“Should you be getting off here, lad? The curfew’s in a few hours,” Elmer heard the middle-aged coachman of the carriage he was highlighting from utter as he dropped his feet onto the pavement. “They say nothing good comes out of sleeping in a cell, you know.”

Elmer had already paid his fee before boarding, so he just simply turned around to bow at the coachman, whose head was covered in a top hat.

“Thank you for the ride. I’ll be fine.”

He raised his eyes to see the coachman scanning the empty walkway he was standing on, discarding the tone of surety he had spoken those words with.

“Are you certain?” the coachman asked as he returned the deep gray orbs which made up his gaze to Elmer.

“Yes,” Elmer replied, and he knew this was the part where he would need to tack his answer on with a lie. “I’m just going to pay homage to my parents and be on my way. It won’t take long so I’m sure the curfew won’t meet me here.”

“The gate’s still open, so I guess the guard is still around.” The coachman seemed to ponder for a while before clearing his throat. “If that’s the case, then maybe I can wait. My carriage’s empty after all. I’ll just drop you off once you’re done.”

Quite a good man… Elmer sighed.

For such a world divided by hierarchies and filled with condescending people, meeting someone such as this coachman was a pleasant experience; though he could not accept the man’s offer now.

He also wanted to keep his exploits to himself and Lev alone. They were going to sneak into the cemetery after the guard was gone after all.

His nose had twitched twice with his first lie, now it was in play to twitch again with the next he was about to utter.

Elmer chuckled first. “There’s no need to bother, good sir. You should fend for yourself before thinking of others.” He waved his hands fervently. “And besides, my apartment is close by. A very trekkable distance. I’m not so stupid to let myself remain outside during the curfew.”

The coachman fell silent. “If you say so,” he said soon after. “Then… I’ll be on my way.”

“Safe trip home.” Elmer bowed again before the coachman spurred the pulling horse, through the reins he held, to take the carriage off.

It was not long after the sound of hooves clattering on cobblestone had faded away did the now-straightened Elmer hear a whisper of the word “glasses”.

He turned around to glimpse the walkway, which had been empty before him, to suddenly have one more person about it. A person who was creeping in some sort of sneaky manner within the shadows pouring behind the pole of a lamppost to the far end of the cemetery’s brick fence.

“Where have you been?” Lev whispered again, his voice low and as weary as his slackened face, which had gone from very pretty to less pretty because of the black contours that tainted the lower lids of his narrow amber eyes.

Well, the rough way he was dressed had a touch to that as well. With a rumpled shirt and an unbuttoned vest a person would almost think he was standing within the walls of his room. Not like Elmer was any better though. He was also extremely exhausted and roughly garbed.

Elmer closed in on Lev, slowly brushing his eyes through the slightly opened entrance gate adorned with ornate designs, as he skipped past it and appeared before the weary pawnbroker.

“Do you want to be imprisoned for a whole night, huh?” Lev complained as soon as Elmer bobbed up before him. “Do you know what it’s like to sleep in a cell?”

Of course he didn’t, and unless Lev was a criminal, or he had stayed out during curfew before, then he as well didn’t.

Elmer exhaled. “The guard’s not even left yet, that means the curfew is still some ways away.” He would have known surely what the time was if he’d had a pocket watch.

“Oh really?” Lev jerked his head backward, then dipped his hand into his vest’s inner pocket and brought out the item Elmer had just thought about—a plain silver one.

Elmer had a lingering feeling for it at the sight.

Lev clicked the pocket watch open, and after a few seconds of silence from both he and Elmer—who had been expecting some words that should have been well worth his wait—he suddenly pulled the slightly exhausted Ascender behind the lamppost where he was, and into the shadows that spread out behind it.

Elmer gasped weakly as a befuddled expression took over his countenance. But just before he could ask why Lev had taken such an action, the pawnbroker let his lips loose first.

“Now.”

A simple word Lev had said, but tacked on with the sound of a metallic gate shutting and chains wrapping around its bars, Elmer could not find himself confused.

A whistling tune emanated from the guard after he was done with his lock up as he took off his bowler hat, crossed the street, and walked down the pavement that made up the other side.

It was not long after that he found himself a carriage which would take him home and away from this desolate area of Sailport where Spearhead cemetery was situated.

