Chapter 55

"The boy seemed friendly."

Cattleya chirped up, disrupting the still ambience of the night, above chirping crickets and the distant roar of street carriages and the kingdom.

"Yeah, very friendly."

I grumbled, before turning to look at both Shinso and Cattleya.

"Shinso, why not head back to the apartment we bought, we don't want to go out here wasting money."

Shinso gave a little pause before he nodded slowly.

"Well then..."

Cattleya sighed as she dug through her purse before talking out 4 silver Lumin.

"Pay for a separate carriage with these, I'll head back to headquarters, and I'll get you guys if necessary."

Me and Shinso both nodded before heading in our own separate paths downtown, away from the Madame's house.

"Heh, that kid was weird, what a geek."

Shinso chuckled to himself proudly as he made fun of Raymond, I turned to look at him and laughed along.

"Although I did find his research intriguing, he seemed to know quite a lot about the previous era, and all of that uncovered history."

Shinso still wore that mischievous smile as he looked back towards me, while I stared into the pavement as we walked along the street until a carriage would spot us, because we were too lazy to give any sort of signal.

"Yeah, nerds are like that."

Suddenly Shinso fell silent as he was deep in thought, before speaking up again after a few moments, his tone dripping with worry.

"I listened to what Cattleya and Madame Fitzgerald were speaking about, some incident where someone turned into a flesh blob something."

Shinso nodded as he listened to my information, before abruptly sticking his hand into the street, signaling a nearby street car to come in our direction.

"Here you go."

Shinso didn't say much after he handed the coachmen the four silver Lumin, stepped into the car and sank into the seat, exhausted by the night's events.

"Tired, huh."

Shinso looked at me with a half sleepy expression, smiling at me lazily.

"Yeah, but it's not like I'll sleep much tonight, I don't know how the apartment beds are."

He didn't say anything after the coachmen propelled the carriage forward, and sent the horses flying down the street.

I watched as the more deserted parts of town quickly began to overflow with life and the usual clamor of the town, indicating that we were back in the less noble part of town.

I could slowly feel myself sympathizing with Madame Fitzgerald, thinking her decision to move to a part of the kingdom which was more obscure and out of the way was a good one, ethnicity and financially.

"Sometimes I wish I was rich. I mean, I've always wished my family back home possessed a little more money besides the scraps we usually had to suffice with, but living in another part of Japan besides the run down parts near the outskirts would be a little better."

I couldn't believe I was having an internal monologue, especially one about wanting more for myself, that would make myself seem greedy and look down on humans and other people like ants, similar to what that man said to the boy in my dream.

"We're here."

Shinso croaked as he sat up in his seat, stretching his arms before opening the carriage side door and stepping out into the road, reaching out his hand for me like a gentleman.

I felt my heart pounding in my chest a little as he took my hand and helped me step down from the carriage, I felt like royalty for that brief few seconds.

"It's a few blocks down that way."

Shinso said, pointing east towards the more bustling section of the streets, where I could hear that it was noisier than what we previously anticipated up here, making my stomach churn a little.

"Yeah, I guess we should go then."

I looked up at the large clock in the center of the kingdom, which read that it was about 9:30 at night, which surprised me considering that we left for Madame Fitzgerald's at about 7:00 PM.

We then headed down the street slowly, weaving past the ongoing crowds, and trying to ignore the overwhelming smells of the food in the markets and clamoring street vendors.

Eventually we reached our apartment, stepped in and headed up to our room, before entering it at the end of the hallway.

"This seems somewhat pleasant."

Shinso remarked sarcastically as he dusted himself off and collapsed onto the bed, sinking into the sheets like quicksand. Unfortunately there was only 1 bed in the room, and a couch near the fireplace, along with a few common items like tables, chairs and surprisingly an...indoor fridge?

"How do they have an indoor fridge, or a fridge in general?"

I was instantly dumbfounded as I approached the almost modern looking fridge, this looked like nothing from Oboro's apartment, either this complex is more advanced or Oboro is too far behind to realize it.

Shinso looked over at the fridge and opened his eyes, before spotting the hand book on the top of the fridge, which was probably either instructions or how it probably came to be.

Upon opening the books it seemed like a pamphlet we'd see across all hotel rooms. 

"The refrigerator, a mighty device used to keep our accommodaties fresh and cold. It was invented over 20 years ago, but was kept in the other kingdoms, like the Katshin, Midus and Indun empires across the 4 cardinal routes, it was finally introduced to our lovely kingdom last year in a trading agreement."

I read this pamphlet, looking for any possible instructions. Who knows how refrigerators in this time and age worked, what if accidentally putting a mystical item in a fridge would accidentally lead to it exploding or going rogue or something.

