Falling to the ground, Mark slowly started to wake up. Mark looked at his own hand but it was solid to his eyes and he could feel his entire body but when he placed his hand over his chest, the rhythmic thumping that had been there since his birth was gone.

“I really am a ghost… where did all my things go and what happened?” he muttered confused and began to think about what happened.

He reviewed his entire life and found he didn’t have many missing memories besides those he actually knew he forgot even before the time of his death.

When he reached the time of his death he remembered just the simple sight of that ghost.

“What the hell happened to that ghost? I had never seen anything like that before.” he groaned and got up. Strangely he felt the ground solid under his feet.

The house he was in was a kitchenette which consists of a simple living room/bedroom, kitchen and bathroom unit.

This was indeed the very same house he lived in but he did not know how he got here again. He knew for sure this was his home because he looked out the window, which had no blinds anymore, and saw the familiar view outside.

To leave his bedroom he struggled a bit before he got used to phasing through walls but he wasn’t floating like in anime.

Entering the bathroom he finally got to see himself in the mirror. He looked no different from his old self and he was wearing the same clothing he wore when he had died. A black ghostbusters shirt with shorts and his glasses.

Finally he lifted his shirt but found nothing under it. He was still extremely confused about everything and still couldn’t touch anything as he wanted and simply returned to the bedroom/living room.

“Wait… the house was cleaned out… How long have I been dead?” He asked himself but suddenly something caused him to tremble, “And what about the book!” he suddenly shouted and ran to the kitchen and put his head under the sink before pushing his head into the floor.

Maybe because he wanted to pass through, his head passed into the ground and he looked around until he found a compartment. The darkness did not worsen his vision in any way. He sighed when he saw three items there. They were a copy of his prayer beads, another of the strange weapons and a pure black book.

The Prayer beads were quartz which, even to normal people, is said to help mental concentration and absorb radiation for cell phones and batteries. For him, he discovered through the book that quartz prayer beads could help channel his energy to use against spiritual beings.

As for the strange object, that is called a Vajra. It is a hindu exorcism weapon that in some cases has an actual blade on either end. This one did not but just focusing his energy on it allowed him to form a good attack weapon which is actually very effective against ghosts, since punching had very minor effect.

As for pens and the post its, those are common goods he could find anywhere so he didn’t care.

What was most important to him was the book and prayer beads which could help him focus his energy.

The book he encountered in a book store once. To him, exorcism and occult was a very big hobby since he was in his teens but naturally it was something that would have died out if he never found this book. He purchased it thinking it was just any random book but when he actually purchased an authentic quartz prayer bead and did the chants, he discovered that the mantra it taught was real.

This led him to maintain his desire and taste of occult long into his adult life. He sometimes did part time work as an exorcist because the book mentioned that helping spirits move on is beneficial to the soul and increased a person’s karma. When this accumulates, it could improve a person’s luck and health in daily life. Naturally he would want to become an exorcist if there was such an amazing effect.

“Thank god I made this place so secretive.” He sighed and stretched his hand and tried to touch the prayer beads. To his awe he could actually touch them. He wrapped the string of beads like he did before and raised his head a bit before looking at a needle sized hole in the back of the sick’s wall.

He closed his eyes and began to chant the mantras he knew in hopes that he could still use it and to his awe, it worked but he saw his body become transparent. Thinking of this being an effect of using his own energy as a ghost he placed his finger through the wall and when he more or less guessed it was through, he focused the energy to his finger tip.

Click!

The sound of a button being pressed was heard and he let all the energy go which returned his body to normal just as a simple mechanism of gears began to lift the floor boards and raise the secret compartment.

Soon the book, bead string and vajra were out and he could take the beads out and the book without any problem but for some reason he could not take the vajra unless he focused a bit of energy into his hand.

“This is really weird, I can touch the book and beads without any problem but this doesn’t work.” He muttered and closed the compartment once more. He took all three items to the living room/bedroom and sat under the sunlight before opening the book in hopes of figuring out what was going on.

