With a lurch and clanging of metal gears, the lift started its descent. The dimly-lit lobby from above soon disappeared from view; orange lights on the lift illuminated the serene expression on Stockham’s face. Essex stood next to Isaac and rested her back against the railing, her long coat rustling in the wind kicked up by the descent.

“I’ve been working down here for three weeks now,” she called out over the grinding of the gears.

While steam poured from pipes along the walls, Stockham smiled. “I suggest you get some sunlight once in a while. Remain with these mole people you call subordinates too often and you’ll lose whatever remains of your social skills.”

Essex gave a relaxed chuckle, then spoke to Isaac. “How’s the weather been up there? Lot of sunlight?”

The amused tone in her voice made it sound like she was playing some sort of game. Isaac didn’t feel comfortable letting himself relax around her, though considering he was about to see the Heart - whatever it may be - he probably couldn’t have relaxed anyway. “It was sunny today, but the past month has just been cloudy and rainy.”

“That's autumn for you,” she supposed. “How’s the time?”

“I think the sun was just starting to set when General Stockham got me at the hospital.”

“I’m not asking for the time. I’m asking for how the time is.” When Isaac gave her a confused look, she gazed upon him like he was simple. “I asked for the weather, now I’m asking for the time. How does it feel up there? Did this past month go by fast for you? Do the days feel long? There’s no sense of time when you’re below ground all day. No sense of weather, either. That’s why I’m asking for both.”

Isaac used to work as a miner, after all. So, esoteric nonsense aside, they did have that in common, at least. “Do you like working underground?”

Essex just shrugged. “I like working on what interests me. What interests me now is currently underground, so that’s where I am.”

The lift continued to plunge into the underground darkness. Chills ran through Isaac when he placed a hand on the railing. “The days seem long, but the months seem short.”

“Careful, Isaac,” Stockham warned. “Don’t fall into Essex’s trap. She’ll keep you down here, you know. Make you listen to her talk about equations and time and theoretical physics.”

“Just like our first date?”

The lift went silent. Isaac shared a glance with one of the soldiers; for a brief second, he displayed a sort of oh, shit look before returning to his usual aura of stoicness. Stockham could only chuckle and smirk as the lift reached its destination.

The soldiers immediately got to work. With the orange lights illuminating a small part of the landing, one of the guards stepped off the lift and headed towards the wall. He grasped a large lever and pulled it down; the landing flickered to life. Orange lights running up the walls illuminated a large metallic lobby, one large enough to house construction machinery and even a few trucks. Isaac felt like he was in the lair of some sort of mad genius from his science fiction serials.

Another set of giant metal doors awaited them. One of the cultivator guards opened a hatch on the adjacent wall and placed his palm inside. Red lights flickered and then raced along the metal surface of the wall, crackling and whistling, until they formed the outline of the doors. Steam hissed and gears turned as the doors opened, revealing a dark chamber.

Stockham walked calmly forward, with Essex and Isaac following behind. The guards fanned out, some pointing their rifles and superpowered hands towards the darkness in front of them, while others sprinted towards control rooms on the side of the chamber. One flicked on a light switch; through glass windows, Isaac could see an array of electronic equipment. Hidden gears grinded faster and faster while that particular clicking noise of telegrams echoed through the chamber with increasing speed. Steam engines within the walls spewed forth a layer of smoke, the red lights of Rddhi usage flashing through the fog.

The air had been cold prior to this, but now it felt entirely freezing. As Isaac stood there, goosebumps ran up his arms - but not just from the chill. In the darkness ahead, behind all the drifting smoke and within the shadows, something was there, something large and ominous. Isaac could feel it innately, a sort of heady intoxication that urged him to step forward. He resisted it, but his breathing slowed. Unseen pistons and hammers clanged, and there was a low humming, or rather, a low guttural groan from an unnatural beast. An invisible pulsation lapped at Isaac’s dantian like waves on a rocky shore, as if trying to pull his soul back out to sea with it. Whatever was there in that darkness was not of this world.

When Isaac looked up at his superiors, Stockham had a look of pure ambition on his face, while Essex displayed the cold, detached look expected of a scientist rejected from the academy one too many times for working on something forbidden. Neither seemed particularly concerned with the sense of foreboding Isaac felt.

A soldier looked from the control room for approval. With a confident nod, Stockham gave it. The soldiers began pulling more levels, and Isaac could hear their conversations drifting over towards him.

“Chromodynamic usage, stable.”

“Bodhipakkhiyadhamma readings, positive.”

“Bhavana Pattern, normal.”

“Heartbeat…regular.”

Two of the soldiers looked at each other, then pressed down on a control panel at the same time.

The darkness in front of Isaac retreated as overhead lights began to turn on. One by one, light appeared, forcing the shadows into a corner, until finally, finally, all that remained was a gigantic, heart-shaped mixture of flesh-colored tissue and gray-colored steel. Isaac took a step back at the sight. The flesh parts pulsated in a regular beat, sending out red sparks of Rddhi that were absorbed by the metal. Huge pipes rose from the ground and into the Heart, while telegram lines trailed overhead, plugged into the tissue at various parts. The entire spectacle had a subdued, antiquated quality to it; this would not be the heart of a young man.

Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

And, around the equator of the heart, there was a black band of metal. In the center, amid a solid white circle, lay the black octagon symbol with the line running diagonally through it. The Heart bore the symbol of both Project Patmos and the Sect Hidden in the Mountains.

“I see you recognize the symbol of the Sect,” Stockham surmised. The slack-jawed Isaac hadn’t realized both the general and Essex had been looking at him. The higher-ups still didn’t know about his Knyzosis Art, so he could only give an awkward nod.

