“...in... hood... who… all...”

“GHOST BUSTERS!” I completed the song that had been murmured under the breath of our favorite fire elemental.

Ash made a complex expression before letting out a loud agonized cry as he understood what had just happened.

“CYGNAS DAMMIT! NOT AGAIN!” She cursed loudly towards the heavens while holding her head in her hands and crouching down in place. Yuu and Crys looked at him with confusion and pity respectively while I just laughed out in amusement. “Why the hell did you have to get this hellish thing in my head? Why?”

“Because that’s the basic condition for ghost-related situations!” I replied cheerfully for the Nth time, and just as expected, it took her no less than a second to have both of his hands around my neck.“If you… mind it… You lose…”

-5 (1105/1110) (Choking)

After a moment, he finally let go of me, giving me some space to breath and recover from the damage I had taken. Totally worth it! While thinking so and gladly receiving the help from Aura to stand back up.

Thankfully, there weren’t anyone else besides us on the road we were trekking, seeing how we had already diverged from the main road that led to the mine some time ago, the traffic had quickly cleared up. Thankfully, we didn’t have too much trouble with finding the way after talking with Lord Wich, who pointed out the way to us.

And funnily enough, looks like exorcising a house can also count as a quest.

QUEST:

Haunted Manor

On your search for a house, you have come across a building that fit your interests. However, such building has long since been haunted by the ghosts of an old warrior and his wife, which brings problems for the repairs of the house. Find a way to deal with the issue and the house shall be yours.

(Third party intervention is allowed)

Rewards:

Mansion

????

Well, who am I to complain about an easy quest I already planned on doing? Heck, after learning what lord Wich had found out about the ghosts I was almost sure that the plan I had come up with would work without issues.

Well, this did mean that the whole reason I brought Ashley with me would end up never happening, but hey, it’s not like every plan in a story have to go badly, right? Right?

“…”

“Master?” Crys looked at me worriedly once she noticed that I had gone strangely quiet.

“We are going to a haunted mansion. I have a plan in mind that I’m almost sure will work, and even if it doesn’t, I’m pretty sure we can count on Ashley and Yuu to deal with whatever will be thrown our way.” I stated our present situation, and she nodded slowly with a slightly dubious look. “Looks like we won’t have much issues…” I turned towards her with a pleading look. “Can I tempt fate to have something funny hap-”

“No.” She interrupted me at the same time an over-sized paper fan appeared in her hand and slapped the back of my head so hard that I almost fell down forward. “Bad master. No tempting fate. We don’t want to be cursed with bad luck!” She said angrily.

“Heeh… I didn’t expect Crys to believe in luck.” Yuu said surprised, and when I stopped to think about it, it actually made sense. As the two of us turned towards her curious, she simply stared back at us.

“I don’t believe in something such as luck. I do believe in Gon’s capacity to get into trouble, however.” She said coldly. “And I’d rather not take any chances with him.”

“Ah. I see.” Yuu nodded.

…Oi, Yuu. Why are you agreeing with her? While looking at her incriminatingly, I decided that it wasn’t worth worrying too much about it and simply sighed before walking forward. It didn’t take much longer after the little sketch before we finally saw the mansion. And I must say, for a haunted mansion…

I’m not sure whether I should be satisfied or disappointed with what I saw. It was precisely what one would expect when one thought about an old haunted mansion. Large building with some visibly rotten pieces of wood and some pieces falling apart. Would probably have looked amazing back in the day, but now it was seriously needing some repair.

Welp, that’s exactly what I came here to do. Getting pumped up, I looked back to Yuu , Ashley and Crys. The first was looking towards the mansion with a strangely serious look while holding something on her hand, while the second had a slightly worried look while holding on to the two daggers in her waist, while the last one had a fierce look while holding a miniature broom that I had no recollection in either buying or making.

Well, I entitle my maids and followers a modical amount of freedom, so let’s not ask about it.

“Well, we’ll try the first plan. If things go downhill, I’ll be counting on you guys.” I said in a bit more serious than usual. “Ashle… Sorry. Rival, if things seems dire, feel free to run. This is a lot more dangerous to you than to us.”

