Emotions Made Manifest: Cursed Spirits

[Cursed Spirit]

Twisted beings formed from Cursed Energy shed by humans.

It sounded much like the way distorted frequencies in Solaris gave rise to distorted afterimages.

But Cursed Energy was the most direct form of negative emotion, so it needed no contamination or alteration.

Simply leaking from a human body was enough for Cursed Energy to give birth to a monster filled with powerful resentment: a Cursed Spirit.

But that was only supposed to happen with ordinary people.

Neither Solaris nor Sonoro had ordinary people who produced Cursed Energy and could not control it.

Mo Bai was the only person in this world who possessed Cursed Energy.

And as a sorcerer who could control it freely, he could not possibly have let any leak out...

Could he?

"G-good evening!"

While Mo Bai was lost in thought, the Cursed Spirit raised a sharp, spiderlike limb from beneath its skirt and stabbed at him.

"Tch."

Mo Bai clicked his tongue and sidestepped its attacks one after another.

Then he grabbed the spider legs supporting its body, lifted it with ease, and hurled it into the classroom.

Bang!

"Good... evening..."

It sounded like a shoddily made robot.

The Cursed Spirit lay twitching on the floor, repeating its greeting until it dissolved into black smoke.

"Weak, and barely any intelligence. Grade three... no, grade four Cursed Spirit?"

Standing in the classroom, Mo Bai rubbed his chin as he murmured his assessment.

What he really wanted to know, though, was why a Cursed Spirit had appeared here.

"No, that can wait. I need to get Moqu and the other students out first." Mo Bai shook his head, cutting off his train of thought.

This place, once used only to put students through trials, was growing more dangerous by the minute.

First the Remnant Star Society had been hiding here, and now Cursed Spirits had appeared out of nowhere.

But just as Mo Bai turned to leave, the classroom door slammed shut, as though the room had read his mind.

Click!

Frowning, Mo Bai tapped on the door.

It was solid. He doubted he could break it even if he reinforced his body with Cursed Energy.

The door itself was reinforced with Cursed Energy.

At that moment, Mo Bai turned to look behind him again.

The space that had looked exactly like an ordinary classroom had somehow become a tangled maze.

And he noticed something else...

Mo Bai clenched his fist, trying to gather Cursed Energy.

"Good evening!"

Just then, that familiar, distorted voice rang out beside him.

It was a spiderlike Cursed Spirit resembling the one from before.

This time, though, the Cursed Spirit's head was that of a man instead of a woman.

Bang!

After punching it into black smoke, Mo Bai ran straight into the maze without hesitation.

That Cursed Spirit had been just a warning.

If he refused to enter the maze, more would probably appear, each one stronger than the last.

Forget getting Moqu out. Right now, Mo Bai could barely keep himself safe.

At the center of the plaza on the Academy's Dark Side.

Moqu looked up and saw that every member of the "audience" was staring at him.

Had this happened before? Had the audience looked at him with such disgust back then?

Fear crept over Moqu. He desperately tried to remember how this play had ended in reality.

But whether from nerves or because the Dark Side of the Academy had obscured his memories, he could not recall how the play had ended.

So he looked at the audience.

He wanted to find something in their eyes.

What was it even supposed to mean? It had no substance at all.

It jumped from one idea to another. The plot had no continuity.

Hadn't he crammed in too many jokes and references?

What an awful play!

In the end, all he could read in their eyes were thoughts that rejected everything he had done.

The work he had poured his heart into, all his effort, his dream.

Had it amounted to no more than this...?

But the world was so vast, and the academy had so many people. Surely someone could understand him, could see what he had put into his play?!

Clinging to that thought, he searched the crowd before him.

No one. No one. No one!

All he found in his fellow students' eyes was disappointment.

Even...

Even the version of himself onstage, the Moqu of the past, looked at him now with nothing but disappointment...

And as Moqu sank deeper into despair, something from Sonoro quietly seeped into his body.

Bang!

After smashing another Cursed Spirit, Mo Bai looked at his fist again.

Something was definitely wrong.

His total Cursed Energy had suddenly fallen by half.

"Heh heh heh! Class is starting!"

Before Mo Bai could think it through, another Cursed Spirit charged out.

He had no choice but to destroy it too.

He had little time or energy left to puzzle over it. Along the way, Mo Bai had "picked up" a few people.

"Boo-hoo... How did this happen? Why are there such terrifying monsters on the Dark Side of the Academy?"

"Ugh. I only came to the Dark Side to let off some steam. How did I end up in this mess?"

"Damn it! I want out!"

Some students despaired, some complained, and some were angry, but most were too frightened to make a sound.

That was understandable. No matter how talented they were, until they left the academy's protection and faced real danger, they were still just students.

In this situation, Mo Bai had no choice but to summon the black and white Divine Dogs to stay beside them, hoping that would lift their spirits a little.

After all, he was only a student himself. In a situation like this, he still needed Doctor Lu to step in...

Ordinarily, Mo Bai would not have bothered with these students. But now it seemed the maze had formed because of him.

He recognized the power making up its walls. It was his own Cursed Energy.

Since he was the reason they were caught up in this, he had to look after them.

He turned to the students and reassured them:

“Don't panic. I'll find what's causing this, take it down, and then help you find the ‘Key’ to get out...”

Whoosh!

Before Mo Bai could finish speaking, a dark figure appeared behind him like a ghost.

Then Mo Bai heard a woman's whisper beside his ear:

"But what if the source of all this is you? What will you do then?"