'Just Great!' Damon thought bitterly, pressing his lip together.
After a few seconds, he exhaled slowly and suppressed the growing frustration. The situation was escalating far beyond what they had expected, and he was unsure if they could have prepared for any possibility that had occurred.
While grappling with the dilemma, Damon shook his head, and his lips could not help but form a self-deprecating smile.
"It looks like I still haven't gotten used to having my own Deus ex machina," He muttered.
As his words fell, he reached into his inner coat pocket, searching for the smooth texture of the golden turtle badge given to him by Vincent.
It was a bit odd that badges crafted with a turtle-shaped insignia were imbued with his mother's runes, considering they did not align with her fondness of feathered creatures. But nonetheless, he planned to use it to have her directly break them out of the domain.
However, only felt a headache coming on as he clenched his empty fingers.
"Tsk.." After quickly rifling through his other pockets, he could not help but click his tongue upon discovery that his badge was missing.
'Where could it have–' Before he could finish that thought, his eyes shifted beyond the classroom window. Outside the vast lake lay unnervingly still as if lacking all life, yet Damon had doubts about whether that was actually true.
As the memory of the dark water rushing into his lungs resurfaced, a chilling realization dawned on him. His badge had likely sunken to the bottom of the lake alongside his brother Vincent and the priest Kruger. Although far apart, he could still sense the duo floating below even now.
'I'm not sure how long they'll last… 'Damon
At that moment, Everything in his vision dulled as though a blur had been applied. The more he observed the water's surface, the more the surrounding forest wilderness distorted, dripping down like heated wax or paint flowing off a canvas.
'Crap!' Damon hurriedly broke his line of sight away from the window glass when he realized his mind was starting to feel sluggish.
"Is everything out to kill us..?"He muttered, taking a breath. Amidst his annoyance, He lightly shook his head, slowly rubbing between his brows, and sighed.
Following that, he turned around and approached Henry, who sat silently, playing beside Cecil. His posture was noticeably tense as his fingers moved carefully across the keys, yet strangely, he flowed with ease, creating the image of an experienced pianist.
There was a certain warmth that Damon had not seen before now spreading around him, and much like a moth to flame, Cecil subconsciously leaned in to grasp it. As she listened, her legs curled up to her chest, and all her attention was seemingly captivated by the sound.
'Wait a second.. Is this what master was describing?'Seeing Cecil's dazed expression, Damon paused his steps with slightly furrowed brows. What he was feeling was unmistakably Spiritual energy, but the intent Henry was transmitting to Cecil carried an unbelievable amount of compassion.
Could his brother really be so kind to a potential threat..?
Was Cecil that desperate for the kindness of a stranger…?
Staring at her current state, Damon felt compelled to question if the vulnerable person sitting beside Henry was actually a mature adult.
Yet in truth, he couldn't be faulted for that. The Cecil Watson he had heard about should have been in her mid twenties, contrary to the spirit manifested before him, who appeared no older than thirteen years old.
As if sensing his curiosity, Tomoe's voice stirred within his mind.
["A spirit does not always reflect the age of the body it once inhabited. While the soul and flesh age together, the spirit often manifests in the form most aligned with its subconscious Will."]
'That's… interesting,' Damon admitted inwardly. 'Does that mean a normal person's Will could interact with spiritual energy if it were strong enough?'
["Don't be absurd, boy,"] Tomoe snapped. ["Only Specters are capable of forging their Wills into a tool. Mundane humans lack the framework necessary to develop a Will capable of influencing spiritual energy; at most, they would possess a unique presence and nothing more. The sheer stress of it would have naturally triggered their core awakening as a specter."]
Damon held his gaze for a moment longer, studying Cecil's side profile, then walked closer in thought.'Could she actually be a specter…?'
The idea wasn't entirely unreasonable. A hidden Specter, suppressing her abilities to pursue a simple dream of music, avoiding the obligations and dangers that came with awakening. It would explain the resilience of her spirit, the way this space bent around her emotions, and why the one who created that creature did not destroy her entire will.
Yet the longer Damon watched her, the more the theory unraveled.
'She doesn't seem like someone who could lie that well,' Damon concluded.
His attention then shifted briefly back to Henry as he said with a hint of genuine surprise. "You play pretty well, brother."
Hearing his compliment, Henry did not respond, too focused on the white keys, but Damon wasn't expecting one either. Whatever fragile equilibrium existed here was being upheld by the music, and he wasn't eager to test its limits.
Instead, he focused on Cecil as Henry's warm spiritual intent continued to embrace her form.
"Hey Cecil," he said carefully, keeping his tone casual. "Have you seen anything bizarre come out of that lake?"
The words had barely left his mouth when something shifted.
It was subtle at first, like a pressure change before a storm. Damon's skin prickled as an instinctive sense of danger washed over him, sharp enough to make his heart skip.
The music faltered.
Henry's hands froze mid-motion as the final note rang hollowly through the room. Slowly, Cecil turned her head.
Her eyes were no longer bright.
The warmth drained from them all at once, leaving behind a hollow, vacant stare that seemed to swallow the light around it as her lips slowly parted.
"The Lake?"
******
Deep beneath the lake's surface, where barely any light could intrude, the final syllables of Vincent's spell incantation fell.
The surrounding water shuddered as his azure Spiritual energy gathered, then condensed, quickly slamming together to form a pitch-black coffin around the serpentine shadow below him.
'I'll seal you here!' Vincent thought, clenching his teeth.
But the triumph was short-lived. Before he could reinforce the spell, the coffin warped from within as the creature's spiritual energy spiked and its edges distorted.
A soundless rupture soon followed, and the creature's body split unnaturally, dividing into two identical forms that surged out in opposite directions, leaving the spell to collapse in on itself, dispersing uselessly into the surrounding depths.
"Of course it couldn't be that simple," Vincent grumbled, the bubbles of his breath rising sporadically.
Despite its previously narrow escape, the creature did not retreat. Instead, the to forms began to encircle him, increasing their speed until only blurs were visible within his mystic eyes. Without warning, one rushed forward, passing straight through his form.
A sharp chill tore through his chest.
Before he could react, the second followed, striking from another angle, phasing through him as though his body were no more substantial than mist.
Lucky he had the foresight to reactivate Aquaphine Shift, yet after both strikes, a cold sense of dread began to settle in his stomach. At the moment of contact, Vincent felt a large chunk of his spiritual energy vanish, presumably drained from his very form.
'How did this happen !? Henry said it needed a sound illusion to absorb energy,' Vincent wondered.
'If I keep this up, I'll be a husk before they even touch my skin!'Vincent deactivated Aquaphine Shift without hesitation, allowing the faint distortion around his body to dissipate, and the surrounding water pressed in once more.
Since the defensive utility of the skill was no longer worth the cost, the only remaining option was to push the offensive forward.
Without a moment's hesitation, he focused, extending his perception outward, attempting to distinguish between the two entities.
Yet the moment he locked onto one, the sense of gloomy intent slid away, reappearing within the other without warning.
Upon discovering this, Vincent's eyes narrowed as his expression became ugly.
"It's using Parallel existence…" he thought grimly.
It was a high-level skill under Union Affinity. One that allowed a user to distribute their Will across multiple bodies, shifting consciousness freely between them. While the risk of your Will being impacted by memories shared when shifting to another body was significant, the benefits far outweighed the cons.
After all this was an ability said to be rare even among the most advanced Specters!
It made no sense for a creature born from a civilian to possess it. Was this part of the mutation? A perverse gift from whatever corrupted her? Vincent wasn't sure, but that did not alter his course of action. He had no time to lament the absurdity.
Suddenly, the water behind him stirred.