---
Fortunately, my memory is great despite myself being an old man. That's why I remember that day. A few years ago, I was in a bar. It was around 10 o'clock, perhaps 10-20 minutes past that. I was celebrating my success on a mission I had done, it awarded me good fortune. I was a little drunk. It was going well but then I saw a kid come and sit near me. He had good looks but he was rather clumsy as his wallet had just fallen before me.
"Hi, your wallet fell" I pointed it out.
"Ah, Thanks." He said, with a thankful look.
"By the way, what's are you, a kid, doing here at this hour?"
"Oh, it may look like that but I am actually older than I look and I also am here due to a business."
"I see, I see, Marcus, nice to meet you."
"Evan."
He was rather not much talkative, I would have done the same, if I was not drunk. Still, our little chat ended there. It was quite, well, quiet. Around 11 o'clock, the bar was almost empty. I was planning to leave soon too but then there was a loud sound like breaking of glass inside the storage room of the bar. The owner maybe felt like there was some thief tried to steal wine. He picked up his shotgun and was about to go inside but the kid stopped him.
"Hey, don't go there. Let me go, I feel there's something unnatural here."
"What? Unnatural? What are you trying to say?" The man said, in annoyed manner.
"Sir, in your language, I feel like there's a ghost in your storage room."
"You think I am a fool!? Now that I think about it, you are here since a lot of time but haven't drunk much. It's your friend that was stealing wasn't it? So that you could signal him in case something goes wrong and he mistakenly made a noise to alert me?"
𝑆ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝐼 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑒? 𝐻𝑚𝑚... 𝐹𝑜𝑟 𝑛𝑜𝑤, 𝑙𝑒𝑡'𝑠 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑠𝑒𝑒 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑝𝑙𝑎𝑦𝑠 𝑜𝑢𝑡...
"No Sir, I just feel there's a ghost there."
"Enough of your SH!T. I will check myself what 'Ghost' is in there and you better run away before I come out to shoot you." Said the man, while going inside the room.
"Hi, how do you know about these ghost stuff? Is your ability to detect abnormal higher than a normal person?" I said to Evan.
"Oh wait, you know about these stuffs too?"
"Well yes, but I see that your ability to sense abnormal is stronger than mine, the energy of the apparition inside is so low I wouldn't have noticed even if I was sober. I am an exorcist by the way."
"Yes, I get that a lot. I was here only because I felt the presence of an apparition while walking by. This is rather abnormal for an abnormal itself to be out this early."
"Hmm, it should be a-"
We heard a gunshot, then another. Only after that, we heard the scream of bar owner as he came out screaming and running like he had seen a ghost which in this case, I thought was the matter. We (Evan and Myself) decided to check out this apparition together and after a while, we were able to remove it completely from the bar. After that, we left the bar and parted our ways, only to meet after a while when I was searching for a junior. I had saved up enough money to pay someone to work with me.
---
"Wait? You're telling this now? We should've looked into it first then your long story to be honest."
"Sorry"
We got the book. Upon touching it, I sensed something dark like the book was an apparition in itself. It had a dark black cover with a pentacle on it, with a head of a goat like creature, possibly a demon on it. Opening the book, the book indeed had many rituals along with the one which brought back the dead.
It's instructions were clear. First, they need a sacrifice, the body in which the soul of dead will reside in, it needed to have been away from sunlight for a while. It was supposed to be kept alive until the ritual is done so that the ones performing the ritual will kill it just after the soul gets freed from the realm of death. Until now I had been holding it but upon giving it to Evan, it made it all clear.
Evan touched the book and almost blanked out but then he opened his eyes and said..
"The book, it isn't what it seems like. It's a trap, trap to bring demons into this realm. The ones that suicide, are also mere vessels like the sacrifice."
"Well it makes sense. But who's doing is this? I mean, who even wrote this book?"
"God of Death. This book, upon understanding, tells that the God of Death, also known by many other names such as Hades, Hel, Anubis, Shinigami, Yamraj, Mictlantecuhtli and many more, has the authority given to him by gods to play with the souls he captured. The God had only given him the right to play with them in his realm but it was never fully said that. His authority was to play with them and so, he mischievously did all this through a loophole."
"So he won't let us escape from here?"
"No, he just likes to watch. He won't interfere. It's like he has given us a challenge. Win or Die."
"Well it means that we can exorcise these apparitions. So first we gotta face them one by one and kick their ass out of this house."
"Indeed, I feel sad for the death of this family but we can't do anything now."
"Wait, what about Mary? She was locked up yet she survived?"
"From what I felt from this family's energy, she felt like a human so I believe she escaped as someone left open the door by mistake."
"Well good for her, let's now free her family's bodies and get out of this house. Here take all this and specially this bible. I have 3 of these. One with you two with me."
"Sure, Let's Go."