After the guard had disappeared, Lev released the nervy grip he’d held the lamppost with and walked out of its shadows with an exhale—Elmer following suit.

“See.” Lev turned to Elmer. “The curfew is not in any way far off.” He turned the pocket watch he was holding to Elmer. “We only have three hours left. What’s the plan?”

Elmer did not bother asking Lev how he’d known what time the guard would perform his lock up as such a knowledge seemed fairly obvious for the pawnbroker. The man’s family members were buried here, of course he’d know when the guard who manned his parents’ and grandparents’ graves went home for the day.

After a deep inhale, Elmer closed his eyes and puffed out air. “Firstly, sneaking in.” That was the only way to get in.

Lev turned to look at the high brick fence that surrounded the cemetery and scoffed. “Sneaking in? You and who? There’s obviously no way I can climb that.”

“Only me,” Elmer told Lev. “Only me,” he repeated again, this time his voice lowered.

Lev put his eyes on Elmer, narrowing them a tad. “And me?”

Elmer took his gaze away from the fence and to the pawnbroker. “What I told you to do. Sleep.”

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The expression that stormed Lev’s face at the mention of that word showed that he was still not having that idea. And he did not let his mouth keep silent about that.

“Do you even know what you want to do, glasses? I’ve asked before, but you have to understand, my life’s at stake here.” Elmer turned away from Lev. “I already told you, once I sleep it’s most likely going to kill me. This is your first job, right? Can you guarantee that you’ll stop it before it gets to that? Can you?”

This is frustrating… I’m also afraid, Lev… It’s not only you, so just let me have a minute to relax, please…

“Levi,” Elmer said all of a sudden, his voice so low and plain that even Lev’s uneasiness had to take a pause. “You’re only making me more anxious with your words. Just do as I say, please. I’m the Ascender here, not you, and I’ll make sure to do my job well. Trust.”

The whistle of the wind was all that remained after.

That was it. That was the silence Elmer needed, and that was when he took out the pendant he had rolled into his sleeve.

“What is that?” Lev asked as soon as he saw the bronze item dangling from Elmer’s wrist.

“A divination pendant,” Elmer answered. “Please remain silent. I want to find out if the curse is actually in this cemetery.”

Please let it be, I don’t have any more time…

Elmer took in a deep breath and exhaled, then he closed his eyes as he turned his body fully toward the cemetery and muttered, “The watchful eye of the Heavens that sees all. I plead for your vast gaze. Show me if what I seek is in this place with me now. Lev’s curse.”

Lev shuddered as the pendant suddenly shook fiercely and spinned so fast that the wheels of a carriage would pale in comparison to its speed.

“What…” He trailed off in astonishment, and Elmer opened his eyes with a smile then.

“It’s here,” Elmer said, turning to Lev to see the pawnbroker staring at him with widened eyes while the pendant slowed down to a halt from its ferocious spinning.

“Magic.” Lev swallowed a spit. “So even an inexperienced Ascender can do things like this? Wow.”

Well, after today I will be one great step away from being inexperienced any longer… Elmer kept his riposte to himself while he tucked the pendant back beneath his sleeve.

All of a sudden his smile faded as his insides quivered and his chest tightened with the recollection that he really was about to take on a spiritual being, and worse, it was with a person’s life on the line.

He knew this would be nothing like his battle with the Lost he had fought, this would be harder and far more demanding, he could feel it in his heart. But this was also his first step to helping Mabel.

Right here, right now, he was going to make sure the exorcism he was about to perform would prove successful. Only then would he become a real bounty hunter—a real Ascender—and only then would he have a closer access to the information on The Warlock’s Torch. Hopefully.

“Lev,” Elmer said, calling out to the weary pawnbroker whose eyes had been darting about anxiously. “Let’s head to the side.” Elmer gestured with his head at the bushes that made up the cemetery’s perimeter, and Lev nodded.

Upon getting there, Elmer pointed to one of the oak trees that stood tall beside the cemetery’s fence. “You can sleep there, it looks more comfortable than the rest, seeing as you did not bring the mattress.”

Lev looked at the tree and back at Elmer. He wanted to say something but he could not get himself to speak. His voice had hung in his throat, and his hands were quivering so softly it almost seemed as though the cold air surrounding the cemetery was getting to him.

