Mitchell's pale red eyes were reflected in the cold white edge of the scalpel, and the chill gleam of the blade made him feel a phantom pain for no reason at all.
In his shock, he instinctively began drawing on the power of the Warp-eye on his forehead.
As that third eye carrying cursed power opened just a fraction, an invisible wave spread through the medicae station, like a stone dropped into a still pond, sending trembling ripples outward.
At once, not far away, bottles, jars, and metal instruments on the operating table began to vibrate and collide. Different tones overlapped like an orchestra, and the sharp clatter rang without end.
Priestess Lena clearly sensed the unstable psychic fluctuation. The mechanical arm holding the scalpel withdrew at once, and she explained in a rapid stream of electronic speech:
"Do not get agitated. I was only treating you. And extracting a little sample while I was at it."
As she spoke, she raised another mechanical arm holding a transparent quartz jar.
Through the thick glass wall, one could see that inside the pale yellow liquid floated a short length of intestine with an eye growing on it, slowly writhing.
Its surface villi had mutated into tentacle-like forms, pulsing in a pattern that was both regular and revolting.
At the sight of that blasphemous and twisted chunk of flesh, Mitchell's mind, which had only just returned from the edge of the empyrean, gradually regained the ability to think normally. The Warp-eye beneath the gemmed headband, which had opened by a sliver, slowly closed again.
He could feel that the writhing mass of flesh had come from his own body.
What was surprising was that this horrifying fact, the kind that would have shattered the mind of any normal person, had no real effect on Mitchell at all.
Because as a Navigator, he knew very well that this kind of mutation might simply be his final end.
His ancestors had, since the Dark Age of Technology, possessed the power to gaze upon the empyrean with opened souls.
But in return, they had also inherited an eternal curse.
It was said that back in that vanished golden age, they had a special title:
Those Who Walk the Wire.
At that thought, Mitchell's emotions began to shift.
He struggled to sit up, only to realize he could not.
And when he looked down at his own body in confusion, he discovered that what remained fixed within the life-support frame was a mutilated shell.
He stared blankly at it, disbelief written across his refined features.
"Do not look so shocked. At the time, your condition was practically just a heap of conscious meat. A heap that kept growing fresh tissue, no less."
"Praise the Omnissiah. If I had not happened to know a bit about biological separation techniques, even the parts of your body that were still normal might have been swallowed by the mutated tissue."
Priestess Lena casually put away her tools, the blood-drawing needle, the bone saw, and the rest of the dissection kit, while matter-of-factly describing how dire Mitchell's state had been.
That obviously did nothing to comfort him. Once Mitchell realized this broken body was all he had left, an intense flood of emotion surged through him.
Even if House Hayek had enough influence to equip him with a much sturdier and more durable set of augmetics, the loss of his own flesh was still a sorrow no ordinary person could easily accept.
And the most important thing was that injuries this severe, along with the long period he had spent unconscious, seemed to mean that the ritual to chart the voyage route and ascend as Holy Son had already failed.
And the moment he understood that fact, what flooded his heart like a tide was not despair, but boundless joy.
Mitchell's pale, almost transparent face slowly twisted into a grin he could not keep restrained.
By Asuryan, was there anything better than this?
He was so damned tired of this cursed competition for succession.
Brothers turned against brothers. Kin turned into enemies. The blood ties that should have linked the members of his family together had instead become double-edged blades while the question of the Holy Son remained unresolved, stabbing straight through the hearts of his relatives.
The glory of a proud Navigator dynasty had been tossed aside. What flowed from the chests pierced by the blades of kinship was no longer hot blood in service to the Imperium, but black sludge filled with greed.
It was precisely to avoid that looming conflict that Mitchell had chosen to travel separately with the servants and guards of his own branch of the family, and had selected the farthest and most hazardous Caleis route as the path of his ritual, all to avoid clashing with his siblings and cousins as much as possible.
If not for the ancient covenant of House Hayek forcing every descendant to take part in this long-voyage charting competition, Mitchell would have gladly chosen to stop caring altogether.
In his eyes, whether one became Holy Son or merely a scion, whether elder or Star Father, they were all simply different individuals among the Navigators.
And Navigators were born to explore and guide.
Power and status only slowed the pace at which a Navigator could find the path.
Their purpose from birth was to walk the wire and seek the correct road amid the haze of the Sea of Souls.
If even they, the eyes that guided humanity, turned their gaze toward meaningless struggles for authority, then who would remain to steer the vast, rotting vessel of the Imperium itself?
Now, with his physical condition laid bare before him, he could simply report it to the family and free himself from this advancement ritual that, in his eyes, had never had any meaning at all.
And what pleased him most was that if the family agreed to let him withdraw from the ritual, then he would no longer have to keep drifting along aboard Solomon's broken ship.
At that thought, his expression turned a little strange.
He seemed to have spent only a few months aboard that ship, and now only half of him was left.
If he ever got the chance, then before disembarking he absolutely intended to leave a message in the Navigator sanctum aboard the Spear of Destiny:
Run.
Because this ship was simply too dangerous.
That made him think back to the last time he had tried to glimpse the path of that ship.
Endless gray fog had obscured the direction of the road. He strained to look farther and finally managed to tear open a corner of it.
And behind that corner there was...
The instant Mitchell's mind reached that point, he suddenly realized he had to stop.
Because the memory that came next was something that should never, under any circumstances, be recalled.
But unfortunately, by the time he realized that, it was already too late.
The tape of memory moved forward on its own, rewinding past the seals of his subconscious and releasing the fragment of recollection that had nearly killed him:
Upon the pilot's throne soaked in warped power, among the corpses of countless servants, beneath the mocking laughter of that invisible monster, his gaze pierced through the gray fog that blocked the sight of his third eye and caught sight of something beyond it.
It was a door.
A deep blue door.
It was crystal clear, like carved sapphire. Ancient and newborn at once, both kinds of presence layered upon it together. Brilliant blue feathers drifted out from the opened doorway, carrying a sacred beauty that made one yearn to touch them.
There was only one detail that made the whole thing unbearable.
On each of those feathers were carved countless human faces twisted in agony.
(End of Chapter)
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