They passed through the citadel’s now-unguarded front entrance. Several dead ghouls lay torn and bloody outside, and there were even more within. There didn’t seem to have been any survivors, which confused Kano. Had the remaining ghouls killed themselves? Or had there been a third party who’d wiped out the stragglers after the initial fighting? The odds that the ghouls had all killed each other off during the fighting seemed far too low for that option to be worth considering.

She still didn’t understand why Werisah had gone to all the trouble of attacking the citadel. An had already been in control of it, so had it just been for the sake for kidnapping her? She was working with Werisah willingly now, but maybe she hadn’t been initially. It seemed a rather extreme way of convincing her.

If it had involved anyone else, Kano wouldn’t have believed it. But necromancers doing something this absurd seemed surprisingly plausible. They were capable of all sorts of insanity, no matter how ridiculous it may seem to a sensible person.

It wasn’t as if they had any concern for the ghouls they’d killed, that much was clear. Did they think any differently when it came to Kano or Miusvon? An certainly made it sound like she did, but lately her actions didn’t seem to reflect that. If Kano hadn’t been useful for their experiment, An probably would have happily left her to die and continued on with her work.

It was hard to imagine she really cared all that much about others, even her fellow necromancers. And yet by her own estimation, she was the best chance of salvation the world had? It was hard to believe someone who cared so little for others could do them much good. Not that the necromancers cared what Kano or anyone else thought of their plans.

Though there was little to do other than think, Kano had found little in the ways of answers. She certainly hadn’t come up with any way to help herself, and there was no Thirty-Six to rescue her from entrapment this time. But maybe that was for the best. The anger Kano had felt before was waning, and she was losing her will to fight. Did any of it even matter? She’d tried. Tried more than she could ever remember having done, but it hadn’t gotten her anywhere.

Maybe it was better that the necromancers were left to their own devices, without her interference. At least they had a plan, unlike Kano, who barely knew what she was doing at the best of times. She tried to convince herself of this, partly to make her forced inaction more bearable, but she couldn’t manage it. No matter how she tried to spin it, some part of her still wanted to destroy the necromancers.

Letting them do as they pleased was unacceptable, even if she had no way of stopping it. Kano, focused on her thoughts and with no control over her body, said nothing during the trip, and the necromancers were only slightly more talkative. They seemed in quite the hurry to get back to work. After going up yet more stairs, they finally reached An’s lab.

The door slid open, revealing the room beyond, unchanged from when Kano was last here. Miusvon was right where Kano had left her, though she didn’t seem to be bleeding anymore. Hopefully that was a sign that she was getting better. But it was hard to tell from a distance, given her closed eyes and slumped posture.

Neither of the necromancers spared Miusvon more than a glance, reaffirming Kano’s assessment of their compassion, or lack thereof. Miusvon had been An’s dedicated servant for a long time from what the natural had said, and yet her dead or dying body elicited little response from her master. It was probably because An no longer needed her, which didn’t bode well for Kano’s chances once they were done with her. Not that she’d expected anything different. How else would one treat disposable tools? And that was all the lives of others seemed to represent to the necromancers.

It was no wonder they were so dedicated to creating new life. How else would they fuel their work if the current crop ran out? The pair of black-robed figures spent a while messing around with their equipment while Kano was forced to stand there, staring straight ahead.

Eventually Kano’s body received some kind of signal, one which her mind was incapable of perceiving, and moved itself over to where they were working. A squarish piece of electronic equipment was mounted on a mechanical arm attached to the wall opposite from Kano.

“Good. Now just stay there for a bit,” An said, as if Kano had any choice in the matter. The necromancer moved behind the machine in front of Kano and tinkered with it for a while. Then An went over to her colleague and said, “Can you let her speak? I need to ask her a few questions.”

He nodded, and Kano regained the ability to talk.

“What is it now?” she said, rather unamused by recent events.

“I’ve been running a few tests on your new body, and I was wondering how you were feeling,” An replied, walking back over to her.

