Chapter 8: Possession

  As he let out a sigh of relief, Mr. Magician watched as the sprit flew into the ethereal walls time and time again.

  His worsening anxiety made him turn around and look behind him, even though the pendant didn’t move.

  After seeing absolutely nothing behind him, Mr. Magician turned to look at the spirit he had trapped… There should be more.

  After picking up the glass vial on the floor, with careful steps, he walked past the spirit he had trapped and was careful not touch neither the triangle on the floor nor the spiritual barrier.

  The pendant continued to follow the spirit trapped in the spiritual barrier as he walked towards another part of the house. As he was walking, he noticed an opening in the wall to his right, the stairs leading to the first floor was before him.

  He hesitated to walk down, but ultimately chose to continue his search for spirits on the second floor… If they haven’t already reached the second floor, then they are probably preoccupied with the first floor. Maybe, they gave up on me.

  Mr. Magician stagger and touched his temple. A depressing thought followed by a weak headache pestered him.

  After a minute passed, his headache subsided, and he decided to continue to venture further into the house. After noticing a half open door, the pendant in his hand suddenly turned towards it, no longer focusing on the spirit behind him.

  As if someone held him by the throat, Mr. Magician’s breathing stopped for a moment. He peered into the room with his levitating pendant in hand.

  Through the crystal monocle on the pendant, he saw three clouds swirling around the room. Unbeknownst to him, a battle had occurred inside the room. A battle between spirits and humans.

  Mr. Magician noticed charred human corpses on the floor. At first, he didn’t believe his eyes but after inspecting the corpses from a distance, he had no choice but to believe the scene before him… Are they the cultist that Captain spoke about?

  The cultists were missing body parts, some missed fingers, other missed a whole arm or leg.

  Mr. Magician noticed the smell of charred corpses fill his nostrils. He started salivating… I’m hungry, I haven’t eaten for days.

  Mr. Magician shook his head violently with a surprised expression and correct his previous thoughts… Wait no, I ate two hours ago!

  Mr. Magician turned off his thoughts and turned his attention back to the charred meat on the floor.

  After looking at the seared meat on the floor for one last time, he turned his gaze towards the spirits chasing each other.

  One spirit was caught in the between the two other spirits’ standoff, its colour was white with specks of black that moved around in circles at random.

  The two other spirits had different shades of red moving within them… Do the colours mean something?

  After the white spirit had noticed its predicament, it started shaking in a pitiful manner. It had managed to escape being absorbed into either one of the two red spirits but now it was trapped with no way out.

  As if looking for a miracle, the spirit sensed something outside of the room. The black spots within the spirit started moving in a picturesque manner and the spirit turned into a stream of light heading out of the room.

  Mr. Magician noticed the change in the spirit and clasped his dagger even tighter than before. The spirit moved towards him and entered his monocle.

  A radiant light emitted from the pendant as Mr. Magician fell backwards in fright while letting go of the pendant.

  Holding back his reflexive cuss, Mr. Magician stood up in a hurry, closed the door in front of him and quickly sealed the door with a spiritual barrier by cutting along its shape with his ceremonial dagger.

  A rather terrified expression appeared on his face. He looked around in absolute horror. Through the monocle levitating in front of his eye, he saw no other spirits other than the one he had trapped before.

  After letting out a sigh of relief, Mr. Magician was suddenly startled by a loud noise coming from the door next to him.

  The spirits started flying into the door in an attempt to get to the other side, unfortunately it was sealed with spirituality… Those things can’t get out, right?

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  A chill suddenly ran down his spine as Mr. Magician turned around. Footsteps coming from the stairs could be heard creeping ever closer.

  Emerging from the stairs was the captain with his whole team in toe. Mr. Magician let out a sigh of relief as the captain looked over in his direction.

  “Hmm? Newby, you alive?”

  The captain whispered towards him… Why didn’t he ask if I was hurt? Did he expect me to die or is it simply normal for them to meet walking corpses that can answer a question?

  Mr. Magician jested in his thoughts. He shook his head and answered quietly in a whisper.

  “I’m alive…”

  “Good, what happened?”

  As Ms. Snow noticed that her pendant moved towards her left, Mr. Magician started recounting what had happened after he was separated from the group.

  Ms. Snow inspected the trapped spirit while listening. Mr. Specter was the first one to speak after Mr. Magician was done talking.

  “Captain, how many spirits are left?”

  “Subtracting the ones we exorcized, four. Except from the spirit that disappeared from Mr. Magician’s sight inside the room, every spirit has been either exorcized or trapped. I think we should…”

  Ms. Snow turned around as she listened to her captain. She was about to give a thumbs up to her outstanding junior that had managed to trap three spirits when she noticed something odd.

