Max gulped.
That wasn’t a suggestion.
That wasn’t encouragent.
That was a threat.
’She’s saying she’ll take one from if I don’t learn how to grow one back.’
’No... no way. I’m a kid. They wouldn’t—’
Right?
’They wouldn’t do this to a child.’
That thought clung to him like a life raft—fragile, desperate, probably leaking.
Then his eyes drifted back to the operating table.
The person lying there didn’t look much older than him.
Max swallowed again, harder this ti, and quickly looked down at the phone like it might save him. His hands shook as he started reading, forcing his brain to focus on words instead of blood.
One of the doctors noticed.
He glanced at Max, then at Diaza, eyebrows lifting slightly.
"So... he really knows magic?"
"Yeah," Diaza replied casually. "The little fucker just perford on my back."
She rolled her shoulders, stretching her arms behind her—unintentionally pushing her chest forward as she did.
"Felt like I shaved a few years off my body."
The doctor stared for half a second longer than necessary.
Then he went right back to work, hands disappearing into the open incision.
"Well," he muttered, "hope he’s a fast learner. I can’t keep this cut open forever."
He paused, then added without emotion,
"Harvesting’s already done."
Thanks to Max’s frankly unfair ability to understand runes like a language he’d been born speaking, he picked them up with insulting ease. Symbols that took others years of trial, error, and near-death "epiphanies" clicked for him after a single glance.
dical and biological applications did slow him down—briefly. Not because the magic was hard, but because flesh was ssier than symbols. You couldn’t just slap a rune anywhere and call it a day. You had to know where to apply it.
Once he figured that out?
Yeah. That was it.
The rest felt less like learning and more like rembering sothing everyone else had sohow forgotten.
Max stood there, staring.
At the open stomach.
This was not ani gore.
This was not censored, tastefully angled, dramatic lighting gore.
This was real.
Skin pulled apart. Muscle held open. Warm, wet insides glistening under surgical lights like so obscene biology exhibit. The sll hit him a second later—tallic, thick, unmistakably alive.
Max swallowed.
Please, he thought desperately, ’let this be the first and last ti I ever see soone opened like a lunchbox.’
His legs felt weak. His brain tried to blue-screen. Sowhere deep inside, a very reasonable part of him scread that this was where normal people fainted.
Unfortunately, Max was not normal.
He squeezed his eyes shut for half a second, took a shaky breath, then forced himself to look again.
’Okay,’ he told himself. ’It’s just at. Complicated at. Expensive at. Don’t think of it as a person. Think of it as... biological hardware.’
That helped. Slightly.
"Alright," Max muttered, more to himself than anyone else. ’Kidney... kidney... where the hell are you hiding...’
The doctors paused just long enough to glance at him like he was insane, then went back to work. Diaza watched silently, arms crossed, expression unreadable but clearly entertained.
Max stepped closer.
That was a mistake.
The heat coming off the body made his stomach lurch again. Blood pooled where gravity allowed it, dark and thick, clinging to skin and gloves alike. One wrong step and he was pretty sure he’d slip and faceplant straight into trauma.
Dignified way to die, his brain offered. ’Local child drowns in soone else’s organs.’
"Nope," Max whispered. "Not today."
He backed up half a step, breathing through his mouth now, then cleared his throat.
"I—I need blood," he said suddenly.
Everyone looked at him.
Diaza raised an eyebrow. "Excuse ?"
"I need his blood," Max repeated, voice steadier than he felt. "A sample. I can’t... I can’t write directly on him yet. Too many variables. I need to map the runes first."
That part was technically true. Mostly. Also, writing on a living, open human as his first attempt felt like speedrunning a war cri.
One of the doctors scoffed but handed him a shallow tal dish filled with blood.
Max took it.
Instant regret.
It was warm.
Not taphorically warm. Warm-warm. Fresh, body-temperature warm, with tiny bits of... stuff in it.
"Oh god," Max muttered. "Why is it textured."
His fingers trembled as a drop sloshed dangerously close to the edge.
Do not spill it.
Do not drop it.
Do not scream.
He set the dish down on a nearby tray like it was a bomb, wiped his hands on his pants—uselessly—and grabbed a sheet of thick paper.
Slowly, carefully, he dipped his finger into the blood.
The mont it touched his skin, his brain recoiled.
Sticky. Slick. Wrong.
Max visibly shuddered.
’This is—ugh—this is not what I imagined my second life would be like,’ he muttered, flexing his fingers. ’I was promised harems and face-slapping young masters, not... finger painting with kidney juice.’
Ignoring the stares, he began writing.
Runes ford under his fingertip—clean, precise, glowing faintly red as they absorbed the blood. Each symbol locked into place like lines of code compiling perfectly on the first run.
The room grew quiet.
Even the doctors slowed.
Max focused, blocking everything else out. Organ structure. Regeneration pathways. Mana circulation. Cellular replication without mutation. No tumors. No extra kidneys. Absolutely no surprise tentacles.
After a few minutes, he leaned back, dizzy but... satisfied.
"Okay," he said, exhaling. "I’ve got the frawork."
Diaza stepped closer. "And?"
"And now," Max said, lifting his blood-sared finger, "I need sothing to activate it."
Max stared at the runes one last ti.
They were clean. Precise. Logically sound. If this were code, he’d already be hitting run and leaning back in his chair with a smug grin.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t code.
This was a man with his stomach open.
Max swallowed, throat dry. "I... I think I’m ready," he said, hating how small his voice sounded.
Diaza’s smile widened imdiately.
Not a reassuring smile. Not a proud-teacher smile.
A this-is-going-to-be-interesting smile.
"Well then," she said pleasantly, stepping back and gesturing toward the table, "go ahead."
She paused, adjusting her glasses.
"Just be careful," she added lightly. "We can’t have anything blowing up down here. Blood is already a nightmare to clean, and exploded organs?" She sighed. "That’s paperwork I don’t want."
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