“Why the hell did you change your words at the last moment?” Ashley asked me with an angry look. “I also have no idea whether to be annoyed at your insistence on the rival thing, or get worried about your consideration.” She sighed before shaking his head and turned towards the house. “Anyway, I have no intention to die here, so don’t worry about me.”

“Okay.” I nodded and turned towards the house. “Time to go i…”

“WHO ARE YOU TO ENTER OUR RESIDENCE?” A loud booming voice echoed all of a sudden, literally throwing me backwards as the house shook and the grass underneath waved away with the pressure. The voice vaguely sounded like what one would expect from an angry old man, except that much scarier and ethereal sounding. “TURN BACK AND NEVER RETURN!”

Whoa. Someone really doesn’t want us to go in. Thinking about that amusedly, I couldn’t help but smile a bit wickedly.

“I’m the future new owner of this place!” I shouted back. “Don’t think you’ll keep me out with a little threat like that!” I made a cool aggressive pose while staring at the house, making my statement that I had no intention to hold back on taking the mansion to myself.

…

…

…

Come on, aren’t you going to say anything back to me? I stood there in my cool looking pose for a few seconds, but no answer ever came back to me, making my cool pose go wasted.

“What are you even doing?” Ashley asked me confused.

“Just injuring my pride. Don’t mind me.” I replied pouting before once again walking into the terrain.

“YOU DARE TO RE…”

“WHY THE HELL DID YOU SHOUT AT ME NOW?” I interrupted the spooky disembodied voice with an angry shout. “YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE THAT SOONER YOU RETARD!”

“YOU DARE TALK BACK TO US?” The voice echoed angrily.

“YOU ARE CYGNASDAMNED RIGHT THAT I TALK BACK! YOU MADE ME LOSE FACE IN FRONT OF MY RIVAL YOU DIMWITTED UNCORPOREAL BASTARD!” I shouted angrily while walking in towards the building. “YOU BETTER READY YOURSELF CAUSE I’M GONNA TEACH YOU WHAT I DO WITH GHOSTS WHO LIVE IN MY HOUSE!”

“S-Shishou. Are you sure it’s a good idea to anger the spirits?” Yuu asked me worriedly.

“…No. It’s probably a very bad idea.” I said a bit worried after I stopped to think about it. “Oh well. What’s done is done, so let’s leave it for later.”

Yuu nodded weakly while Ashley and Crys simply facepalmed. I shrugged it off before walking towards the building. Looking around, I felt slightly surprised at the large garden before the mansion, which, in contrast to the decrepit building, was perfectly kept and organized.

It was also a pretty big property, if I were to take a better look. Heck, I think even the beach house from my grandpas aren’t as big as this. Starting to worry that the reward might have been a bit too much.

No. Bad Gon. You should be Greedy. No turning back on the reward.

“Shishou!” Yuu suddenly called me as I held onto the door. “Here.” She said while handing me something. “These should help you with angry spirits if anything happens.”

I blinked surprised and looked down to what she had given me. It was a rectangular piece of paper with some black ink spread around in some very particular shapes that vaguely looked ancient kanjis or something of the sort.

“Isn’t this a talisman?” I asked surprised.

“Hmm.” She nodded with a worried expression. “When you said that there were ghosts, I thought about making these.”

“I didn’t know you knew how to make talismans.” I said surprised.

“I did not. I looked these up on the internet.” She quickly denied.

That’s even more surprising! While staring at Yuu in shock as she also delivered the talismans to Ashley, who looked at them curious.

Minor Talisman of Evil Warding.

A simple talisman made by a beginner with the intent of protecting the user from evil spirits.

(Creates a minor barrier in front of the user that defends against attacks from evil spirits. This barrier will shatter under strong enough attacks and lasts for but a brief moment.)

Minor Talisman of Exorcism.

A simple talisman made by a beginner with the intent of defeating evil spirits.

(Causes a weak elementless magic explosion upon contact. Bonus damage against undead, demons and dark-oriented monsters.)

“…I did not expect it to be an actual item.” I said surprised.

“I do pride in making this world as variated as possible, you know?” Crys commented in a low tone so that Ashley wouldn’t hear us.