For almost two days he read through the entire book carefully but there were no instances where it mentioned a ghost using any of the tools or tricks which irritated him. What was worse is that because the beads and book were true physical objects, he very well couldn’t carry them around.

He ended up sighing and putting the items back into the secret compartment and decided to go outside or at least the neighboring kitchenettes.

It should be noted that he lived on the 1st floor at the very back of the building. What was strange is that no apartment within 3 units of his own were occupied but the 4th and beyond had occupants. Also it was only his floor as the floor above had residents.

He did not know how to fly, so he just walked through the walls and used the stairs until he found an apartment with residents.

The person wasn’t particularly clean and was a student, since he lived about 30 minutes by car from the nearest college. What he was looking for was a computer or laptop and thankfully it was night time and he easily found the resident on her laptop.

He jumped out of the room as soon as he saw the resident, not because she would see him but because she was only in her underwear and as a virgin and coward in this department, he was still too much of a novice even to peek on her.

He looked around and made sure if the resident was male or female, and dressed at least properly enough, and looked over their shoulder to look at the date.

“12/04/2020” he looked at the date.

After a moment spent to process the information his jaw dropped and he felt almost dead inside, though he was dead already. He had died over 5 years ago in the dead of summer in july and it was december 4th five years after his own death.

But although this happened, he didn’t spend much time on it because it actually began to make him think. “Wait a second… I was dead 5 years… that makes sense that my things are all gone but why aren’t there any people around my apartment, or better yet, living in my apartment?” he muttered to himself.

At that time, he suddenly felt as if something intruded into some kind of territory as he felt two people walking through the corridors directly towards his own apartment.

He quickly ran out of the room but when he saw the people in the corridor he jumped back into the room and peeked at them from behind.

One of them is a slightly more aged and familiar landlord who owned the apartment building he lived in but the other was a handsome young man dressed in all black with a white undershirt and black pants.

It was probably the most classic, or even cliche, look of a religious monster hunter. Going through the walls he followed them carefully because the man gave Mark huge signs of danger.

At the door to his apartment, he hid behind one of the doors just near them.

“This is the room, most of the others who came all said the source of the disturbance came from this room.” the landlord said unlocking the door.

“Hmm… I have purified many ghosts and spirits but this place doesn’t feel like it. Although i do feel a presence so it most likely isn’t a dangerous ghost like you said.” he said.

“H-how can you say that!? More than once exorcists were attacked here by floating objects to the point that we emptied the entire apartment of all the affected units.” the landlord said.

“Exactly my dear sir, you were able to clear out the entire space of all furniture and items. Normal evil spirits, ghosts who have awakened spiritual powers would not have accepted intruders within their territory.” the young man said.

Mark was listening and realized this was probably a true exorcist, not some kind of occultist, this was a man with formal education on the subject.

“Alright, if you say so. The door is open, so if you need to protect your own life, I do not need more people dying or getting hurt.” The landlord said and walked away from the area.

The young man sighed and walked into the apartment and looked around. He was not like Mark who did chants and things to empower his body, as a ghost, Mark could properly see it, the man’s eyes shone with a light in his pupils. It was the exact description of the true spiritual sight the book he owned spoke of.

He could also feel the young man’s energy was constantly empowering his body, it was nothing like Mark was before, this was a true pro exorcist.

“Greetings, I mean no harm.” he said.

Mark raised his left brow and smirked, “I beg to differ sir, the fact that you are here to expel me is far from being no harm.” Mark said without thinking.

The man’s face turned strange and he lifted his hand to his chin, “Did the ghost evolve?” he muttered.

“What do you mean evolved!?”

Mark suddenly jumped out of the wall and looked at the man with shock.

“You really did change!” the man said.

“What do you mean change? I woke up only two days ago.” Mark replied.

The young man nodded, “As expected, I guess it might be confusing for you but I guess you already know you died right?” the young man asked.

“That much is obvious.” Mark rolled my eyes, “What do you mean evolved?” Mark asked again.

