Evil Spirit (1)

"Heh, well... esteemed sir, what can I do for you?" Roddick forced an awkward smile, but his eyes darted toward the door. He looked ready to bolt at any moment.

Green smiled without answering. He raised a hand toward the door and summoned a Skeleton Soldier armed to the teeth.

The towering Skeleton Soldier planted himself in front of the door, cutting off Roddick's escape. Lola had told Green that the man was an utter bastard: a cunning liar through and through. There was no point negotiating nicely with someone like him. A show of force was the quickest way to deal with him, provided it left him frightened and hopeless.

Green said nothing as he summoned the soldier, nearly a head taller than Roddick, with an Enchanted Rifle in his hands and a gleaming bayonet fixed to it. A chill crawled down Roddick's spine.

After that, everything went much more smoothly. The entire conversation took place in an atmosphere of cordial cooperation. By the time Green left in his carriage, thoroughly satisfied, he had the address of the Tower of Yin Spirits' secret base. It was in a small town called Polis, under Landon City's jurisdiction. Once a supplier of ceramics to the Lorenzo Kingdom's Royal Family, the town was known for its pottery. But its clay deposits had gradually run dry over the past decade or so, lowering the quality of its wares and sending the town into decline.

Boris Town lay seventy kilometers from Landon City, a three- or four-hour carriage ride away.

Green did not leave immediately. He made thorough preparations first, then asked Viscount Paul for leave so the viscount would not think he had fled like Doctor Wilkins.

It was not that Green felt any deep attachment to the Wilson Family. But the tree had not yet fallen, and its monkeys had no reason to scatter. Dangerous as the crisis in Landon City was, Green was confident that, with the Graveyard at his disposal, he might even gain more from it. At the very least, raiding the Tower of Yin Spirits' base was a good opportunity.

Green did not wait until the next day. Once everything was ready, he boarded a carriage for Boris Town at half past three that afternoon.

The carriage raced along. The coachman plainly hoped to reach Boris Town before darkness fell completely.

Boris Town was roughly the size of a county, but it had no Anomalies Bureau—only a shabby Police Station where one chief and six officers were responsible for keeping order across the whole town. Anyone with eyes could see that the Police Station was just for show. The town's real armed force was the two large ceramic factories' Factory Guard Units. Together, they numbered over a hundred men, all equipped with rifles and recruited from retired soldiers. They were fairly well trained.

Green had done his homework before coming. According to Roddick, the Tower of Yin Spirits' secret base was hidden inside one of those ceramic factories. The organization had secretly taken control of the entire factory and its Factory Guard Unit of more than fifty men.

Green bounced along in the carriage until, not long after nightfall, he finally saw the lights of Boris Town.

As the carriage entered town, it passed a stretch of low shacks where the ceramic factory workers lived. Business was poor now, though, and many workers had left. The place looked desolate. Hardly a light showed across the sprawling residential district, in stark contrast to the brightly lit streets at the town center not far away.

Roddick had explained that a relative of his used to work at one of the town's ceramic factories. Six months earlier, an accident had caused a factory building to collapse, punching open the entrance to an underground cavern and exposing a scattering of old artifacts. His relative was a trusted man of the factory owner. Knowing that Roddick traded on the black market and had a good eye for such things, he asked him to come appraise the finds and see whether they were worth collecting.

But someone had arrived before Roddick. The man was an official of the ceramic factory's workers' union. He claimed to worship a True God of the Void named the Lord of Yin Spirits. Everything in the cavern belonged to his god, he declared, and the factory owner had to seal it up at once and offer it all to him.

Naturally, the factory owner had the fanatic thrown out.

Roddick happened to see the man struggling wildly and shouting, "Lord of Yin Spirits!" He paid little attention and focused on the appraisal. The objects turned out to be antiques from the Tiexuosi Dynasty, seven hundred years old. None were magical items, but they were intact and worth a great deal.

Roddick was delighted. He even pocketed one of the pieces and later sold it for a tidy sum of Gold Pounds.

Had that been the end of it, there would have been nothing remarkable about the affair. But only a few days later, Roddick's relative suddenly came to him in a dreadful state. Wild with fear and anxiety, he could barely speak. He kept muttering things like "devils" and "everyone's gone mad," and begged Roddick to save him.

Roddick was startled. After all his years surviving in the black market, he had seen his share of strange incidents. He immediately grew wary. He put his relative up at an inn, then hid at the Mages Association instead of going home. He also hired a mercenary to watch the inn.

Roddick was not just a black-market trader. He was also registered with the Mages Association as a junior Magic Apprentice. His talent was so poor, however, that he had barely managed to begin learning magic and was unlikely to progress much further. That was why he concealed his status as a Magic Apprentice while working in the Underground Black Market.

Once again, Roddick's caution saved his life. Early the next morning, he heard rumors of a death at the XX Inn. When he made inquiries, he was stunned: not only had his relative died, but the mercenary had killed himself too. Roddick did not believe the two would have committed suicide at the same time. Yet the scene investigation and every other sign pointed to suicide, and the Police Station ultimately closed both cases as such.

Even now, recounting the incident to Green after all that time, Roddick felt his hair stand on end.

If it had ended there, Roddick would have kept the matter buried. But just three days later, his relative found him again! This time, he was no longer alive. He had become a Ghost.

A convergence of resentment, fear, hatred, and other negative emotions had turned the ceramic factory manager, Maxim, into a Ghost after his death. He was now transforming into a far more vicious and terrifying Vengeful Spirit.

With such a Ghost haunting him, Roddick knew that once Maxim completed his transformation into a Vengeful Spirit, his own death would follow.

That was why Roddick had been forced to keep investigating, eventually discovering that the Tower of Yin Spirits had set up a secret base inside a ceramic factory in Boris Town.

Green's eyes lit up when Roddick mentioned the Vengeful Spirit. His experience with the Hard-Skin Ghoul had taught him that he could subdue Wild Undead. A Ghost was already a Tier Three Unit in the Graveyard; if it evolved into an Evil Spirit, it would become an elite Tier Three Unit. Its attack power might not surpass a Ghoul's, but a Ghost had no physical substance. It was made entirely of energy, immune to physical attacks, and able to pass through walls and turn invisible. Used well, those traits could produce all sorts of unexpected results.