“How I’m feeling?” The question was so ridiculous that it took Kano completely by surprise. Since when did they care about how she was feeling? She realized a moment later that this must have something to do with their work, rather than any concern for her well-being. “Pissed off, mostly. But I’m also tired and hungry.”

“That’s not quite what I meant. How does your new body feel? Is there anything that feels strange or different about it?”

“I’m not sure,” Kano said in a deadpan tone. “It’s hard to tell without actually being in control of it. That part definitely feels different, in case you were wondering.”

An pressed her lips together in a mildly perturbed expression and cleared her throat. “This will be a lot easier for all of us if you just cooperate.”

“I’m sure it’d be a lot easier for you two.” It was going to be difficult for her either way.

An went back over to Werisah and whispered, “Is there anything you can do to make her more helpful?” Presumably she hadn’t wanted Kano to hear what she was saying, but if so, she’d underestimated the natural’s hearing.

“Not really,” Werisah said in the same hushed tone. “The control I have is fairly rudimentary, insufficient for more complex tasks such as interrogation. It’s hard enough to force them to speak in an intelligible matter at all.”

Overhearing their conversation gave Kano a little bit of hope. Perhaps she still had a modicum of leverage over them. She was still a valuable test subject as far as she could tell. An came back as if nothing had happened, and Kano decided it was better to pretend she hadn’t heard them.

“Why do you need to know how I’m feeling, anyway?” Kano asked. “I doubt you suddenly developed some concern about my current condition.” She tried to make her second sentence sound as accusatory as possible.

An had the grace to look ashamed, though Kano doubted it counted for much. Probably little more than a reflexive twinge of conscience rather than indicative of any real remorse. “This is the first real test of our current method. I’m just trying to make sure we don’t run into any nasty surprises. I’m trying to ensure your well-being as well, you know. It’s in all of our best interests that nothing bad happens to you.”

She said that, but clearly they had very different ideas of what “nothing bad” happening to Kano meant. Having her free will stripped away wasn’t considered something bad? Things had to be extremely messed up if that were the case. But maybe from An’s point of view, she was little different from a ghoul, at least in terms of deserving autonomy.

It was astounding that they could be so blind. How could anyone ever think Kano was anything like a ghoul? She’d even spoken at length with An, but it didn’t seem like she’d made much of an impression. Was it because she’d disagreed with what she was doing? That didn’t really explain it, given that she seemed to have discarded Miusvon, who’d been greatly in favor of An’s goals. Kano had probably been right the first time, and even naturals were the same as ghouls to them.

“Well?” An prompted after they’d stared at each other for a while. “What’s it going to be? I’m trying to make this easy for you, but I can’t afford to spend much more time on this.”

“Fine, I’ll help.” There wasn’t much point in resisting at this stage. She’d only end up losing her speaking privileges. She’d be better off waiting for an opportunity when her opposition actually achieved something. Assuming something like that came to pass, which didn’t seem too likely at this stage. Still, there wasn’t much else for Kano hold out for. That hypothetical situation might be the best chance she’d get to impact the world of her own volition.

“Thank you. Now then, do you feel any different from before your change?”

“Physically? Not really. Definitely nothing bad. If anything, I feel refreshed and energetic.” Much as she hated to admit it, whatever the necromancers had done to her was working great so far. Her body was in the best condition she could remember. Though that wasn’t saying all that much given that she’d been in a bit of a death spiral.

“Excellent,” An said, smiling. “I’m glad to hear that you’re doing well. Please let me know if anything goes wrong. The sooner you tell me, the sooner I can fix it. Okay?”

“Sure.”

An made a few notes and went back to her work adjusting the equipment. It seemed like whatever their next step was, it had significantly different requirements to An’s prior work, which seemed reasonable. They were entering a new phase, after all. Kano watched them work, wondering what she was doing to do.

It didn’t seem like she was going to implode just yet, so she had to come up with some sort of plan before that happened. Even if she probably wouldn’t get a chance to use it, it would give her something to occupy her thoughts. And maybe there was some way she could free herself. If there was, it couldn’t come soon enough. She was getting awfully tired of trudging after the necromancers, alternating between wracking her brain as she tried to discern what they were thinking and lamenting their insanity.