Chapter 79: Old Friend
Now it"s time for ghost hunting!
It was only me, Lina, and Blobby who enters the haunted building.
Lina asked the key from the seller and the seller happily give it to us when we said he doesn"t need to come. We just said we want to check the building before deciding to buy it.
"Lina. You don"t need to come if you"re afraid."
I can see clearly that her hand that holding the key is shaking. She"s afraid but still choose to come. Even Victoria choose to not appear and let Blobby takes control. But in the end, their memory is shared. Victoria can see what Blobby sees.
"I"ll come with you. I"m the one who suggested this building after all."
"That"s very brave of you. But I don"t want anything happen to you so…"
"I"ll come with you…"
She said with her voice shaking. I guess she is worried about me.
"Fine. You can come. But stay close behind me at all time, okay?"
"Okay!"
She stuck behind me and her chest is touching my back. Awesome!
But I can"t move freely if she"s holding the hem of my sleeve like this.
"You can grab the hem of my shirt. That way my movement won"t be restricted much."
"Okay!"
Now there"s a bit distance from her body. Her chest no longer touching my back. What a shame. I should have told her later.
We enter through the front door. There are not many people outside at the moment, but usually, whenever someone entered this building, they would watch them with great interest. That"s also why I choose to come here in the morning when people are not around.
"Excuse me! Is there any ghost I can talk to here? Bring me a ghost that can speak human language!"
I entered the haunted building and asked to see a ghost that I can have a conversation with. It might be weird… no. It is weird to do this. But I don"t have any other way to exorcise ghosts. I just entered the building boldly and challenge the ghosts here. I haven"t used my aura yet since I don"t know if it can work or not. I will try to hit it with a normal attack first.
"Who dares to enter this building? You will suffer for eternity!"
Here it comes! Back then I saw about five ghosts here. And all of them are coming right now. The leader of the ghosts must be the one in the middle. The one with the upper half of a woman that keep floating. The rest have men"s appearances.
That she-ghost is the one who talked. While the rest… I don"t know if they can talk or not. They just waiting for the she-ghost"s order.
"Who are y-"
"HUACHAAA! Oh? I can"t hit her."
Instead of waiting for her response, I just swung my fist at her. It went through her body.
"You dare to hit me? How dare you lowly mage- GUAGH!"
"Oh? I can hit her if I used aura? Then it will be easy."
"Wait wait wait wait wait! How can you touch me?"
"I"m using aura."
I answered her as I prepared to swing my next punch.
"Aura? You"re not a mage?"
"My magic level is still weak so I mainly used aura. Were you an aura user in the past?"
"Yes I was. And I was pretty popular- hey! Stop trying to punch me!"
"I don"t have any interest in your past. Now that I know I can use aura to hit you, I will destroy all you ghosts who put a curse on me!"
"Wait! What curse?!"
"After gaining aura, my special ability is my vision. I defeated All-seeing Eye to get it. Do you get it now? I used my eye to see into this building about three days ago and since then, I was obsessed in purchasing this building. Knowing my personality, being obsessed with a haunted building is not something that should happen to me. So my guess is that there"s a curse or charm magic that has been cast on me when I peeked inside this building. Then I know now that I can hit you with aura, I"ll exorcise every ghosts here."
"Wait! Stop! Please! We can talk about it! I don"t want to die even though I already dead!"
"Shouldn"t it be that since you"re already dead, you"re experienced in… dying?"
"Wait! I know what happened to you and it was unintentional! Please let"s have a chat! I can also undo the charm magic on you but it might takes time! If you kill me, the charm magic can become permanent!"
"…fine. Explain."
Looks like we can converse with the ghost. Since we no longer need to fight, I can let Lina walk on her own. No longer need to grab my shirt.
"Lina, since I don"t need to fight anymore, you can let go now."
"No."
"…wanna hold my hand?"
"Yes."
Lina let go of my shirt and hugged my arm. I can feel her chest touching!
"…d.a.m.n riajuu."
"Wait! Where did you learn that word?!"
I heard something familiar from she-ghost. It was what Victoria called me before!
