Otherworld Advance Team
Chapter 952 - 945: Magic Shock

Chapter 952: Chapter 945: Magic Shock

"Are we really going to do this?" Axia frowned, asking with disgust on her face.

"Surprisingly, you folks from the Elf Race still hold quite a taboo against this," Cheng Ziang seemed rather calm, even making a joke with her.

"Everyone fears death..." Axia said flatly, and then she closed her mouth and stayed quiet, even lowering her breathing rate to avoid inhaling anything inauspicious.

Cheng Ziang pulled out a dagger and began examining the corpse. His first check was for rigor mortis. After pondering, he said, "The rigor mortis has softened a bit, but it’s still pretty stiff. Considering the temperature here, I estimate the time of death to be around two days ago."

"So, the day before we arrived here?" Luo’er asked, furrowing his brows.

"Yeah, roughly," Cheng Ziang nodded in confirmation.

Next, he used the dagger to cut open the corpse’s clothing to check for livor mortis: "The lividity is mainly settled in the lower part, with a purplish-red hue. It doesn’t look like death was due to frostbite..."

Then he leaned over the corpse’s face and made a gesture that disgusted Axia. He moved close to the nostrils and mouth of the corpse, then gently fanned towards his nose. Axia, with a frown, couldn’t help but ask with contempt, "What are you doing?"

"Checking if the target was poisoned..." Cheng Ziang laughed and said.

"What’s there to check, he was killed by a ghost," Axia said, looking baffled.

"The difference between science and superstition lies in the correct verification procedures. Common sense might lie, and experience can often be deadly. Only through meticulous analysis can we deduce the essence of the matter," Cheng Ziang said, looking down as he carefully checked once more.

"Who taught you that?" Axia couldn’t help asking.

"Dialectical method," Cheng Ziang replied with a shrug.

"Ziang always seems to take a strange interest in some things," Luo’er said with a smile, trying to ease the awkward and eerie atmosphere inside the tent.

"Takes one to know one, don’t you think?" Cheng Ziang said as he bent over and continued his careful inspection, making a playful remark.

"Do I?" Luo’er blinked and asked.

"You know it in your heart," Cheng Ziang said while reaching to check the corpse’s bulging eyes. He immediately found something amiss, "There are traces of bleeding in the lens of the eyes. Given that the eyeballs have frozen, I assume it happened before death."

"Could the bleeding in the eyes be due to excessive fright?" Luo’er asked.

"I don’t really understand; after all, I am not a professional forensic analyst," Cheng Ziang shrugged, then said, "But judging from the condition of the corpses, it seems unlikely. Scaring someone to death is quite difficult unless the person already had a health condition. However, there are two individuals here, with the same manner of death. You can’t say they both had a health condition."

"So, what exactly caused their deaths?" Luo’er asked, his head lowered and brow furrowed, lost in thought.

In fact, Luo’er didn’t believe that these two people were killed by a ghost, because he fundamentally didn’t want to believe in such things. He was more inclined to think that the two had been scared to death.

Cheng Ziang used the dagger to rip open the clothing under the rib cage of the corpse and once again found something unusual, "There’s extensive punctate subcutaneous bleeding under the left ribs of the corpse, which probably isn’t due to a disease..."

"Then what do you think it could be?" Luo’er asked.

Cheng Ziang glanced at him, then turned to look at Axia, shaking his head as he said, "Based on all the evidence thus far, it all points to one cause, and that is Magic Power Erosion. An excessive influx of magic can cause a person’s capillaries to burst, leading to serious subcutaneous hemorrhaging. Excessive magic can also cause severe internal bleeding, but in the current situation, we don’t have the opportunity to perform an autopsy for verification, we can only analyze based on some of the conditions of the corpse’s exterior."

"You mean to say, these individuals all died from Magic Power Erosion, but why do they exhibit such terrified expressions?" Luo’er couldn’t help but fall into deep thought.

"Perhaps they truly saw something they shouldn’t have, which is why they were scared to such an extent," Cheng Ziang said, lowering his head to glance at the corpse’s wide eyes and exaggerated mouth, shaking his head in a moment of reflection.

"I’ve been saying all along that these people were killed by ghosts, but you just wouldn’t believe me," Axia turned her head, complainingly speaking.

"The results obtained from an on-site investigation are much more accurate than rumors and hearsay," Cheng Ziang said, shrugging his shoulders.

"You don’t believe me?" Axia stared at him, asking.

"You haven’t seen this ghost either, have you?" Cheng Ziang faced her fearlessly, asking with a smile.

"But, but I’ve heard about it," Axia stammered in response to Cheng Ziang’s gaze, shifting her eyes away nervously, then stuttered out her reply.

"So you see, hearing is deceptive while seeing is believing, Aunt Axia, you still have much to learn in this regard. Don’t mistake superstitions for truth," Cheng Ziang said, narrowing his eyes.

"How did you determine that he might have died from Magic Power Erosion?" Luo’er asked curiously.

"Because of this," Cheng Ziang pointed at the subcutaneous hematoma on the corpse’s ribs, and then looked at Luo’er, "These symptoms once appeared on you as well, at that time, your condition was very poor, and you had withstood a magic attack."

"Eh..." Luo’er stood in shock, not having realized his body had once displayed these symptoms.

"The moment excessive magic strikes the human body, it tears through the body’s meridians, while simultaneously compressing blood vessels, leading to severe subcutaneous hemorrhaging. Generally, magic flows through all the meridians in the human body, causing widespread subcutaneous bleeding. However, the first point of contact with the magic bears the brunt of the damage, hence the symptoms there are much more pronounced."

As Cheng Ziang spoke, he took a dagger in hand and ripped open the clothes below the corpse’s right rib where a large area of pinpoint hematomas had also appeared. He pointed to it, explaining to the two others, "Look, high concentrations of magic entered or exited his body here. This magic passed through his body, bursting his meridians, and exited out the other side, thus causing widespread pinpoint hematomas on both sides."

"Simply using magic as a method of attack?" Luo’er mused.

"I think that should be the case, there are no obvious traces of Magic Formulas on the body, such as scorch marks from fire magic or frost marks from ice magic. It must have been a simple high concentration of magic intake, which then resulted in Magic Power Erosion," Cheng Ziang analyzed.

In reality, the primary damage from Magic Power Erosion was to the internal organs, with damage to the meridians being secondary. A person would not immediately die even if their body’s meridians were burst by magic; after recuperation, they could return to a certain state, at the cost of being forever unable to use magic.

However, once Magic Power Erosion affected a person’s organs, that was when it became most fatal. Excessive magic could lead to organ failure, and once organ failure occurred, the only thing waiting for that person was death.

Thus, most victims of Magic Power Erosion eventually died of organ failure, including soldiers from the multinational forces of the United Nations, as well as Luo’er’s father, Luo Chuan.

The denizens of the Otherworld are born into an environment filled with magic, so from the day their bodies start developing, they constantly adapt to magic. In principle, unless one is a Mage, most cases of Magic Power Erosion that do not affect the organs can be healed, although they might leave lingering side effects. As long as one does not use magic or get struck by magic, there shouldn’t be any problems.

The reason Feng could withstand an overload of magic without succumbing to erosion was mainly due to the organ within her that could store magic, the Dantian. This Dantian absorbed and stored most of the excess magic, ensuring other organs would not succumb to erosion and fail.

At the same time, Feng’s bodily meridians were thicker than those of regular Otherworld denizens and also more concentrated, which allowed her to endure a higher intensity of magical input without suffering damage. Even if magic did burst her meridians, they would repair themselves in the shortest time possible, ensuring the body could operate magic normally.

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