Ghost immediately leaves the headmaster's office and appears on top of the archery classes roof. His face turns from the blonde prince to a pitch black blank mask. The mask only has an area to show his eyes, there isn't even a hole to breathe. His hair turns blue and eyes glow menacing red through the mask.
Ghost also slowly shrinks a couple inches. Sleek black leather armor appears over his body instantly with the daggers attached to his waist.
“Sigh that teacher is such an idiot, why would I go around without my weapons or armor? In this world nowhere is safe or else I wouldn't be needed *sigh* I wonder how she even got a job here sometimes. No matter what you should always have a weapon within hands reach.”
“There isn’t birds flocking out of the forest so they shouldn't feel any danger. It's probably not a monster capable flight then. There also isn't a mass exodus of monsters trying to escape the forest so it doesn't have a dominating aura. It could have already dominated all the monsters in the forest tho so I can't be sure if the forest itself is a trap.”
“What are you looking at Ghost?” Rainte appears right next to ghost and whispers in his right ear. He quickly jumps away and stares at the ghost girl in shock.
“How do you know it's me and WHY ARE YOU HERE!” Ghost can't help but scream at the end of the question.
“If I concentrate I can speak ‘normally’, master.”
“That's not what I asked you and you know it!”
“Master I don't look at peoples outer appearance. I’m just a soul now, so that's what I look at your soul! You can't change how that looks so most disguises are ineffective in front of me.”
She looks at him with a mixture of wanting to be patted and punched at the same time. Well, I guess being punched might be the same as being patted to her.
*Sigh* “Don’t go around telling people that my appearance is fake, okay? I’ll let you keep calling me master if you don’t. Anyways don't follow me I have to go somewhere that's dangerous and it's already proven that things can hurt you.”
“But, I want to help thee!” She starts to sound flustered and more olden towards the end.
“No, if you want to call me master you're going to have to listen to my orders!” As Ghost actually believes this weird creature would listen to his orders. There is only one way to get her to listen to him is to fulfill her urges.
“Nay thee can't stand ho me from following thee.”
“Oh, but I can stop you!” A vial of blood appears in ghosts hand and immediately breaks. The blood spills out and turns into ropes tying Rantie like a raw Thanksgiving turkey. “Now you're going to stay here while I’m off doing my job.”
-At least she will probably be enjoying this and she can't be touched by some even stranger man. She can also turn invisible still, right? Oh well, she is on an isolated roof so everything should be fine.-
Ghost moves so fast that he vanishes from the area almost instantly reaching the forest.
He reaches the area where the student was found to see if there are any battle scars to learn from. “Hmm, it doesn't look like there was a struggle over here strange. Did the teacher knock out the student and launch her out of the forest to protect her?”
“If that was the case there would be broken branches over here but it isn’t strange. Oh well, it's not my job to figure out what happened here, it's my job to save the teacher and to kill the troublesome creature.”
He enters a dead quiet forest while ignoring all the strange things about this case. The forest has a completely different vibe from just a couple days earlier.
“Why is it so empty? Where are all the birds nesting in the trees and all the insects on the ground? Maybe there is actually an animal that’s controlling the others.”
“I wonder why it attacked humans usually the stronger ones avoid us because we live in groups and by killing just one you might have to deal with hundreds afterward. This is even more so because the monster should be able to tell that it’s our territory.”
It is curious about why a beast would hunt humans near a stronger group of humans, but then again Hiro did want to hire Ghost for protection.
“It could be a beast that has gone berserk and can't think straight, but if that was the case the other animals wouldn't be so calm. Unless the reason why I don't see or hear any of them is that the creature scared them into hiding hmm.”
“There is only one way to find out and that is to see the said beast!” Ghost quietly yet quickly traverses the forest. As he continues further into the forest nothing changes still quiet and empty. The forest feels like a ghost town as if he was the only existence here.
Suddenly a ram rams at Ghost, which he barely manages to side with a gash on his side. The blood that drips from the fresh wound turns into a dagger and stabs the ram.
