Rein was amazed. She was incredibly beautiful and eye catching. He didn't even know how to react, Her shiny black hair that reached her knee, her mature appearance, her white revealing clothes, her voluptuous body ,all just felt too otherworldly for him.

He shook his head.“Master? What do you mean? Who are you?” Rein asked.

“Isn’t it obvious? I’m your guardian spirit and you’re my summoner, so you are my master.” She answered with a big smile.

“Wait-wait a minute, how can you be my guardian spirit? I-i failed the summoning yesterday didn’t i?” He asked back..

“No, you have never failed the summoning, i was originally summoned during you're first summoning ritual 2 years ago.” She answered as she walked near him.

“Wait...let slow down. My head not right, right now.” He sat down on the chair in dining room . His headache became even worse now and his breathing heavier. He held his head, if she had been summoned two years ago, why doesn’t she showed herself sooner.

“Do you want some?” She asked while handing him a cup of tea.

Rein looked at her and accepted it.

Steam was still coming out from the tea when he took the cup. He placed it on his mouth and slowly drank it.The tea somehow taste good, which is strange because there’s only one type of tea in the house, and it doesn’t taste this good . The tea soothed his mind.“Thank you.. Uh.. who are you again?”

“Oh yeah! i haven’t introduced myself. I’m Emeralis, and i’m your spirit.” She introduced herself with a happy tone. She sat on the chair facing him.

“I’m Rein. Emeralis, can you tell me what is happening? If i summoned you why didn’t you show up earlier? Also what happened last night? And the wound in my chest, I can’t really think right now, my mind is clouded. ”

“Well that is understandable after what happened last night. I was summoned two years ago, but because of your curse, i was unable to materialize in this world. I’m only able to watch you from time to time. Until yesterday that is, when you were killed and the curse somehow saved your life.” She explained.

Lightning struck his head. His head burning. The memory he regained came with such a great pain that he almost collapsed.

Emeralis hugged him and cast a magic that reduced his pain. He calmed down for a second, then he realized that she was hugging him tight. He pushed her away, but when he pushed her, the intense headache came back again.

She hugged him again, and his headache was gone.

“Please calm down Rein. You have just recovered from an impossible injury. Let me like this for now, it should calmed you down” She said while stroking his hair. Rein face lit like a lamp, but he doesn’t have a choices, and it actually felt pretty good for him.

“So i died last night huh? Because of that lady in black. Wait- how am i still alive? she shot my chest right in my heart.” He asked.

“Because of your curse, i don’t know how it healed your wound, but when i materialized last night, you’re already collapsed on the floor with your chest wound closed. I only bandaged you so that the wound won’t open again.” He answered. He still doesn’t understand what was happening, but something she said felt off.

“How did you know my curse is the one that save me? and even if it save me, why the heck a curse that make my life miserable suddenly helped me?” He asked. His voice raised.

“Calm down. I know cause i’m a mage spirit. Your curse became incredibly weak after you were healed last night, that’s why i’m able to materialized. So i got into the conclusion that your curse is the one that saved you last night. Also there is some-… no, nothing.”She answered. She sound troubled.

“What is it?Tell me.”

Emeralis took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. “I-i don’t know how to say this but, after inspecting your body last night you.. ” She pulled herself, her eyes pointed somewhere else.. “Your curse, i don’t know what someone have in mind by doing so.. Okay let just get to the point, you’re not born with a curse, someone cursed you when you were still a child.”

“What?” He asked in disbelieve.

“I-i don’t know what someone might get for putting a curse to a little child.” She answered.

“You mean that all that’s accident was caused by someone?” He asked.

“Yeah, mor-” Before she could finish her sentence, the doorbell rang. “Let me open it, just stay here and finish your tea.”

Rein still couldn’t put it into his mind, He couldn’t believe what she just said. He squeezed his knee. He was angry like never before, his family, all that people important to him died because someone put that curse on him.

A loud sound of explosion came from the front door. The sound distracted him from his thought, without thinking he rushed there.

Emeralis was standing in the middle of the lawn, her hair floating like many arm a. A blue aura of magic covered her whole body. The front door was blown without a trace along with the wall around it.

“What is happening here?” He asked in panic. When he looked, Fear, Uriza, and Eliel were standing in front of Emeralis with weapon in their arm. Albert was trying his best to stop them, but it was a wasted effort. Fear apologized and pushed him aside.

“I knew it! I knew i should have killed you yesterday.” Fear declared. Her eyes showed determination to kill.

