Chapter 9: The Ghost of Sector 666

Zara was a third-year physical education student at one of the city's university campuses, and as recently as the previous evening, her biggest worry had been whether the takeout they'd ordered would be enough to feed two ravenous women after a grueling day.

She had gone out for barbecue with Lyra, a childhood friend, and had been just about to reach for the first bite when that indifferent voice announced their forced journey to another world - not even giving them time to finish their curses.

At first, she had sat in her Hearthhold so dazed she couldn't decide whether she should be terrified or furious at everything in existence.

Eventually, she forced herself to steady her breathing and take stock of her surroundings.

Athletics had at least taught her that panicking rarely helped once a situation spun out of control, and curling up on the pallet waiting for someone to undo the transmigration hardly seemed like a winning strategy.

When she discovered the Worldheart Console and realized she could search for other people, finding Lyra was the very first thing she did.

Her friend's reply brought a relief so profound that Zara managed her first genuine smile since the transfer.

Landing in the same sector - Sector 666 - already felt like a stroke of absurd luck, but when they began comparing the view from their windows, they realized their shelters were barely a dozen meters apart.

The next morning, they set out together to gather materials, confident they’d fare much better as a pair than alone.

The forest quickly shattered any notions of an easy adjustment to life in Elyndra, however.

Their mana ran dry faster than they liked, physical labor proved exhausting, and Lyra’s longsword - which had looked so badass on the starter selection screen - made for a miserable substitute for a woodcutter’s axe.

To make matters worse, Zara had spotted that suspicious shadow darting between the branches, prompting Lyra to insist they relocate before finding out what kind of predator was stalking above their heads.

Between all the interruptions, hauling heavy loads, and scouting safer ground, their combined haul amounted to barely two hundred units of wood and a hundred of stone.

Against the shelter upgrade requirements, it looked pretty pathetic after such a grueling day.

Fortunately, each of them had stumbled upon a supply crate, so at least come evening they didn't have to test whether one could survive on pure spite alone.

Zara stood by the window of her Hearthhold, water bottle in hand, gazing out at the alien sky peeking through the canopy when a pale, bluish glow flickered in the darkness.

At first, she took it for a reflection from inside the cabin, but when she tilted her head and the glowing shape kept drifting among the branches, she pressed closer to the glass.

Her fox ears perked straight up, and the small gray tail behind her hips twitched as she tried to parse the dark silhouette suspended high above the ground.

Standing a hundred and eighty-two centimeters tall, with athletic thighs and shoulders built for rigorous training, Zara wasn't easily rattled.

Yet none of that athleticism stopped her from jerking backward from the sill, nearly fumbling the bottle in her grip.

“Holy fuck… What is that?!”

She stole another glance outside.

Seeing the glow vanish behind a massive trunk only to reappear a short distance away, she spun toward the console so fast that her chest bounced beneath her snug athletic top, water sloshing over her knuckles.

Wiping her hand against her shorts, she brushed back the chestnut hair falling over the crimson, bifurcated mark on her right cheek, and hurriedly pulled up the Regional Channel.

The feed looked exactly like what one would expect from a sector that had already earned itself a rather notorious reputation:

[Trade five units of stone for food. Even a scrap of bread is fine.]

[Need water. Any longer and I'm seriously heading to the stream.]

[Half a bottle of water for food, PM offers.]

[Elyra Voss, you think killing one of mine settles this?!]

[Lirana, your girl tried to rob me. If you want to follow her lead, be my guest.]

[Jamera Bellmont, give me back my damn pickaxe!]

Zara stared at the familiar circus of bartering, threats, and bickering for a moment before typing out a message, her eyes flicking toward the window with every other keystroke.

[Zara : Guess what I just saw.]

[Either spill it or go to sleep. Nobody's in the mood for guessing games.]

[If it's another crate, congratulations.]

[After the day we’ve had, do you really need to put on a show in chat?]

Zara grimaced, briefly regretting having phrased it like that, but quickly tapped out an explanation, her fingers pressing harder against the screen.

[Zara : Something glowing pale blue just flew through the trees outside my shelter.]

For the next few lines, responses to previous arguments continued to scroll by, but the topic soon caught fire, and pleas for food and trading insults gave way to questions.

[What do you mean "flew"?]

[A bird?]

[You kidding?]

[Zara : Not kidding. Saw it just now.]

[Tessa Lorne: Can you describe it? How big was it, and what kind of light?]

Zara glanced toward the window, but the luminescence had already vanished.

She tried to piece together the image from memory, suddenly far less confident in the details than she had been a moment ago.

[Zara : Couldn't see the exact shape, it was too dark. Something black with a bluish glow, kind of like a dim lamp. Moving through the canopy, not very fast. Looked like it hovered for a second, then kept going.]

Replies began flooding in faster, and as several users parsed the description, a single message was all it took to veer the conversation in a completely different direction.

[Wait… A ghost?]

[Don't be ridiculous, what ghosts?]

[This is a world with magic. Yesterday I didn't believe in teleportation either, and yet here I am instead of in my own apartment.]

[If it's a ghost, does a sword even do anything to it?]

[How should I know? I've never fought a ghost!]

Zara swallowed hard and glanced back at the window, instantly wishing she had covered it with something before opening the chat.

