The Barefoot Girl (Part II)

The boy shut off his radio and put away his square-rimmed spectacles. He scanned the cemetery once more as he combed his fingers through his long, pale white mane. Standing up, he let his thermal black jacket drop to the ground. He pressed his palm against the center of his chest, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and recited the words:

O’ spirits... O’ spirits of Holden. With my lifeforce as tribute, I call upon thee, for I have a task that must be sought through.

Will-o'-the-wisps flickered around the stump where his left arm once was. Sickly pale blue flesh materialized in the shape of a human arm, contrasting with his dark skin. From this new arm burst out five thin tree-root digits black as the night sky.

O’ Spirits… Dear spirits of Holden. For this, you have my utmost gratitude.

Amos was thankful that the spirits were still receptive to his call. He had been left on the verge of exhaustion from hours of intense sparring with his sisters just days prior. He removed the chains from his sheath, and held it to his side, gripping it tightly in his new temporary hand.

He concentrated on his breathing, then continued down the path of tall shrubbery, employing the foot roll technique from his stealth training in primary school. The humming grew louder and louder. Before he knew it, he had reached the end of the path. He slowly peeked around the corner and saw her.

A teenage girl wearing a white lace sundress sat on a large semi-collapsed tombstone. Her bare feet dangled over the edge, kicking to the rhythm of the melody. As she sang, the girl moved her head from side to side, and a swarm of will-o'-the-wisps danced all around her. There were so many that Amos couldn't keep track of them all. They always seemed to increase in number wherever he looked.

No wonder her mana was difficult to detect.

Without another word, Amos gripped the hilt of his sword, sizing up his target as he prepared to draw. Just as he began to pull the blade from the sheath, the girl’s tune came to an abrupt end.

“The spirits are certainly lively this time of night... wouldn’t you agree?”

Shit.

Amos ground his teeth and sheathed his sword before stepping out of his spot. The girl lowered her chin as she turned to stare at her would-be assailant. Upon her gaze, Amos became lost in the girl’s emerald-colored eyes, following their every move until suddenly, he could see himself from a bird's eye view.

Huh? What the…?

It felt as if some outside force had ripped his soul right out of his body. He could no longer feel the cool night air, nor could he feel the heavy breaths his body was taking. Amos had fought powerful mages, warriors, and gangsters of many races as well as some of the continent’s most feared monsters, but none of them had ever made him react like this.

No... I can’t let her take me...

Amos focused his mana and after a bit of a struggle, he suddenly found himself back in his body and let out a sharp gasp. His heart raced as a cold sweat ran down his face. After regaining his composure, he gave the girl a once-over, noticing the welts and bruises on her legs as she playfully kicked them back and forth. Soon the moonlight had completely diffused the darkness surrounding them, lighting up the entire cemetery. The girl's pale blonde hair appeared to illuminate in the moon's radiance.

It was odd, the sight was certainly breathtaking, yet the boy still felt a chill run up his spine.

“Hm... you don’t look so well, stranger…” The girl wore a puzzled look as she tilted her head. “Is everything all right...?” Her voice was dreamy and distant as if she wasn’t speaking to Amos at all. It made her question sound all the more condescending. She then turned to her league of will-o'-the-wisps, who indulged her with a cacophony of chirps, which made her giggle. “Yes, yes... he certainly is much stronger than I pegged him to be…”

The girl stopped kicking her feet. She let out a playful grunt of effort as she pushed herself off the tombstone, landing gracefully in the cold, damp grassy field below. At that precise moment, Amos found his new right hand gripping the hilt of his weapon, preparing to draw it should the girl decide to make any sudden movements towards him.

“My, oh my, he’s like a spooked horse! How cute...” The girl giggled, looking the boy up and down. “Half-Hōjinese… half-Anubian?" She turned to her wisps for an answer. They chittered and chirped vigorously as if providing a matter-of-fact response. “Yes, yes, you're right, Anubians don't have white hair… Ah, eyes of amethyst... Perhaps he's Zemian, then? Mm. So he is of bi-ethnic heritage like my brothers and me… Interesting...”