Fear charged at Rein. Emeralis knew what she was going to do and tried to intercept her, but Fear was a warrior and Emeralis was a mage, her speed is far superior than Emeralis.

In a blink of an eye she was in front of Rein. A sword of light formed in Fear hand. He doesn’t have time to react, he doesn’t even have time to feel anything. The light closed in on his chest. He closed his eye.

A sound of sword clashing. When Rein looked at his chest, a black sword was blocking Fear attack. If fear sword was a light that illuminate all, the sword that blocked it was a black hole that absorbed all light. Fear took a step back.

He looked at the owner of the sword, a man wearing a white trench was standing beside him. Under his coat he could see a black breastplate, a complete opposite of his coat. His eyes was bizzare, its colour inverted.

“Calm down Ladies, I’m here to talk to this man.” Said Aldwin.

“Move aside! if you’re going to stand in the way then i also have to struck you down.” Fear threaten Aldwin. Uriza and Eliel stood beside Fear.

Aldwin laugh. “Oh! You want to try?” Aldwin replied.

“What is happening here?” Rose and father Marcus asked when they arrived.

“Rose?” Rein eyes widen in surprise.

“You’re late Rose!” Aldwin complained, his hand on his hips. She looked at the situation.

“Why don’t we settle this inside the church and talk it out? Instead of slashing at each other throat.” She asked. Rein told Emeralis to stand down, and Albert also do the same to his spirits. “You too Aldwin”

They lowered their weapon, but the hostility could still be felt on everyone skin.

The situation was really awkward. Rose sat at the end of the table, while Albert and Rein in the middle, opposite to each other. Each spirit stood behind their respective master. Rose asked Father Marcus to stay outside.

“So can you tell me about what is happening here?” Rose asked.

“I don’t know…. I just wake up and suddenly, an explosion happened.” Rein answered.

“I’m sorry Rein, for what they have done. I was just here to visit you because you left suddenly yesterday. They have promised they wouldn’t do anything out of the ordinary, but when they saw her, well shit happened.” Albert answered, pointing at Emeralis. “Uriza, You’re the one who attacked first, why?”

Uriza clenched her fist and looked away. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Uriza, Please!” Albert begged, looking directly at her eyes. Seeing Albert like that, she sighed.

“Emeralis… she was my sworn enemy in life, and the one who killed me. We killed each other actually, so of course i would react like that.” She answered. Albert, Rein, Rose, and Aldwin were shocked.

“I-i’m sorry Uriza.” Albert stood up and apologized.

“Wait what?” Rose asked. “That’s strange, spirit don’t usually met someone they knew when they was summoned, much less their sworn enemy.”

“Is that true?” Rein asked Emeralis.

“Well, half true. If not for her final suicide attack, i would have survived that.” Emeralis answered. Hearing that, Uriza couldn’t hold her anger back.

“IF NOT FOR YOUR COWARDLY TACTIC I WOULD HAVE KILLED YOU!” Uriza screamed as she punched the table. Uriza almost fired a fireball, but Albert stopped her by standing in front of her.

“Please Uriza, calm down!.” He said. Uriza took a deep breath.

“Yeah, you should listen to your master like a good bitch you are.” Emeralis mocked her.

“Emeralis!” Rein scolded her.

“Oh, shut up!” Aldwin shouted. “Set aside your petty grudge for another time, the game of spirit is happening right now!”

“Game of Spirit?” All of them were surprised.

“Damn it! for us to be summoned at such time.” Uriza complained.

“Really? shouldn’t you realize by now that spirit as strong as yourself can only be summoned around the time the game start? Not to mention spirit as strong as you should be able to feel the change in the air.” Rose asked.

“We know that, it’s just…..” Uriza answered.

“Wait-wait! what the fuck is going on here, what is this game of spirit?” Albert asked.

“Yeah what are you talking about?” Rein also asked.

“If you wanted to know more, why don’t we go somewhere else? Someone who know more about it will tell you in detail.” Rose asked. Albert and Rein looked at each other, they were hesitant, but from the way they speak, it is something important. They both nodded.. “Then it settled then.” Rose stood from his chair and started walking outside. Rein raised his arm “What is it?”

“I’ve just wake up,at least let me take a shower and have a breakfast first.” Rein answered.

“Just don’t take too long.” She replied.

Even if their spirit was uneasy about this, Albert and Rein agreed to go with Rose. After Rein took a shower and had a breakfast he returned to the church. A military truck already parked in front of the church to take them.

