While outside, the other orderlies were busy tending to the wounded, only one woman had been designated to watch over Maggie in the tent—exactly as Tonar had demanded.

Elisa hadn't come. The last time they had spoken, the exchange had ended badly, and despite all the pride she could display, a strange bitterness remained in Maggie's heart, a dull ache at the thought that Elisa would choose absence at such a crucial moment.

The woman was methodically preparing her remedy. She was crushing thick leaves and roots with a pungent aroma between two stones, a mixture that gave off such a strong odor that Maggie almost gagged. Pinned to the ground, unable to turn her head, she stared at the ceiling, passively enduring these strange herbal smells she knew nothing about.

A few minutes later, the sounds of pounding ceased. The woman approached the bed, placed two fingers on Maggie's wrist, as if to take her pulse. She nodded softly, then slid her hands over the frail torso of the wounded commander.

"What are you going to do?" Maggie whispered, her voice faint. She couldn't even turn her head, forced to keep staring at the dark canvas above her.

The woman inhaled, her features calm despite the tension.

"I'm not skilled enough to read your pressure points directly, nor to map your spiritual vessels. So..." Her voice softened, but a dull gravity clung to it. "I'm going to push my essence inside your body. With that, I can inspect your condition from the inside."

A silence fell, thick, almost vibrating like a threat.

The air grew heavy in the tent as the woman pressed her palms against Maggie's chest. A strange heat immediately seeped in, like a silent river slipping into her still-gaping wounds. Maggie jolted: her body trembled involuntarily, a raw fear rising within her. Since her return from the tunnels, she hadn't felt the slightest vibration from her core—as if a part of her had ceased to exist.

The foreign essence progressed nonetheless, irresistible, following the paths of her vessels. It was a dual sensation: both soft like water, and sharp like a shard of glass. Every muscle fiber shivered under this current, every nerve resonated with an electric pain. She wanted to struggle, but her body wouldn't obey.

The woman frowned, concentrated, her eyes closed. Maggie, meanwhile, held her breath, convinced her heart was about to burst. The energy seeped deeper, searching, exploring, until it reached her spiritual core.

And there... Maggie's expectation shattered. She had hoped, perhaps, for a brutal awakening, a sudden reconnection to that force she thought lost. But that wasn't the case. The essence, instead of latching on, seemed to dissolve there, to decompose into a void with no purchase. As if her core was now just a gaping chasm, incapable of holding onto what was offered.

Maggie felt a cold sweat bead on her forehead. Her throat tightened.

Why? Why doesn't it react?

Her fingers trembled against the fabric of the pallet. The current continued, but every second reinforced the certainty that there was nothing left to save inside. Nothing but a silence, deep and desperate, at the center of her being.

The heat of the essence gradually faded, as if the river flowing through Maggie had finally dissolved into arid sand. The woman kept her hands on her torso for another moment, eyes closed, expression strained. Her brows were furrowed, but it wasn't surprise that marked her face—it was a deeper, more bitter worry, that of someone who had already seen too many bodies on the brink of rupture.

She reopened her eyes. The gloom of the tent accentuated the hardness in her gaze. She didn't straighten up immediately, preferring to press her palms again as if to confirm what she had just perceived. Her lips pursed.

Maggie, lying down, felt this silence sharper than any response. She wanted to turn her head, to question, even to demand. But her neck refused the slightest movement, her body seemingly pinned by an invisible weight. Only her eyes could still move, searching the woman's face with a mute fever.

Finally, the healer removed her hands and took a slow, measured breath, as if searching for the exact words to offer. But even before she spoke, her gaze already betrayed a chilling truth: she wasn't expecting a miracle. She was stating a fact.

"...You shouldn't still be alive."

The sentence fell, simple, clear, unadorned. Maggie thought for a moment she had misheard, but the woman's severe and clear gaze confirmed her words.

"Your bones... many are broken, some shattered to fragments. Your organs..." She shook her head, her tone remained measured but a dull anger pierced through. "I count at least three severely damaged. And your spiritual core..."

She paused, as if this subject alone required more caution than all the rest. Her eyes fixed on Maggie's, heavy, unyielding.

"Your core is damaged. It hasn't shattered, or cracked... but it has swollen. Five times larger than it should be. It's taking up too much space, and it's devouring your body."

Maggie's breath caught. Her lips moved without sound. The mere idea of her core—that invisible heart that had guided her entire existence as a fighter—already terrified her. But to hear it described like that, misshapen, monstrous, oversized... it was as if the woman was holding up a mirror she refused to look into.

"When I pushed my essence into you," the healer continued, her voice low but firm, "I thought it was dispersing... but no. It didn't disappear. It was consumed. Your core absorbed everything, like a chasm."

A thick silence followed. Maggie felt an icy shiver run down her spine. She thought of all the times her core had been a source of strength, light, even survival. Now, it had become a parasite, a hungry mouth feasting on everything given to it.

The healer turned away slightly, as if to mask the shadow crossing her face for a moment. She knew what this meant: Maggie was only alive by a miracle. Her body was a fractured house, its foundations ready to give way, but someone had driven in stakes to prevent the ruin from collapsing. She hadn't been saved, no. She had been nailed into this world, forcibly clinging to an existence that her own core threatened to consume.

She finally straightened up, crossing her arms over her chest, her eyes fixed on Maggie as if to force her to remain aware of every word.

"You understand? It's not that your core has weakened. On the contrary. It has... expanded. But bigger doesn't mean stronger. It means it demands five times more energy than your body can provide. It's like inflating a fragile waterskin to the size of a lake. It's not designed for that. It will burst, sooner or later."

Maggie swallowed with difficulty. Her eyes stung with tears she refused to let fall. So all I've endured, all I've held on through, was to end up... like this?

The healer sighed, passing a hand over her sweaty forehead. She too seemed exhausted by what she had just discovered. But she spoke again, harsher, as if to wake Maggie from her thoughts.

"Listen to me carefully. If you're still alive, it's only because someone has forcibly kept you in this world. Your body, your core, everything is on the verge of rupture. But there's still a thread, just one. As long as it holds, you hold."

Maggie closed her eyes for a second, swallowing this truth like poison. She felt reduced to a pathetic state: no functional core, no strength, a body in pieces. And yet, still alive. Not by victory, but by a cruel artifice.

"So..." she finally murmured, her voice rough as sand. "I'm doomed?"

The woman stared at her for a long time, her silence heavier than any answer. Then, after a moment, she shook her head.

"Doomed? No. But every second will be a battle. And not just against what's lurking outside. Against yourself."

She crouched down again, placing a hand on Maggie's shoulder, gentler this time. A sincere warmth passed through her gaze, despite all the severity of her words.

"You are suspended between two worlds, Maggie. And you alone will decide whether you fall, or whether you keep forcing your way forward, even in this state."

Maggie remained silent, staring at the tent ceiling. The phantom current she had felt moments earlier still vibrated in her limbs, like a cruel reminder of what she had lost. But at the heart of her fear, another feeling was being born, faint, fragile: anger.

Not at the woman, nor at Tonar, nor even at fate. A dull, burning anger, directed at that monstrous core devouring her from within. She had always lived to fight, and now, her enemy was inside her.

The healer, without knowing it, had just sealed a new resolution.

Maggie inhaled weakly, her painful ribs protesting. But in her eyes, despite the fatigue, a different glint already shone—that of a survivor who refused to be reduced to silence.

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