“Um… when you brought me some place secluded, this wasn’t what I had in mind.” Lana spoke uncertainly.

“What exactly did you have in mind?” I asked absently as I spread ingredients over the ground. “I told you I had some business to take care of and you said you wanted to accompany me.”

“Ah… that… I don’t know… maybe… no… ahem…” Lana touched her fingers together while speaking nonsensically.

“As a witch, I thought you might be interested in seeing this spell. That’s why I invited you.” I explained.

“Oh?” Lana blinked and finally looked down at the ground.

I had returned to the basement of the school where I had been locked with Rosita earlier. When I had taken Lana down into the dark basement, she had acted strangely quiet and even shook nervously while eying me. I figured as a witch, she’d be used to these kinds of places, but it seemed like I was mistaken. After that, I had begun to pull out and mix ingredients to create the appropriate reagents to initiate the spell. Meanwhile, Lana stood nearby watching me in confusion.

“Do you know how to make an inverted sorceress’s circle?” I asked.

“A wha- an inverted sorceress’s circle… pfft… yeah… of course…” Lana declared, her voice rising slightly.

“Just copy this. I need it two meters in diameter.” I pulled out a sheet of paper and tossed it to her.

I had been working on that design in between handing out tickets. It was a fairly standard spell circle, so I didn’t see any reason Lana wouldn’t be proficient in such a thing. She juggled the paper for a few seconds before straightening it out and looking through it. With her hands holding it tightly, she gave a stern nod. She got down on her knees and started drawing, even though she was kneeling on her dress and getting it dirty. I nodded in affirmation. That was the kind of dedication I expected from a witch.

I returned to my work, creating a dozen different poultices and potions. To date, this was the most aggressive spell I’d ever cast since coming to this world. The spell would take care of several problems at once. I had been looking for such a chance since I had come here, but it hadn’t been until I entered this basement that I realized it met the requirements that I needed.

“What does this spell do, anyway?” Lana grunted followed by a tearing sound. “Ah! My dress!”

“I’m going to summon a spirit,” I explained.

“… oh… that sounds fun.” Lana smiled.

“Spirit can be fun, but they can also be dangerous, so be careful,” I warned Lana.

“R-right!” She got back to work drawing the circle.

After being locked down there with Rosita, I had felt the residual presence of a spirit. Either someone had died down in this subterranean boiler room or they had been buried down here. For whatever reason, their attachments were lingering. Occasionally, one could encounter a spirit that died happily, and their attachment was to family or friends. Others were a bit more malicious. Based on the circumstances, I guessed that it was the latter type, which was far less fun.

That said, the part I didn’t tell Lana was that I had intended to capture the spirit. Spirits made pretty good servants, and I could use them as another weapon in my arsenal. For example, protecting my sister or getting revenge would be extremely easy with a spirit. I wouldn’t need to do anything but send the spirit, and no one would be able to connect me to anything supernatural that happened either. It was smart easier… ahem… I meant

This world didn’t allow slavery. That didn’t worry me too much. Ever since Asana became the presiding goddess of my previous world, they had also done away with slavery. Although slaves were convenient, I considered myself an abolitionist. I didn’t keep slaves and had been known to purchase and free several. Of course, the prerequisite to me buying them was that they would be a willing participant in an experiment before I freed them. It was a better deal than prisoners, who would have to be subjected to experiments only to have to go back to their cell when they were done. That practice was also outlawed by Asana.

Her priests preached that all life was sacred and treasured. Of course, there were always exceptions. One exception included the recently departed. Spirits that refused to return to Asana’s life cycle were considered fair game. They could be captured, sold, enslaved, and abused. Much like demons, they were an affront to Asana’s grand design and were thus treated as less than trash.

This world didn’t truly have spirits in the traditional sense. Normally, a ghost or spirit was formed when there was an excess of mana. Ghosts were far more likely to show up in the buildings of former mages or castles where magic might be used regularly. When someone died, or sometimes even many someones, a malignant aura stuck around. Its creation and existence were influenced by many factors, from the location, the instigating event, and even the personality of the individual involved. In the right circumstances, this aura would condense and merge with the mana, forming a spirit.

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The mana on Earth was far too thin for such a spirit to form completely. Perhaps, there were shadows of such a malignant aura, but the majority of what I had seen while looking for information on the Internet leaned toward the entire ghost hunting business all being just for show. If any of those so-called ghost hunters encountered a real spirit, they would likely go insane before being brutally murdered by the spirit.

However, it was exactly this kind of spirit I planned to bring into the world and enslave at that moment. I wouldn’t just be able to use them tonight to assist with my problems around my sister, but I would be able to use them for the future too. They could gather supplies, perform surveillance, and even aid in potion-making. There was no shortage of uses from a properly controlled spirit. Sure, there was the chance that they broke free of their control and rampaged, but I was confident I could handle any malignancy that appeared in this world.

“Are you done?” I asked as I finished up the last of the reagents.

