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Vampyr Autopsy - Printable Version

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Vampyr Autopsy - Velameestra Windrunner - 07-18-2020

Trigger Warning: There is some description about dissecting a cadaver in here.

Serendipitous.

It was a term that had been relevant multiple times since her arrival in Northrend. “Happy accidents,” while not the penultimate purveyor of her discoveries, still played an important part in some of the breakthroughs that were already packed into Velameestra’s unexpected sabbatical.

The walls of the study that had become her temporary quarters were littered with diagrams and notes that had materialized in increasing numbers since her arrival. While she was far from a true artist, an obsessive attention to detail, a practiced hand, and clever use of illusion magic had allowed her to create accurate, traced replicas of what bits and pieces of vampyric physiology she had managed to decipher--with no small thanks to Alleria’s aid and certain specialized magics.

But it was incomplete data, and she had assumed it would remain as such for the time being.

Until the body of a fallen Blood Knight had returned in the wake of one of the more recent expeditions.

His name was Sangrias Stillblade. The gashes on his upper torso and throat were evidence enough of what fate had befallen the unfortunate elf during his trek into the wilder parts of Northrend.

“...troth wux de wer sone di sulta [...protect you from the consumption of the end],” Vel spoke the final incantations of the gentle repose ritual she was casting over the body, the sharp words of the draconic languages fading into silence. The glow in her eyes seemed to seep beneath her skin, tracing its way down the tattoos on her left arm before dispersing from her outstretched hand to spread across the lifeless corpse and fade into its flesh.

A satisfied “hmph” sounded in the back of the elf’s throat as she pushed her hair back to tie it into a small half ponytail.

“My apologies for this, Ser Stillblade,” she offered as she bent over the body and started to carefully assess the more severe damage that had been left by the wounds. Some of them displayed the tell-tale signs of the vampyric regeneration that she had observed Alleria and the others were capable of, though it had clearly not been enough to keep up with the trauma he had taken. “But… I do hope you’ll be able to understand the merits of it.”

The lower half of her face disappeared beneath a cloth mask she had fashioned from some scraps of fabric as her slender fingers closed around the handle of a nearby scalpel.

----


The table that had become her workspace was far cleaner than one would expect from the grisly work Vel was doing. Fragments of ribs--carefully broken as they were--were laid out in the proper order next to Sangrias’s body, their surfaces white and devoid of blood. The body’s chest was bare, bisected by a precise incision that allowed the arcanist access to his internal organs, though his lower half had remained mostly covered, and his face untouched beyond some less intrusive examinations of the structure of his mouth. In fact, his features almost looked more put together than they should have been, his expression one of restful peace instead of pain, and his brown hair brushed cleanly from his face instead of disheveled and messy from the battle that had claimed him and the travel that had brought him back to his people.

Velameestra herself also lacked much evidence of her work. It was almost subconscious--a snap of her fingers at random intervals, a flare of arcane energy, and whatever gore had been smeared on her hands or the table vanished as if it was never there. As had become customary, she was dressed in what minimal clothing she could manage with the cooler temperatures of the arctic continent. Her shirt was sleeveless, and her arms mostly bare, though the patchwork of bites and deep scratches that littered her right arm had been carefully protected by layers of soft, dark bandages.

“It would seem the adaptations run much deeper than I initially thought,” the elf mused. “You were much less an animated corpse and more a uniquely adapted entity. Vampyrs seem to blur the lines of what could really be considered dead… which is… not the most tactful way of phrasing things, I suppose.”

Her head tilted with curiosity as she delicately prodded at the exposed lungs. Even limp and unused as they were, they were much smaller than what could be observed of an average humanoid’s. They seemed to have shriveled, becoming little more than vestigial reminders of the organ in order to create adequate space for the other adaptations that were more necessary. Vampyrs didn’t need to breathe, after all, but in typical undead their biology didn’t mutate to account for it. The internal systems just… ceased operating.