The unfamiliar term made Amos scrunch his face. Zemian?

“Hmm, and then there's that queer aura of yours…” The girl was suddenly speaking to him again; the intonation in her voice was more direct. She rubbed her chin in thought, eyes wide with wonder. “I detect an immense amount of spectral energy coursing through you… And that’s not all, despite making eye contact with me, your soul managed to return to your body… I have never seen such a thing... Anyone else would've simply perished from my Soul Extraction spell, but you…”

“......”

The wisps chirped again, this time in a joyous manner as if confirming her hunch. The barefoot girl grinned at the boy, her eyes dazzling as she slowly raised her right arm and pointed to him. “...Yes… Then it must be so... You are just like me...”

“......”

There was such an air of sureness in the way she appraised the young man standing before her. Amos eyed the girl carefully, looking her up and down for any signs of additional movement. Something was completely off about her. The way she walked, the way she talked, even the way she smiled. Everything she did felt uncanny, like a piece of her just simply wasn’t there. Amos was slowly, but surely starting to see why the headmaster and his associates were calling for this girl’s execution.

“Such unpredictability could prove dangerous if left to roam about as it pleases,” the headmaster explained.

Soul Extraction... No wonder nobody else could track the girl down. With a spell that powerful, she was able to destroy the lab and escape without leaving any traceable DNA. For someone subject to harsh experimentation, it was understandable that she'd develop a firm grasp of her powers. And with all those victims, she had a plethora of new souls at her disposal, far more than Amos could ever hope to stand against.

Fighting her alone will prove difficult, but wearing her down appears to be my best course of action, Amos deduced. She managed to catch him off guard earlier. If he repeated that mistake, he was as good as dead. And it wasn't a stretch to conclude that he'd be no good to her if he was dead. That I know better than anyone.

“Hm… You appear to be high-strung, kinsman,” the girl observed. “Tell me… could this perhaps be your first time… meeting someone else who can communicate with the dead?”

“......”

Amos didn’t answer. Or, more accurately, he couldn't. His esophagus had gone bone dry. In truth, this was his first encounter with another spectral mage, or someone of the 'whisperer' class, as the headmaster liked to call it. For a long time, he thought he was the sole whisperer in not only Empyrea but the Holy Kingdoms entirely. Clerics and onmyouji, mages who use divine magic to purify corrupt spirits, were quite prevalent on the continent given its namesake, but whisperers, those who form contracts with wayward souls and use their power to meet their ends, were almost non-existent.

“Oh, so it is!” The blonde girl smiled, her frostbitten hands caressing a small wisp. “It is also my first time meeting someone like me! I struggled at first against the monsters they threw at me, but once I figured out how to use my mana, fighting them became a lot of fun! But after a while... it became tiresome...”

She paused for a moment, lowering her gaze.

“Say... let me ask you a question, kinsman...” Her voice sounded much clearer, more engaged than before. Again, her eyes met his. This time, Amos did not feel the same sensation as before. She gave him a look as if waiting for him to grant permission. When he said nothing, she continued.

“If your life… and everyone in it was suddenly taken away from you in a single day…” Her smile had faded. In its place, a solemn look of remembrance. “...what would you do… if it meant that you could see them again?”

“......”

It was a question that Amos had not expected. On one hand, he had no memory of his past life, his parents, his hometown in Northern Hōjo, or even how he lost his left arm. On the other, just like the girl, there was also that strong sense of yearning. So in a way, he felt like he could relate. The girl maintained her gaze, this time with her eyebrows raised, lips tightened. It seemed as though she was genuinely seeking an answer.

“I don't remember much about my past,” Amos finally said, “Nor do I remember anyone in it. But if getting those answers was at stake..." He then drew his Chokuto sword. A 27.5-inch blade with a hilt of 26 centimeters. His contracted spirits gathered around it, forming a rippling blue aura. “...then I would gladly go to any length to have them.”

