Mirage Garden P2: Mirage of death

After the Mirage Garden had changed it's surroundings for Koku to more or less relax while he waited for thr girls to finish, it was revealed to Koku that the girls were next to him and that although their bodies were there, their souls or consciousness weren't.

"I wonder how long they'll take, or if they'll gain anything from this…", Koku wondered as he sat down on the grass and simply looked at the wonderful garden sight with rivers, trees, flowers and many things on one side and on another he'd see a waterfall with lilies and some strange flowers he hadn't ever seen in any books, "This looks so pretty…" Koku thought as he'd drift off into a nap.

Meanwhile Koku took a nap being in a safe place, Kurai was within a test of her own. Right in front of her stood a hooded figure, the jet black wings protruding from it's back gave it the image of a fallen angel, but there we're clear differences. For example, this individual reeked of death and had a dark feel to it's aura; that paired with it's hood and black boney scythe. 

"M-mister whats your name?", Kurai asked feeling very intimidated. After a few seconds of silence the hooded being moved it's hand slowly pointing at something right in front of her on the ground. When she looked at whatever it was, she could see that it was a dark red orb with three shades of red swirling into the middle. "I-it's light red, dark red and crimson red…", she looked at it not knowing what to do since the hooded individual hadn't spoken and was just facing her direction still not saying anything. "Ummmm…do i use this?", Kurai asked very hesitantly while knowing she had to use it, yet seeked to know what to do with it specifically. 

Upon hearing her question the hooded individual pointed to her mouth, and that's when she understood what it had wanted her to do with the red orb. "I-i have to eat this?", she thought to herself panicking, "I can't eat this…it wouldn't even fit to begin with, i-it's like an apple sized orb..", she thought to herself even more as she now held it right in front of her mouth.

"Ummm… h-here goes i guess", Kurai pouted as she gave up thinking about it and placed it as best as she could into her mouth. The moment she did so, the orb shrunk into the size of a grape and began to emit a foul scent which carried some sort of effects along side the consumption of the orb itself. 

Though the effects weren't known to be good or bad to Kurai so she naturally assumed they were bad since her stomach began to feel as if it was twisting itself and she even fell onto the ground holding her stomach as she fought the urge to puke. 

For several minutes Kurai struggled until she felt the effects slowly dissipate and evetually disappear entirely. "What was that?", Kurai muttered slowly getting up off the floor feeling horrible. After getting off the floor, she could see the environment begin to change. This and she felt her body feel different, it's as if something was purified within her body. Seconds after seeing the change she could see that the hooded being wasn't there anymore…that and she couldn't feel it's presence of death anymore too. 

While all of this happened, Koku had been napping and was woken up by the void writing a message in the Void space. "Reaper's vessel. Aquired through Void seed", When Koku had read that from the Void space, he was confused as to how he got that by literally doing nothing. "What? where'd i even get this from? i haven't even seen a reaper", Koku questioned until he looked over at the girls and noticed something different with Kurai. "Her body, it's…", Koku then tried activating his Mystic eyes and upon doing so, he could see what it had been. 

Once he was able to read the formula of things within her, he was able to figure out what he problem with her necromancy, "She's ill because of…poison manipulation?", Once Koku understood that, he began thinking since she hadn't yet unlocked it and his eyes didn't show how to unlock that ability. "Wait…but she's not ill anymore?", Koku read a little more and simply found that something had purified her body from all sorts of bad things.

This is when the lost codex began to do it's thing once again. Feeling it, Koku pulled it out as soon as he could reach into his pouch. Once he did this, he began reading through the pages. 

"Reaper's vessel: Increases necromancy control by 666% and increases the output of dark attributes including power by 666%. Further adds immunity to instant death abilities for the user and the ones labled as their companions. This also increases the user's defense (Not immunity) against dark/demonic attribute attacks/effects by 666%. (Plus a 666% dark/necromancy magic cast speed boost which is unique only to the one who houses the reaper)

(Passive) Reapers guidance: The reaper which has no gender is adjusted according to the gender of the vessel and is then adapted for compatibility by making itself the same gender as the host, which then allows the reaper telepathy for communication with the host for any sort of guidance despite not having a voice.

(Passive) Death binding: Whatever gets killed by the user only, becomes abousltly loyal and cannot be force controlled by anything. This also increases the power of the things the user kills by 150%."

After reading this, Koku sighed and looked at Kurai once again…"First Yoru has amazing potential, and now her sister…", Koku slapped his forhead thinking everyone who's close to him is going to become really strong soon, maybe even stronger than him if he falls behind. Since Koku had thought the information was going to end there, he was about to close the lost codex, but then it glew up slightly. "There's more?", Koku wondered as he flipped to the page after Reapers vessel ended; and as he flipped to the next page, he'd seen the title of the page's name, "Void seed?", Koku asked confused as he began looking through the pages trying to read everything about this so called Void seed. 

