Tranquil Mountain Hot Springs-Part 4

The mysterious duo is gone, and there are still three more traces to follow. The two people he had seen weren't ghosts, there was a distinct lack of miasma. But that begs the question, what were they doing here? Did they arrive before him, or after? If they arrived after was Tommy alright? With a head full of questions Belle heads back toward the entrance, he should check on Tommy first, just in case. He approaches the door and pulls, but it doesn't open. There's a slight tint of miasma to it, great, he was stuck and who knows what happened to Tommy. He heaves a huff of annoyance, scratching at the back of his head before turning around and taking a breath to keep calm. It was okay, Tommy was smart, and if he saw anybody he would hide. He didn't know if the miasma on the door was from the two mysterious people or the ghost haunting this place, but he should focus on his goal first. He can spot the other three miasma trails and chooses the next one to follow, it takes him through the hot spring and into a laundry room. The same rotten stink permeates throughout the room as it did with the one before. The laundry room is another room that hasn't been renovated yet, with rotten floors and old laundry machines collecting dust. As he steps into the room, he pauses, glancing at the corner of the room where a figure lies in wait. It's a man, wearing a suit, but his skin is clinging to his face and his eyes are devoid of life. Another hand rests on his shoulder, the trail of miasma leading straight toward it. 

"Uhm, hello?" He tries talking to the man, but all he gets in return is the hand pointing at him. The zombie-like man starts stumbling toward him and Belle grabs out his axe, swinging it at his head. The man doesn't dodge and his head is easily lopped off, the hand digs its fingers into the man's shoulders, and he disappears into a bunch of ash. The hand floats itself up, but before it can run off Belle swings at it with the axe. 

"I'm not letting you run off this time." He smirks, the axe connecting with the hand. He smacks the hand to the ground, it's cut in half with the fingers scuttling around, trying to move. He reaches for the hand to exorcize it, but when he touches the hand, he feels a sense of drain and quickly retrieves his hand. 

"What the-?" He mumbles, investigating his hand, not much has changed but he spots a few wrinkles. The hand is still wriggling on the floor but the two pieces are slowly fusing back. That shouldn't be possible with the effects of the axe, that means its ability circumvents even the axe's ability, something to keep an eye on. He quickly pulls out the gun and focuses, shooting the hand and exorcizing it. The gun has gotten easier to shoot, now he can basically aim and shoot with barely any recoil. He checks his hand again and finds it's returned to normal, the wrinkles are gone. 

"Hmm, it seems like the hand has some sort of life-drain ability." Belle muses, thinking back to the zombie-like man from before. There was a high chance it was actually a human, someone who wandered in and got caught by the hand. While he's thinking, a voice drifts into the edge of his consciousness. 

"Look, I didn't know finding the damn thing was going to be this hard, we also have to be careful, someone else is here with us." The voice gripes. It's coming from the hallway and Belle rushes out of the room and turns his head, finding the mysterious duo from earlier. They're stopped in the middle of the hallway, one is a guy with short black hair, his bangs pushed back by some hairclips. The other is a woman with wavy brown hair and a white cardigan, they're staring at Belle in shock. 

"Hi, what are you doing here?" He asks, sticking his hand up and waving.

 "W-what? That's what we should be asking you!" The woman squawks. 

"I'm hunting ghosts, isn't that obvious." Belle shrugs. 

"No!" They both shout. 

"Whatever, just answer the question." He demands. 

"Ugh, we don't have time for this, Jen, let's go." The man says. 

"Right!" The woman responds cheerfully, a cloud of miasma suddenly surrounds the duo and they disappear. 

"Ah, wait!" Belle calls out, running to where they disappeared. It's too late, there's not a trace of the duo left. 

"Sigh, seriously, why can't anything in my life be easy." He groans. Now he has to deal with a ghost and figure out what the mysterious duo is doing here. He regrets not bringing Leslie, this would've been finished much faster if he and Luna had been here. Whatever, there was always time to take out his annoyance on the ghost and the scattered body parts. He spots one of the miasma trails and heads after it, this one is taking him to a recreation room in the back. It has old vending machines and a ping pong table, it was a place for the guests to rest and have fun. There's the familiar rotten stink as he walks into the room, he glances around for any hints and finds someone cowering in the corner. 

"Hey." He calls out, getting closer. It's an old man, he's shivering and muttering something under his breath, but he looks human enough. When he gets close enough to touch the man, he leaps out and grabs Belle's shoulders. 

"Get me out of here! I don't want to turn to ash!" The man screams. 

"Woah, woah, calm down, I can get you out of here but you need to tell me what happened," Belle tells him, carefully peeling the man's hands off his shoulder. 

"I-it was…a leg!" The man says fearfully. 

"What?"