"It doesn't say anything unusual or tells us in big bold text not to insert any items inside the fridge."

I joked, closing the book before reopening the fridge, which was previously empty. But now, it was filled with different foods and drinks from this era, including boiled meat, stews, chicken and vegetables.

"Damn, they stocked up."

I remarked as I took out a piece of boiled meat, a nice, tender piece of beef, which was already dripping its oils onto the hardwood floors, which were already creaky enough.

In the streets in the more deserted part of the kingdom, Officer Palau was returning from his overground job, wiping the sweat off his brow from either chasing petty thieves or filling our mundane paperwork.

"Auugghhh."

A guttural moan filled the air, it sounded like it came from an alleyway nearby, making Officer Palau perk up and immediately look for the source of the sound, taking out his lantern and lighting it, before walking towards the sound of the moans.

The moans slowly began to shift into voices, slowly but surely, the guttural and intelligible sounds began to breathe life.

"Help...me."

The voice sounded like it came from a young man, probably in his young 20's. Upon heading into one of the alleyways, Officer Palau's eyes widened as he spotted the source of the groans and moans.

The figure wasn't anything remotely human, but rather a flesh blob. It looked like a melted candle, with eyes, ears, hands, legs and other appendages protruding from the heap of meat, and most of them only continued to grow and nourish like bacteria.

"What the?"

Officer Palau almost dropped his lantern as his tone rang with evident fear, but as a member of 2 organizations, one over and one underground, he had to ensure that either section of the world was safe and protected.

Suddenly, all the eyes on the blob turned towards Palau. Their pupils and retna's reflected evident fear and confusion, which only astonished and frightened Palau simultaneously. 

"Help, help, help."

The blob had voices, multiple voices ringing out at once, like a crowd of people begging to be freed or something of the sort.

Officer Palau would've said something, but he was too frightened to speak or even move, but he could feel his hands moving on their own, reaching towards his handgun which laid in his belt.

At that critical juncture, all the hands on the blob suddenly reached out towards Palau, the appadenges moving like rouge tentacles devouring everything in their path.

Palau, who had became too controlled by fear to do anything, suddenly pulled out his handgun and shot the hands and the creature with almost all of his bullets, making the creature shriek like a banshee, before all the eyes closed, and the arms, legs, hands and feet flopped limply.

All the clamor and distress in his mind suddenly felt like a fog, a dark, misty fog enveloped around it, and pushed enough pressure to the point where the feelings and emotions completely disappeared, making him feel a sense of calm and peace after killing the abomination in the alleyway.

Back in the apartment, I suddenly felt a cold rush in my body as I sat on the bed, my head deep in a history book, and I felt spirit calling starting to erupt.

"Abomination, help, abomination, help."

The voices were layered, blurred and morphed like a dream, a cloud of voices whispering together like a chorus.

I lowered the book, an expression of warning and slight curiosity now on my face, as I scanned the room as if the voices were somewhere inside, except there was only the distant ambience of the kingdom and the quiet sound of flipping pages.

"What's wrong?"

Shinso asked as he peeked his head above the book he was reading, his eyes locked on me and my concerned expression.

I simply looked towards him and gave him a slightly reassuring smile.

"I thought I heard something, nothing too much."

"I didn't hear anything, you might be delusional."

Shinso's words came out blunt, but true. Maybe spirit calling is an ability that only calls out when you're in danger, or maybe it's doing something wrong, maybe I'm doing something wrong.

I suddenly had a thought pop into my head.

"What if I can do Aaron's exercise, and try to decipher the meaning of the words I heard."

I gave a heavy sigh as I closed my eyes and took in a few deep breaths, focusing on the string that I previously had envisioned, I imagined it running at in infinite length, running free and true. 

But suddenly the string came to a halt, and the anchor was planted there, preventing any movement from the string.

I began to think of the anchor as my limitations rather than my power, and that the anchor was merely what my mind would comprehend as real and as fake, what lurked in the shadows and what stayed in the light.

Suddenly, the void around "me" started to shake like a mystical earthquake, that started to make me feel disoriented and dizzy, suddenly the spirit voices rang out again.

"Abomination, help, abomination, help."

And at that moment, I felt my surroundings begin to change, and the world around me started to melt, I could feel the void state I was in begin to falter like a broken lamp, like it was dimming and coming back to life. 

At this point I couldn't tell if I was doing any of this correctly, Aaron's words regarding a loss of control were still dominant in my mind, and I started to question if that was what was happening right now to me.

I felt illusory tentacles wrap around me, wrap around my body, my mind, my soul. I opened my eyes, my eyes on the void, and I saw the black, inky tendrils wrapping around my body, attempting to drag me under into the darkness of the void.

