“Congratulations on getting the job sweetie, I know it's something you’ve always wanted.”

Clay sat in the backseat of his mother’s car as she drove them home, the open envelope still in his hand. Normally he would be ecstatic at the news, but after everything that had happened, he was left feeling hollow. “It’s strange they offered this to me after everything that's happened…”

They probably want to keep an eye on us.

The car ride was silent the rest of the way home. Clay avoided looking at the scorch marks that were still on their front lawn. As they walked in the door they were greeted by their dog, wagging her tail happily as she always did. This brightened Clay up a bit as he knelt to pet her.

“Alastor, we’re home!” His mother called out as she walked to the kitchen. “I’ll make us some dinner.”

Alastor came running around the corner and stopped when he saw Clay. They stood in silence for a minute before Alastor spoke up “This is probably a bad time to tell you but, I claimed your room.”

“The hell you did” Clay laughed. He grabbed his brother into a half hug and half tackle while Alastor tried to escape.

Hmm.

“Alastor, prepare the table would you.” Their mother called as Clay let him go.

His soul has also been modified.

“What? How can you tell?”

I felt it.

“So he… is also immortal?”

No, at least I don’t think so, it feels different from what I feel in you.

“How many others are like this?”

Well, I didn’t feel anything from your father earlier, his soul felt normal. The dark furry thing felt normal too.

“It’s a dog… never mind.”

Clay entered the kitchen, coming up with an excuse as he hugged his mother. “What's that about?” she asked.

“I’m just thankful to be home and glad you were there to give me a ride is all.”

She seems normal.

Clay let her go. “Hey, where’s Rose?”

Rose was his older sister, two years older than Clay at 21. Alastor was 17, and Uriana was much younger at 6 years old.

“We are not sure, your father had talked to her last night but she seemed a bit off, he told her about what happened and she didn’t say much. She probably was in shock. We haven’t talked to her since. Your father went out to check up on her.” His mother answered as she worked the stove.

“Oh.” Well, he could test her later. Clay looked up and saw his dog Zoey waiting by the back door, tail still wagging happily. “I’m going to go out back with Zoey, call me when dinner is done.”

Clay stepped out into the brisk air, the sun was setting and the falling temperatures showed that autumn was quickly approaching. He sat at the foot of his patio as he watched Zoey run out into the yard.

“So what did you mean about lending me your power?”

Well, to be honest, I don't know how it would manifest in a physical form, but I am a being of spiritual energy. It's hard to explain but in the spiritual world we don’t interact or fight with physical attacks, we have exchanges of energy or battles of the soul.

“What does that even mean? It’s energy… is it like mana? Could I use your power to cast spells?”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Mana… no, Mana is more… physical for a lack of a better description. With mana you can bend the physical world to your will, spiritual energies exist separate from the physical.

“This still makes no sense, how do I even use it?”

Hmm, I suppose the simplest way would be to just unleash my energy into something, but if we did that now we would probably flood it with energy and fry.

“Great.”

How about you try just doing basic body movements, but with my energy focused on it. I will unleash my power, can you feel it?

“I feel something… this is a weird sensation.”

Try taking a step, but focus the energy on the movement.

Clay closed his eyes and focused, when he thought he was doing it right he took a step forward.

Opening his eyes he found himself in darkness.

“What the hell happened.”

Looking around he saw lights in the distance, and he could just make out his house, it was so far away.

“What, how did I get so far?”

Interesting.

This time keeping his eyes open, he took another step and found himself nearly walking into the wall of his house. “Woah.” Clay was giddy with excitement at his newfound power, focusing on it he almost forgot the events of the past two days.

“That’s amazing, I wonder what else I can do.” At first, Clay wanted to jump, but thinking about it further if it was similar to his last power, who knows how far into the air he would end up. Instead, he started practicing throwing punches while concentrating his spiritual energy on his fists. He aimed them at a nearby tree but nothing happened. “Hmm.”

Clay approached the tree and punched it as hard as he could. “Fuck!” he shouted as the pain radiated through his hand. “So much for super strength.” Looking up he saw light blue lines traveling up the tree, and a slight seared mark where his fist had landed.

Placing his hand on the tree, he concentrated on pouring his energy into it. The same lines filled the tree, and he felt something radiating off of it and back into himself. Watching the tree, it quickly began to decay until he felt the energy stop flowing.

You drained it of its life force. This has been very interesting, and I’m sure with more practice and control of my spiritual energies, we will discover new possibilities for its application.

“I want to keep going, if I can master this power maybe I actually can save her…” Clay for the first time felt a tinge of hope, that maybe he would be able to do something after all. Maybe he wouldn’t be so useless.

“Clay?” Alastor stood on the patio “Who are you talking to?”

“Oh uh… just myself. I didn’t hear you come out.”

“It’s ok, I understand, I also wish I could save her. I wish I could just turn back the clock and be there for her, and you when you guys needed it.” Alastor mumbled.

Clay thought back to the earlier incident with his father. “It’s not your fault, you couldn’t have known. Honestly, I’m glad you weren’t there, you probably would be gone if you had been.”

“I know I'm useless.”

“No, that's not what I mean” he wasn’t sure how his father was able to reassure and make others feel better in these situations, but he knew he was failing to replicate it. Alastor sat at the foot of the patio, and Clay sat down next to him.

“We’re just human.” Alastor and Clay sat quietly next to each other, watching the sunset.

“At Least you’re going to be working with the NDSA from now on though. I’m sure working with them, you’ll be able to hunt down who did this and get Uriana back.” Alastor sounded a bit hopeful.

“I will try my best.” Clay tried to sound optimistic for his brother, but he knew it was unlikely he would be able to spend much time working on his sister's case. The world is full of problems, and the NDSA couldn’t commit to just one.

Clay started thinking back to what Sephtis had said about Alastors soul. “Hey Alastor, have you noticed anything… different, or weird about yourself?”

Alastor looked at him quizzically “No… how do you mean?”

Clay was quiet for a minute, debating whether to fill his brother in on the details. “Well you know how I died… but then I didn’t?”

“Yeah, I wanted to ask about that but thought you might not want to talk about it.”

Clay told Alastor about everything that had happened with Sephtis and what he had said about their souls.

“So you think I might be able to come back from the dead too?” Alastor sounded almost excited.

“Well, no, at least according to Sephtis it’s not the same.”

“Damn” Alastor groaned. “Then what the hell is it? I don’t feel any different at all.”

Clay just sat quietly, unsure what to say.

“Hey Clay, if you could go repeat yesterday, knowing what you know now, do you think things would play out differently?”

“I don’t know. I’d like to think, if I can master these abilities, I would be able to save her.”

“And what about the Elves?” Alastor looked up at his brother.

“I’d kill them, every single Elf that attacked us that night. I wouldn’t let a single one get away.”