It vanishes and turns into an eagle whose feathers shootout at Ghost. He easily dodges most of the feathers but purposefully takes a couple cuts which drip a couple drops of blood. The blood turns into a cage and surrounds the tiny eagle.
“So, it's a shapeshifter that's causing problems. What did you think kidnapping a student and using their form to spy on the school was a good idea. But you were caught in the act by a teacher and you got greedy for someone in a higher position? So, who sent you one of the rumored beast kings?”
Kaww! The eagle charges at Ghost beak first it's beak breaking the blood cage, but the fragmented cage turns into daggers impaling the eagle's body.
“I would capture you but know every time you change you can mini teleport so it's better to just destroy this body of yours. Now please tell me you have better bodies than these! Any respected shapeshifter would have at least one body that has magic abilities. These bodies are at most C grade with a couple B grade traits.”
A black indistinct figure appears in front of Ghost flickering in and out of existence. “Don't get cocky human if I wasn't afraid of more of you showing up I would never have used such pathetic bodies!”
“But, since I was caught there is no use hiding anymore and I should just kill you and try again when things settle down.” The shapeshifter starts to turn more indistinct. It slowly went from a humanoid figure to more animalistic.
Roars started to resound throughout the forest as if they were afraid of what was about to appear. A massive pressure starts to flood out of the animastic figure. A claw slowly appears than a second.
“Don't tell me it's the strongest form is of a dragon! The pressure that is releasing is a close one.” As Ghost was making his guess a third claw appears and then the fourth. It's tail and legs slowly start to appear next. The legs are obviously more mammal-like covered in fur instead of a dragons scaly legs.
“Even if it isn't a dragon with this pressure it isn't any weaker than one. There aren't many animals that are as strong as a dragon of this scale.”
The body and head slowly start to appear while the tail and legs finish appearing. The fur is white in color while the face slowly starts to appear more and more feline.
“It's a white tiger, this is bad the wind magic of is too strong for me to go against! I don't know what's worse a dragons thick scales that are almost impossible for me to cut or the wind magic slowly me down while speeding it up.”
I can't put my finger on it but something seems to be missing from this white tiger. It might be because I’m not that familiar with this universe, but there really is something missing.
The complete body appears in all of its glory, but something feels off about it as if it was still incomplete. There was no wind surrounding it nor was there any pressure from the surrounding air. “Feel the wrath of a divine beast you mortal!” The tiger roars out, but Ghost can't help but laugh.
“To think you would be so cocky about borrowed power. I know about you shapeshifters and how you get your forms. You have to kill the creature and take its soul, but if someone else gives you it's soul you can still use it but not completely.”
Ah, so that’s it the tiger didn’t have any mana! Almost everything in this universe has mana so that's why it felt like it was missing something important.
“The body your using isn’t complete your missing the most important part of the white tiger it's the overlord of wind yet you can't control any of the air elements. If it's only the physical body of the white tiger then you don't scare me nearly as much.”
The tiger vanishes and slams into Ghost making him go flying backward through tens of trees. Ghost proceeds to coughs out a bit of blood.
“I stand corrected with if you can continue at that speed and strength than you deserve to be so proud.”
The tiger still looks full of energy but is moving at a slower more manageable speed. The blood Ghost coughs up turns into mini needles and flies at the tiger.
-If I knew this would have been such a tough and empty fight I wouldn't have waisted those vials on rainte.-
The needles don't manage to penetrate the Tigers' skin. The reorganize and combine into a shackle around the Tigers right back leg.
“Hey, buddy you don't know how to use that body that well do you? Did you get it recently or have you never fought someone strong like me? You missed a prime opportunity to hurt me, you know?”
Ghost moves at around the same speed of the tiger and stabs towards it. The daggers barely cut skin deep into the tiger. Ghost quickly back steps away from a swipe of the tigers claw.
Shockingly he moves at the same speed backward as he does forwards. “Come on big guy you gotta try harder than that.” Ghost taunts the tiger while cursing under his breath that it's still a shapeshifter, which does not have any blood in its body.
