we'd ever experienced before by many times. It was used as a torture method back on Earth, but back on Earth, they only used rudimentary methods of it, limiting what their victims could hear, see, touch and feel."

"But, they never fully and truly deprived one of their senses. They still had a body that could hallucinate and imagine experiences, allowing them to still feel something. A human mind is not meant to be isolated, to be trapped like this."

"Lacking the organs to even simulate something is a psychological hell. I'm already losing my memories. The human mind is meant to have a connected physiology. It cannot function without it and will destroy itself without it."

"The only reason why I haven't begged you to kill me as I am right now is that I recognize that there isn't an actual benefit to death. I can only gain something if I live. Once I possess a body, I will be able to live again. Because, August, this is worse than death."

Damon's tone sounded so threatening, so real, so tortured that August shrank back. His emotions were on a high. August was not naturally empathetic, but that little that he felt from Damon made him tear up. He wasn't sad, but he still cried. Damon's namesake had come out in him once again.

"I'm stuck! I'm stuck inside of nothing! I'm not living, but I'm not dead, either! What am I, then, August!?" Neither of them knew the answer, so they sat in silence while August calmed down. Damon, of course, was already calm.

He couldn't be anything else, which was, ironically, why he had shouted. He had shouted and altered his tone to manipulate August. He knew that August would never take it seriously if he didn't put on a performance better than any actor he knew. He had been analyzing his memories of notable actors as best he could, trying to perfect this exact performance.

He needed to ensure that he would die if he ever lost his mind. There were only ever benefits in life, so he knew that he had to live to benefit. However, he was taking a gamble.

He was gambling with the devil, betting on a fiery table, betting that he could make it into a new vessel, and draw a new cosmic hand of cards. His wager was his mind, and the devil's was his life.

He needed to make absolutely certain that he had a way out if he lost this bet. If he couldn't have life, then he would take death. He would not let the devil take both his mind and his life. If he couldn't win the table, then he would flip it.