“How do these works?” Ashley asked while holding on to the talismans curiously.

“Just throw it in front of you.” She said. “That’s how they usually work.”

“Have you tested them before?” I asked curious.

“Sorry.” She shook her head. “I just completed these before meeting Shishou.”

“Well, looks like it’ll be the test run this time.” I said while pocketing each talisman in one of my pockets for easy access. “Thanks for worrying Yuu.” I said before gently patting her.

Yuu nodded weakly while closing her eyes in pleasure

Okay, fluffyum reserves are refilled, guess it’s time to get going.

Putting my hands on the doors of the house and slowly opening them, I quickly ran the plan over my head once again. First step is to not die. That’s a pretty important step. Second step would be to make sure to not let the ghosts take control of the situation. It was pretty important to make sure that they are wary of me, or at the very least listening to my words. Third step would be to…

“SCRAM!”

“SHISHOU!”

Is that chair flying straight to my face?

I remember reading something said by a scientist saying that humans are faster to react than they are to act. I’m pretty sure that the fact that I managed to pull the talisman and throw it before the chair hit me square in the face is a very good proof of that fact.

Seeing as the talisman burned before me and created a circular barrier that stopped the chair in its path left me really happy. Both for the fact that Yuu’s talisman worked, and the fact that I didn’t get chaired to the face.

On the other hand, the barrier shattered entirely after blocking the chair, and the table that came after the chair was pretty damn painful.

-94 (1016/1110)

“More incoming.” Ashley warned as I heard the sound of weapon being unsheathed.

I quickly got back up and saw as another three other chairs came flying towards us. Me and Ashley quickly prepared to move away from the furniture projectiles, but Aura and Yuu quickly stepped in front of us and created a wall of ice to block the furniture.

“LEAVE THIS HOUSE!” The voice echoed once again, followed by the sound of wood being torn apart from the walls of the building and being flung towards us.

“Whoa! Dude! Chill out!” I said while quickly flinging an explosive knife towards a cluster of wood and blowing them up. “Don’t go breaking my house, will you?”

“YOUR HOUSE? YOU DARE CALL OUR HOUSE YOURS?” The voice once again, threatening to burst my most likely non-existent eardrums.

“Aaaah, damn. Heads up! Something big coming!” Ashley shouted while parrying some wooden planks.

Following her shout, we heard the sound of wood dragging upon wood followed by a strangely melodious tone that was played in complete disarray. A very, very familiar sound for anyone who spent at least a couple of hours watching old style slap-stick comedy cartoons.

I quickly looked around in panic. Firstly looking up where the most-likely direction of the attack should come, but noticing that there was nothing there, I quickly looked towards the side, searching for a stairways.

“You’ve gotta be joking me.” I said in disgust when the sound echoed again, finally allowing me to see its source.

A large grand Piano, that one with the curvy back like you see in cartoons, was sliding on the ground towards us. I’m no expert on piano-damage calculations, but I’m almost sure that whether it be real life or game-life, a piano that size hitting something at the speed of a car on a highway would hurt. A lot.

But I was too annoyed to react to that.

“Aura. Front wheels.” I said coldly while pulling out a freezing knife and quickly throwing towards the back leg of the piano.

Aura reacted quickly, jumping in front of me and instantly freezing the front part of the piano in one single block as my knife took care of the rear part. Of course, it wasn’t enough to completely stop the piano, but it managed to slow it down significantly to the point that I could stop it with my own hands.

“YOU CYGNAS DAMNED RETARDED GHOST!” I shouted angrily.

“THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNI…” The voice started, but I wasn’t exactly in the mood.

“IF YOU ARE GOING TO USE A PIANO, AT LEAST DO IT RIGHT YOU DAMNED RETARD!”

“““...What?””” Ashley, Crys and the voice asked in synchrony.

“Look. It’s common knowledge that any use of a piano to attack someone else must be done by either releasing it on the person’s head or have it rolling down a stairway and watch as the victim stares wide eyes in shock before being forced to run away in panic downstairs.“ I explained Piano-usage one oh one to them while pushing the piano away with my leg.

“Would you mind not giving the enemies new creative ways to kill us?” Ashley complained after she finally processed my words.