Fortunately, that awkwardness was easily covered up by the supernatural sight in front of him. Stockham nodded and returned his attention to the Heart. “My men are still investigating as to why the Heart bears that symbol. My father, a Naval engineer, found the Heart on a spot along the coast following the War of Independence. Based on his research and our own analysis, the Heart had been lying there for centuries. We believe it even pre-dates the Unleashing by a little less than a century.”

“You mean…” Isaac gazed back up at the Heart. “This is over five hundred years old?”

“Prior to the Unleashing,” Stockham began. “Man fought one of his most destructive conflicts in history. It was during this time that our ancestors learned the art of atomic warfare. A group of nations attempted to conquer and enslave the world, so an even greater coalition arose to save it. That’s what we’ve gleaned from the surviving texts, anyway. But we believe the Heart is somehow related to the war. Whether physically or theoretically, the Heart was born during it.”

The Heart let out a low moan that made Isaac’s own heart skip a beat. “Is…is it alive?”

“It has the sentience of a plant,” Essex answered. “It is certainly alive and reacts to particular stimuli. But it’s not intelligent, nor does it even have the capacity to develop intelligence. It simply exists.”

So overwhelmed by the sight, only now did Isaac remember the prisoner with them. He shifted his weight from foot to foot uncomfortably at his next question. “Does the Heart need to eat to survive?”

Stockham took this question. “In that capacity, it also operates similar to a plant. However, while plants require sunlight for photosynthesis, the Heart differs in that regard. It specifically requires moonlight. As to why, that’s another mystery. It can go for long periods without moonlight, however. It has not received any moonlight in the fifty years since we constructed this holding chamber for it. We suspect that it won’t need any more for another two decades.”

A slight breeze shifted past Isaac, but it was just Essex lightly shaking the Dedericks’ documents at him. “But our friends here at Zhanghai don’t know that. Within the numbers, I found equations estimating the Heart will need to be replenished with moonlight within the next few months to keep it alive. Since Zhanghai doesn’t have the Heart, they’re operating with incomplete information. Hence, the incorrect equations.”

“Though they do know we have it,” Stockham concluded. “Try as we might, the Heart’s been down here for fifty years - at some point during these decades, information was bound to get out.” He clenched his fist. “But we’ll use that to our advantage.”

Before Isaac could ask, Stockham motioned for the prisoner. The sentry brought the blindfolded man past Stockham and towards the Heart. The flickers of Rddhi across the flesh picked up when the sentry stopped a few feet away from it.

“My predecessor in the Department neglected this chamber,” Stockham admitted. “So, when I first took over his role, we had to do some simple house cleaning. One of my men killed a rat in front of the Heart, and that’s when we discovered the purpose behind its creation.”

The prisoner struggled to free himself, but the guard held a tight grip on him. The low groans from the Heart picked up in intensity.

Isaac wasn’t sure how to feel about watching somebody get sacrificed to an abomination. But before he could step forward, Stockham put a hand on his shoulder. “This will be as painless as any other execution. And the prisoner was found guilty in the murder of four children in his northern village. It’s why we chose him for this demonstration.”

The prisoner raised his head to cry out, but a rag covered his mouth. After a nod from Stockham, the cultivator placed his hand on the back of the prisoner’s neck and activated his Rddhi. A sharp flash of lightning plunged into the man’s neck, and that was all. The prisoner slumped over, smoke rising from his head, blood pooling below his body. The cultivator stepped back and looked up at the Heart.

The groan now thundered around the chamber. Isaac took another step back. The blood, as if pulled by a magnet, began flowing towards the heart across the metal floor. Upon reaching flesh, red lights flashed at the spot of contact, and the blood was absorbed by veins along the surface of the Heart before disappearing into its interior. But that wasn’t all. A murky cloud of gray slowly floated out from beneath the man, right where his dantian would be, and began drifting toward the Heart. Tiny red dots flickered inside the cloud. They, too, were swallowed up by the Heart upon making contact with its flesh.

“Praise the Skyfather,” Isaac swore under his breath. The apple from earlier threatened to leave his stomach via his mouth, but Isaac kept it down. Stockham looked upon the Heart with wonder while Essex jotted down observations in a notepad.

“The Heart absorbs the resources of man,” Stockham said, his face illuminated in the red lights of the abomination. “While it takes on blood, we believe its main purpose is to absorb and store the soul of humans. It’s nothing more than a giant battery that can be fueled with millions of souls as a power source. However, simply killing a person in front of it with cultivation will only result in the Heart absorbing a fraction of their soul. There must’ve been a way to completely absorb it all.”

THE HEART CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO EXIST. THE HEART CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO BE REVIVED.

Isaac understood what the Dederick brothers meant a little better now. This ancient, living device was specifically designed for the consumption of human souls. The Heart was already revived. Or rather - it should not be allowed to be filled with its fuel.

“What can the battery be used for?” Isaac asked.

Stockham sighed. “Another one of the mysteries we face. We have no idea what our ancestors intended to use this for. Perhaps they only built it because they could.”

He then gestured to the documents in Essex’s hand. “But it appears our Zhanghai and Restorationist friends have found a use for it. It’s all becoming clear now. They intend to use the Heart as a power source for their weapon, which they’ve codenamed Polyphemus. The atomic material will help transfer the energy stored in the Heart into the barrel for firing.”

The Heart returned to a slower pace of beating. Stockham gazed back up at it. “Our enemies know we have the Heart, and believe they must steal it soon before it withers and dies from lack of moonlight. We’ve placed them at check, Isaac. It’s time we finish this investigation of ours once and for all.”

Isaac could only nod, but even bigger questions distracted him.

The Heart. The Mind. The Soul. My brother’s research on Project Patmos lists all three of these. And if the Heart is a literal, tangible thing…

…is there a Mind and Soul out there, too?