“Hmph! At Least I can hurt you. You, on the other hand, couldn’t even harm me with a full powered strike.” The tiger immediately pounces towards Ghost, but it hits nothing but air. Ghost tries to cut off the tiger's tail but yet again it doesn’t go that well.
“Why is your skin so thick you big cat! I can't believe I have to do this for a pay to win shapeshifter.” Ghost pulls out a syringe and stabs it into his arm easily piercing his vein stopping perfectly.
The tiger charges at him and tries to swipe at him yet again but it's too late the blood is already filled into the syringe. Ghost ducks under the claw swipe and releases the blood.
The blood shoots out of the syringe and turns into hollow daggers with the actual blade being inside of them. It starts to vibrate at a speed invisible to the naked eye like a chainsaw.
He stabs straight at the underbelly of the tiger trying to gut it. The daggers pierce past the skin and into the muscles but get stuck in the harder muscle.
The tiger swings it's paw at Ghost while the dagger is stuck in its bloodless abs. The paw hits Ghost and once again sends him flying through trees and hitting against a cliff. The dagger was successfully pulled out when he was hit but he dropped it thanks to the sheer force of the strike.
“This little toy of yours actually can harm me, but in the end, I'm not a tiger and these wounds don't even matter. But this weapon of yours should matter a lot for your total fighting force.”
It crushes the dagger underneath its paw and a sharp schink sound is heard throughout the quiet forest. The blood that was on the dagger turns into chains and a shackle. The chains connect the two shackles together. The new shackle goes around the tigers back left leg.
“Haha, sacrificing my weapon for slowing you down is worth it I’d say. As for these wounds, the blood is still useful to me so don't worry about it.” The other dagger appears in his hand also covered in a bloody chainsaw.
With Ghosts back against a cliff he has nowhere to run away, so he puts his foot against it and launches forward. He appears in front of the tiger almost instantly and slashes at one of its eyes. The tiger moves it's head away but the dagger slices off a bit of its cheek.
The tiger roars at Ghost and the air pressure shockingly pushes him away from it. “Dumb kitty can't use magic so your white tiger's roar can only push me backward. Heck, I’ve heard that the white tiger and any other monster that’s at S or higher can turn into a human. You can't even manage that how sad.”
The tiger gets so angry it tries to bite at Ghost. He takes the free chance to cut at its neck, but the tiger uses is thick skull to block the stab.
The tiger then proceeds to push Ghost farther and farther backward till he hits a tree. Then it pushes at full force breaking the tree while shaking Ghosts internal organs.
Ghost spits out blood at its eye blinding it then turns it into needle destroying the eye. “Haha, trying to kill me via shockwaves isn’t turning out to well for you is it?’ It instinctively hits Ghost away through a couple more trees, but Ghost doesn’t let go of his dagger this time around.
The tiger's eye proceeds to regenerate as if nothing happened and then it rushes at Ghost at max speed. It arrives in front of him before he can react and slashes at him with its claw cutting right through a thick old oak behind him. The tree gives Ghost just enough time to duck under the sharp momentum increased blow.
“Jeez, you can still move at that speed with those leg chains? Well, might as well increase them then.”
The fight that was moving all around the forest finally returned to the original point and the blood that was used to kill the first couple of formes comes up underneath the tiger and attaches itself making the leg chains complete.
I thought that I felt this before during his fight with the wind bear, but Ghost’s blood magic seems to be severely weaker than when we first watched him. I wonder if this is a current problem of his or if it happened naturally over time?
“There you shouldn't be able to move at that speed anymore.” As Ghost keeps taunting the tiger for another bite the tiger starts to paint clearly the charges take to much energy.
“Oh, does the poor little kitty move to fast for its body? I wonder how many times you can move at that speed even if I didn't tie you like this?”
The tiger charges at Ghost at max speed out of pure rage, but the seemingly useless chains turn into a blood spike shooting it up off the ground stopping it in its tracks.
Ghost takes the opportunity to charge at it and takes a deep cut out of its side. He then retreats and takes the opportunity to try to behead the beast. But the tiger releases another roar and stops Ghost in tracks.