The elf chewed on her lower lip, and another incantation streamed from her lips as her fingers flowed into the appropriate gestures to summon the illusion she desired. On cue, an elven man materialized, his legs partially spread and his arms held out to his sides. He was absent of any clothing, his head shaved, and his features generic and simultaneously reminiscent of everyone and no one. Vel twisted her fingers again, and his pale skin and the underlying musculature became translucent, leaving little more than a vague, flickering outline of his form over the network of arteries, bones, and organs that she had conjured. The illusory lungs that were nestled beneath his rib cage shrank before her eyes, more accurately matching the pair in Sangrias’s chest.

“Hmph. Still connections to the larynx and trachea remain unchanged,” she continued to herself as she went back to leaning over the fallen blood knight. “But overall surface area has been reduced. The lungs are only large enough to allow speech to function. I suppose that’s all they’re now needed for. The heart meanwhile…”

The woman’s eyes narrowed as she grabbed the scalpel again and carefully pulled one of the lungs aside, her gaze scanning the heart’s surface. Her lips twitched into a perplexed frown.

It was larger than she expected now that the lung had been moved aside, and while the expected veins and arteries were still present, others seemed to lace from the surface of the muscle and intertwine with structures that were not part of a conventional circulatory system.

“...strange,” Vel mused as she honed in on one of the arteries that she didn’t recognize, and continued to carefully cut and pull as she followed the artery to its termination point.

It was intricate work, the elf’s attention now fully enraptured as she buried her hands further into Sangrias’s abdomen, until after several long moments, she stopped, and her brow furrowed--perplexed.

“...that’s the liver.”

Sure enough, the artery terminated at the deep red organ that was supposed to be part of the digestive system.

She sighed.

“...Seems I’m getting to know you more than I expected,” Vel muttered, before she brought her scalpel forward to start a delicate incision.

Blood immediately seeped up from beneath the blade, causing the elf to curse beneath her breath as she grabbed a nearby rag to soak up the excess fluid. She put the scalpel aside, a snap of her fingers cleansing the tool of blood, and gently pulled the incision open.

More blood spilled forth, bathing her hands in a deep crimson and forcing the mage to forgo the rag in favor of her magic as she pulled back to assess.

“...I think it’s storage…” she said finally, to no one in particular. “A digestive system is no longer needed… so it just got assimilated into the circulatory system. One which… only operates when necessary.”

She leaned her weight back on her foot, a snap of her fingers cleansing her hands of gore before she rested one of them on her chin in thought.

The process of creating a vampyr is far from conventional necromancy. Mutations happen, but it’s nowhere near the complexity of this. It completely restructured the existing anatomy for efficiency while leaving the template intact.

Vel’s eyes snapped back to the illusion, and several more layers became translucent, leaving only the circulatory system showing its full colors.

“When blood is consumed, it still enters the stomach, but the stomach is also likely now part of the circulatory system…”

She moved back to Sangrias, this time following the line of the esophagus down to the stomach. Sure enough, her fingers found veins and arteries that had no reason to be present. Ones that had been overlooked in her examinations of Alleria due to the multi-layered nature of the identify vitals spell.

“The entire body is sustained by a single system operated by a heart that only beats when necessary. The necromantic magics involved in this process have completely rewritten how a mortal body operates, and it completes such a metamorphosis in less than 24 hours.”

Vel couldn’t keep the shreds of excitement from creeping into the edges of her voice as she once more snapped her fingers to rid her hands of gore and turned again to her illusion. She flitted about it like an eager child, fine-tuning the image to more accurately reflect her findings before returning to her cadaver’s side with unrelenting curiosity.

They’re different. Clearly.

The thought materialized in the back of her mind, causing Vel to glance back to the blood knight’s resting face. Were it not for the tips of his fangs visible behind his partially open lips, he would have been indistinguishable from any other quel’dorei.

The metamorphosis isn’t kind, for as many of the strengths Kael is trying to focus on.

But they’re mostly physical.

Look at how different we are now from our ancestors. It doesn’t give us any less right to exist.

A faint smirk touched the edges of her dark lips.

Like a caterpillar into a moth.