Chapter 320: The Cost That Wasn’t Listed

Chapter 320: The Cost That Wasn’t Listed

The description warned of fatal physical collapse. Jin had read it during the fight and thought he understood the risk.

He had understood half of it.

Propped against three pillows, he brought the panel closer. Sitting up without help still made the room tilt, which was becoming embarrassing now that Elsa had stopped looking terrified every time he moved.

[Imitation Draconic Heart]

[Components: Draconic Dread + Draconic Will]

[Physical combat output: +100%]

[Exertion beyond normal fatigue limits enabled.]

[No healing. No energy restoration.]

[Warning: escalating internal strain. Prolonged use may cause fatal physical collapse.]

There was nothing about the tamer. Nothing about blood.

Underneath, the record he had found yesterday remained unchanged.

[Abnormal Bond Event]

[Event timing: cessation of Imitation Draconic Heart]

[Abnormal strain surge recorded through the active bond.]

[Tamer response: collapse.]

[Mechanism unresolved.]

You noticed that, then. Very helpful.

He closed the panel when a nurse knocked. She checked the monitor, collected a small sample, and told him his blood count had improved.

"How much?" Jin asked.

"Enough that we’re pleased with the trend. You’re still well below your normal range." She turned the screen so he could see the comparison. "Keep eating, take what we’ve prescribed, and let us know if the dizziness gets worse."

"Does that help you work out what happened?"

"It tells us you’re responding to treatment," the nurse said. "Your doctor is still reviewing the cause."

Jin had hoped those would be the same thing. He thanked her anyway and looked away from the screen.

"Does feeling useless count?"

"Only if it’s a new symptom."

His mother laughed from the visitor’s chair. Jin gave the nurse an injured look, but he ate everything on the tray afterward, with two breaks to lie back.

Elena pretended to read while he worked through the last few spoonfuls. He knew she was watching him. Yesterday he would have complained. This morning he scraped the bowl clean and turned it slightly so she could see.

"Good," she said, without looking up from the page she hadn’t turned.

The veterinary team allowed another visit that afternoon. Jin went by wheelchair, holding his phone while a porter pushed him through the connecting corridor.

Glitch was asleep on his other side. Someone had changed the treatment line near his neck, and the dressings across his chest were clean. His breathing sounded easier than it had yesterday.

Jin rested a hand behind the horn ridge. The familiar warmth was reassuring enough that he stayed quiet for a while.

"Has he tried getting up?" he asked the technician.

"Once. We helped him settle before he put weight on the injured leg." She checked the bedding beneath his shoulder. "He’s more alert when he’s awake. That’s progress. The internal strain will take much longer."

Glitch’s tail shifted at Jin’s voice. Through the bond came a faint recognition, followed by the heavy reluctance of a beast who had no intention of waking properly.

"All right," Jin murmured. "You can ignore me. I’m used to it."

He stayed until the technician needed to examine the dressings. When the porter turned his chair toward the door, Glitch opened one eye.

"I’ll come back," Jin told him.

The eye closed again.

He had promised that casually so many times before. Now he waited until the porter had taken him into the corridor before rubbing his face.

That evening, with his family back at the Longstable, Jin reopened the Engine.

The blood bothered him more than the warning. He had encountered blood consumption before, around those earlier experiences with avatar deaths. The connection was familiar enough that he could not dismiss it as coincidence now.

It has to be involved.

He wanted to stop there. Having a culprit would have felt better than staring at an unexplained medical result.

But involvement was not an explanation.

He went through the sequence in his head, checking his recollection against the private combat record. He had transferred accumulated growth into an injured beast during a fight. Glitch had awakened Draconic Will, sustained it alongside Dread, and entered a combination neither of them had used before. Then the state had ended.

Jin’s collapse had followed that last event.

That did not tell him which of the earlier steps had made it possible.

Glitch had gained skills before without leaving Jin unconscious or dangerously depleted. Some abilities used a tamer’s blood, but neither of these descriptions listed such a cost. Perhaps the unusual transfer had mattered. Perhaps the combination had drawn on something when Glitch ran out. Perhaps the Engine had done something its own record couldn’t explain.

He disliked how quickly a plausible guess could begin sounding true just because he wanted an answer.

I don’t know yet.

There would be no test. Glitch could barely lift his head, and Jin had needed help visiting him. Repeating any part of that battle would tell him very little worth knowing if one of them failed to survive it.

He closed the combat record and checked the next day’s visiting hours instead.

Sera Vantt arrived the following morning. She paused in the doorway until Jin waved her in, then took the chair beside his bed.

"How’s Glitch?" she asked.

"Awake between naps. Still barely moving. His Core’s intact, but they’re saying weeks for the strain." Jin shifted the blanket off his knees. "Mantle?"

"The shoulder’s been treated. He can walk with support, and he’s furious that nobody will let him try without it." Her tired smile faded. "They expect him to fight again. He’s got a lot of healing to do first."

"I’m glad." Jin hesitated. "The shoulder looked bad."

"It was." Sera looked down at her hands. "I stayed until they finished working on it. He kept checking whether I was there."

Jin understood that better than he wanted to.

They talked about their beasts for a while. Mantle disliked being fed lying down. Glitch had slept through a meal and then woken offended by the empty trough being taken away. Sera laughed at that, and the conversation became easier.

Eventually Jin asked, "The enhancement you used. How did you feel when it ended?"

"Awful," Sera said promptly. "My hands shook so badly I couldn’t hold a cup. I’d maintained it longer than I should have."

"Did the doctors find anything unusual in your blood?"

Her expression changed. "No. Why?"

"Mine was low. Much lower than they could explain from the fight."

"Your count?" Sera leaned forward. "But you weren’t bleeding like—"

"Like Glitch. I know." He picked at a loose thread on the blanket. "They haven’t found a reason."

Sera was quiet for a moment.

"My technique exhausts me," she said. "That’s a cost I’ve trained around. It hasn’t done anything like that. But I don’t know how your beast’s enhancement works."

"Neither do I. Not well enough."

That much he could admit honestly. He didn’t need to mention the transfer or the Engine to explain why he was asking.

"When Glitch fell, I thought he’d finally run out," Sera said. "Then you went down without anyone touching you. For a second I thought something was still happening on the field."

"I remember trying to reach him." Jin glanced toward the connecting corridor. "After that, nothing."

"I’m glad you woke up."

He looked back at her. "Thanks. And for asking after us."

Sera nodded, then stood when the nurse appeared to check the time. At the door she stopped.

"That shift when Mantle went for the foreleg," she said. "You turned Glitch’s chest into it."

"I couldn’t let him take another hit on the leg."

"I know. I thought I had it." She gave him a small, rueful smile. "Look after him, Astor."

"You too," Jin said. "Tell Mantle to stop trying to walk."

"You’re welcome to tell him yourself when you’re stronger."

Her visit gave him a comparison, not an answer. Different techniques could have different costs; he wasn’t going to pretend otherwise. Still, she had exhausted herself reinforcing her beast without suffering anything like his blood depletion.

The Engine remained his strongest suspicion. The unanswered part was why this time had been so much worse.

His phone buzzed before he could start circling the question again.

[Meridian Academy — Delegation Office]

[Astor, J. — Regional League allocation processed.]

[Meeting requested: tomorrow, 10:00.]

[Location: Longstable ground hall.]

[Subject: individual allocation and additional academy award.]

A message from Marris followed.

Your doctor has approved the visit. Bring your family.

Jin read the subject line again, then opened his account.

The balance loaded.

He sat up too quickly and had to lie straight back down.

That can’t all be mine.