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It lets the spike pierce into it and quickly uses the opportunity to break it off of its body and eject it out of the body. Ghost, on the other hand, stares at it in shock for a bit then starts to smile like he had a brilliant idea.
“Hey, kitty weren’t you proud of your defense at the beginning now look at you. Your hurt all over and your speed and strength have exhausted your tiny amount of stamina. You don’t know the basic of stamina management, so look at you a great shapeshifter actually panting.”
The tiger gets angry yet again and charges at Ghost one more time not listing to him at all. Ghost stabs at the tiger's forehead to stop its momentum, but the tiger bites at the dagger instead of Ghost!
The Tiger's sharp teeth bite into it and destroy the other dagger. “Now without a weapon how are you planning on hurting me? There is also no way you can control that blood after it goes into my body right?”
“I already know a lot about you Ghost. Which is why I was trying to use shockwaves to kill you instead of cutting you and giving you more blood to work with! I’ll let you know this before killing you the person who gave me this tigers soul asked me to kill you in exchange for it.”
I thought there was something suspicious with the way the tiger was fighting, but I didn’t want to ruin the surprise to everyone else if I was right.
“So who is that wants me dead I’ve made quite a few enemies in my time adventuring. But, most of them shouldn’t be able to come to this planet. Maybe it's one of those flying lizards or how about the god of one of the worlds I was summoned to hmm.”
Ghost starts to think about the various enemies he made in his previous adventures, but he forgets one key point. Most of those existences wouldn’t be able to come to his own world much less send a shapeshifter with an S rank soul after him.
“It doesn't matter because you're dead! You think I told you that information to let you have a peaceful death? I told you it to make you have an unsatisfying death!” The tiger tries to finish off the unarmed Ghost but suddenly stops moving and looks at Ghost in shock.
“Your information isn’t exact enough I can actually control the blood inside of you. Since you told me some nice information I’ll be nice and tell you some as well! I can control the blood inside of you since you don't have any inside of you!”
“There‘s a barrier in a flesh and blood creature made by their soul that prevents me from controlling their blood. But for you, there isn’t since your soul doesn’t find blood important.” The tiger vanishes and turns back in the black indistinct figure. Which tries to run away, but a blood jail appears around it.
“Now tell me who told you to kill me and I’ll make your death less painful.”
“I’ll tell you! There is no need to torture me the one that wants to kill you is-” The shadow implodes inside of the blood prison.
“Did it self destruct? No, it was too much of a wimp to destroy its own soul. Then what could have happened? I don’t know enough about various S rankers much less the gods ruling each planet.”
“I wonder if there is an expert in this type of field. I also need some better weapons those daggers were nice and all but I think I’ve outgrown them.”
Ghost first moves all the blood into new vials while it's still liquid and moveable. Then he takes a couple minutes to recollect everything that happened during his fight something he learned to do while adventuring around.
“That white tiger wasn’t as strong as it should’ve been its strength was probably an S, it's speed was also an S but it's stamina and defense were at most A.”
While it's physical stats were partly in the S without the ability to use mana or internal energy it became severely weaker and easier to predict.
“So it couldn't move at S class speed constantly yet it was an idiot and couldn't hurt me without using its speed. Looks like I’m right to keep my speed and stamina equal to each other. But my strength is too weak and it won't go up anymore.”
“If I could use mana to build up my current physical body maybe I could breakthrough to S or somehow change the mana I have to internal energy. My speed is stuck at A same with stamina and defense. My strength is the only that doesn't want to go up to A.”
“Sigh that fight would of been much easier if my blood ability wasn’t constantly weakening. I wonder why this is the case and if it involves all water type magic.”
He starts to look around for anything that could explain what happened to the shapeshifter. But the forest is empty of anything unusual it's as if the shapeshifter vaporized into nothingness.
“Great there isn't even anything here I can use as proof of subjugation, nor is there any clues of where the teacher is. Did the shapeshifter already kill him? But then why didn't it turn into the teacher, before I arrived and got close to me to kill me, weird.”