As Koku read through the pages, he started reviewing the information in his head. "So this thing called Void seed isn't something i can see and it's something that the void imprints onto their souls to mark them as allies of the Void and myself, therefore protecting them from any Void phenomenon like disasters caused by the Void…and it grants them a slightly small bit of power while increasing their potential to safe levels for them to grow on their own all while granting me any outer source powers they obtain via becoming one with them. Hmmmmm…this actually seems really useful for not only me, but for them…", Koku muttered as he'd see both girls still there as if they'd been sleep walking (Just without the walking). 

While Koku did his own thing, Kurai had felt the pain from a little bit completely gone. Though just because her pain was gone did not by any chance mean, that her troubles were gone. A few seconds after looking around her surroundings the environment began to change into a sort of dark castle hallway with dimly lit green fire on the tourches. "Where am i now?", Kurai wondered as she had began to walk through the castle hallways.

After 5 minutes of this, Kurai found herself in a hallway that seemed very weird to her; it's as if it emitted the sense of dark magic. While thinking this, her eyes became fixed on the ground when a boney hand poked out of the hallway floor; right after this whatever it was began to claw it's way out of the ground and seconds after beginning this, it was revealed to be a skeleton. 

When she'd seen this skeleton, she heard something behind herself so she ducked and turned around seeing another skeleton swinging a sword at the spot where her head used to be. "!!!", Kurai upon seeing this, rushed passed it back into the hall she was before reaching this one and closed the heavy rotten wood door, and began to summon a skeleton of her own. 

While she summoned her own skeleton, she noticed the door get damaged as the skeletons on the other side which could number anywhere from 2-30 began to attack at the door with dull swords, axes, hammers and even some with scythes. These skeletons were basic skeletons which meant they really weren't all that strong in terms of fighting, but against a Necromancer who isn't able to use magic nor necromancy really well, that prove be lethal. 

Right after finishing the summoning cast which she had felt was abnormally fast, she summoned a skeleton. But when she had seen the skeleton, for some reason the skeleton wore a heavy knight style armor with a dull sword and a worn-out shield. she had been confused but relieved because of this.

But as to why she was confused, that was because she had been able to summon only basic low tier skeletons, but as far as she knew, she had just summoned the highest ranking skeleton amongst the weakest skeleton types…the skeleton knight (which has no magic and very minimal intelligence). 

The skeleons that were attacking on the other side of the door were the lowest of the lowest types, the basic skeletons, and now that she had the Knight skeleton, she felt as if she could maybe beat the 2 skeletons on the other side, though she also knew by the sound of the hits, that there were more than 2 at this point.

After a few seconds, the door came off it's hinges falling forward in the direction of Kurai and the Skeleton knight; and just as the door touched the floor, the skeletons came pouring in by fives at a time, but just seeing passed the first five, Kurai could tell that there were easily anywhere from 300 skeletons or. maybe even more since she couldn't even see the other hallways on the other side, even then she could hear the sound of bones clashing agsint each other as they tried moving forward in masses. 

After the first five skeletons took their steps into the hallway Kurai had been in, she saw how the skeleton knight pushed forward with it's shield and sword crushing the five skeletons in an instant. After seeing this, Kurai tried testing if she could summon more since seh didn't feel her mana getting burned through like the times in the past she tried this. 

Right as she tried to summon another skeleton, she did it; she summoned another skeleton knight and after that she summoned 1 more and after that couldn't anymore. So now having 3 skeleton knights attacking the large group of skeletons was a good thing since Kurai herself could see the numbers of the skeletons getting smaller and smaller by the second. Eventually around 5-7 minutes later, the group of skeletons was gone and Kurai had seen all the skeletons remains including her still standing skeleton knights turn into a light green colored paritcals which all gathered around her and soon dispersed. 

This made her body feel slightly stronger, but not so much as her soul…she felt her soul grow and she could feel something strange, as if a storage had collected something in her soul (her soul gathered the skeletons adding them to her summonings). 

After this happened, Kurai felt dizzy for a second; after that she could see the environment start fading into a place full or greenery. "Welcome back?", she heard from a familiar voice. "Koku?", Kurai called out turning to her side and seeing Koku sitting aginst a tree branch. 

"Seems like you passed your trial…and by the looks of it, you gained a lot from it too~", Koku told her as she walked closer while thinking as to why Yoru had been standing still next to the spot she had been at. "Oh about that, i'll just tell you", Koku sighed as he relayed what had been going on with Kurai. After telling her that, both of them chatted for a while until Yoru finished her test, though what was Yoru's trial like? was on the mind of both Kurai and Koku who talked their worries away hoping for Yoru's victory in the trial.