Chapter 11: The Ghost of the White Family

"Did you get it?" Salomon asked, looking up. At this moment, he and the panting Junior Master John were hiding in a secluded alley in Salem. Ignoring the stench of garbage and vomit covering the ground in the alley, he urgently asked John.

"This... this is my first time stealing something." Junior Master John kept patting his chest, seemingly trying to calm his heart that felt like it was about to leap out of his throat. This experience was still too stimulating for him. But when he took a deep breath, the foul smell in the alley choked him, making him gag uncontrollably.

"Actually, our behavior leans more towards robbery." Salomon blinked innocently. He reached out and patted Junior Master John's back. "Hopefully, no cameras caught you, otherwise, the next time you go out, a few police officers might appear in front of you. Given the racial issues, they might shoot with just a slight warning, so I suggest we prepare protective spells before we go out next time. What? Me? Don't worry, I've always kept my face covered. Oh, I regret choosing this place, it's really too smelly."

Nearby, the crowd, whose vision was gradually recovering from the blinding light, continued to clamor, while Ricky White started shouting. Even though his eyes were blinded at the time, the sensation of the ring being snatched from his finger was still very clear. He felt a chubby hand grab his wrist without a word, forcibly pry open his palm, and then his ring was gone. It was a White family heirloom; since he put on that ring, he had never encountered any misfortune, whether it was sharpening pencils as a child or shaving as an adult, not a single scratch had ever appeared on his skin.

And now, Ricky White had purplish-blue marks on his wrist, which might be the most serious injury he had ever sustained in his life.

A senator dropping his pants in public and a senator being robbed on the street carry different weights. The former can be seen as a joke; everyone enjoys political scandals. The latter, however, is a matter of the politician's safety. Thus, the situation quickly escalated. The Salem police immediately controlled everyone present, including the journalists who were unaware of the truth and were still protesting for freedom of the press. The police forcefully pinned these fools, who couldn't see the situation clearly, to the ground.

Salomon and Junior Master John escaped disaster by leaving slightly earlier, but if they were still wandering around Salem, it would only be a matter of time before they were found.

"Here." Junior Master John finally caught his breath. He opened his palm and said in a muffled voice, "It's right here."

It was a platinum ring with a massive pink gem. The gem's setting had a lattice pattern. There were two smaller pink round gems at either end of the oval pink gem, and between the settings of the oval and round gems, a total of four even smaller pink gems were set. These gems had a deeper pink color. Using his limited knowledge of gem identification, Salomon recognized that these should be pink diamonds. The gems on this ring, in terms of weight alone, far exceeded the category of "expensive." Perhaps even the gems on Queen Elizabeth II's pink diamond floral brooch were not as large as the ones on this ring.

"Okay, I think we can leave now. Put it in my pocket." Salomon nodded. Although he knew how to use portal magic, it was somewhat comical to say that they hadn't used a portal to get here, but a long-distance bus. This was a necessary measure because before obtaining a large amount of the Vishanti's magic power, he couldn't use many spells from the Vishanti lineage.

Junior Master John poked his head out of the alley, ready to take Salomon away from this dreadful place. He really couldn't stand only breathing through his mouth anymore; he felt like if he stayed any longer, he would throw up every single sandwich he had eaten earlier. When he waved back, signaling Salomon to follow, he didn't get a response.

He felt a chilling aura cling to his back, goosebumps spreading across his skin. He couldn't help but shiver. This feeling was very familiar; he had encountered it once before at the British Museum when he and Salomon obtained the ring.

"I knew it wouldn't be that easy," he murmured. Immediately after, he heard a loud crash behind him and was thrown forward onto the ground by an irresistible force. When he scrambled up from the street in a panic, brushing off the fallen leaves stuck to his face, he saw that the originally narrow alley had widened considerably, and the stone bricks at the entrance looked as if they had been smashed by something. This situation was still ongoing. Salomon, holding his head, dodged back and forth in the alley. From beside him, from above, everywhere, shattering stone bricks fiercely struck his body, but he couldn't stop, only constantly evade, because something formless in the air was venting its fury, wanting to smash everything around it.

Of course, that included Salomon.

Passersby cried out in alarm, and some of the police's attention was diverted here. Junior Master John ignored the stares of others and the police who were treating this as a major threat. He urgently shouted, "Come out! Salomon, come out!"

"No!" Salomon glanced around him. Skeletal ghosts in old-fashioned clothing, enveloped in pink magical energy, were crashing into him with their bodies. He could only ignore the sharp broken bricks on the ground, roll away, and evade the attack.

"Heretic! Thief! Sorcerer!" No expression could be seen on the ghosts' decaying faces. They shouted in a voice inaudible to ordinary people, "Return what you stole from our family!"

"F**k you!" In the midst of the chaos, Salomon raised his middle finger and fiercely retaliated against the ghosts. Of course, it was only a mental gesture; he had no time to chant spells at all. The ghosts were not easy to deal with either. Taking advantage of Salomon's distraction, they slammed a whole brick hard onto his back.

Junior Master John, enduring the falling bricks and rubble, rushed in abruptly. He tucked Salomon, who was lying on the ground, under his arm and ran out of the alley.

"Are they still there?" he asked Salomon, his legs aching, as he ran.

"If... if you let me down... I can... take them... out!" Salomon's reply was full of pain. Every word he spoke, his abdomen was severely constricted, making it impossible for him to breathe normally.

"Gentler, gentler, let me down!"

"No! Not here!" Junior Master John said intermittently, "We can't expose magic..."

"I... I thought... we... Kamar-Taj... wasn't... the Ministry of Magic..."

However, these ghosts were not ordinary ghosts. Unlike the deformed, twisted, and self-less specters in the British Museum, these were phantoms residing within the ring. They remained in the world by relying on the power within the ring and guarded every generation of the White family. Their power was much greater than that of ordinary ghosts. On their way chasing Junior Master John and Salomon, they not only smashed the glass of many shops along the street, shattered the asphalt road, but even overturned several cars, as if an invisible monster was rampaging through the street, with crashing and banging sounds everywhere.

But no matter what, the weaknesses of ghosts never change. Even the most powerful ghosts are no exception. Fire and lightning are always the weaknesses of spiritual beings, and physical attacks caused by magic can also harm their bodies.

"This is the place." Junior Master John ran to a sparsely populated area, a gap between two abandoned buildings. The reason he came to such a place was entirely at Salomon's request. Salomon repeated it many times, in great pain and intermittently, before he understood. Master John also no longer cared about the rule that magic shouldn't be exposed; he could only try to choose the most secluded spot possible.

When he reached their destination, he unceremoniously dropped Salomon and leaned against the wall, gasping for air. He felt like his lungs were on fire, and the ringing in his ears and nausea made it almost impossible for him to breathe.

"Thud!" Salomon was roughly dropped onto the ground. Junior Master John's previous maneuver had almost shaken his brain into a smoothie. But he didn't have time to complain. He quickly stood up, swaying slightly. Ignoring the pain in his back and abdomen, and without even bothering to brush off the dust on his clothes, he concentrated and began to chant a spell.

For the first time, Salomon felt that Kamar-Taj's close combat lessons were useful, as they allowed him to get used to pain and not have his spellcasting interrupted by injuries. Casting spells during combat was something every Kamar-Taj sorcerer could do.

There was one spell that Salomon particularly liked. It was a spell that released the most primal magical energy, and due to the spell's nature, unless the target used magic to defend against it, this tracking spell would inevitably hit the target. If a sorcerer had to face an enemy who wasn't a spellcaster and didn't know the target's weakness, this spell would be the preferred choice.

That's right, it was—

"Magic Missile!"