Hughes held the edge of the table corner with one hand, covered his stomach with the other, his stomach kept tumbling with food that had not been fully digested, the strong feeling of vomiting made his whole face dark, he didn't care about talking to other people at all, his cheeks were bulging high, and the corners of his mouth were flowing yellow-brown turbidity, the only thing he could do was try not to vomit out, as for the aristocratic demeanor - can you still take care of that?

Although he passed the training of knights, successfully obtained the title of knight, and mastered combat skills that were completely unimaginable to ordinary soldiers, Hughes had only practiced swords with his companions in the training ground, at most he kicked two hooligans in the city to relieve his boredom, he had never experienced a real moment of life and death, and he had never even seen a corpse up close, let alone a corpse that had died so miserably.

Carroll's pretty face also turned pale, but compared to Hughes's gaffe, she performed much better, and was able to stand calmly in front of the corpse.

"This is Hood's corpse?"

"Yes, what's your idea?" Hodge asked nonchalantly, pulling out a pair of thin-skinned gloves made of fish maw from a drawer.

Carol's eyebrows were furrowed: "Such a wound...... What the hell is going on, I've heard people say that he scratches his own broken chest, but how can he do it to himself?"

"It's incredible that he did it himself, isn't it? I didn't believe it when his body was brought to me last night, until I confirmed that the festering part of the wound was consistent with the flesh between his fingers. ”

Hodge took out the oil lamp in the corner and put it on the table: "You are asking the point, I have seen a lot of crazy people who can do something to themselves, and the most powerful one is to stab himself in the heart eighteen times without blinking, until the nineteenth knife before he swallowed his breath, just thinking about it hurts, but even so, I keep scratching my chest with my fingernails until I scratch a hole and pinch my heart to burst, I really have never heard of such a case." ”

"What do you think, Mr. Priest?" Hodge magically pulled out a sharp knife, and on closer inspection, he could see that it was the same knife that had helped him escape from the Nightmare Land eight years ago, and that Hodge had always kept it with him all these years, and that he had sharpened the blade from time to time, and that the knife could be of great use here—no longer a stab in the neck, of course.

Indeed, this is simply incomprehensible. Fink's face was as usual, he had been in contact with countless corpses in the priest's city, dissecting the flesh, organs, tissues, and bones of the corpses to understand the composition of the human body.

But he also couldn't imagine how a person could be so cruel to himself: "I can understand stabbing myself with a knife, but trying to dig open my chest with my fingernails is at least a thousand times of desperate scratching, and finally my heart is burst...... This is not in line with human behavior, even if the person goes crazy to do this, the subconscious will intervene to stop it before the damage worsens, at that time he will not be able to control his body at all, this is the innate sense of protection of human beings, but it does not take effect in this person, unless ......"

"Unless there is a stronger stimulus that renders his sanity and consciousness useless. Hodge placed the knife on the oil lamp and burned it for a moment, then turned and walked over to Hood's body, "I'm going to start the autopsy, do you want to come and see it?"

Carroll endured the discomfort, Fink was very interested, and even suggested to Hodge: "You just use this knife to dissect? It looks more like the guy cutting meat chops at the table, you should use a finer and more professional dissecting knife, and the environment here is not suitable for dissection and surgery, the air will bring diseases and invade the human body from the wound, you should-"

Before he could finish his sentence, he was interrupted impatiently by Hodge: "Do you want to say that I should be dissecting in a completely sterile laboratory in a field covered in magic? Don't be too naïve Mr. Priest, see clearly that this is a small broken village in the far north of the North, where are the dissecting knives and sterile laboratories, you think you are still in the priest's city? ”

“...... You're right, I took it for granted. ”

"Then I'll get started. ”

Hughes was spitting a cask while the guards stood in a circle around him, and in another space carved out by the screen, Fink and Carroll were silent, and the operation required absolute concentration and silence.

Hodge's hand holding the knife was very steady, and his movements were quite neat, and Fink, who was watching from the sidelines, even felt that in his eyes, the corpse had seen through the skin, such a knife that was completely unsuitable for dissection was randomly cut into the muscles by him, and the division was not bad, and he was ready to cut open the skin while ensuring that the organs and blood vessels were not damaged.

Fink was in a trance, he knew that he was not qualified to question this young man's knife method before, his understanding of the human body was completely better than his own by several levels, and he even vaguely felt that even the priest scholar who taught them anatomy in Priest City might not be able to study the human body more than Hodge.

How is it possible that a herbalist in the countryside is anatomically superior to a good priest?

After the autopsy was completed, Hodge made an observation, and then stepped sideways so that Fink and Carroll could see it clearly.

"Well, how is that possible?" Fink exclaimed.

"You found out, too. Hodge leaned against the wall and nodded slightly.

Carol looked at it for a long time, and the autopsy looked so normal, except for the heart and blood vessels that were pinched, there was no blackness or other phenomena caused by the toxins in other parts, so she was quite puzzled when she heard the conversation between the two: "What did you find? I don't think there's anything wrong, it looks quite normal." ”

"It's just that it's too normal, so it's very abnormal. Fink inhaled hard, "Look at the blood vessels that connect him to his heart. ”

In order to help Carroll identify what a blood vessel is, Fink takes the initiative to lift Hood's blood vessels.

Carol stared for a long time: "Nothing is wrong...... Right?"

"If it was a normal person with no disease and no pain, then there was nothing wrong with it at that time. "But for a madman who is constantly clutching at his chest, these blood vessels are too normal to seem to have any sign of increased blood flow, is that reasonable?" unless his nerve structures are completely necrotic, which is not the case from the results. ”

"What do you mean. Carroll vaguely understood, "There's nothing wrong with his body, but he can't react to the pain?"

"It's not a loss, it's a reaction that only has the first half. Hodge took out Hood's brain and pointed to the dense blood vessels on it, "Look, the pain does reach the brain through the terminals, but there is no process from the brain to the body, the feeling only stays in the brain nerves, this result is by no means caused by short-term pain, only when the brain is always in a state of stimulation, it is possible to destroy part of the function of the cranial nerves, is it caused by grasping?" I don't think so, long before he scratched his chest, he was already occupied by greater pain, did he think of anything, Mr. Reverend?"

Fink's face turned ugly: "But that's just a legend, this disease has never really appeared!"

Hodge pointed at Hood: "Not before, but now there is." ”

Carroll's blank gaze swirled between the two.

Fink's breathing became rapid, and he named the symptom that only existed in legends.

"Phantom pain!"