Frost and Thunder

Had an Apprentice from the Tamara Family visited Calderon and left these marks behind?

That was Angel's first thought, but she quickly dismissed it. If a member of the Tamara Family had wanted to leave a mark saying "I was here," she would surely have chosen a script still in use during the Fourth Epoch, not pictographic symbols that had long since fallen out of use.

Then another possibility occurred to her:

Perhaps the Tamara Family hadn't left these symbols. Perhaps the symbols had eventually evolved into the family crest representing the Apprentice Pathway!

Just then, Angel felt a faint stirring in her spirituality.

An attack? No, the warning isn't that strong. It's more like I'm moving deeper into danger, but haven't yet reached a dead end... She immediately left the building and floated into the air, scanning her surroundings for enemies. At the same time, she performed a simple divination and discovered that the "change" came from herself.

The once-rounded face and alluring red lips of her Demoness Spirit Body had turned pale. Her purple eyes had lost their luster, and a gloomy aura coiled around her. With her ankle-length black dress, she looked like a ghost from legend.

I've become half an undead without even noticing?

A chill ran down Angel's spine. She knew this could happen in certain areas where the Underworld overlapped with the Physical World. Living creatures there would die without warning and become undead, their souls bound in place as evil spirits until someone purified them.

Does Death's divine kingdom have a similar power? Instead of killing people outright, it gradually turns living creatures or ordinary Spirit Bodies into undead?

Still pondering, Angel rose until she was level with Klein. The marked slowing of her transformation into an undead confirmed her guess.

*Much of