Without waking up either Lily or Smokewell, I went downstairs to Asmod's shop. It was empty as always. And the owner was nowhere to be seen. Once again, I was mesmerized by the deceptive greeting cards on the shelves.

"Did you want something, Grimly?" he said.

I jumped as I heard the voice. I looked behind and he was by the same door that he had stepped out of to sneak up on me just like the first time I'd come here. "Yes, I wanted your help with something," I said, taking a breath to calm myself.

"What is this about?" he asked.

"Let's go into that room in the back first." I pointed at the door behind him.

He gave me a curious look before pushing the door and holding it open for me.

"So, you remember how I uh, helped out when the Cornelius guy was about to get lynched?" I said a bit nervously.

Asmod was quiet for a moment before saying, "How could I forget? I'd never seen something like that before."

Yeah, me neither. "Well, it was something that I'd been practicing for some time. I thought it was a good opportunity to test it out."

"Oh, I see."

"Yeah. I'm still unsure about the limit of that particular ritual," I said, "So I was wondering if you'd be interested in helping me test it out?"

"I'd be happy to," he said, "just don't flatten this place, please?"

I gave a nervous chuckle. "Oh no, I didn't have anything as drastic as the last time in mind." We arrived at an empty spot in the dim workshop. "I actually needed your permission with something."

"Oh?"

I nodded and pulled out the urn that contained his mother's ash.

"Hey, no! Not that again!" he jumped up, trying to snatch it out of my hand but fell short.

"I'm not going to disturb this. There will be barely any scratch on it, I swear."

"Why can't you just leave my dead mother alone?" Asmod said in an almost whiny voice.

"Asmod, you saw the skeleton that we brought back. It's exactly how it was when we first found it. This will be the same. Just let me use it one time."

The enchanter stepped back with a wary look on his face. "Tell me what exactly you want to do with it?" he asked.

I knew he would ask this question. I had my explanation ready. "The ritual derives power from the remains of people. I want to draw power from the ash," I said.

The wary look hadn't left his face. "That doesn't sound very good."

"It's one hundred percent harmless to the ashes and the urn, I promise," I said.

"And what about my mother's spirit?" he crossed his arms.

"Your mother's spirit is at rest, Asmod," I said, "the ritual won't go anywhere near that. I'm only going to draw the power from what's left."

Asmod still didn't seem reassured. "Let me ask you a question," I said, "if there is anything left of your mother's spirit in the ash, do you want it to stay or do you want it to be set free?"

"That's the whole point of preserving her ashes," Asmod said, "So that I can have a part of her with me even when she is gone. I'm afraid, this isn't something I can help you with, Grimly."

I paused. "Wait, what did you say?"

"I'm afraid I can't help you--"

"No, having a part of her with you...even when she is gone," I said. I handed the urn back to him. "Thanks for your help, Asmod! I know what to do now!"

****

I remembered Yazara En's grave in heaven. The skeleton wasn't a corpse. It was an impurity. Mortal remains. A part of him.

Old Elsa's journal stated that the liberation ritual drew power from a part of the person who carried out the ritual and a part of the person whose remains would be at the centre of the pentacle.

The remains don't have to be actual remains. They could be something that people owned and left behind. I rushed upstairs to the apartment again.

I dug into my suitcase, pulled out my coin purse and went back downstairs. I had a theory that I wanted to test out.

****

"Something old and useless?" the pawnshop owner asked. He was a balding man in his mid 40's with a thin moustache and a long chin.

"Yes, something that someone sold to you or didn't redeem and now it is sitting on these shelves gathering dust," I said leaning over the counter and waving my hand over all the stuff that was on display on the shelves behind him.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Hm." The man scratched his chin as he looked back at the items on display. "Most of the items that haven't been redeemed by the owners usually get auctioned off and auctions happen on weekends. However, I can sell you that shiny saber that was used by one of the Ravenwind navy commanders in a war against the invaders." He pointed at the blade hung on the wall. The edge was shiny and had gone blunt from lack of proper care. Also the tag on it read: 400 steambolts.

The story that he was associating with that sword started to sound fake when I looked at the price.

"I want something cheaper than that," I said.

"How about this dagger that Queen Minerva used to kill the king before running off with her lover? It only costs 350 steambolts."

"Cheaper."

"How about King Alain's pocket watch--"

"Cheaper."

"How about the pirate chief Marwood Newbury's spitoon--"

"Cheaper!"

The owner gave me a deadpan stare before resting his elbows on the counter. "Okay, how about you tell me how much your budget is so I can show you something that fits the price?"

I gingerly looked down at the purse in my hand. Then I looked up at the man. "How about something around one steambolt?"