“M-Master, did you seriously…” Crys asked in disbelief.

Even Aura sighed in disbelief at my words before looking at me incriminatingly. Ugh… if even Aura is giving me that glance I guess it means that I should stop and cool down.

I took the moment of shock from everyone else to calm down and take a deep breath to calm myself down. I guess I should go back to the plan now. Come on Gon, let’s not make ourselves repeat that same sentence again.

“Okay. I guess it’s time to have you guys stop trying to kill me so that we can sit down and solve this mess.” I said while opening my inventory window.

“AND WHY SHOULD WE HEAR TO YOUR WORDS, INTRUDER?” The ghost asked angrily while the sound of wood being teared apart and furniture being moved.

“Because…” I pulled out the item from the inventory and felt the sudden weight that almost made me stumble forward. “What I have here…” My voice came strained as I tried to support the weight of the item. “Is a full barrel…” I could already hear the sound of objects flying towards me, and even though I had managed to put the heavy object on the ground, I didn’t have the time to dodge them. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure I didn’t need to do it. “Of freezing cold mead.”

It was an incredible scene as all the pieces and bits of wood and furniture that had been flying straight to my head suddenly made a full ninety degrees turn to the side, slamming upon the wall to each side and completely avoiding us.

…Oh god. Is this really going to work?

“Wha… Dear! Why did you do that?” The voice asked surprised, leaving us surprised.

“That’s mead, Rognar.” Another voice suddenly echoed, this one clearly being from a woman.

“And what of it woman? These guys want to steal our home! We have to get rid of them!” Once again the furniture’s started to float, but before they could even gather speed, the female voice stopped them.

“Do you even remember the last time we had a glass of mead?”

“That doesn’t matter! They…”

“Rognar, Don’t you even dare touch that bloody barrel.” The woman said, sounding really, really angry.

“Woman! These damned intruders are gonna… Wait… Why are you… Oh goddess… is that…” Huuh… What’s happening? I leaned on the barrel and looked back to the others, but they were as flabbergasted as I was. “By Cygnas… not the broom… NOT THE BROOM! GYAAAAAAAAAH!”

Strange. Why do I suddenly feel pity towards the ghost that was trying to kill me just a few seconds ago? That said, the sound of a wooden broom smacking someone echoing through the entire mansion like some kind of amped up surround sound made the whole situation so surreal that it was almost funny.

Okay, it wasn’t almost funny. It was hilarious.

After a few seconds of pained screeches and broom beatings, the house finally calmed down, and the air straight in front of us started to twist and shimmer for a moment, before it finally began to coalesce into a more familiar shape.

“Speak, golem. What are your intentions?” A transparent, floating blue figure asked me.

She was much shorter than me, such that even though she was floating above the ground a fair amount, she still was looking straight at me. With a long hair that fell all the way to her back held together by a simple cloth tied around her head, she wore a surprisingly fancy dress that didn’t match the housekeeping headgear. Being around the height of a kid, yet clearly being more mature and a bit chubbier too.

“...Not exactly what I was expecting, but I’ll take it.” I said amused while opening the barrel lid and showing her the inside. “Anyway, as you can see, this IS indeed mead.”

The ghost dwarf woman peeked over the border of the lid and her eyes widened in anticipation and hunger.

“…What do you want for it.” She asked me feverishly.

“I want to negotiate.”

“NEVER!” The first voice echoed as a dwarf materialized besides her. This one being male and wearing full mail armor and a face-plate helm. Holding an axe in one hand, he put the second one on the woman’s shoulder, trying to pull her back.

But before he even had the chance, a ghost broom materialized on the woman’s hand and she smacked the male one in the head with so much strength that he smashed flat against the ground.

“Shut up, Rognar.” She said coldly. “I might love you a whole damn lot and have promised to follow you in death. But right now there’s a whole barrel of Mead before me and I’m thirsty like never before.” She said while staring down at him. Rognar let out a really pitiful moan of fear while moving away. “Anyway, what do you want golem.”

