As soon as the guy at the door stormed in, I knew i did it. Just as the man collapsed on his desk, I let my concentration go and quit my act of playing big.
I was completly out of energy. This took everything I had. But because of that, it worked and would continue to work for the rest of this plan.
I felt tiny and weak, exactly as someone just killed would look like. I came to a halt right next to the remains of the soul of the newly dead man.
On the plus side, thinking was possible again.
'That worked even better. It took long enough, but Im safe now. I will just play dead until they leave and then take in the empty body. As long as god didn't lie, it should work like I want it to.'
'The body is empty, it has neither power nor personality. If I enter it like this, both my powers, or what remains of them, and my personality will take it over. He said the memories belong to the body, so I will have his. But it will still be me and as I know me, I will grow strong in no time.'
'Even though this instance of me won't be able to, but another me will experiment with this power and get back to the real me. That's what you will get for taunting me.'
---
With a fast slash through the air I cleaned of the blood on my sword and but it back into the scabbard. A quick look through the house revealed nothing important and so I stepped out into the open where Milton and Adam where waiting.
"Done and done, let's go home", I said jokingly. Of course we weren't done yet.
"As if", Milton answered, "There is still clean up and safety measures to take. You know that."
"Yeah yeah, let's just get it over with. I'm done with this hunt."
The clean up was simple. Adam laid out another spell around the hut that would burn it to the ground once we were gone.
He was a bit grumby about it though, as he had to collect the holy stakes used for the previous spell. They were about eight inch long nails made of blessed silver and decorated with carvings.
However, decorated might be the wrong word, as the carvings were the runes necessary for their respective spell.
To effectively use these spells, one needed a lot of these stakes and so they were reserved for only the best of the best of our order.
'Also, someone like Adam was good to have', I thought while watching him pull the stakes seemingly out of nowhere.
Milton was still looking a bit concerned, but he always worried to much about protocol and safety.
My thoughts were somewhere else, namely on the innocent hermit we just killed. One could not be a warrior and still be emotionally struck down by this, but it still gave me a bad feeling.
'We could have safed him. Technically. It would have been risky and far to unsecure. But it would have been possible... Nevertheless, nothing good comes from dwelling on this.'
We got done with it pretty quick, practice goes a long way after all. Milton remained on edge during the whole process, throwing glances at the body from time to time.
Once we were done, the spell was prepared and the surrounding checked, we moved out again and started our journey back to Withermore.
I didn't look back and was glad we got this over with. My mind was aleady swaying to food and other luxuries back at home.
---
'They're gone for a while now... I doubt they will come back... that one guy kept looking at me... but I don't think he will convince them to turn around... so it should be safe now.'
I took a look around. At the moment, the hut was still looking fine, but it wouldn't be long until nothing of this was left besides a pile of ash.
My sight wandered over the furiniture, the desk, the chimney and finally rested on the now dead man.
The soul was still lingering around, resting inside of the body.
'What happens to it anyway? Where does the soul go after the body dies? And what is the soul to begin with? Ahhhhhhhh, I will enjoy finding all these things out. But first things first...'
Now all left for me to do was to claim my price.
'I could go and find someone else... but they might hunt me again... I don't think I have the energy left to do that anyway.'
'Now, all I have to do is take over the empty body. I hoped they would exorcise 'us', but this should work too. I was scared for a second that they would just kill him, but I know that sword. If it exorcises the likes of demons, it should exorcise humans too.'
With that in mind, I began moving into the body. It felt like pressing yourself into a really tight space, while there was also a force trying to push you away, like trying to get the same poles of two magnets to touch eachother.
It also felt just as impossible as that.
the force was immense, I pressed with all my might to try and get in, but it wouldn't let me.
'Come on, let's... do...this...'
I didn't feel like I was making progress, but I didn't give up. I pressed even harder, mustering all the strength I still had left to try and push in.
And finally...
It felt like the definition of "after tight comes loose".
My being flowed into the body, it felt like I was in a current and getting carried away, more and more of my very essence transfered and it was oddly satisfying.
But suddenly it stopped.
The sensation of running with high speed into an immovable wall drove through me, followed by a strong and sudden push.
I physically felt being kicked out of the body, I even flew a few steps back.
---
'What is this...?'