Published at 14th of April 2026 11:58 pm

Chapter 2. Preparations for the real deal

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Real haunting?

Now, that was interesting. The last time I actually got to use some magic was three months earlier, against a barely solidified spirit.

You sure?

Do you even have to ask? came a self-assured voice from the other end.

Okay, okay, wait. Dont tell me. Let me guess. Now I was as giddy as a child before Christmas. A family moved to an old, weirdly cheap house, and it turned out that it was haunted.

Nope.

Okay. A group of college kids tried summoning ghosts and unknowingly used an actual medium.

That one was actually quite rare these days.

Not even close.

Right. Some weird cult got their hands on a real grimoire and screwed up a ritual.

A grimoire would be exciting, but the voice on the other end just chuckled and answered, Colder.

But there was a ritual? I tried to get a clue.

No ritual.

Hmmm, I needed a moment to think this time. An old local legend turned out to be true, and someone who didnt know that they had magic in them did something wrong.

Oh wow, that was a long shot. Are you giving up? I could tell by the voice that my broker was having a bit too much fun, so it was something I wouldnt guess easily.

Not yet. Was there an artifact involved?

No artifact.

Does the family have some hidden lineage?

Lineage was not likely. It was almost impossible for any bloodline to manifest in the world after the magic was gone. But worth a shot.

No special bloodlines.

Something that dates back at least a thousand years is somewhere in this story. But it is not a grimoire and not I started to wonder out loud.

Nope, nothing ancient.

My brain came to a screeching halt.

Wait wait, wait, what do you mean nothing ancient? I said, annoyance now coloring my voice. Did you start to buy into the Vaticans cover-up? Or did the ambient mana make a return while I wasn't paying attention? Because if not, then either the family has mages or this is not a real haunting. My excitement quickly turned into disappointment. Okay, tell me this wasnt some weird joke?

We checked the family, nothing special. The housealso nothing. We searched for artifacts and found none. No classic sources of hauntings. No runaway cryptid or mage in the vicinity. But He ended with suspense.

Oh, drop the act and tell me.

Buuuut...

I was starting to consider getting a new partner. This one was pissing me off.

The woman described it like this: Two weeks ago, she killed a home invader. Some creep she met online. But she gave him a chance, and things didnt work out. And before you ask, nothing special about the guy either, maybe except for his messages to her.

I can imagine.

Anyway, he turns into a stalker and finally gets the bright idea to declare his love by breaking in during the middle of the night. She puts a couple of bullets in him, and then it starts. Bad dreams, a sense of presence, sounds in the night, things misplaced when she returns home.

I furrowed my brow. Okay, sounds like a haunting, but you know those can be easily explained by the fact that she killed someone two weeks ago, and her moral compass is acting up?

Yes, I knownot everyones the heartless killing machine you are.

Thanks, I said flatly.

Youre welcome, came a cheerful response. Anyway, we thought the same until she added a new detail. Every night after the sun goes down, she can smell the odor of burning hair.

Oh, I said as my eyebrows shot up.

That changed things.

Yeah, oh indeed. Also, in the dreams, the man speaks to her in a strange language. The dreams are so vivid that she could cite some of the phrases. The language is the Black Speech. He ended with a dramatic tone.

Are you sure? I was back to excitement.

Yes, from what we can translate, it should be something along the lines of you shall be mine in the other life spoken again and again.

Unlike all the rest, that part sounded like real haunting, a very strong one at that.

Got you interested?

Verythree thousand dollars plus the standard amount based on the rank of the spirit. Paid in gold obols.

Deal.

The deal was struck, so my broker hung up.

Now, I was excited to the point of bursting. Not only a haunting but one without any explanation. I had no idea what to expect, but there was a real chance of a challenge. Not just slugging it out with barely solidified ghosts with the terrifying ability to move some chairs and moan at night. No, this time it might be a proper fight.

I wanted to go to sleep and start the preparations first thing in the morning, but after a while, it became clear I wouldn't be getting any sleep anytime soon. So, like an excited schoolboy before a school trip, I decided to prepare all the necessary gear.

I put on some clothes and made my way to my old car. With the roads empty in the middle of the night, it took me barely twenty minutes to get to the warehouse complex where my family's wealth was kept.