Nodding at the boy's resolve, the girl released the little blue wisp from her grasp. She watched as it rejoined the others. A warm smile spread across her face. “I see…”

She inhaled deeply. A foreboding aura began to encircle her entire body in the blink of an eye. The will-o'-the-wisps danced around her again, this time more ferociously.

“I wish to know your name, kinsman… Could you please tell me?”

“It’s Amos… Amos Naragishi.”

“Well, then Naragishi-san… I believe I shall follow in your footsteps. If it means seeing my friends... seeing my brothers... then I… Nanaya Kusanagi… shall see this through…”

Kusanagi?

She closed her eyes and levitated into the air, holding both of her hands to the night sky. Her eyes then shot open, casting down upon him, with an expression Amos could only describe as dark… brimming with sheer malice. A bit jarring for a girl who was all smiles just moments prior.

“...with no regrets!!”

Suddenly, Amos sensed an overwhelming presence from above and looked up—floating over his head was a swarm of will-o'-the-wisps. When he looked around, he noticed that more spirits were rising from their graves and floating towards Nanaya, joining the others. At this point, there were far more than Amos could count. They grew in size, with some forming an arch around their new host, chirping in unison as they did so. Soon, the spirits began to morph, save for the ones surrounding her. Amos could make out a few knives, swords, spears, halberds, and even a few handguns, and assault rifles. It was at this point that he wondered just how the hell someone capable of all this had been contained for four years up until now.

This is going to get ugly…

He took a deep breath, raised his sword into a high stance, and channeled the mana coursing through his body, preparing for his target's—no, his opponent's—first move. The bladed weapons danced around the girl, while the long-ranged weapons hovered nearby. A few aura swords darted towards him a split second later. He ducked the first three, dodged the next two, and swung on the final one, sending it flying far to the left. When he looked up, he saw two aura halberds descending at full speed.

As he rolled out of the way, he was surrounded by at least 30 more bladed weapons from all sides.

There’s no end to them!

Nanaya lowered her hands as the weapons sped towards him. Amos sank to his knees, his sword at his side. As he closed his eyes, mana flowed through his veins.

Tutela...

The spirits Amos summoned gathered around him to form a shield, deflecting the oncoming volley of weapons. Some of them had pierced the ground around him, sticking out before quickly dissipating. He knew he couldn't keep this up for long; a few more attacks like that, and the shield would surely come crashing down. Before he could recover, a few more weapons were hurled at him, and they were low enough to slip through the gap between his shield and the ground.

This is bad!

Calling off the shield. Amos rolled to his left, dodging all but one Wiccastrean athame cleverly hidden behind an Empyrean great sword. The smaller blade slashed his side, sending a searing-hot pain shooting through his body.

“Guh...!”

The assault rifles and handguns followed. They fired at him with extreme haste. Amos took his sword and rotated it clockwise with both hands, deflecting a hail of orange bullets. These were not the typical guns he had to deal with on a regular basis. For starters, these weapons usually had people manning them, making it relatively easy to deflect their bullets back at the wielder. Those guns also had to reload when their clips or magazines exhausted their rounds—the marksman behind these guns, on the other hand, was currently in the air about 120 feet above the conflict, with no reloading time to speak of. Amos was partially impressed.

Her spectral domain is certainly more extensive than mine…

Knowing he couldn't spin his sword any longer, he broke away and bolted to the right, the transparent bullets close behind.

Nanaya could be heard cackling with glee. “Oh, this is most riveting, Naragishi-san!! It has been far too long since I've had an opponent of your caliber!!”

A Zelsh great sword and a dwarven battle-ax materialized ahead of him, and Nanaya flung them at his head with a swift flick of the wrist.

Amos needed to act quickly. He took a large diagonal step to the left with his right leg, then stepped forward with his back foot, turning 180 degrees. He swung his back foot around, striking a brief eagle pose before launching himself into the air with his arms and right leg. He wrapped both arms to the left, which allowed him to rotate in midair. He could see the great sword zip past his head, indicating that the battle-ax wasn't far behind. As he made a full rotation, he noticed the ax spinning just below him, only a few centimeters away from where his feet would land—he had timed this perfectly.

And now for the tricky part…