As she pounced, the cold was so intense that even the air rustled as frost formed. The "evil ghost," her eyelashes, cheeks, and hair coated in white frost and her complexion turned completely blue, reached out as though she wanted to strangle Miss Teresa.
But Shade still blocked her. The Silver Moonbeam Greatsword in his one hand stopped her grasp. Its glow was dim, yet that made the runes once hidden within the light on its blade clearly visible.
Holding Miss Teresa in his left arm, Shade wielded the sword in his right and watched the frost-covered young woman. She staggered back two steps, then lunged at them again. The sword light was not bright, but it pierced her with ease. Specks of light drifted out from her false body. The young woman, seeming to have regained her composure, looked at her own hands and gave Shade a miserable smile.
"Am I ugly now?"
"Though I'm not sure what exactly you are, Miss Schultz Teresa is truly beautiful."
The now half-transparent young woman nodded bitterly.
"Can you hug me one last time?"
Shade considered it. The Moonbeam Greatsword vanished, and he drew her into his embrace with his left arm as well. That false body finally scattered into motes of light and disappeared completely, while the transparent, pure-white soul curled up in Shade's arms and blankly looked toward her body on the other side.
When soul and body took each other's hands, the body that Shade had "fished out of the sea" began coughing violently, and color finally returned to its pale face. Miss Schultz Teresa opened her eyes, then grimaced in pain as she clutched Shade and trembled. As her soul returned to her body, all the discomfort of the body flooded into the soul at once.
With both