She hadn't thought of a ghost herself, but once someone put the idea in her head, the pale glow and a shadowy figure drifting effortlessly without touching the ground painted an unsettling picture.

[I saw something blue too, but it vanished before I got a good look.]

[It was down low near the dirt, then rose back up. Swear to god it was glowing green for a second as well.]

[Maybe it devoured something?]

[Or it's gathering energy.]

[We were just at 9,979 people. It's at 9,978 now.]

The note about the counter made Zara glance up at the header on reflex.

Seeing the lower number, she squeezed her bottle so hard the plastic crinkled sharply.

She didn't know exactly when the count had dropped or what had happened to the missing person, but for half the chat, the coincidental timing was all the proof they needed.

[There you go, that thing really is killing people!]

[You don't even know if it's connected.]

[Then go outside and check for yourself if you're so brave.]

[I'm locking up everything. No way in hell I'm stepping outside tonight.]

[Mom, if you're in this sector, please answer.]

[Something just thumped against my door.]

[It's probably a branch.]

[And what if it's not?!]

The chat splintered into skeptics calling foul, people inventing wild details, and those paralyzed with terror.

Regardless of who was right, Zara had no intention of going near the window again tonight.

She shot a quick warning to Lyra about what she’d seen, then pulled back closer to the lantern light, deciding stargazing could wait until the sky stopped looking so damn suspicious.

Serayne had no clue that while hauling her salvage, she had been crowned a mysterious nocturnal entity whose prowling was already being linked to drop-offs on the survivor counter.

She was far too busy sorting through her haul.

In addition to the workshop equipment salvaged from beneath the ruins, she had dragged back two more supply crates spotted on her ferry runs, their telltale green luminescence cutting through the gloom too brightly to ignore.

Grabbing them had prolonged the expedition and taxed her exhausted arms, but leaving packaged food sitting under a tree felt far too painful to justify skipping the extra work.

Now, crates - both empty and full - crowded the floor near the entrance, the cauldron rested beside the mortar and pestle, and a few glowing mushrooms continued to cast a soft azure radiance that Serayne appreciated purely as handy ambient lighting for her loot.

Tomorrow, first thing I do is figure out a better way to carry things… If I keep wrestling cargo like this, my arms will quit on me long before I ever become an alchemist.

She hadn't opened the new crates yet; the relics from Avelra’s workshop piqued her curiosity far more.

Packaged rations from Asterra were at least familiar at a glance, whereas the translucent dagger, the preserved tomes, and that unassuming pouch could possess properties she couldn't begin to guess.

That morning’s demonstration with the flying plank had been more than enough to discourage testing things by swinging them at random.

Settling before the console, she rubbed her sore palms and reached first for the small pouch, which had looked the least impressive when dragged out of the cellar.

Placing it onto the right-hand panel, she withdrew her fingers and waited for the system's appraisal readout.

[Worn Herb Pouch  -  Rank C]

[Internal Space: 1 m³]

[Operation: Mana infusion enables storing and retrieving items within the internal space.]

[Property: Stored herbs do not lose potency over time.]

[Condition: Prolonged mana starvation has restricted the accessible space. Original capacity was larger. Continued infusion may gradually restore full functionality.]

Serayne read the description, then looked down at the pouch - which easily fit in the palm of her hand - and found herself utterly speechless.

Slowly, she turned her head toward the cauldron.

Then to the crates, to the tangled mess of vines she’d used as harnesses, and finally to her own arms, still burning from hauling all that cargo back and forth between the ruins and her Hearthhold.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me…”

The pouch rested innocently on the panel, devoid of guilt, as Serayne pulled it closer with the expression of someone who had just realized she'd spent an entire day carrying the exact solution to every problem she’d been cursing in her pocket.

The entire time… The whole damn time, I had you on me while I was dragging that shit by hand…

She didn't know yet whether stored items retained their physical weight, but simply consolidating multiple unwieldy bundles into a single pouch was an astronomical upgrade.

A cubic meter of volume was far more spacious than the word “restricted” implied; picturing a meter-wide cube in her mind, she immediately measured it against the crates on the floor.

It could swallow far more than she could ever carry in her arms in a single trip.

Restricted capacity… Forgive me for having to settle for such meager gear.

A wry smile cut through her exhaustion as she reread the note about restoring its original parameters.

But her eyes drifted back to the sentence regarding herbs - that was where the relic's true value lay.

Avelra had emphasized ingredient integrity, harvest techniques, and preserving the volatile potency required for concoctions.

The pouch had clearly been tailored to alleviate that exact headache.

No wonder it had belonged to an alchemist’s workshop.

Serayne lifted the pouch with newfound reverence, as if the appraisal result had transformed an ordinary scrap of canvas into something delicate that could be ruined with an overzealous squeeze.

Peeking through the drawstring opening, she peered inside.

She hadn't expected to see an entire cubic meter gaping back at her, but a faint pang of disappointment still struck when simply looking didn't explain how to operate it.

She turned the pouch in her hands, inspecting its seams, and checked the notification again, fixing on the words regarding mana infusion.

Up until now, triggering Featherstep and Gathering had been a matter of willing the skill to activate, while the console had guided her through binding the shelter and moving items.

Now, for the first time, she had to channel mana deliberately into an object that lacked a convenient user interface.

Having eighty points in her pool didn't mean she had any clue how to direct them.

Alright… So how exactly do I feed you mana?