After a while of trying to articulate words, but proving unsuccessful, the weary pawnbroker gave up and went to sit on the patch of grass that made up the tree’s borders, leaning backward on it and shutting his eyes.

Elmer chose to say nothing—he couldn’t even say anything.

He tried to believe he could do it, but he was not a hundred percent sure he could. He was as perturbed as the pawnbroker, even though a bit less since it was not his life that was directly on the line, and therefore he did not want to bless the man with any more hope than necessary.

Failure was not an option though, he was going to make sure to exorcise the curse.

Elmer dipped his hands into his waist bag, brought out his brown leather gloves, and put them on. Then he shuffled backward, nudged his glasses onto the bridge of his nose, and ran up the brick fence, sharing three kicks between the front foot of his feet to propel himself upward, and allowing him the opportunity to grab the top of the fence.

Very nimble he was, and due to Eddie’s explanations he now knew what to thank for the heightened explosiveness his legs now had.

Elmer scaled the fence and dropped down behind one of the countless shrubs in the cemetery, avoiding the tombstones he had seen from up high.

He quickly stood up and prepared himself to recite the prayer he had learned from Eddie for the spiritual eyesight, well aware that he had already spent the little time it would take for Lev to fall asleep. Any more and the curse would get to Lev before he could get to it.

“The watchful eye of the Heavens. The peering gaze that rains down upon the world. I pray for a minuscule portion of the power of your sight. Grant me the ability to see what I seek. Lev’s curse.”

The air suddenly grew colder, but in a vast contrast to it was the heat that stormed Elmer’s eyes, forcing him into a nervous shudder.

It was as though a kettle of highly boiled hot water had been poured on them. And he would have let out a harrowing scream if it had not taken only a second for the raging heat surrounding his eyes to reduce into a simpler warmth of tender feel.

Elmer slowly opened his eyes, which he had shut when that unexpected and uncomfortable sensation had stormed them, and found himself seeing things in a different color than usual.

The feeling was first hazy, and he almost fell down to his buttocks, but he quickly regained his composure. Everything was spread out so far in a bizarre blur.

He was not blind, he knew. He was not also in another place like the dream world he had wandered into when he had taken the essence elixir. This was still the cemetery, only his eyesight had changed.

All of a sudden, as he was still trying to settle this new sensation he had down, he heard the howls of wolves, and he took his hazy and blurred gaze toward the direction they had come from, a place which was on the opposite side of the serpentine gravel path that divided the cemetery wherever it snaked through.

There, surrounding four tombstones that were lined up horizontally, were a pack of wolves made out of smoke.

Their figures were very visible, but their bodies were constantly being blown into the distance as though a soft wind wanted to take them far away from where they were but proved futile.

And in the midst of the snarling wolves was the floating figure of a woman shrouded in a pale white gown.

She had long silver hair like that of the full moon which was hung up in the dark sky, reaching down to where her legs would have been if she wasn’t being strung up like a puppet in the air. And from where her eyes had been meant to be, eerily streamed never-ending tears down the feature where a face should have been.

The wolves are guarding the curse… Does that mean the grave it’s floating on is where the ritual had been performed…?

There was no need to spell it out to Elmer.

His breathing hastened as he quickly dug out his already loaded revolver and cocked its hammer, at the same time, taking the purgatory talisman in his other hand and filling his ears with their indistinct whispers. He was glad they weren’t too loud, they in all actuality would disrupt his mind wickedly if they were.

All of a sudden, as though the wolves had noticed what sort of yellowish paper it was he was holding in his left hand, their snarling intensified, and they directed them clearly at him.

At the same time, so did the cries of the floating woman make their way into his ears. It was so painful, so sad, and also, so peaceful.

If he had come here without any knowledge on what exactly she was, he would have had a feeling of remorse clenching his heart for whatever unknown plights she might have faced.

But that did not matter to him at this moment. She was not a person or a wandering soul, she was a curse, a killing one, and he was the bounty hunter who had been employed to take her down.

Elmer nudged forward, planting a foot before his other with a deep breath. And at that action, the snarling of the wolves amplified in realization of what his intentions were, before they suddenly rushed toward him, all six of them.

Neither fear nor hesitance was allowed for Elmer at this moment. There was no backing down any longer.

Saving a life or causing the death of one was what his decisions would cost. The latter he had no longing for.

Holding that in mind, along with a steeled resolve, he dashed forward.