Chapter 66: Spat out by the mist
For the past twenty-four hours, Mikel had been juggling talisman setup during the day and chasing internet-famous spirits at night—not to exorcise them, but to form a Phantom Contract with these so-called horror legends.
Most of them had been disappointments. Just like the rumors about Madam Carmina.
A once-renowned fraud during her lifetime, she was so convincing in her fake visions that even spirits mocked her. After death, she was trapped in her own cracked crystal ball, now kept in a dusty local museum, gathering "spiritual energy" that didn’t exist.
Mikel had asked her for spiritual tracking assistance. She summoned the ghost of his "future child," made tea for it, and then started reading his horoscope.
Doom’s verdict?
[Falsehood Overflow Detected.]
[A ghost who lies to ghosts. A legacy of disappointment.]
In the end, Mikel shut her down by feeding her to the Blood Chain. He didn’t have to. But with his Recovery Protocol still active, he couldn’t afford to let cursed spirits roam around unsupervised.
The next spirit on his list was Athena, the Weeping Archivist.
Once an overworked record clerk from a tiny government office, Athena had died in a fire while trying to alphabetize tax slips. She died clutching a misfiled ledger, and now she was haunting the charred remains of the old town hall, her echoing sobs drawing attention from bored amateur ghosthunters.
Her special skill?