"Riajuu? From a friend-"
"Sonia! Is that you, Sonia?!"
"This voice! Victoria? Is that you, Victoria?! Where are you?!"
"Over here!"
Victoria left my arm and returned into her blob form.
Does she knows the ghost? Don"t tell me I was right when I joked about the ghost being Victoria"s old friend?
"Victoria! You"re a slime!"
"And you"re a ghost!"
"Don"t tell me, that ghost is your old friend?"
"Umm… yeah. More like we were both disciples of my master."
"Alright. I understand. We need to have a chat but before that… Lina, can you please go to the seller and purchase this building for me? Please do it before he knows the situation is under control and they want to raise the price."
"…"
"Lina? Please. I can only count on you."
"…will you praise me later?"
"I will praise you whenever you want."
"Okay. I"ll be back soon."
She really wants me to praise her that much? I already know but she must really loves to be praised by me.
"Now, let"s return to the topic. That ghost is your fellow disciple and she knows how to lift the curse she casted on me unintentionally?"
"Hmm… where do we start?"
Victoria slowly tells me the story about her relationship with the ghost in the past.
That ghost used to be Sonia. A fellow disciple of Victoria. And they were rival as well. Maybe that"s how Sonia learned about words like riajuu.
Victoria was a beautiful girl. I can see that Sonia is quite beautiful as well. Don"t tell me her humanoid form is the real Victoria?
"Hup! This was my real form in the past life."
She changed into her humanoid form but there are few differences than her usual form. It"s just her legs are shorter, her chest and b.u.t.t is smaller, her face is not that different from usual. I guess she only changed some parts that she doesn"t like, huh?
"Well, except she wasn"t all black like this. She also usually wear brighter colored dress."
Said Sonia who knows about Victoria in the past.
Sonia was jealous of Victoria. Especially when her crush had a crush on Victoria. But Victoria doesn"t like him.
Trying to win him over, Sonia ended up needed to defeat a succubus for her special ability to manifest.
"So that"s where the charm magic come from… have you finished undoing it yet?"
"I"m halfway there. I"m not as proficient in this as back when I"m still alive."
The story goes and they have grown up and live separately. Away from each other and never heard anything from the other.
"It"s done. Now I will continue the story."
Sonia finished undoing her charm magic casted on me. Now I don"t have any obsession toward this building anymore. But what is it that makes me charmed toward this building? Not on her?
It was because she died in this ground. It was this land that I get charmed by. But since it was still her magic, she can still undo it.
"How did you die? And how did you end up being a ghost? Along with those four ghosts over there?"
"I died after getting seduced by a mage. That mage had ulterior motives to kill all aura user. That is why I hate mages in general. I already had many lovers back then. The ones who still stay with me are these ghosts hanging around with me all the time. They can"t speak now that they"re ghost. I"m the only one who can. On my last breath, I casted a powerful charm magic in hope that mage will be seduced and tried hard make me survive. But it didn"t work on him. Instead, it was this land that my magic worked. Then somehow, I and my lovers ended up becoming ghosts and whoever see or walk this land, they will be charmed by my magic. Someone got charmed and built this place. Since I don"t want to stay in the wild, I let him build this place and once the building is finished, I scared him to death. Ever since then, whoever bought this place will be chased away whenever I got bored since I can"t leave this place."
So that"s why I got charmed by this building. Wait!
"That mage who killed aura user! Was that the same mage who killed you as well, Victoria?"
"Maybe. He said he wants to kill all aura user. So after he killed Sonia, he should be going to another aura user one by one until he ended up killing me."
"Sonia? Do you know who that mage is?"
"I don"t remember much, but after I died, before this place was built, there was a rumor about an Evil G.o.d who ma.s.sacred strong people. If those strong people are aura user, then…"
That means the Evil G.o.d is the one who hunted aura user. Then someone at this very moment is trying to become Evil G.o.d himself, or maybe even revive the real Evil G.o.d.
Worst case scenario, he"s reincarnated just like Victoria, and slowly trying to get his power back and conquer the world.
Destroying the cult becoming harder and harder now.