Ghost once again ignores the weird things about his very first case. Maybe he realized that there was something happening in the background, but only really cared about getting his little sister cured.
The forest starts to come back alive. Sounds of various beasts can be heard once again, birds start to be seen flying around above the trees. Ghost realizes that without his weapons the forest isn’t as safe anymore. So he immediately leaves the forest at the fastest speed he can move without hitting a tree.
He appears on top of the roof that he tied Rainte to and as his luck would have it she was still there. The problem was she was constantly moaning semi-erotic and was also constantly trying to make the rope go tighter and tighter.
“Should I ask what you're doing or should I just leave you here till someone hears you moaning and finds you. How about this you don't have to follow me around and I’ll just leave you tied up like this then we will both be happy?”
“NOOO, master this might feel amazing but eventually the feeling will slowly go away. It's much better if I followed you and you used many different amazing ways to torture me! You’re the only one that can tie me up and use these various and interesting ways of torture. Even if someone could hurt me I doubt that they could capture me as you can!”
“Sigh, so I'm going to be stuck with you unless I have the heart to mercilessly kill you. But I can't just kill you because of your annoying me. If I did that then I would be the same as I was a couple of years ago.”
Various memories flash by as he starts to recall all the errors that he did in the past. They all still haunt him to this day.
“Fine! But, when you're around me you can't talk with that fake accent. Maybe when you're around others you can still pretend to be an older spirit. This shall be my first order as your master and also a test if you don't follow it then you can't call me master.”
“So, if I talk like I did when I met you then you won't hurt me but instead just leave?” She looks at Ghost shocked and confused as if all her life was a lie. “I thought using that voice would make me look older and special, so they would be more willing for me to follow them.”
“Don't lie to me I know you were using that voice to annoy people into beating you!”
“But master your the only one that can hurt me what's the use of annoying people that can't hurt me?”
“Oh yeah?” Ghost instantly punches at her and causes her form to disperse. A faint moan could be heard from Rainte as she tries to hide her joy from him, but thanks to Ghosts sharp hearing she fails.
“So just having your form being disrupted is still a form of lesser pleasure for you? Now it looks like you annoying people will gain you a reward!”
She stares at him in shock for a bit her face slowly turning more and more red. Eventually, she gives up and screams, “OK! I admit to my mistake for lying to master. I’ll confess that I was using that voice to make people mad and disperse me. Then I’ll become invisible and go away from them as if they slew me or if they were hallucinating.”
“Now that we have that out of our system do you know any way to make someone die if he reveals any specific information?”
She pauses for a bit and makes a face that tells she is thinking very deeply about the problem Ghost asked her. Eventually, she stops making the face and looks really confused.
“There might be a way to do that, but I don't know how it could be possible to make it happen based off of spilling secrets. What happened was probably someone put a seal on its soul as for anything else and what type of existence could do so I don't know. Maybe if you find someone who knows more about souls they could help you and maybe even help me as well.”
Ghost thinks about it for a bit and decides it's best if he just asked the headmaster about anyone who is well versed in souls. “Good girl now let’s go find the headmaster and ask him some questions and tell him the beast has been slain.”
Ghost and Rainte head back to his dorm room to go down the secret tunnel. Rainte being a ghost and not limited by air resistance can actually move faster than him, but sadly she is also incapable of touching anything much less harming something.
“As your master can you do anything useful in combat? I know you can't touch anything so don't tell me about that what I want to know is if you can use any magic?”
“Nope can't use that it's way too confusing and since nothing seems to be able to hurt me I haven't thought or cared about combat. Since I can turn invisible and move faster than you I guess I could be a scout.”
“That's not enough even if you haven't met a person who can harm you that doesn't mean no one can. You need to learn how to protect yourself so that I can trust you to look ahead for me.”
“Well, I actually haven't been a ghost for that long so I don't know if there is a way for me to harm the living. Maybe if you find a necromancer he would know more about what type of undead I am? Oh yeah, necromancers are magic that uses death magic and can control the dead.”