  “I think I know where the last spirit is…”

  Everyone turned their heads to look at the brunet holding a pendant. Her pendant was still pointing towards the spirit trapped inside the spiritual barrier.

  Everyone first assumed that it was behind her, but most noticed that something was off with their assumption.

  Ms. Snow was a rather experienced mystic compared to her low number of characteristics. Everyone, except the new guy, knew that she would never turn her back to a spirit that wasn’t trapped.

  Ms. Snow pointed her right index finger at the young man in a short purple cape and said in a whisper.

  “His pendant.”

  Everyone turned their heads to look at Mr. Magician. They saw a noble looking young man, with styled black hair and a black and purple outfit adorned with silver.

  He held a silver dagger in his right hand and had a monocle with a chain adorning his face.

  “Zephyr!”

  Mr. Rouge shouted to the tallest man in his team. Zephyr stretched out his hand and brought it back with force.

  A strong wind enveloped Mr. Magician, similar to the wind that brought him to the second floor. He lifted from the ground and was drawn towards the group of mystics.

  Mr. Rouge stretched his hand out and just as Mr. Magician’s face was about to hit Rouge’s hand, he stopped in place. A light coming from the captain’s hand blinded Mr. Magician. The light shone bright until it suddenly disappeared. Mr. Rouge sighed in relief.

  “It’s an artifact.”

  The muscular captain let out another sigh of relief. Rouge said an unfamiliar term for the newest mystic of the group.

  “What is an artifact?”

  Mr. Magician asked a question and then noticed Ms. Snow taking a couple of steps forward before explaining in a normal conversation volume.

  “An artifact is an item that has a spirit characteristic. The white spirit that disappeared probably entered into the pendant and integrated with it. By instinct it probably thought that it was better to become an item than to be absorbed by the other spirits.”

  “I see.”

  “You could say that the spirit possessed the pendant.”

  A woman with shoulder length black hair spoke up. She was dressed in a black suit with a black tie.

  She was one of the two that had come from the second floor when the group first stepped into the house. Mr. Rouge looked at the woman with black hair and issued instructions.

  “Ms. Astral, take the new kid outside, Olivia should be back by now. Get on the carriage and return to the detective agency. The rest of us will return after exorcizing the spirits and talking with the Sleepless.”

  “Understood!”

  The short haired woman in black suit turned to look at Magician. She scoffed before speaking.

  “Follow me.”

  “Yes!”

  Mr. Magician’s anxiety didn’t subside until he had finally left the house. Outside, waiting on the carriage was Olivia. She looked at the two mystics approaching the carriage and waved her hand.

  “You done?”

  “Not yet…”

  Ms. Astral gave instructions to Olivia. After confirming the instructions, Olivia told the two mystics to get on. After sitting down in the carriage, Ms. Astral crossed her legs and looked at her junior.

  Feeling a bit uncomfortable, Mr. Magician decided to ignore her gaze for now… Why is she looking at me like that?

  After tilting her head, Ms. Astral stood up and approached Mr. Magician. Startled, he pushed himself further into the seat.

  “You shouldn’t carry it on your face for too long. While it probably doesn't pose a threat, you can never be too careful.”

  Ms. Astral grabbed the monocle on Mr. Magician’s face. After taking it off, she wrapped it around his neck. Because the pendant’s chain is too long, she wrapped it twice.

  During this whole process, Mr. Magician looked down Ms. Astral’s shirt collar. A tiny bit of sweat ran down her white supple neck. Magician was reminded of the seared meat on the second floor… Why am I so hungry? What if-.

  Mr. Magician stopped himself from thinking any further. The words that were about to appear in his mind terrified him… What was I just about to think? Take a bite?

  He started to get worried. Something was wrong with him, he knew it but didn’t understand. Ms. Astral had watched his reaction as she wrapped the pendent around his neck.

  “Perverted brat.”

  “Huh?!”

  Mr. Magician was caught off guard. The beautiful woman in front of him just scorned him… She noticed that I was looking!

  Magician was about to say something but was interrupted by Ms. Astral’ sigh and words.

  “Keep yourself under control, I am not one to… humour a child.”

  A quiet and awkward carriage ride awaited Magician. Olivia was blissfully unaware of what was going on in the carriage as she was the driver sitting outside.

  …

  After drifting for an unknown amount of time, the reminiscing man smiled as he spoke.

  “I miss those days. Ms. Astral wanted to see the new guy blush didn’t she.”

  The man couldn’t help but make a wish as he remembered the stout woman that teased him when they first met.

  “I wish she was here to tease me again.”

  The expressionless man showed the slightest hint of emotion. Something he haven’t done in years. He tried to change the subject… Now that I think about it, wasn’t that around the time I first had a slight problem with my desires?

  Not like my desires bother me now, they disappear when one becomes a god. But I almost miss when she used to force-feed me.