[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies":3,"chapter-notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-chapter-239":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","Notes on Kraft Anomalous Studies",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2283717,4467,"Chapter 239: Solid-Liquid Transformation","notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-chapter-239",239,"\u003Cp>Inside the Xi Guo Estate mansion, a surgery with poor timing but perfect location had just been completed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The lead surgeon—or rather, the lead chisel—claimed he needed rest after the procedure, declined the evening’s discussion invitation, left the scene, left his assistant to monitor the patient’s vital signs, and slipped off to a secluded, prearranged small room.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>A cultivator stood guard at the door, barring all onlookers. Nearby, the remains of martyrs still recoverable after the attack were temporarily stored; here, however, lay a shape tightly wrapped in multiple layers of cloth, barely discernible as human.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Only a small amount of blood seeped from it; the fatal neck wound had drained away most of the life-sustaining fluids, causing death within seconds—proof that human components still made up a significant portion.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Given past precedents, several loops of rope were wound around the humanoid form, securing it firmly to a heavy solid-wood table.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>[As if afraid it might come back to life.]\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>That was their assessment—but what they didn’t know was that this exact scenario had been the assumed condition during handling.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Yet now it seemed the excessive tightness of the bindings was unnecessary, and only made unwrapping harder.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Kraft placed his hand on the tightly wrapped form, felt for a moment, confirmed no signs of movement, locked the door from within, and pulled out a scalpel he’d taken from the table.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>No other instruments were available; even this small knife was temporarily only meant for cutting ropes and cloth. Under current circumstances—with only one example—recklessly employing destructive methods was irrational, let alone the fact that this thing might need to be handed over to the Church.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He slightly lifted the wrapping and sliced down the center; the Xi Guo family’s tools were razor-sharp—the fabric parted cleanly, sliding aside to reveal the body inside, which at first glance showed no obvious abnormalities.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Judging solely by the exposed skin, one might assume the deceased was elderly; deep wrinkles, capable of hiding tiny insects, hung loosely over frail limbs.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Yet inconsistencies were apparent: the wrinkled skin bore no pigmentation spots, was not overly rough, and even by contemporary standards could be called smooth, resembling the skin of a middle-aged person with good living conditions and some weight gain.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Upon inspecting the chest and abdomen, one noticed the excessive overgrowth of skin layers, collapsing and overlapping like fish scales.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It evoked memories of extreme weight loss: reduced elastic support beneath the skin, with skin collapsing too slowly to keep pace, much like soft marine creatures drying and wrinkling.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But this manifestation was far too pronounced—it resembled a deflated ball with its valve removed, its contents rapidly and massively drained, leaving only a shriveled husk.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Self-immolation, isn’t it?” There likely wasn’t a more effective way to burn fat—if the process could be controlled, many would go mad for it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The deceased’s facial features had been utterly erased by this violent transformation; even those who knew him well would struggle to recognize his original appearance.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Yet the deep skin folds themselves might serve as evidence that subcutaneous fat had once been abundant—in other words, this might originally have been a fatty. A notable trait, given how rare fat people were these days.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Kraft cut open the left sleeve, separated the threads fused to the wound, and peeled out the limb, half-cut from the sleeve.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It was hard to call it an “arm”; it could only be described as a new thing modeled after a human arm.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The long bones appeared to have been severed midshaft, yet had not healed normally; instead, new condyles and epiphyseal plates had formed directly at the fracture ends, creating additional joints beyond the shoulder, elbow, and wrist.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>An inappropriate analogy: Kraft felt it resembled worms disguised as bones.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>This worm-like growth was uneven. The five fingers had become slender and irregular, and one could even spot a newly forming phalanx—a smooth bony protuberance near the distal end of the middle phalanx of the index finger.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The duplicated metacarpals elongated the palm, stretching the taut skin. Extra carpal bones clustered like tightly packed stones on an arch bridge, forcing the hand into a curved posture, fingers drawn inward and bunched together.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Overall, all these changes rendered the arm extremely flexible, capable of extraordinary, almost soft-bodied movements with extra bends, while still maintaining bony support.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Rather, it was a transformation—toward a direction far removed from human norms, more intricate yet harder to control.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>With the opponent’s cognitive capacity, controlling the extra joints was impossible; in combat, the limb could only be used like a whip—swinging it to strike with weapons.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>[Does he think he’s a multi-axis machine?]\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The evidence proved that hardware was one thing; the accompanying control system was entirely another.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Kraft didn’t understand the mechanism, and perhaps never would—but this trend of transformation looked strikingly familiar.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He set down the deceased’s left upper limb and lifted his right hand—the one embedded with the foreign object.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The foreign object was embedded at the center of the palm; on the back of the hand, a hollow depression remained, its healed surface coated with unknown black granules, as if something else had once been embedded there too.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Identifying the object was easy—it was as familiar as the lines on his own palm.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>When still, the object had lost its luster and resembled stone; its unsoiled surface was a dull gray-white, so bland it defied description, as if the very concept of color had been washed away.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The stone fragment occupied the center of the palm, retaining traces of artificial polishing; the rest was an irregular fracture surface, suggesting it was a small piece of a larger geometric body. Crystal-like spines grew where it met the skin. This location was problematic—it impaired most palm functions.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Kraft rolled up his own left sleeve—a habit he’d rarely followed since a certain day. As the sleeve rose, tiny fragments of stony material appeared on his pale, sun-deprived skin, their edges sprouting fine crystalline growths.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>[The same substance.]\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The difference lay in the fact that the deceased’s arm bore additional dark, nearly black veins.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In the heat of close combat, Kraft had briefly assumed these were newly formed vascular structures, perhaps to supply nutrients—but now it was clearly a mistaken assumption.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Their distribution perfectly overlapped with a portion of the superficial veins he could identify, occupying the distal end of the arm.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>After life had departed this body, they retained a full, swollen appearance, jarringly incongruous against the shrunken skin—still filled with contents, yet without any pulsation, as if they had once carried venous return flow, now congealed due to cardiac arrest.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>His fingertip reached toward the substance, then halted mid-air; instead, he lightly tapped it with the blunt back of the scalpel.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Unlike the imagined stagnated fluid of a vein, parts of the tube walls had hardened—like calcified vessels—while much of it resembled damp coarse gravel.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Kraft selected a smaller one, pried open a tiny incision with the blade’s tip. Black fluid oozed out, mixed with salt-grain-like crystalline particles of the same color.\u003C\u002Fp>",1174,"2026-06-20T02:15:56.940Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","b0729b3a4accb342c049082d2f0c23a8e9d88905370d41f2ee92704eef684b15","notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-chapter-240","notes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-chapter-238",406,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fnotes-on-kraft-anomalous-studies-cover.jpg"]