Not all of these potions were necessary. Some merely set up the appropriate environment, such as diffusing mana into the air and creating an area of denser mana nearby. Others were involved in the summoning as well as the enslavement. A few merely existed as backups in case something went wrong. They were intended to protect me and cancel the spell. It was never a bad idea to be too prepared.

“Ah…” Lana got off her knees with some effort, looking between the sheet of paper and the floor before nodding. “Uh-huh.”

“Light some candles,” I ordered.

“Y-yes!” She made care to avoid the circle as she ran to the pile of items I had prepared at the side.

After a few moments, she started lighting candles. The candles weren’t necessary for the ceremony, although many mages often used them when convening with the spirits to come off as more mystical and eerie. I just needed the light to see the entire thing as a whole. The single swinging bulb overhead didn’t put out enough light that I could examine the intricacies of the circle. I wasn’t a fool, after all. Even if I trusted this little witch with my life, I’d always checked to make sure that things were going properly. Just as I was looking down at her first runic drawing, the light decreased.

“Lana… light…” I growled as the light dimmed even more.

“Aiko… wh-what’s going on?”

I finally looked up, and I could see the candles were going out one at a time. Lana already had lit nearly all of them in an arc around the magic circle, but the first one went out, then the second, and the third… following after her. The speed of them increased, and then and when they got near Lana, she jumped back with a squeak. When the last candle went out, there was a moment of silence where the two of us met eyes. That’s when I saw a dark shadow behind Lana.

“Move!” I cried out.

As pale white hands emerged from the shadows, wrapping around Lana, the bulb suddenly sputtered out with a crack, plunging us into darkness. Lana let out a scream, and I let out a curse. Who said that ghosts couldn’t manifest in this world? All I had done so far was release a little bit of mana. For the ghost to spontaneously form from that, it must have soaked it all up like a desert at the advent of rainfall. I threw a potion from my hand, and when it struck the ground with a crack, there was an eruption of green light. Lana crouched down, blocking her eyes, while I grabbed my second potion and threw it at the circle.

It cracked as well, but this one sizzled when it touched the formation. I did a swipe with my feet disrupting the circle that I hadn’t even had a chance to activate. As the green light was fading, I pulled out my cellphone and turned on the flashlight. I looked around the room quickly to find that Lana was crouching with her hands over her face.

“Lana, are you okay?”

There was a moment of pause, but then Lana pulled her hands apart and looked up at me with a smile. “I’m fine.”

I nodded, and then tossed a bottle to her. “Sprinkle this all over the ground. It will disperse the spirits.”

The first bottle had just been to create light, while the second one broke the conduit between the spiritual and physical world. With this final step, the malignant auras in the basement would be put to rest. I hadn’t considered that this location was the building of countless youth. Teenagers were both hormonally and emotionally charged, and all of their emotions seemed to have accumulated down in the basement, creating an aura far stronger than I anticipated.

I should have realized it from the beginning. In reality, with the mana of the world so low, I shouldn’t have been able to detect this aura in the first place. It had to be enormous for me to be able to feel it even when I hadn’t been looking for it. As much as I thought I had a handle on the rules of this world, I was still discovering new things every day.

Part of me regretted sanctifying the ground, but I couldn’t afford to take any risks. I’d have to find a new place and try again at a later date. Lana quietly helped me drizzle the potion over the entire floor. As she did so, she hummed to herself and even giggled slightly. She seemed a be in a good mood. I would have thought that after this scare, she might have been shaken up. However, Lana was a witch, so such things were common for such a person. I had only known two witches. One of them sacrificed and bathed in the blood of goats, and the other was the crazy one. Suffice it to say that witches were interesting characters.

“Are you doing alright?” I asked one last time once when we finished sprinkling the potion.

“I’m fine.” She looked down sheepishly. “I guess I messed up the magic circle, huh?”

I shook my head. “Not necessarily. There are other reasons this experiment might have been a failure.”

She looked back up at me and then smiled. “Do you think we killed the ghost for good?”

“Maybe,” I responded, keeping my eyes open as I surveyed the dark room with my light. “Ghosts can be tricky though.”

“It’s okay…” She giggled. “I know that if there is a problem, you will be able to fix it.”

I frowned slightly. Lana seemed to have some misconceptions about me. She seemed to be thinking I was trying to help. In truth, I was just looking for a spirit slave.

“We’ll see…” I responded nondescriptly.

“In that case…” She stretched her back, sticking her chest out. “I’ll head up first. See you!”

She winked at me, and then ran up the stairway, skipping steps as she excitedly ran back up to the party. Her dress was still torn and dirty, but I decided not to remind her of that and ruin her mood. After she was gone, I picked up the remaining supplies and used a pinch of magic to create a whirlwind to sweep the rest of the signs of the magic circle away. It hadn’t been done correctly. Would that have been the cause?

No… it was over now. The ghost hadn’t had enough time to form, and I had already cleaned up after it. It was just that things felt a bit too easy. My life never went smoothly.