T'was not my fault

Saturday was here again and even though Chris had gone through a few Saturdays in Riversky, this one was different not just because of the auction he was going to be attending with Hassel. He was looking forward to it for personal reasons, and though the auction was going to be a spectacular sight to see it wasn't his main focus for the day.

Nheico did say that she was always ran night shift in the library, so he was hoping to catch her there because she was the only person he knew that had any possibility of helping him with his predicament. The better expression should be that of the people that could provide a solution, she was the only one he knew.

He had no way of contacting her and she had no idea that he was coming, worst of all she may not want to talk to him or even remember him. So going there wasn't a guaranteed certain success, it just increased his chances of getting help. Staying put meant him certainly getting no help at all, so he had to go.

…

"Eeeek!!"

A sharp screech cut through the darkness that covered the sky of the ocean bringing chills to the bones of those who could hear it, there were no rune barriers to simulate the day and its transition to night. Though that did not matter as everyone that could come to sea was above the martial Mystery rank, therefore they were already no longer mortal and could not be stumped by such mundane darkness.

"Captain, that's the eleventh one so far… please give the order to change course captain" at the helm of a grade three battle ship of rare class, two men stood with solemn looks on their faces one of them looked determined while the other looked and felt resigned to his fate. He kept on whispering to the determined captain about how he wanted to stay alive because he hadn't fulfilled the wishes of his late mother, and by heading towards those horrible death throes would not bode well for his future. He kept whispering. "Captain, you know today is not a good day to die. What if we were to turn ba--"

"Shssh… do you hear that?" the captain finally interrupted his whispered tirade.

"Hear what captain, I don't hear anything… oh! I know, everyone's dead?" he kept whispering.

"No, it's too quiet… the only sound left is from us, not the ocean or its inhabitants, just us." The captain said with a quivering voices. "TURN THE SHIP AROUND, no, no no no, abandon ship. Every man for himself."

Theirs was a crew of fourteen plus the captain, they were seasoned ocean explorers, so on hearing the captains orders they were all already out of where they were and some of them were already running into the distance on the surface of the ocean. He watched them almost leave the edge of his vision when suddenly they all stopped moving, even he could feel his body beginning to cease as he could only use the rest of his power to look behind him. "What a ghastly sight… maybe I should have listened after all."

"Boom!!!" the ship self-destructed at the captain's final command, the last sight he had seen was the flames and shrapnel of the rare class battle ship cover the grotesque bodiless stone head with hair that spanned the entirety of his vision whose grip on them all ceased their souls. Sadly, the rune powered flames born from the self-destruction of the battle ship could not burn through the hairs of the creature… they were all going to join him soon it seemed.

He was a Mystery at the pick of the spirit force rank and yet, he could not even put up a fight neither could he sense it. Yes, he could be blamed for the death of his entire crew, but the truth of the matter was they were already dead from the moment they trespassed into the creature's territory. Such were the dangers of the ocean, it was just a terrible match up.

…

A while later a figure floated into a cave beneath a wide area of reefs. "This captain has to be the most stupid of all that has been fed to the petrified head."

He could still remember his first encounter with the stone head and how he believed he was already dead when its hair coiled around him, he could still feel the sensation of death that gripped his soul… quite literally. That was his first experience with his own soul, it was a soul stealer. But then he realized he could still move and the sensation he had felt weakened, no longer was he bound by the soul stealer as its hair phased through his body.

When he was younger he had a fortuitous encounter when he had fallen off a hill, within the settlement city he had lived in. At the bottom of the hill at the edge of the settlement city, he had seen a weakened giant ghost scorpion trapped by an even larger rune circle formation. He had already passed the ideal age for an awakening and he believed he was going to die mortal, but it seems that was not his fate after all. To the courageous the spoils, the rune circle formation was multi-faceted; a sealing rune, a guaranteed connection rune, and a sacrifice rune. The sealing rune was obviously used to seal the dying ghost scorpion, the sacrifice rune was to offer up a soul sacrifice to the Mystery, and the last one he named the guaranteed connection rune because he saw no records of it anywhere after the few years he spent searching and trying to understand. To him that rune was the most important of all of them. The sacrifice to the Mystery granted him a memento that had saved his life so many time, but this memento was a special soul type that seemed miraculous when pitted against bizarre creatures and situations.

"I tried warning the captain. I always warn them, but look what happens." He said consoling himself, while he rested on the dried ground within the cave. He was waiting for something. "It shouldn't be long now, the stone head would soon enter a state of dormancy."

It had happened a few times now, he never deliberately lured anyone to get fed to the stone head creature but once in a while they end up going there. So he benefitted from the aftermath, the creature never took anything physical so the soul cores of any other creatures that is killed and the treasures of those that die always fall into his hands. Now all he had to do was wait.