Chapter 242 - "Who r u?"

“What the hell is this? Why is there a stone city in the middle of the fucking ocean?!” Gustav asked, in panic, breaking his average, honed composure.

It was difficult to answer his question, because most of the team didn't realize what was going on either, apart from Timothy. Although he needed a moment to have a good look of his surroundings, he instantly knew where he was, and come to think of it, ending up in a city like this has been an aspiration of his ever since he used the Explorative Soul ability for the first time, several months ago.

“We're in a ghost city, deep inside a ghost kingdom.” He answered, “I'm assuming that it's a more civilized place, cause these bastards here aren't randomly shooting at each other. As for the ‘stone’, it's just highly-altered gas, and even though I didn't know that one could play with gas clouds like this, I can still see the channels patterns they used to build the city! It's very impressive work, that's for sure, especially since the channels they used aren't even phantomized mana channels, but rather, gaseous channels.”

Half of what he said went above everyone's heads, especially Gustav's. He was just a mere goblin, after all, and he never expected that he would have to deal with such spooky situations throughout his life.

Likewise, what he said next oozed with inexperience, “I hope you understand what you're saying, because I sure as hell don’t! I only know that you mentioned mana, and something about channels- I assume that we don't need to dig a canal in the ghost world?”

“No, we won't have to dig anything.” Tim assured him.

It was reasonable for Gustav, and the rest of the team to be so confused, as this wasn't a normal situation for them. Not to mention, the city was absolutely breathtaking!

The city was the best version of medieval, stone city's that one could ask for! There were tall stone buildings all around them, a thick, dark-gray stone road covered every inch of the ground below them, and the overall architectural values of this place, beat that of even the most advanced city in Valporovus, without a doubt! It was easy to be impressed by it.

The other thing that absolutely weirded them out, however, was the fact that whole people were walking around the city, simply minding their business! Humans, to be exact, these people looked a lot like humans, even though their ‘bodies’ were by all odds phantom-based. Since Timothy and the team looked like a pack of blobfish in their ghostly form, and not like humans, it was inevitable that they were going to catch the attention of the more advanced ghosts around them.

“We're gonna get chased out of here in two minutes,” Ortana then added, “We're sticking out in the crowd like a sore thumb!”

It was reasonable to be worried about that matter, and they actually got in trouble moments later, just by floating around without actually doing anything else! They were suddenly put in nets, by these handful of ghosts who surrounded them, and behaved like guards!

Now, non-physical entities weren't supposed to be trapped by mere nets, but the nets that caught them weren't physical either! Such order caught the team by surprise, regardless of how they had already expected for things to go wrong.

Two minutes later, they were in a guard house of sorts, being interrogated. It took little time to realize that plumpy, multi-colored ghosts such as themselves, weren’t welcome here. The team simply shouldn't be here!

A fine-looking, brunette woman interrogated them, and she was very direct with her questions. At first, Timothy didn’t know if he should answer back, or flirt with her, but he was quick to realize that the other wasn't in a flirty mood!

“How did you get into our city?!” She yelled, and smacked Timothy against his fat, blue, blobby head.

“I got everyone here, lady, so I insist that you treat us nicely, because I'm a master in mana channel manipulation! I expect, and demand a better reception!” He followed along.

Timothy lied about the part of being a ‘master’ in mana manipulation, he was a novice by all means, but he understood that a master of such a branch would be welcomed in this ghost city, because this place was exclusively made of gas channel manipulation with similar patterns to what he already had learned! He knew how to bargain his way towards a couple of advantages!

Nevertheless, the lady in front of him was smarter, so she countered. “If you were a master, you would've been able to shift into a better-looking soul, kid, and also, your soul is tremendously weak! You look like you drool when you sleep at night, you belong in the wild.”

“Fair take,” He admitted, and this time he was a bit more truthful. “But I'm strong enough to create abilities of my own, and that's how I got everyone into your city. I crafted an ability for them, one that allows us to detach our souls from our body, and the truth is that we just happened to swim below your city here, and gave the Explorative Soul ability a shot.”

Timothy knew that he wasn't in danger, and that was why he didn't shy away from telling the truth. The worst thing these ghosts/souls could do was banish the team back to their own bodies, which in this situation, wasn't as bad as it sounded.

Jokingly, he then asked. “So, are we going on a date, or what?”

“Maybe when you grow a pair of legs,” The guard lady added, “I appreciate you telling the truth, kid, because in this case, the truth is valuable information. We don't get many wild, blobby visitors such as yourself in our city. When we do, they usually attack everything in sight until we put them down…”

“Well, we're not wild. We're very much alive, and it wouldn't benefit us to cause trouble in the first ghost city we've ever been to.” Arvena intervened, and then she directly asked. “So, what will happen now? Will you let us go?”

“We could let you go, yes, but I think you guys would benefit from staying in our city for a while. Half of the citizens here are alive as well, they have bodies to go back to, so it goes without saying that we welcome any soul, or ghost who is civilized and doesn't cause us any trouble. With some effort, we can even help you look more civilized too, and not blobby.” She explained, and this was about the best reception that Timothy, and the team could hope for.

With the offer that they’ve been given, mastering the ghost world, and leveling up the quality of their phantomized mana became a lot easier!