“Good to see someone actually follows reason here.” I said while nodding satisfied at the fact that there a fellow logic-thinker in the room with me. “Anyway, feel free to grab yourself a mug…” Not even I finished speaking, an old mug came flying straight from somewhere and dove itself on the barrel, scooping a large serving of the drink before flying towards the dwarf woman who drank it heartily. “Wow… Anyway. I have a win-win proposition for you.”

“Haah… I’m all ears.” The woman said while putting on a cheerful smile.

“Well, as you might have guessed, I want to move in here.” She nodded while frowning ever so slightly. “Yet, the two of you, despite already having passed away, have no desire to leave this house.”

“That’s right…” She nodded in agreement.

“Then, why not have the house in my name, I become the true owner of it, yet let the two of you continue living here while working as the house keepers slash guard?” I said my idea and she responded by simply frowning suspiciously.

“And why exactly should we agree with this idea?” She asked me, clearly not trusting me as of yet.

“Well. First, the house is a complete disaster.” I said bluntly while pointing around us. She flinched slightly. “I’d say it have only a few years before it falls down under its own weight. Even less if you deal with all intruders the way you do.” She made a complex expression before looking towards her husband coldly once again.

“And you are saying that you’d repair the house if we let you move in?” She asked.

“Yes. That’s exactly it.” I nodded.

“Okay. What’s exactly stopping us from just kicking you out of the house once it’s repaired?” She asked me with a taunting tone.

“Well, that would be your dwarven honor, the good will of your person, and the fact that I’d pay in beer from all around the world whenever I came back to here.”

“Why do we have to trust you?” Rognar asked angrily.

“Excuse-me, I’m talking with the leader of the household.” I said disregarding the warrior.

“What? Speak that to my face!”

“Rognar. Quiet.” The woman said once again.

“Yes ma’am.” He complied quietly.

“That… Seems like a very good deal to me.” She said, still sounding a bit suspicious while scooping another mug of mead. “Though, why would you make that request to ghosts like us?”

“Well, to be honest, it’s quite simple. You see, since I’ll be away most of the time, I’d have to hire a housekeeper and guard to make sure the mansion’s clean and no one steals all my stuff.” I explained. “Which would probably end up expensive, since this is known as a haunted mansion and moderately far from the town. On the other hand, the two of you have managed to keep most people away from this place for what? A couple of decades?”

“I think it might be four decades. I stopped counting after some time.” She replied with an indifferent shrug.

“Yeah. That’s it. That means that you guys are amazing guards. Then I thought. Hey! Why not hire them instead? Since they’ll be living in the mansion anyway!”

“I just want to make a note that, under normal circumstances, no one with the slightest modicum of common sense would have thought that, Master.” Crys added sarcastically.

“Shut it. This is a perfectly logical reasoning.”

“How the hell is making a deal involving a supply of beer to a ghost logical reasoning?” Ashley asked annoyed.

“It’s best if you don’t try to understand Shishou and just go along with his ideas.” Yuu consoled him.

Et Tu Yuu?

“…Looks like this isn’t the first time you do something like this.” The woman said while watching them talking.

“Well, it isn’t the worst either. I still think that convincing a dragon to do a backflip was a bit more amusing.” I shrugged. Just one more day in the life of Wargon.

“…I might have to hear about that one later.” She said amused.

“Later? You mean…”

“You have a deal.” She said while extending her hand. “Repair our house, bring me beer, and I’ll make sure this place is safe and clean.” She said with a business smile. “Name’s Thalia, by the way.”

“Awesome! Great doing business with you.” I said while shaking her hand. “Name’s Gondorrer Ghostnegotiat… Erm… Gravelheart.” God freaking dammit.

“Seriously?” Ashley said in shock.

“B-But Thalia!” Rognar called in disbelief.

And with that, the plan worked almost exactly as I had expected. While thinking of how I had gotten myself an awesome house-insurance policy. I couldn’t help but feel that there was something a bit strange.

I mean, the plan shouldn’t have worked. Hadn’t I pretty much set the flag for total disaster when I invited my rival here in case things went bad?

Welp. Guess this goes to prove that real life is pretty different from fantasy.

Either that, or the Author just decided to build a flag, then have it be completely ignored just for the fun of it. It’s also a totally plausible hypothesis.