Suddenly the voices that repeated that one phrase, all fell silent as if they had their mouths covered, and one voice, one I found all the more familiar yet terrifying, called out to me in the darkness.

"I know you're in there."

The voice belonged to Isaiah Walls, but I was confused by how he was able to even speak to me in this moment, in a state where my consciousness was in my body yet my consciousness was also in another plane of reality, the realm of the void state.

The voices I heard earlier rang out again, saying in illusory unison.

"Spirit dominance."

And at that moment, the illusory tentacles that wrapped around my spirit body started to disappear, until it was just my body left, sitting in the darkness.

Back in my physical body, an enormous, waving pain filled my mind, beaming like a pair of drums.

And at that particular interval, my physical bodies views started to erupt in the usual orange glow, illuminating the dark room.

Shinso looked up at me, and noticed the pain I didn't know I was in. He rushed over to me and began to shake my body violently, in a desperate attempt to wake me up back in the regular world.

"Wake up you idiot."

He then gazed at my forehead, and a strange, burning mark began to form on it, pressing my skin like a hot iron, until a symbol, a strange one was on my forehead.

In the void state, my body started to morph and change, and strange limbs began to protrude from my body, from places I didn't know could even happen.

I could feel strange arms, legs, and eyes sprout from my body like plants, and feel new organ structures begin to form in order to accommodate the new growth.

Suddenly, a strange, red illusory light began to shine in front of me, and from that light came voices, murmurs, and calls.

The illusory red light began to expand like a puddle, until it was about the size of a swimming pool. And from the pool sized red light, a red eye spread out and opened, its large pupils locked on me.

"What are you doing?"

I asked him, my voice almost muffled form the acceleration of the changes, but the eye simply continued to stare at me, its gaze unmoving and unchanging.

"I didn't need you here."

The voice of Isaiah responded, his tone like a wave of bricks hitting my body, but suddenly the voices that kept whispering returned.

"Don't think, don't think, don't think."

Something deep in my gut told me I had to listen to them, no matter who they were. But my thoughts also felt like they weren't my own, what if it was also Isaiah controlling my thoughts, along with the rest of the void state.

I tried to make my mind blank, eliminate all sense of reality and thought, and I could feel my body begin to revert, my eyes retracting, my mouths retracting, my legs and arms retracting, my body reverting back to normal.

But what could Isaiah possibly want if he told me that he doesn't need me here? I was simply practicing my skills and hoping to find out the origin of the ravings, but ending up in a spiritual battle with Isaiah was even harder.

Suddenly the void began to melt like tar under the hot sun, and the surroundings began to change, reverting back into the room I was previously in, and I could begin to see Shinso's blurry figure, shaking me awake.

"What happened?"

I asked as I shot awake, my eyes wide and sweat beaming down my body. Shinso looked down at me and sighed a sigh of relief.

"I don't know, you just started acting this way all of the sudden."

Something in my mind told me to look towards the book I was previously reading, and the very page I was on. 

I instinctively raised the book to look at its contents, and what I read made my gut drop to my feet.

"Loss of control, an anomaly that can come in many forms and ways, some can make people turn into mindless creatures, while others can turn into flesh blobs with no sense of space, time, or rationality."

I immediately thought back to the ravings I heard before I entered the void state.

"Abomination, help, abomination, help."

Those voices rang inside my mind, making me shutter like it was 30 degrees outside. Suddenly I felt my mind begin to forcibly shift somewhere else, towards a strange section of the kingdom, it was like an out of body experience for sure.

I caught sight of the flesh blob inside the alleyway, unaware of what it was or who made it, but my mind began to think of Isaiah for a particular reason at that moment.

Then, my mind came to the conclusion on its own, one that I normally wouldn't be able to understand.

"Isaiah has an ability, that if anyone even thinks about him, they'll know who they are, where they are, and their intentions."

The ravings I heard were probably focused on that blob-like creature, and even looking at it made my head spin and my heart begin to race. I suspect that Isaiah made that creature, it was the same type of creature that Cattleya and Madame Fitzgerald were discussing earlier.

We've all been talking about and thinking about Isaiah for a while, but why would he choose me? Why would he choose that critical moment where my mind was in the void state?

My mind begin to race with more questions then I had the power to answer them with, and I was left dumbfounded in my current situation on how I was looking at something that was away from me, about 20 blocks down, from the apartment room.

"Perhaps the void state is also like a place I can use to transport my mental consciousness, but I didn't do it intentionally. Maybe the spirit calling did it for me?"

I reopened my eyes, before lying down on the couch, too exhausted to stay awake any longer.