Unlike yesterday, the warehouse had become more like a military compound. Barbed fences covered the perimeter, guard stood watch on the watchtower and the roof, soldiers were jogging and training all around.

When they got inside, Arthur had already waiting for them inside his command center, surrounded by desk and monitor.

“Welcome! Rein, Albert, and.. spirits” Arthur greeted them. “I’m Arthur, the leader of the heroic faction. Please, take a seat.” They sat on the chair that had been prepared for them.

“Nice to meet you Arthur, you seems to know our name.” Rein replied.

“Well let’s cut to the point. You came here wanted to know more about the game of spirit right?” He asked. They both nodded. Arthur explained to them about the Game of Spirit and its rule.

Of course, Albert and Rein had difficulties understanding and accepting what Arthur had just explained.

“How the Heck can someone call this a game, when people are staking their life on this?” Albert asked.

“Because most people didn’t gamble their life, most just use their spirit to fight and escape if their spirit are defeated.” Arthur answered.

“But spirit are human too!” Albert yelled.

“Not many share your sentiment you know. Some spirit even prefer to be treated as nothing but a tool, a means to an end.”

”For people and spirit to fight each other like this. such a game must have a very extraordinary reward then?” Rein asked.

“Indeed, the reward are usually a legendary artifact.” Arthur answered.

“So people killed each other just for some fucking artifact?” Albert asked.

“‘just’ is not the right word. Each of these artifact have enough power to change the world, or empower a man to change it, even if it was just a lesser artifact. The best example for this would be the last century game of spirit that happened during the world war I, the battle of somme. The detail wasn't clear, but the winner was a german soldier. He won a lesser artifact, The golden swastika, which said to be able to grant its wearer a great charisma, leadership and charm, enough to take over a country by word alone. But after the war, he was seriously injured, so he gave it to his friend, Adolf Hitler.

And look what happened if the wrong person get hold of an artifact.” Arthur explained.

“You said about faction-faction, what are those?” Rein asked.

“You could say that faction are an ancient organization, created in ancient times even before the great disaster. There are 7 faction: Hero, Warrior, Hunter, Holy, Evil, Mage, Secret. Though recently the holy faction renamed to church faction, the evil became devil faction, and the secret became assassin faction. Each faction has their own goal in mind. We the heroic faction seeks to maintain peace and reduce the amount victim when a conflict was unavoidable, for conflict is within human nature and completely erasing them was impossible.” Arthur answered.

“Then what about this century reward, what would you do if you win it?” Rein asked.

“We WILL win it, for this time game spirit, the stake are too high. The winner of this century game will be rewarded with The Source, a virtually unlimited magic generator. Since it was unlimited, anything should be possible, even granting immortality, world domination, or any wish at all. And when we win it……… I’m going to personally destroy it myself.”

“WHAT?” Albert asked. His voice loud. “If it was unlimited magic, shouldn’t you use it for creating world peace? You said it yourself, the heroic faction main objective was to maintain world peace. Why did you want to destroy it?”

“Then how? How do we create world peace? What the artifact do was provide you with unlimited supply of magic, if you wanted to make your wish come true you have to do it yourself.

The second problem is because power corrupt. Let’s say i use the source to create world peace, but what if i become angry? What if i become crazy? Who could stop me then? ” He answered. “The best we could do is destroy that thing, so it doesn’t fall on the wrong hand.”

“Wait a minute, you explained as if this game was held by someone.” Rein said.

“Not someone, but Gaia, the spirit of earth itself, she was the one who gave the winner the artifact. Even if we, the factions, didn’t participate, a random person that happened to be in the area would be given the prize, but since no one wanted a random person to win a powerful artifact, so we participated.

But there are usually something called supervisor, when a game of spirit happened, the area surrounding it will have its magical density in air,water, and ground a significant increase. People with power who lived there usually wanted to collect all of that magic, so they act as supervisor, watching and regulating the game while they were collecting the magic,but they can’t be trusted completely because they might betray us in the end and take the prize for themselves.”

“Now that you know about all of this. I was hoping that we could worked together and form an alliance to win this game. What do you say?” Arthur asked. He extended his hand. Albert and Rein was still thinking. “Albert, we may not be able to save everyone, but if you help us, we will be able to save more live than without you.”

After thinking for a while, Albert agrees. He won’t let innocent people die on his watch, he had enough.

“What about you Rein?” Arthur asked.

Rein closed his eyes, thinking. “No,” He answered quick.