I nodded to the 24-hour security guard and made my way inside. After entering my storage unit, I patted the two gargoyles on their heads like large dogs. They were big, black, ugly stone things that looked like old Halloween decorations. Decorations that would come alive and rip apart any trespasser just to feed on what remained of the body.

The rest of the unit resembled a blend of an ancient library and a mad scientist's laboratory. Books in piles on old cabinets. Coffers locked with weird locks without keyholes. And old statues depicting things that had no business being depicted in three-dimensional geometry, seeming to be in a constant state of battle against the rules binding them to our Euclidean space.

There was a lot. Most of my family's treasures were lost to time during the age of the Inquisition, but the most essential things were here, protected by enchantments and gargoyles.

I sat by the only non-cursed-looking object in the room, an old, heavy desk for work, and began my tasks.

What should I take? I said to myself, my gaze sweeping the cluttered space.

It should be a spirit. The burned hair suggested an apparition, and Black Speech suggested, at least, partial intelligence. Making a quick mental list of things needed, I started on the preparations.

First, alchemy. I spent some time mixing reagents in a lab setup that could have come straight from a movie set. Once the elements for the seal and the essential potions were done, the next part was the attack.

My dagger, staff, and my own magic should typically be enough for offense, but I couldn't be too sure, especially with the enigmatic nature of the haunting. So, after some hesitation, I decided to start on one more concoction.

I stretched my back as I walked to one of the shelves and took out a bottle of holy water. The original, of course, not the bullshit they used in churches those days. Then, after a bit of searching in the mess of my familys belongings, I finally located the right coffer.

I put my finger on the rune-lock and whispered the correct phrase to open it. Inside were a couple of white bones that could fetch a few dollars as haunted-house decorations. If any specialist looked at any of them, they would probably say that it was the wing bone of some huge bird, if not for the weird hole in the middle that looked suspiciously like an eye socket.

Now for the hard part. Taking a special carving knife, I pushed some of my magic into the blade, and previously hidden runes lit up. Straining my muscles, I spent the next hour trying to scrape enough powder from the bone, feeling my magic flow out of me with every pass over the hard material.

How anyone could have killed the bones owner was eyond me.

After getting enough powder, I put the bone back in its place and mixed the fruit of my work with the holy water. Not many spirits should be able to survive contact with that.

My basic preparations were done, but the last part was surprisingly tiring. I wanted to rest a bit before returning home, but the feeling of emptiness quickly made itself known. It was like a pressure difference that desperately wanted to be corrected, but for some reason couldnt. A feeling of something missing from me that I wanted back but couldnt locate. The nasty outcome of using magic in a world lacking any natural mana.

With a heavy sigh, I opened one of the most protected chests in the room. It was about half full with blue crystals, segregated by size into compartments within the coffer. Some of the crystals were the size of a pebble, while others were a bit larger than my fist.

I took out one of the pebble-sized ones. Now with a source of mana, I instinctively drew the energy into myself, slowly feeling the sucking sensation go away.

That sensation of emptiness was the cause of many mental illnesses. Untrained people with potential for magic used their mana in a fit of rage or sorrow, only to spend the rest of their lives thinking they were missing something.

Thank the Abyss, I had the crystals.

With everything prepared, I went back to the apartment to rest. Before going to bed, I confirmed that my broker had sent me the details of the meeting with the client. It was supposed to be tomorrow. And then, it would hopefully be go time.

The next morning, after finally winning the battle with sleep, I woke up with the exorcism on my mind so much that I almost forgot it was a working day, and I still had to go to college.

The exorcist gig was nice, but I needed a job in the future. With any hauntings and mana sources becoming scarcer every year, a normal job was a nice thing to have. A safe thing.

I studied two courses. Archaeology, as there was always a chance of coming across some ruin dating back to the age of myth, and, for the second, physics online. My father chose that one, to have something logical, something that described the world in specific terms, to anchor the mind when delving into things that couldnt be truly understood or perceived.

I arrived at the campus only to be greeted in the worst way possible.

Ayyyyy, the exorcist. Fought any ghosts recently? I heard the idiot from my course greet me.

Ever since someones grandmother became my client and showed the exorcism photos to one of my groupmates, he just wouldnt leave. The worldwide dwindling supply of mana was the only thing stopping me from putting a curse on him.

I gave another tired sigh.

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