“There are still existing organizations that help purify evil spirits and help ghosts pass on. We generally classify ghosts differently depending on their mental state. Two days ago, I had made an initial visit to make sure this place was actually haunted, naturally without the landlord knowing and just from the back, and I personally identified this place as having a spiritual life form. At the time, the instinct of the emotions in the air told me you were a wandering spirit.” He said.

“Wandering spirit… I never heard that term before. I was really into the occult and even practiced exorcism from a book I found with real exorcism techniques but I never heard of this.” Mark replied.

“Interesting, well that somewhat explains why your mind woke up. How long ago was your death?” The young exorcist asked.

“5 years and 6 months.” Mark replied and even went on to explain how he died.

The young man scowled upon hearing that and took out a cell phone and put it on the ground before kicking it over. “Please pinpoint the house. What you met is a vengeful spirit, they are an evil spirit but their very being is getting revenge on those who unjustly killed them. They are completely filled with only the intent to kill but they are very territorial and never leave their homes.” he explained.

Mark just looked at him as if he was dumb, “How am i supposed to touch it?” Mark replied and showed him by trying to grab it only to his surprise he was able to.

“This isn’t the first time we met ghosts like yourself, the phone has my mana on it so naturally you can work with it.” he said.

Mark frowned as soon as he heard that and let go of the phone and just touched it as little as possible, opening the maps and putting the address in before sliding it back.

“Best to maintain my distance while getting information.” Mark thought and the young man smiled as soon as he saw how Mark was acting. “So mana is the name of the energy humans use… so what about ghosts?” he asked.

“Ghosts can’t use any energy, if they could, they would already be an evil spirit.” The young man said, picking up the phone and looking at the address.

“Why is it only referred to as evil spirit? From what I know, there are both evil and good spirits aka demon and angel.” Mark replied.

“That is true, but for you to become an angel, you have to have been a strong exorcist or someone with a strong presence of qi or mana. Qi for martial artists and mana for exorcists or as most modern day people call it, wizards. Only in this case, and the person being very good in nature, and in the case where their soul not instantly break into the 10 pieces that make it up and pass on, would they become a good spirit but as you said, you were only an occultist who encountered what most likely is a journal of an exorcist of very low caliber and chanced upon the spiritual side of the world.” The young man explained.

Now his voice had a large presence of arrogance as he spoke of what was probably his position in the world.

“Still, as with all exorcists, we want to use the least exhausting method to send a ghost or spirit on. So as with all conscious spirits, you should instinctively know what your most major regret is. Once you accomplish it you will be able to move on without any hassle.” he smiled.

Mark thought of his regret and instantly a phrase appeared in his mind that he unconsciously spoke. “My regret is that I could never become a pro exorcist and have my name remembered in history.”

The smile on the young man’s face froze and sighed. “As expected, I kind of realized it might be something like that.” he pulled on his suit’s left opening and pulled out a strange object that looked like a cross but he held it from the long side of the cross.

It began to shine and suddenly from the upper hand of the cross a blade of light formed like a lightsaber but the light from it was far more dangerous than Mark expected.

“Since we can’t have you wandering around I will forcefully send you to the next realm.” he said smiling. “You see, unlike what you know, for 5 years you have haunted the surrounding rooms as a wandering spirit with moments of stress where you injured quite a few people. A wandering spirit that had spiritual power like you, thanks to the little bit of work you did as an exorcist, makes you very dangerous. You said, there exists an energy called karma in this world and when a person dies, depending on their situation they become wandering spirits but their karma doesn’t disappear. It sticks to their soul and prevents them from breaking apart, making them wandering spirits. Your soul, for five years, has been digesting this and turning it into spiritual power so you are just a step away from becoming an evil spirit. Sadly I have to keep you from causing problems for society.” He said and took a step forward and swung the light sword.

Mark was trembling and instinctively jumped to the left, where the sword was coming from, and dodged.

