Over the ing days, Krahe underwe another battery of tests, a over nearly a dozen possible lung repts all with their own advantages and downsides. One purely meical model in particur stood out, having an outer shell of articuted metal. These so-called “fuser Mod. 5018s” had incredible performance characteristics, given the listed price — it was clear they were meant for someoh a signifit proportion of high-demand muscuture, and thus, Krahe would never have to worry about running out of breath were she to choose them. There were, however, two catches that made her dismiss them as an option. First came the requirement for Thaumio actually power the eponymous “fuser” — a literal fuel tank that would have to be refilled through a port between the ribs. This was, apparently, much less of a problem than it seemed, and was thus readily tolerated by the users — in part because the lungs could still operate indepely, but would do so at around 80% capacity pared to normal, healthy lungs. The sed catch was revealed by Firminus: They had a serious problem with certain parts wearing out quickly, and rept parts were ly easily avaible in Audunpoint — that is to say, they would take time to arrive and would cost a premium. The problem was not with the manufacturer price-gouging, but with supply lines. And evee these issues, this model apparently had a staunchly loyal userbase among Audunpoint’s mid-rankers.

  Two other models were simir in that they each had enormous advantages but came with a catch of some kind. The prices all varied quite a bit, as did their characteristics — the models Firminus had picked out ran the full gamut all the to the higher end and even into more obscure models, such as the aforementioned fuser lungs.

  “How many variants of purpose-made lung grafts are there on the open market?” Krahe asked off-handedly.

  “How many stars are in the sky?” Firminus retorted. “Explosions, daggers, bullets, simple direct impacts… After livers and kidneys, lungs are the most only-grafted majan.”

  After some further thought, Krahe made a request: “I’d like to see some other models, if you don’t mind. Keep these three.”

  After going through the sed batch, she had gathered a roster of seven promising didates. This roster, however, was doomed when she made yet another off-handed remark: “Don’t you have something that specifically requires a grafted or otherwise reinforced ribcage? Something that keep w if my diaphragm gets fucked, but doesn’t need aernal power source.”

  Furrowing his brow, Firminus thought for some time. He left, returned with a memory-sb, and spent the several minutes going through it with a sense of tunnel-visioned purpose. Krahe knew better than to disturb him. She’d seework-dredgers kill for lesser disturbances when they were in the zone.

  “Let’s see… Ah, here it is! tinuous-flow model WSU-5101-63-854, the “Dead Man’s Root!” he excimed. “I ’t believe I didn’t think of them at first. But then, lungs are not my specialty. Looking at the dotation, the Dead Man’s Root is one of the few grafts with dotation going back all the way to Zavesh’s own prototypes. Says there’s a whole vault just for spes of this specifig graft going back to a handful inals.”

  “I would hope that the design has improved since six thousand years ago,” Krahe said.

  “Tradition is the preservation of fire, not the worship of ashes. It would be heresy to svishly stick to an old design. I will bring them ht away,” Firminus replied.

  He brought in the same type of wet-ste capsule as all the anig grafts. Within the capsule floated two tangles of greyish, almost wooden-seeming flesh, with many delicate muscle bundles wispily trailing off of them in all dires. More than self-tained sa the manner of typical lungs, they resembled iines or perhaps tree roots, their tubur structures spiraling and winding ba themselves. A faint, purplish glow radiated throughout their many creases. Though Krahe took care to pare their characteristics to those of her other options, she had already settled on her choice. Besides their tinuous-flow feature, they also had toxin-filters and a self-iure specifically tailored to heavy smokers. Lastly, they had a degree of redundanearly unparalleled on the free market. All these factors bio justify the name “Dead Man’s Root” — they could help one survive grievous wounds while appearing dead, at least without close iion.

  Wheime came to go uhe k was, if anything, easier tha. By this point, ahetics worked on her once again. Within the span of just two short hours, her lungs had been repced and flesh mehe scar-riddled sacs that had kept her alive thus far now interred into a capsule like any other relic. Fidelia had insisted upon examining them before she would dispose of them.

  The following two months were a blur of surgery, recovery, and exercise — both of the physical and spiritual kind. The amount of work she was having done ated such a lengthy recovery period to observe for aion signs — thus, ily creating plenty of time for her to beore properly acquainted with the Atomica. The facility turned out to be a subterranean plex owned wholly by High Grafter Fidelia, and uandably, she wasn’t told where exactly it was located.

  The Dead Man’s Root a Scarab alone sufficed to intoxicate her with the new endurahey afforded her, even if it paled in parison to what she had been able to do in her old body. When it came to the scarab, its impntation was as quick as it was uling, in no small part due to the graft’s design. It was, true to its name, an iile, thing. Segments of dark, matte-grey metal protected the back of its tral mass and its legs, which resembled abnormally long, cwed fingers. Its tral mass was that of lively, red tissue, with its two chambers openly visible and a head of grabbing tendrils. Several rib ses had been simply removed for the impntation, flesh and veins pushed aside with no cuts made beyond those that split her skin. The Heart Scarab squeezed through a miniscule opening, and, with unfortable sensations of flesh shifting about, ed itself around her heart. Withiy minutes, it was over, her ribs ba pd skin sealed up. Beyond the Scarab's main purpose, she now also had a yer of physical armor around her heart.

  The key series of operations came after — all at once, everything that o be doo allow her full use of the Atomica.

  This… This took time. Over five days of stant tuning auning, with Krahe itently burning thauma in various ways and attempting to skim or dive. At least a third of this time was taken up by her recovery from the backsh. Over and ain — tune, skim, backsh, recover. Tune, skim, backsh, recover. During this time, Firminus and Fidelia wasted no time, administering the flesh-transformation elixirs bit by bit, as this process wouldn’t interfere with the tuning. They, themselves, had their own struggle, as w with the Liminal Coil proved to be a hellish challenge for the two grafters — well, mainly for Firminus, who swore in multiple nguages and would have doubtlessly piled up a mountain of cigarette butts if his cigarettes didn’t just disie into the ether. The time-ing nature of w with arite was ohing, but the Liminal Coil had not been designed for this type of adjustment, meaning any ges had kno effects down the line. Gradually, painstakingly, they dialed it in.

  Akaso