London, England
They arrived under the cover of night, slipping silently through alleyways, treading lightly on the glistening cobblestone streets. The hoods of their raincoats, one navy, one black, were pulled down low over their eyes, either to shield them from the light drizzle, or to conceal their faces, it wasn't clear. They avoided the main streets, and the pools of light cast by the streetlights and residents' homes as much as possible, seemingly moving with the shadows. Once or twice, someone looking out their window could have sworn they spotted something moving in the shadows, but upon taking a closer look, there was nothing of note. Although, a cat was always seen not too long after.
Eventually, the two mysterious strangers came to a stop, in front of a seemingly uninhabited townhouse. The black coat snapped his fingers, and the lights next to the townhouse and right across from it on the other side of the street flickered and went out. The pair of them surveyed the building.
The red of the bricks the townhouse was built of had faded over time; the fire escape out to the side looked like a rusty safety hazard; the roof had missing tiles; and the windows, although not broken, were smudged with grime, making it practically impossible to see inside. Especially since there was no light on indoors. But that, was, after all, to be expected.
The stranger in the navy coat approached one of the windows near the front door, attempting to peer inside, despite knowing it was futile.
"Perfect location to hunt a ghost." The black coat murmured, looking up at the windows of the top story. At that moment, lightning struck, illuminating their surroundings for a moment. And then, in uppermost window on the right, the black coat caught a flicker of movement.
"Huh." He blinked. "Guess this isn't a wild goose chase, after all."
The stranger in the navy coat turned to her companion. She furrowed her eyebrows. "What-"
"Get away from the window, I'm breaking in the door."
"Are you mad? You'll attract attention." She whisper-yelled. "We're better off picking the lock."
"How boring," The black coat murmured, as the navy coat placed her hand gently on the front door. The wood under her hand glowed faintly for a second. She pushed on it lightly.
The door swung open, revealing a pitch black interior. The black coat pulled out a flashlight and came to stand at the threshold.
"Come on, then. Let's not dally, we have other matters to attend to." He sighed, and took the first step inside.
***
Inside, the townhouse felt...sentient, somehow. The air was thick and pulsed with weak undercurrents of magic. The navy coat attempted to create a phalum, a floating light, but it was snuffed out as soon as it left her palm. She frowned, and called out to her companion.
"Hey, Roland. There seems to be some sort of spell-cancelling magic in the air."
"So we're likely dealing with a Mistral. Good to know. Don't bother casting again and save your magic."
"Alright." The navy coat pulled out her own flashlight from her coat pocket.
The black coat - Roland - pulled out his own flashlight and swung around the room in a wide arc.
"Seems to have been parlour, at some point." Indeed, there were outlines of a couple of sofas in the room, along with a low-lying table and couple of tall figures that might be lampshades. Everything in the room was covered with a tarp, on which there was a suspicious absence of dust, despite the obviously abandoned look of the exterior.
The two companions shared a look. The navy coat hazarded a glance behind Roland, where there should have been wet imprints of their shoes. Roland bent down and examined their path.
"There's faint traces of magic here, Penny. Some sort of cleaning spell. Actually, I think it's all over the room."
"That would explain a lot of things. But I'd like to gather more evidence before coming to a conclusion. Let's finish with this floor."
Roland nodded and stood up, making his way to the open archway across the room.
In the kitchen, the situation was even more unsettling.
"I did expect it to be clean, but this..."
Pots, pans and cutlery shone as if brand new; the sink was clear, save for a lone plastic cup; and the cupboards were dust and mold-free.
"Look at this, Penny." Roland pulled down a can of peas from a cupboard. "It's still good."
The expiry date on the can, indicated a date a few months away.
Penny frowned. "How long has it been since this place had it's last occupant?"
"About 15 years, according to the file and the records we pulled."
"...Can peas last that long?"
Suddenly having a thought, Penny began looking through the rest of the canned goods, Roland assisting once he caught on what she was up to.
"They...they all have valid dates..."
The state of the kitchen appeared as if there was someone living in the place, but that can't have been right. Roland suddenly recalled seeing movement at one of the top floor windows before they entered-
Before he could ponder any further, however, they heard a sound.
Roland reacted first. "It came from upstairs."
The pair moved slowly, cautiously. What they had discovered so far didn't bode well, as that would mean that they were either dealing with a more advanced type of ghost, or that there was actually, someone in the house.
They stopped at the foot of the stairs.
"Do you sense anything?" Roland's voice was a low murmur, but Penny could hear it all the same. Focusing her senses on the floor above them, Penny quickly determined that they were, most definitely, not dealing with a simple ghost.