The young man frowned and glared at Mark, “You dodged.” he said.

“Are you mad, why wouldn’t I dodge!? Did you think I would jump at you like some deranged lunatic to die along with you or something?” Mark shouted back and quickly crawled his way to the wall and phased into it.

“Actually… I did. All ghosts and spirits I have sent on in this manner have been like that so naturally you would do so as well.” He said.

“You are mad, I am not crazy enough to do something like that.” Mark shouted and through the walls he swam towards the kitchen and quickly clicked the button to get his things. He couldn’t worry about it right now.

“You are really making this tiresome, don’t make me waste more mana than I need too since I have to fight that vengeful spirit soon and that will be a really annoying fight.” He complained but Mark did not reply and simply took the book and beads before channeling his spiritual power to carry his Vajra.

With the vajra and book in his left hand, he focused his spiritual power into his right hand and looked at the corner of the door while the exorcist was looking for him. The shine in his eye was even more dangerous now that he was determined.

Because his footsteps had no weight to it he reached the door quietly but the next step would give him away but he did it fast. He opened the door and swung it open before bolting out the door.

“Wha!” The exorcist looked back and Mark could feel the piercing eyes on his back as he ran away. “That book… it must be what he talked about earlier but how is he carrying it?” the exorcist muttered but he had no time and ran after Mark.

The danger warning instantly intensified in Mark’s head as he ducked only for several glowing crosses to fly over him where he once was but he stood up the next moment and continued running until he reached the main exit.

He thanked the fact that he didn’t have to worry about stamina but he worried about his book.

What really shocked him was when he saw dozens of wandering spirits all around him but the man didn’t seem to care.

He growled in annoyance as he ignored the obvious problem of the floating book and objects and ran out of the building.

“What! He isn’t bound to this building!” the young exorcist exclaimed but Mark dove into the crowded streets of the big city he lived in.

A few people might have noticed the books, beads and vajra but it was in the middle of too many people. So he was able to easily avoid many people as they phased through him and he just made sure the items did not hit anyone.

Due to the advantage of being a ghost and not being blocked by other bodies, Mark eventually got away from the exorcist and made his way to an old theater. He had noticed something, the sunlight was really annoying to him which might mean that he was weak to it. Although that didn’t make much sense as many wandering spirits were also moving around in the sun but he decided to wait for now.

He had never expected that being a ghost would come with such dangers and now that he saw the other side of the story, he found that what he had done to some ghosts might have been cruel, though many he did not regret forcing them on as they had actually been killing and had to be judged.

Still, the information he got from the exorcist was really incredible. Not only did he learn what the energy was called for humans but he learned what ghosts and spirits used as well.

The only problem is that he never figured out how to train it. His book also didn’t help in this regard.

Without much way to go on with this he just hid away his three items under some boxes in the attic of the theater far from sight and from any contact with people, something easy to find due to the amount of dust around the boxes.

“Alright let’s look around and see the changes to the world in the past 5 years.” He muttered and walked as far as 70 meters from his things when he hit a barrier. “What the fuck!?” he shouted and tried to push pass the barrier. He was confused why he had a barrier around him and began to panic thinking there was someone who tracked him and quickly climbed back up and picked up his items and tried to find the exit he found no barrier.

When he noticed this he tried to climb down and easily passed the barrier and blinked and looked at his items.

He thought for a while and climbed back up and put the vajra down and moved away but nothing, then the beads but also nothing so he left the book and he finally found the barrier.

“D-does this mean i have to be within a certain distance of the book?” he muttered incredibly depressed.

He felt an ache in his head even though he shouldn’t have any physical pain but the irritation of this was really bad.

He sighed deeply and thought about what to do before having a very interesting idea, though it was already getting a little out of the law, he needed to figure out something to be able to walk around.

Holding his items he left the theater quietly and headed out in the afternoon to find a thrift shop where he could accomplish his plan but not before visiting a supplies shop to get paper and pen, for free, so that he can pass off as someone who had recently become mute.