Moving Shadows (II)

A video reel automatically gets pulled up and is brought in front of Kiyro. A young boy, age twelve, was standing in front of a house. His short brown hair and round face scrunched with worry. His short pants and t-shirt were covered lightly in the dirt, making him look like he tripped and fell. The boy pushed the door open and stood on the side, peeking through. His breath brought out a puff of steam and disappeared into thin air. Then, with weary steps, the young boy worriedly went forward into the dark house.

"He's breaking and entering," Kiyro whispered.

"Shhh. He's not. It's an abandoned house."

"It looks too new to be abandoned. Are you sure?"

"Yes."

The wooden floor creaked softly underneath his foot as the young boy walked into the dark house. Only dim lighting from the moonlight cast its lights through the window allowing the boy to see around him. A few pieces of furniture left over from the previous occupants were covered with white sheets. Broken wooden chairs littered the vicinity making it slightly difficult to maneuver around.

The dimmed light made the place a bit more challenging to see for Kiyro. Small green orbs appeared from the ground and floated around the young boy. One-by-one, more and more appeared already. Finally, a good handful moved around him like fireflies.

"Fireflies?" The boy spoke in confusion. His worried face slowly released and turned into a smile. The green orbs danced around him, whizzing past his head and body like rockets. It was difficult to keep track of darting orbs, and their sporadic movements gave Kiyro a slight headache.

The scene fades out and switches over to the boy in a room. In front of him, he had chalk in hand and was drawing a large magical circle that encompassed his whole body. It was a five-pointed star inside a circle. A triangle shape and an eye-like design were in the middle of the star. With the finishing touches, he picked up the chalk and placed it on the floor.

Rummaging through his pocket, five small tea candles were brought forth and placed on each end of the star. Next, he brought a lighter and began chanting a strange poem.

"Five points on a star. The first to bring forth warmth is fire," the boy lights the top point of the star and goes clockwise. "Then, the stable mother earth is called to protect our surroundings. The blessed metal shapes and brings up the structure of the place. Then the water that cleansed the land purifies the unclean land and brings it back whole. Finally, the wood that brings forth life is asked to close the circle to bring back everything into a circle."

The young boy sits back and pockets the lighter. He clasped his hands and closed his eyes. A language that he had never heard before left the boy's mouth. It made Kiyro's hair stand up as he flinched in startlement.

"What?" Kiyro asked.

"Tongues," said Sylph.

"Tongues? You mean human tongues?"

"No. What the boy is speaking is a language that is new to him. A language that humans don't understand. I could not find a single database that sounds like what he's saying now. It sounds like gibberish, and I can't help but think it is. It seems from the comments people are stating its Tongues."

Tongues? Why? Kiyro thought. "How can someone talk in another language they do not know?"

Sylph shrugged, not knowing the answer. "That's something even I can not answer."

Around the boy, once again, green orbs appeared. Their erratic motions calmed down and danced around him like they were protecting him in his trance. The fire flickered and waned. Around the young boy, outside the circle, humanoid shadows prowled around him like a jaguar waiting for its prey to falter. The green orbs fought back whenever the shadows tried to jump into the circle. Each time they connected, the green orbs created holes in their bodies, making them look like swiss cheese.

"It's the shadows again." Kiyro pointed out. "Stop for a moment. Look." He pointed out. "They're even there."

"That's peculiar. I wondered if the footage has been tampered with." Sylph was pruning his feathers, and he looked up to see. "Nope. All clean. Not a single tampering."

"Really? No computer graphics added on to it by hand?"

Sylph shook his head. "It's in its original format. Went to look at where the footage was pulled out at. It seems another A. I named Bom was recording the whole process."

"I'm guessing Bom is another being like you. That has been hand-picked from the game to be our guides."

"Yep. But not everyone has one. Most camera angles are in the first-person real-time recording of all the recordings I have seen. A third-person recording needs an A. I help to get it into such view."

"Then why have you come to me exactly?"

"Well, about that. I have been told that certain people who were given the real-world quest will have a difficult time completing the quest. So with that being said, a guide was sent to help. I think it's a waste of time; from the intel, I have collected so far, ten percent of the A is already gone. So I have failed to help complete their quest. Those quests can be picked up and done again, but each time it fails, it becomes twice as hard to complete as the last time. I'm not sure how that is possible."

"I'm not sure either, but look. There are things here that had not happened in my quest. Green orbs. Candle lighting, drawing circles, and even these ghostly-looking orbs. What are they? They remind me of spirits."

"If these supernatural occurrences have been happening on the video, I think I need to search for a whole different meaning behind it." Sylph paused for a moment. He fluttered on Kiyro's shoulder and rested. "Here we go. Orbs of transparent balls of light are usually seen during the night and are captured on footage. Some state that they are spirits, others energy, but since the increased use of digital cameras, the sighting of these orbs has increased. Most are caught on camera, usually glass, mirrors, metal, dust, pollen, lint, moisture, snow, hair, or even insects."

"There is barely any lighting, so most of the things you stated will be off the list. The orbs seem to glow without any light source. Where was this video even captured?"

"Parma, Italy."

"That's literally across the sea. Are there any more like these?"

"Tokyo, Japan. Seoul, Korea. Giza, Egypt. London, England. Rio, Brazil. Mexico City, Mexico. Toronto, Canada. Jerusalem, Israel. Moscow, Russia. Baghdad, Iraq. Mumbai, India. Beijing, China. These cities have something appear in their quest recording so far. The quest is not yet finished, but it seems every 200 there is one with a large amount of shadow human, orbs, animals, or bugs appearing in front of them." Each time Sylph said the name of the cities, different footage was brought up in front of him. "It seems like the Eleven-hour game website has also picked up on this. It seems they will be doing a special series on the quests with some supernatural things going on."

All the footage disappeared, and the Eleventh-hour game website was pulled up in front of him. A special announcement was displayed in front of the welcome window. Four dice rolled and stopped perfectly in one.