Chapter 187 - Spectre of the Past

“I conducted countless rituals and divinations… Never with any result. I simply assumed any traces of my past had been destroyed… For this place to remain hidden for so long…”

Argus’ voice trembled as he muttered to himself. He circled the room at a slow pace, carefully examining every minute detail.

The fog-filled doorway slowly dimmed and dispersed, revealing an empty stone wall with no trace of a doorway. As the light from the fog faded Argus removed a lantern from the small pack on his back and lit it.

A warm, bright light filled the room, chasing away the shadows.

“This space was hidden using powers of concealment. Now that the seal has been broken, the information has returned to the world.” Argus concluded quietly, “Therefore, it’s not that the Angel that this place belongs to was watching over me… They were the ones responsible for my suffering.”

“The question is, are they still alive, or have they perished? If they’re still alive, will I be targeted again once they realize I’ve recovered my memories?”

Argus frowned. Despite recovering some of the memories of the ritual, most of them were only related to the painful experience itself, and not the circumstances around it. He did not know why he had ended up in this chamber or why the Angel had ripped his soul into pieces. He couldn’t recall the person who stabbed him with the dagger to complete the ritual.

“Fortunately… Uncovering the secrets of the past are my specialty.” Argus muttered.

He quietly gathered a number of the candles that had not yet burned completely and set them in each corner of the room. He took a piece of chalk from his pocket and drew a circle along the bottom of the wall.

Following this he removed a vial of amber oil from his pocket and uncorked it. He placed his finger over the top of the vial to control the flow. The flames sizzled as each candle received a drop of the musky floral resin.

The shadows grew deep and twinkled with starlight as a mysterious aura filled the room.

These actions attuned the energies in the room to the Domain of Knowledge, increasing the potency of his following actions. If he were performing a proper ritual, he would need to add additional steps. However, the Domain of Knowledge was currently a Godless Domain. There was no suitable higher power to call upon. Thus he could only make the environment as suitable as possible and draw on his own power.

Argus faced the blood stained platform and raised his hands up to shoulder height as if he were supporting an invisible ball with his arms. He exhaled slowly as his eyes turned completely white. The light from the lantern flickered and burst into a bright blue flame as a gentle fog began to billow out of it. The atmosphere grew cold and a feeling of emptiness pervaded the room.

The ceiling seemed to disappear as the darkness above deepened and a radiant nebula filled with glittering stars bloomed to life above him. The light from the stars shone down on the area encompassed by the chalk outline, illuminating the torn paper fragments and ashes scattered across the room.

Just as he was about to continue to the next step his spiritual intuition fired off a warning. A sharp ringing sound undulated through the room as several stars in the void above flickered rapidly.

His actions had attracted a foreign entity. It was unfortunate, but not unexpected. The astral plane was a cold and vast space inhabited by strange and dangerous creatures. Such was the danger of accessing the energies of antiquity, of diving into secrets and mystery. One could never know for sure what lurked in the void, and the danger increased the deeper one delved.

As a Keeper, he had the aspects of concealment to protect him from unwanted attention. This was the purpose of his blue flamed lantern and the fog. Even with these precautions he had still been noticed.

He felt the gaze of an ancient entity awaken in the starry abyss of the Astral Plane. It cast its vision across the void, searching for the source of the disruption. The sound of giggling and the discordant jangling of tiny bells echoed around him as the entity stirred.

Argus quietly observed the stars. They flickered randomly, moving about as they tried to find him, but thankfully they had yet to pin his location down.

If he worked quickly… perhaps he could finish his task without attracting the danger. With a frown Argus came to a decision and activated his power.

“Light of True History.”

The torn parchment and ashes swirled up into the air as a harsh, yet pale white light poured down from the void. They flew across the room in an ethereal state, silently returning to their original positions at the time of the original ritual. The candles scattered across the room relit themselves, growing taller as they unmelted. The shattered sapphire and carnelian gems reassembled themselves into the bronze dagger.

The dagger floated into the air, flying into the hands of a hazy, ghostly figure that was materializing in the center of the platform. The young boy with curly locks of hair knelt on the floor with his neck stretched up as he looked up to the roof. Tears flowed down his cheeks as he sobbed while he grasped the dagger with one hand, the tip of its blade aimed toward himself. In his other hand he held a large leather bound book.

“A self sacrifice ritual…?” Argus stared with his mouth agape, shocked at the scene in front of him. Without a doubt the boy in front of him was a past projection of himself.

The hazy spectre trembled and made a motion to stab himself, but at the last moment turned the blade and held it against his chest. “I- I don’t want to- It hurts!”

“The ritual must be completed.” A soft voice replied, “For your sake.”

A white light blossomed in front of the past projection of Argus, taking the shape of a woman with long hair, “This is the last time. After this you can rest.”

“You said that in Ying Chu…” The boy cried, “I don’t want to do it anymore.”

“This is really the last time, Argus.” The woman replied soothingly, “You can do it.”

After hearing these words, the boy nodded, lifting the dagger above himself once more. He took a deep breath then plunged the blade into his heart.

Then he began to scream.

A burst of white light exploded out of his chest and the gems on the dagger’s hilt lit up and cast colourful blue and red rays across the room. The runes on the parchment pasted to the wall glowed in various colours as they reacted to the energies imbued in the ritual. A number of the pages spontaneously lit up in vividly coloured flames. A vicious cyclone tore through the small confines of the room, tearing the parchment and knocking over the candles and furniture in the room.

The boy convulsed violently, letting go of the dagger and the book as he continued to scream in pain. He lifted off the ground, held up by an invisible force as blood gushed from the wound in his chest and spilled onto the floor in thick blotches.

The leather bound book floated into the air as the white light spilling from his chest poured into its fluttering pages.

There was the sound of breaking glass as the red gem in the dagger suddenly exploded. The white light bursting out of the boy’s chest cut off. The next moment the blue gem shattered into a thousand pieces. A series of complicated runes materialized around his body and then he vanished out of sight.

The leather bound book hit the ground with a dull thud, its pages still glowing faintly with a soft white light.

The woman with long hair bent over and picked up the tomb, gently closing it. She placed her hand on the leather cover, shaking her head sadly.

After a moment she plucked one of her long hairs from her head and began twirling it around the book. After winding the hair around several times, she tied it into a knot. The hair glowed white for a moment, then disappeared from sight.

A white light bloomed around her as she disappeared, taking the book with her.

~

The hazy projection of the past faded from the world as Argus released the spell. His expression was contorted in a painful grimace as he clutched at his throbbing heart. His surroundings returned to their normal state as he cut off the connection to the astral plane.

The room was illuminated once more by the soft orange glow of his lantern. It illuminated off the torn parchment on the walls and the ashes and broken candles scattered about the room.

Argus exhaled softly as he waited for his heart to calm down.

The spell was a success. The knowledge that had been sealed in this chamber had finally all been released with the Light of True History.

The ritual had split his soul, and the other half had been sealed inside a tomb that was tied with a thread of fate.

“Ezra… was her name…” Argus muttered the name of the woman with long hair. “An Angel of Fate…”

What had happened to her after this, Argus did not know. This was the last time he’d ever seen her.

What was she doing here, with him?

“I found that book with Yuzu in Okuron’s library… The angel must have hidden it there…”

“It’s not enough…”Argus frowned as he cast his eyes across the room with a deeply dissatisfied expression.

“It’s not enough…” A voice echoed back.