Taboo Online

"The thorn tells me where the body still answers."

"And where it doesn’t?"

"That part is mine to judge."

She rotated the thorn slightly, and the defender’s body tightened beneath Luke’s hands.

Aelira approached with a living blade still formed along one arm. "The thorn recognizes living flesh. The healer decides what must be removed."

Luke watched black residue gather near the base of the narrow green point. "So the healing can’t start until the corruption is gone."

"Not properly," Aelira replied.

The Thornmender pulled the thorn free, bringing a thread of black corruption with it. Green light closed the puncture behind the living point, although the broken leg and deeper damage remained.

"He needs a splint," the healer said. "Then carry him to the inner shelter."

Luke reached toward a strip of white bark beside her, but Lauren caught his wrist.

"Your shoulder needs treatment too."

"He needs it more."

"You’re bleeding again."

"I know."

After checking the blood running down Luke’s arm, Aelira tossed him a folded length of green cloth.

"Bind it tightly. If you faint on one of my wounded, I’ll have the roots drag you aside."

Luke caught the cloth. "You could just say you don’t want me bleeding on them."

"I don’t."

Lauren took the cloth from him and began wrapping his shoulder before he could do a poor job with one hand. Luke stayed beside the injured defender while she worked.

Another pair of elves carried an unconscious rootkeeper toward the Thornmenders, followed by a third with burns covering both arms. The healers moved between them as quickly as they could, but there were too many wounded and too few people available to help.

The fifth extraction platform remained dark. For the moment, Luke could do more beside the healers than he could with his spear.

"Tell me what to carry."

The Thornmender pointed toward a stack of splints and rolled bandages. "Bring those. Then water."

Luke spent the next several minutes moving between the wounded instead of returning to the defensive line. He carried supplies, helped straighten a shattered leg, held pressure against a deep wound, and lifted defenders onto living stretchers when the roots beneath them no longer responded.

No notification appeared while he held a blood-soaked cloth against someone’s side or carried water between the healers. The jobs were small, ugly, and easy to overlook, but each one kept someone alive long enough to reach the shelter.

One defender stopped shaking after Luke helped secure a splint. Another began breathing more easily once he was turned onto his side. Nothing Luke did looked impressive, yet wounded elves continued reaching safety because someone handled the work that still needed doing.

Whenever he had a spare moment, he watched the Thornmenders. Their thorns did more than push healing mana into damaged flesh. They followed the healthy flow first, found the places where it stopped, and drew out whatever prevented it from moving forward.

Only after the corruption had been cleared did the healers guide clean mana through the damaged area and begin closing the wound.

Aelira had tried to explain that earlier, but watching the process made the difference clear. The injury on the surface was only the result. Healing had to begin deeper, where the body’s natural flow had been interrupted.

Lauren joined him beside a wounded defender whose armor had fused to a blackened burn across his chest. She kept one hand against the surrounding roots, tracking another stretcher through the Heartroot and warning the rootkeepers away from a damaged branch.

"You don’t have to prove you can help without mana," she said quietly.

"I’m not proving anything. I’m useful here."

Lauren angled her blindfold toward him.

Luke tightened the bandage beneath his hands. "The spear’s dead weight until my mana comes back. My hands aren’t."

Her expression softened, but before she could answer, the fifth extraction platform came back to life.

A black generator beneath the terrace released a violent pulse through the branded chains. Golden light flowed backward from the storage tanks and entered the cutting arm, mixing with the corruption already trapped inside it.

The machine’s teeth began turning again with a deeper, harsher sound. The fifth anchor shuddered as the blade forced itself back into the existing wound, and golden mana spilled across the platform.

Part of it burned inside the black cables instead of flowing toward the tanks.

Aelira stared down at the machinery. "They’re burning the stolen memories to restart the blade."

New system windows appeared before Luke and Lauren.

[Warning: The fifth extraction relay has entered emergency operation.]

[Emergency power source detected.]

[Stored Heartroot mana is being consumed.]

The wounded defender beneath Luke’s hands cried out when the Heartroot trembled. Across the final circle, roots carrying injured elves slowed and began to darken.

Aelira raised her living blade. "Every defender who can stand returns to the fifth anchor."

The Thornmenders looked toward their wounded. Luke reached for his spear, but his mana reserve remained empty.

A deep silver chime rose from beneath the extraction terraces before he could decide what to do. Ancient doors opened below the fifth platform, and a wave of hot air carrying smoke and the smell of burned metal rolled up the passage.

Rhea emerged first with two damaged shield panels floating at her sides. Blood darkened one arm, and cracks covered every piece of blue light still answering her.

Two more panels followed behind her, stretched flat beneath the wounded defender from the Sanctuary and the barely conscious prisoner they had freed from the extraction frames.

Dorian came next with a black hook serving as a cane and a golden lifeline wrapped around his ribs. Kellan limped beside him, supported by another anchor around his thigh.

Iris remained between them and the makeshift stretchers. She supported the conscious prisoner with one arm while keeping her three active lifelines attached to the wounded defender, Dorian, and Kellan.

The group stopped at the top of the passage. From there, the scale of Lethariel’s destruction became impossible to miss.

Heat rolled from burning homes, ash drifted over the dead western district, and the exposed Heartroot filled the terraces above them while the extraction machinery cut deeper into its silver flesh.

A system message opened across Luke and Lauren’s vision.

[Emergency reinforcements have reached Lethariel.]

The fifth cutting blade screamed against the wounded root.

Aelira stepped toward the newcomers with her living weapon raised. "You opened the Forge. Good. Now help us keep the fifth anchor alive."

Rhea called her cracked panels into formation.

"Point me at the line you need held."