"I can't really tell...It's not the regular aura you'd expect from a ghost, but it still feels...Unnatural. Like it doesn't belong in this world."
Roland furrowed his eyebrows. "Perhaps...A demon?"
Penny shook her head. "No, it can't be. It's...I've never felt this aura before."
A momentary second of confusion, before clarity lights up Roland's features. "You mean...It could have come from there?"
There are barriers between the different worlds. However, the world of the regular mortals is bordered by about three others: namely, the world of demons, of deceased souls, and another one that appears to be a black, inky void. Virtually nothing is known about this world, primarily because anyone who crosses over to that world never returns, and communication to that side is blocked by some magic field, whose origins lay deep within the seemingly endless void.
If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
Penny shivered. "We'd better contact ASP to send a team and block this place off-"
She was interrupted by a child's wailing. Chills ran down her spine. She and Roland quickly shared a look, and came to an agreement.
They had to leave. However —
"Don't leave." From their left, in front of a slightly ajar door that might have lead to a drawing room, came another child's voice. She was a scrawny thing, mostly skin and bones. Her straw-coloured hair was stringy and unkempt, with sunken eyes and hollow cheeks. Her dark eyes were wide and absolutely terrified. Her next words came out in a rush, speaking over the wailing child.
"You can't leave. He'll-" She stopped speaking suddenly. Actually, it would appear that her body had been petrified, only her eyes having freedom of movement. They darted back and forth over the pair, before finally settling in a rather uncomfortable position, the whites of her eyes showing, to look at a spot to their right, up the staircase.
Roland bristled. The pressure of the building's magic field had increased to just be a degree away from suffocating. He glanced over at Penny and saw her brows furrow from the pressure. They had been trained for such situations however, and altered the magic flow in their bodies to decrease the effect of the pressure on them.
Then the wailing drastically increased in pitch, the sound stabbing their eardrums and making their heads ring. The sound still carried through, despite both of them using magic to thin out the air near their ears.
The sound stopped after a few seconds. Feeling dizzy and nauseous, Roland staggered backwards to lean against a table, while Penny had fallen to her knees. She could hardly see a thing; her vision was swimming so much. Still, they had to get out of their. She began a teleportation circle, practically using her entire magic store in order to overcome the strength of the magic field.
Roland's ears were still ringing, but he could vaguely make out the form of Penny creating a teleportation circle. He could sense that Penny was using a lot of her magic, and realised that she was trying to overcome the magic field. However, this would leave her with little magic to complete the teleportation spell with after creating the circle. Using his own magic, he materialised a barrier around the two of them, creating a magic field of his own, to combat the other one, and relieve Penny of its pressure.
Penny could feel the pressure around her decreasing, and sighed gratefully. By now, there was sweat beading along her forehead, slipping down slowly. She refocused the flow of her magic, controlling it so it no longer flowed around her immediate surroundings, directing some of it to hasten the completion of the circle, and the rest being re-stored.
10 seconds later, Penny was casting the teleportation spell.
"Clavis Locus," she murmured. Instantly, their surroundings began to shift.
Before Penny had completed the circle, Roland was struggling to hold up the barrier. With every passing moment, the pressure from the building's magic field became exponentially stronger. The eyes of the girl from earlier were still trained on the staircase. However, each time the pressure increased, her eyes became more panicked. Roland's body was straining under the magic pressure. His shoulders and spine were aching, the pressure being applied from above while he was upright. Not a moment too soon, he heard Penny murmur the words to the spell, and their surroundings blurred and became a swirl of indistinguishable forms and colours. However, there was one thing Roland could make out clearly despite this. In the general direction of the stairs, he saw an unnaturally large, disembodied grin, with suspicious red stains on its teeth. It seemed to mock him, saying 'You don't actually think you can get away, do you?'
Then the world went black.
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Berlin, Germany...
ASP headquarters were in an uproar.
"Get me those records!"
"Hurry and get the branch heads on air in the conference room!"
"President and Vice President are en route to HQ now, ma'am-"
"What the hell were they thinking? A team of only two-"
"Sir, the London Branch wants to take immediate action-"
"Tell those fools to hold their horses! Two agents are already missing, we don't need to lose anymore!"
