Rebirth Of The Bastard Spirit Summoner

When Darell was finally alone in his room, he crushed the cigar and cracked open a window to let all the air out.

Then he adjusted his tie.

"My my, you're an evil one, aren't you?" came a serpentine voice from somewhere in the room.

Darell scoffed. "Why do you say so?"

There was a light chuckle. "You didn't even want a cigar, did you? You just wanted to torture the poor thing."

The voice paused shortly.

"Elves have a fragile makeup, especially one like her plagued by disease, but you know this..."

Darell glanced at the source of the voice, a tiny glowing ball of purple light—an echo, or rather an Echo's messenger.

A being he was yet to understand.

"She's a stubborn one. She looks obedient on the outside, yet her heart is as hard as stone."

"Ho? How so?" the echo asked, curiosity seeping into its voice.

"There are things even the slave mark can't compel her to do, things that she would rather die than experience. Her defiance disgusts me."

There was an unsettling silence.

"Trying to bed an elf is quite ambitious of you, Darell. I would think you had better use of her after purchasing her for such a ludicrous sum."

Darell chuckled softly, his chuckle transforming into a booming laugh, then he paused and wiped his lips with a handkerchief.

"You misunderstand me. It is not the means that matters, but the end of it."

He walked over to his shelf and pulled it open, taking out a bottle of whisky as well as two glass cups.

The echo watched him as he walked over to his desk and placed the cups down, pouring the liquid into them, then picked one, leaving the other on the table.

He took a sip and sighed.

"You see, your kind is new to this sort of business, so take my advice on this. When you get a slave, you need to make sure you break them in every single way."

He lifted the glass up, the liquid catching the light.

"Mentally, physically, emotionally… When you do this, they lose their soul and become puppets. Only then can they become a true slave."

The echo chuckled. "As long as it's an elf, I'm all in for it. Who doesn't like to see an elf scream?"

Darell glanced at it, a smile tugging at his lips. He placed the glass on his desk and walked towards the door, about to leave when the echo asked him one last question.

"Do you ever feel guilty though?"

He knew what the echo was speaking about without having to ask. His friend that he had betrayed, the family he had slaughtered.

His hand froze on the door, his expression darkening slightly.

"No, business is business." That was what he was going to say, but when his eyes settled on the table, he felt his heart clench.

There were two glass cups, one for him, and one for Adrian.

He had done this so many times that he had filled up a cup for him subconsciously.

Darell laughed dryly and shut the door behind him, leaving the question unanswered.

• • •

It was the second day of their journey to Sandhill, and so far there had been no disturbances. Just a smooth, unhitched ride.

Stark now sat in the driver's seat and Jade sat next to him, while the old man took a nap in the wagon.

He was chewing on a hard loaf of bread, which was to be their lunch, while he watched the road—Jade's portion also on his lap, as she was still completely uninterested in eating.

"What are you planning to do in Sandhill?" Jade asked, staring ahead.

Stark did not answer at first, his grip on the reins tightened slightly, and when he realised it, he let go and cracked his thumbs.

"You hide it quite well, but there is something not quite right with you. You seem… fake."

At the mention of the word 'fake', Stark laughed.

"Well, you're not entirely wrong," he said, taking a mouthful of bread.

It tasted like sawdust and yet he swallowed it greedily. He needed to build up his strength.

Jade was probably noticing the oddity about him, which wasn't entirely his fault.

With as little as a thought, his ghostly stopwatch appeared in his hands and he handed it to her.

"You know what this is?"

Jade eyed the artifact, cradling it in her hands. "I was a student of the academy, you know? I can recognize a soul-bound relic from ten miles away."

Stark nodded. "Do you know what a soul-bound relic does?"

She gave it some thought. "It gives whoever attains one an ability."

"And?"

Jade thought a bit before saying, "I don't know."

Stark glanced at her. "Were you really a student of the academy?"

Jade frowned, her eyes as sharp as razors.

"Alright, alright. These little guys are actually regulators."

His words seemed to confuse her more. "Regulating what?"

There was a short moment of silence.

"Emotions."

Stark waited a moment for his words to settle in before continuing.

"The emotions that cause them to form are temporarily wiped out completely when they are first formed."

"And so the person feels apathy for that emotion for some time," he finished.

Jade took in his words with a complicated expression. "In my time, the connection between them and emotions was still a theory…"

Then she glanced at him.

"What about you?"

Stark cocked a brow. "What do you mean?"

"What emotion do you have apathy to?"

He did not answer at first—he let her question linger in an uncomfortable silence for a while before speaking.

"Anger… and grief."

Jade's eyes widened slightly.

She remembered the theory concerning the formation of relics like it was the back of her hand. Although it had not been confirmed, it was drilled into their heads in their first year.

*'What hell had he gone through to have emotions as intense as that?'*

'How deeply did he love to feel grief capable of calling out to the gods?'

She glanced at him from the corner of her eyes, watching as he happily devoured the bread.

'No wonder he seems off…'

He was still grieving, and yet it didn't show in his attitude.

She glanced at the ghostly artifact in her hands.

'All because of this…'

She couldn't help but think about how cruel the relics were. The gods might have intended good, but…

'How terrible would it be to lose your emotions all at once. Your grief, your rage…'

They are a part of you. A lingering feeling that told the story of whatever hell you had been through.

It took her many years to settle her grief after her death, and yet she could still feel the pain.

Without it, she would have felt hollow.

The only good thing was that it didn't seem permanent. Little by little, his emotions would climb back to normal.

But by then, the worst of it would have passed.

Jade glanced up at the sky and frowned. The gods… they were cold but highly efficient.

"Jade?" Stark said, bringing her out of her thoughts.

"What?"

He reached back to rouse the merchant awake.

"I'm afraid we have company."