The owner's deadpan look didn't change. He reached under the counter and pulled out a small compact mirror. "Just an ordinary mirror that a man came to pawn and never redeemed. It belongs to his late grandmother. She was no one famous. The only price of the mirror comes from the silver plating on it. I can sell this for a steambolt."

I examined the mirror. Its wooden surface was faded and had silver leaves set into it. The bottom of the mirror had a name--Amelia Doyle. This seemed perfect. Something that someone ordinary owned. I still had no way of confirming if the mirror was precious to the woman who owned it. But beggars can't be choosers.

I paid a single steambolt for it and left the pawnshop.

According to Elsa's notes, a soul has two parts, the Abyss and the Core. The latter holds the essence of a person. It is where their personality comes from and it is the thing that fuels life into the soul--the so-called 'spirit' of a person. The former can be considered the dead skin of a soul. It is what a person leaves behind with their mortal remains, whether after death or through some kind of technique like how Yazara had done.

My theory was that abyss can be found in something other than people's skeletons and ashes and corpses. If I could trigger Elsa's memories by examining her personal effects, then it might be possible to extract an abyss or at least a part of that abyss from the belongings that dead people left behind. Old Elsa hadn't specified this in her notes. But then again, maybe she was in a hurry and only focused on the basics before killing herself. She had to get her soul replaced before the Inquisition could get them afterall.

I made my way back to Asmod's nook and asked him to let me into his workshop again. "Don't worry, I won't be touching your mother's urn. Though, I still want to test out my ritual," I said.

The enchanter sighed and opened that invisible door in the wall for me. I arrived at an empty spot inside. I pulled out my knife and carved a pentacle on the floor with an eye at the center. Next I pulled out the compact mirror.

I felt a bit uncertain as I looked down at the item. I'd heard Yazara's voice in my head which had led me to his grave. There had been no such voices this time. But there was also the possibility that those things happened because I was in the immortal realm, and Yazara wasn't even a mortal at all. That might also explain why the abyssal being that I summoned was a giant and so powerful.

"This is just some old lady's mirror," I muttered to myself, "I shouldn't be expecting much."

But a part of me hoped that I was right and I could extract an abyss from this thing. "I'd put one whole steambolt in it after all."

I shook my head and took a deep breath. I placed the mirror on the eye inside the pentacle. Then I sliced my tattooed palm and dripped the blood onto the ritual pattern on the ground.

The air grew cold, my head grew heavy. Then a black mist whirled in the air in front of me. I felt a presence--as if someone had just entered the room--then a voice whispered in my head: "How did you find me?"

I frowned. I was half-pleased that my theory had been correct--an abyssal being could be summoned from a personal belonging. But I was also half-disappointed since this was just a shapeless mist and not even the silhouette of a person--this probably meant the abyss was weak. But again, I had only extracted it from a beat up old mirror. Beggars can't be choosers.

"How did you find me?" the voice whispered again.

"Amelia?" I said, "Amelia Doyle?"

"That used to be my name..."

"Can you show me your face?"

There was a pause before the voice whispered, "I would love to but I can't seem to..."

The frown remained on my face. This abyssal being was certainly weak. "Do you want me to set you free?" I asked.

"I would be grateful if you do..."

"What can you do for me in return?" I said.

"Anything that I am capable of doing in this form..."

I crossed my arms and narrowed my eyes at the black mist. "You'll have to answer my questions then."

"I will try to answer as many as I can..."

I nodded before saying, "Tell me how did you manage to leave a part of yourself in that mirror?"

"I...don't know..." the voice whispered. "I just had the mirror with me at all times. I looked at my face in it everyday. For years..."

I cocked my head. "Was it a gift from someone?"

There was another pause before the voice whispered, “Julia..."

"Who was it?"

"My sister...she...was gone so soon..."

I remained silent for a while, staring into the black mist. I felt like Amelia had something more to say. She spoke again.

"The mirror was dear to me...because of Julia...it was like...I could see her in it..."

"What happened to her?" I said.

"Tuberculosis..."

I paused again before asking my next question. "Do you think you can find her now that you are...like this?" I gestured at the mist.

"I feel like I'm already with her...or at least a part of me is..."

I nodded. "Thanks for answering my questions, Amelia. I liberate you."

"Thank you..."

The black mist disappeared.

The feeling of someone's presence was gone and it wasn't cold anymore.

Amelia Doyle's abyss was weak but I'd learnt something new. Lesson one, personal effects can contain a shred of a person's abyss. And lesson two, even if the abyssal beings were weak, they could still retain some memories of the person they belonged to.

As the new information sank in, I wondered what would old Elsa's abyss tell me if I did the liberation ritual on one of her belongings.

"Maybe I should just ask her myself," I muttered to myself as I pulled out her vial of perfume from my pocket.