"The New York branch...-"
2 weeks ago, Penelope Harthing and Roland D'Iroan went missing while on a mission. They'd set off on what was believed to be a relatively simple job, an exorcism in an abandoned townhouse, but mere hours later, several informers reported strange energy emanating from the same building the agents were reported to have entered. Regular mortals had begun to take note, what with the streetlights playing at contortionists, and the stones on the cobbled streets skipping along. Any animals in the area became suddenly hostile, growling, hissing, among other sounds, all directed towards the townhouse.
The ASP's London branch dispatched a few agents skilled in illusion magic to calm the mortals, but before they got on site, the energy originating from the building suddenly dissipated. However, the surrounding area was still in disarray, with the mortals particularly shaken. The agents spent the day going door to door calming residents, spinning tales of some people playing around with visual effects in order to scare unsuspecting residents, and how they must have used a certain substance that agitates animals; nothing to worry about, the troublemakers would be quickly apprehended.
When analysts got on site, they found that, despite the energy having receded, there was a barrier around the building that prevented entry. This was discovered when someone unsuspectingly approached the door, before it detached itself from its hinges and collided into them, sending them flying onto the street, before calmly reattaching itself to the doorframe.
The building was sealed off, to prevent any further mishaps, and further action to be taken was to be decided at the emergency meeting held at ASP's headquarters with all branch directors, with some attending virtually.
"This is disastrous! Over 20 mortals witnessed the events!"
"How do you plan on mitigating the situation? We absolutely cannot have a repeat of the purge of 1693/1692-!"
A cacophony of voices sounded in the conference room, each trying to speak over the other. Normally, they were much more organised, but the majority of the immortals present distinctly remembered the time of darkness that was the supernatural purge of 1692/1693. All kinds of supernaturals were burned at the stakes, treated as slaves, and much worse. Back, then, a witch had come up with an oblivion spell, effectively erasing the memory of anything supernatural from the minds of mortals. Hence, when the threat of discovery was upon them again, they went a little wild.
"Order, please, ladies and gentlemen. We can't come to a decision if we're all trying to speak over each other-"
"Truth, but the situation is more dire this time, what with the invention of those blasted photography things, and some of our informers have reported one or two people who took still images of the scene-"
"Outrageous-"
"Our priority right now should be containing those images, so that nothing gets leaked to the press," Another said, glaring at the hysterical ones in the room, effectively commanding reason, what with some grumbling.
"We have to get our hands on those images, and then delete them. And perhaps another oblivion spell..."
"But the consequences of that-"
"-We will need someone highly experienced in this area to do it, lest the backlash raises more questions. We only avoided this last time because all mortals had their memories erased, so there wasn't anyone to notice unusual behaviour."
A moment of silence passed, as everyone could only come up with one person suited for the task, however, that person had disappeared a decade ago. Then, one of the immortals present had a brilliant idea.
"Wait, I seem to recall that there was someone she always hung around. Some boy..."
One of them groans, understanding who this one was referring to.
"The demon prince? He'll never accept to help. He already blames us for her disappearance!"
"Then we offer him something!"
"There's nothing we can possibly give him?"
"That may not be necessarily true..." One of them is pensive, stroking his beard.
The little witchling they were thinking of was a favourite student of his. Prior to her disappearance, she left him with a little keepsake...Besides, if they spun the story right, they just might get him interested in that townhouse...
"Yes, I may have something that may interest that demon..."
20 minutes later, the meeting had come to a close, with the final conclusion being that they would send in agents as decoys, pretending to be the press, in order to obtain those images, and then have the demon prince tie up loose ends with an oblivion spell.
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Unknown location...
Roland struggled to open his eyes. His head hurt, his mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and his whole body was heaver than lead. Next to him, he heard Penny groan.
After a few moments of struggling, he finally opened his eyes. Then he abruptly stood up.
This was not the ASP London branch.
They were in a large field, grass, dandelions, and daisies as far as the eye could see. In the distance, to the left, there was some sort of dark mass, that was likely some sort of structure.
"Where, where are we?" He heard Penny's voice next to him. She had stood up, and was glancing around them. Then she swiftly pulled out a magic compass, and tried to get a reading.
"Roland, the dials are just spinning around. I can't - I can't find out where we are," The compass could inform one of their location, using a combination of astronomy and ley lines. Penny and Roland had both been trained in reading it, and it was tested to have never failed once. Unlike now. "And I'm out of magic so I can't do another teleportation spell..."
"Let me try." Spreading his hand flat on the ground, he attempted to form a magic circle. However...
"Penny, my magic's not working. There - I think there's some sort of magic resistance here."
Penny cursed. And she lost her communication disc back at the townhouse, so they had no way of contacting anyone.
"Guess we're stuck here, huh?"