“I know what necromancers are! I’m not an idiot I’ve been adventuring for nearly half of my life now. I don't know where we can find a necromancer in this world, however.”
“Well we are almost at the headmaster so that's just another question to ask isn’t it?” While she was saying that they appear outside of the headmaster office’s secret entrance. Ghost takes the time this time to actually knock on it two times.
“Come in there is no one here.”
“Yo, mission accomplished. There was a shapeshifter who had a tiger soul trying to infiltrate the forest. He was about as strong as an A* adventurer. I tried to interrogate it but when it was revealing why it suddenly exploded.”
Hiro looks shocked when Ghost mention it exploding, but then quickly the shock fades away. “I never thought someone would be secretly teaming up with monsters to destroy my academy. Nor that their spy would be so trusting to self destruct for their cause!”
“Here's the thing it didn't have the courage to self destruct it actually confessed quickly but then it seemed forced to self destruct.”
“You sure that's the case and it wasn't just stalling for time to self destruct? From my point of view, there's nothing that could possibly cause someone to unwillingly destroy their body and soul.”
Ghost tries to keep a straight face, but secretly he is doubting the headmaster. “Now that we have settled that affair I have two more things to ask you about. During the fight my weapons get destroyed do you know a good blacksmith to make me a new pair?”
“Blacksmith? We were summoned to be, not smiths so naturally there is no one summoned to be a smith. Some took up the occupation for fun, but again that wasn't their true calling.”
“On the other hand do you know that not everyone was summoned to a world of magic? There were a couple other worlds that ‘teleported’ them to a science world. Maybe there's someone on that side of the academy that can help you.”
I get why the fantasy worlds needed heroes but why did the science worlds need people? Odds are most of those people were experimented on instead of being returned.
“I actually didn’t know that thank you for the information. I'll look into it to see if there's someone who can help me. The other thing is do you know anyone that specializes in souls? There is a spirit that keeps haunting me and I need their help to get rid of it.”
The headmaster takes a bit to ponder about some unknown thing before his delicate face seems to realize something. “Are the rumors of the female ghost true? Multiple people came to me saying that the school was haunted by a weird old ghost. Has it taken a fancy to you?”
“Yeah, it has and I can't get rid of it. It's immune to ALL my attacks!” Ghost heavy emphasis on the word all while secretly chuckling on the inside.
“Well, that makes sense only S class attacks and higher can harm ethereal beings. If you were an S class I wouldn't have dared to pull you into being the school's guardian they are way too important to our world.”
“As for people that specialize in ghosts as I said earlier an S class would be able to harm it, but I doubt they would able to destroy it since ethereal beings move way too fast. Sadly necromancers tend to be an evil path so all of them are in the traitor school that teaches people the opposite as mine. The villain school that aims to destroy the strongholds and have the world be a dog eat dog world.”
“Thank you for the information. If you ever hear about any necromancer please tell me first. I'm sure I can force some kinda deal out of him or her.” Ghost then proceeds to leave and head towards the science area of the academy.
“Hey, you! Yes, you! Do you know anyone who specializes in making cold weapons?” Ghost asks a random student that was just passing by.
“Hmph a magic student trying to find someone from our science division to help them? Keep on dreaming we will never help you unscientific brats!”
Another student comes by and hits the arrogant student across the back of his head. “Sorry, about him he’s a bit extreme about his views, but he is right. No one will help you they will all probably find some way to turn you down.”
“There‘s one person who might help you, but I don't know if he can make anything strong. In the middle point between the two academies, there is a person who believes science and magic can be fused into one. He might be able to help. We call him the mad scientist but you probably shouldn’t he might get mad.”
“Thank you for your help I’m sorry for causing you and your friend any trouble.” Ghost and the hidden Rainte leave towards the mad scientist's laboratory. After a long and calming walk, they start to hear loud bangs.
“Ghost are you sure we should ask him for help? There are probably some people outside who are good at forging or how else would people get weapons after the break them.”
“Your right but why not check this person out. I was just curious about weapons made with science that's all. Maybe this guy might surprise us.”