The silence in the room was like a cold, heavy blade against his skin. Dust hung in the stale air of the office of this abandoned shopping mall. Dim and sickly, the light filtered through layers of broken blinds into the room, entering through cracked glass windows.
The old man sat in a worn swivel chair behind what once was a reception desk. His white beard reached his chest, uneven and stained with age. Deep lines carved his face like the veins of old bark, and his eyes were gray and hollow, carrying some strange, steady light that made Aaron uneasy. Standing around them were others: a woman in her twenties clutching a pipe, two middle-aged men leaning on steel rods, their gazes suspicious.
The old man was the first to speak.
"So, young man…" it said in that voice that was like sandpaper on rusted metal. "What are you?"
Aaron said nothing.
His gaze wandered over the armor and then to the strange-tickling watch on his wrist, Quanta in her disguised form, faintly pulsing with mechanical light.
"Those things, your armor, your watch. What are they made of? Who built them? Are you military? Machine?"
Aaron met his gaze but said nothing. His breathing was slow, calm. Then, instead of answering, he asked,
"Is anyone of you able to wound. or exorcise a ghost?
Those words cut through the still air like a gunshot.
The silence overspread the room like a spell. Their eyes were wide with incredulity, with terror. The girl unconsciously moved backward, clutching her pipe tightly. One of the men crossed himself. The other whispered, quivering almost:
"He said exorcise…"
The old man's sigh filled the room, heavy and knowing.
"So that's it," he muttered. "I guess… you're one of us, then."
Aaron furrowed his brow. "Us?"
He nodded slowly. "An Exorcist." He leaned back in his chair, which let out a creaking sound of metal in the ghostly hall. "There aren't many left now, the blessed ones chosen by gods. After the Doomsday descended because of human ignorance toward gods, the gods gave a chance to humanity to survive. Exorcise all malevolent supernatural beings. Only then we shall survive. I'm one of them-blessed by the Sun.
He raised his right hand; the skin there was scarred and burned, in the spiral of a mark that glowed faintly, like dying embers. "The light burns what the shadows crave. I have killed two of those things."
Aaron's head tilted; "Blessed by the Sun?"
"Yes, the god who ruled the day," he said. "There were others, too, the Moon's blessed, the Forest's blessed, even one who carried the Sea's call. All gifts came with a price. All faiths demanded something in exchange for their gifts.
Aaron nodded slowly. The quiet tickling from Quanta's form on his wrist vibrated faintly.
"Then you?" the old man asked. His eyes sharpened, piercing. "Are you blessed by one of them?"
Aaron shook his head. "I don't think so. But I've killed one.
The room stirred again. The people exchanged glances in fear, disbelief, something near wonder.
"You killed one… without being blessed?" whispered the old man. His tone was a mix of curiosity and dread. "Then tell me… when you did, did you feel anything?"
Aaron hesitated. His mind flickered back to the suffocating air, the distortion of reality, the scream that was not human, the rush of cold light entering his chest. "Nothing in particular," he said finally. "Only silence afterward."
The lips of the old man pressed into a thin line. "Then listen closely, boy." He leaned forward, elbows to the table, voice low like the whisper of fire through ash. "The more you consume them, the more of them seep into you. Their memories, their desires, their hunger; they do not fade. They wait for you to descend into madness."
His words crawled under Aaron's skin.
"If you keep killing and taking, one day you see them staring back in a mirror," he said, continuing. "That's how most exorcists lose their minds. They awaken the madness inside."
Aaron looked down at his gauntlet, where the slightest shimmer of black energy coiled around his fingertips. "So that's what it means to be an exorcist."
He nodded, his eyes old with weariness. "A curse that calls itself a gift."
Nobody said a word for several moments. The flickering lights above buzzed and then died, leaving them to the dim natural glow. Outside, a howling wind dragged fragments of plastic across broken tiles of the mall floor.
Then the old man straightened. "We're planning an expedition tonight. One of those things… has taken root on the third floor. We've lost two people already trying to drive it out. If you're really an exorcist, blessed or not, you can come with us."
Aaron's gaze rose, level and chilled. "I'll come."
The old man nodded briefly but quite satisfied. "Excellent. Then you'll see what kind of hell we live in here." He turned to the door and called, "Rin! Show our guest around. Give him some rations. Make him familiar with the place." A young man stepped forward from the corridor was slim, wearing a torn hoodie, clutching a makeshift spear. His eyes darted to Aaron's armor, then quickly away. "Follow me," he muttered. Aaron followed. As he left the room, the old man's tired voice followed him, either as a prayer or a curse. "Be careful tonight, young Exorcist. The light may protect you, but the shadows they remember." Something stirred deep within the mall. And on the dark of Aaron's wrist, Quanta pulsed once-like a mechanical heartbeat.