The next day, Yuki had a battle. It wasn’t terribly difficult, but her matches as a whole have become harder, she found. She guessed it was because she now had some form of control over herself. The lack of rampaging and ignoring of rational thought made her hard to stop, but now that it was gone, Yuki had to use more conscious effort in order to win her battles. 

That didn’t stop her, however, from thinking about her next course of action. She still needed to find a way into that hallway. She knew what was blocking her way in now. All she needed to figure out was how to remove it.

She pondered on that question as she let herself sink into the warm waters of the baths. 

‘I need to trap those souls from communicating with the Fiddler,’ she decided. ‘Question is how.’

The guards were made from a spell. Within the guard were souls that controlled the magic bodies. What spell was making the bodies, Yuki didn’t know. She wasn’t sure if she would be able to find out. 

‘So immobilizing the bodies directly wouldn’t be possible right now,’ she thought.

That left attacking the souls directly. The problem was that Yuki knew almost nothing when it came to controlling souls. Magic she could manipulate given the tools and time. Souls were something that she hadn’t even tried to touch once before.

She did have one saving grace, however. The knowledge of her ancestors was bound to have some sort of information that could help her. She just needed to find the right kind. 

That led to another problem. The knowledge of her ancestors would have something on souls because of how expansive it is. That expansiveness was detrimental right now. She needed the right information and she needed it as fast as possible. 

‘So I need to narrow down what I can. Simply looking for knowledge on controlling spirits might give me mountains of manuscripts and books.’

Luckily, she knew someone who might know at least rudimentary knowledge of spirits and those that control them. Ember had talked to many people in her life. She knew about magic that Yuki wouldn’t have any clue about. Even if it wasn’t exactly what Yuki needed, it would be more than what she had right now.

And so, when the time came for her to return to the room she shared with Ember, she popped the question through the link they shared. 

[Controlling spirits?] Ember repeated. [That’s summoning. I know a few people who specialized in that. Some of them tried to explain to me how to do that stuff, but I’m not the best at listening to things like that.]

‘Well, you at least know the absolute basics, right?’ Yuki asked.

[I think. I can give you what I do know, then some things that I think I might know. I’ll warn you before we get to that.]

‘Thanks,’ Yuki said with a smile. She waited as Ember collected her thoughts with a small frown.

[So,] she started. [Summoning. From what I know, it’s the act of getting spirits to do tasks for you. What you can ask a spirit you summoned to do is based on the spirit. Its strength and who it was. Stuff like that.]

Yuki nodded. Ember opened her mouth to continue, but paused for a moment.

[Do you want me to explain what a spirit is?] Ember asked. [Or, do you know about them already?]

‘Go ahead,’ Yuki replied. ‘It’s not a topic I’m well informed on either. I just know that they exist.’

[Alright,] Ember said. [I wasn’t sure since you didn’t know about summoning.]

‘I understand. Go on.’

[So, spirits. They’re basically what a soul becomes when it’s separated from the body,] Ember explained. [The separation normally is because of death, but sometimes it could be forced out for good or bad reasons depending on why someone’s soul is leaving them.]

‘What are the reasons?’

[The good ones are things like manifesting oneself into a spirit form to do some spying around. The bad ones could be like killing someone,] she said. [When your soul is away from your body for too long, your body dies.]

‘What’s the time limit?’ Yuki asked.

[Depends on the person, I think. This isn’t something I really know. It’s super hard to do from what I’ve heard. Though, you don’t need to worry about that.]

‘Why?’

[You’re a dragon, silly] Ember grinned. [Your soul is in your core. It’s protected unlike others where the soul is just floating about in their chest. If someone wants to rip your soul out, they need to rip your core out.]

‘That seems like a massive advantage.’

[It’s pretty niche though. It won’t play a role in almost all fights.]

‘So back to the spirit things,’ Yuki said, moving the conversation along.

[Yes, about them. Um, spirits normally don’t stick around for that long of a time. After a week or so, they just blend back into nature unless some other force is keeping them their. Things like strong emotions when they died. Those become phantoms.]

‘Phantoms?’

[Yes. If a person dies while feeling strong rage or sadness or love, their separated spirit changes and becomes a phantom. Those don’t disappear. They haunt the place of their deaths. I’ve seen a few actually. Not for the faint of heart.]

‘I see,’ Yuki said. She decided not to follow that topic. It wasn’t relevant for the situation at hand. ‘If spirits disappear, then how can they be summoned?’

[I didn’t say disappear,] Ember corrected. [I said blend. They’re no longer proper spirits as they’ve lost their sense of self, but traces of them are still there and can be used. This is where summoning comes into play.]

Ember put her hand out palm up and traced a circle on it.

[Summoners use a summoning circle. In the middle of the circle they put what I think is called something like catalyst or artifact?] she frowned for a moment before shaking her head. [Doesn’t matter. It’s a thing that holds meaning to whatever spirit they want to summon. With it, they can trace the, er, traces of the spirit and drag it back. Then the spirit is separated from nature and regains its identity.]

‘All of it? Just like that?’

[I don’t know. I don’t think so,] Ember said. [If I remember correctly, how much has to do with how old the spirit is and the thing used.]

‘I see,’ Yuki nodded. 

[Anyway, this is supposedly the most dangerous part,’ Ember continued. [I remember it being the most dangerous because the people telling me emphasized it and I was hyper focused until they began talking about contracts and stuff. Then I kinda blanked out.]

‘What do you remember, though?]

[Well, summoning has a lot of risks. Some spirits don’t take kindly to being dragged and might attack the summoner. That’s more of a danger for stronger spirits. The other thing is that summoning takes a lot of mana to do. Plus, after summoning the spirit, the spell needs to be maintained in order to keep the spirit there. So that’s a problem as well.]

‘I see. Then what happens after a summon? You mentioned contracts?’

[Yeah,] Ember nodded. [This is the part I’m shady on, so take this with a sack of salt. I’m going to try to be as vague as I can.]

‘I just need something,’ Yuki smiled. ‘You gave me a lot already.’

[Alright,] Ember said. [The contracts. They’re agreements with the spirit. It’s when you tell the spirit what you want and then do a magical agreement. Since it’s magic, if the agreement is broken, the offending party suffers a great deal. I don’t remember how exactly, but yeah. There are also a couple of different contracts, but I’m not sure what they are or how they’re really different. I just know that they’re basically templates for the agreement that were made to make things go faster.]

‘So contracts are the meat of the summoning then,’ Yuki summarized. 

[Yeah, you can think about it that way,] Ember nodded. [It’s the reason why you summon them.]

‘I see. That’s good to know,’ Yuki said. ‘I think I have what I need. Thank you.’

[No problem,] Ember replied. [Oh, by the way.]

‘Hmm?’

[I tested the hallway again. It’s still acting the same way as before,] she said. [I tossed in a bottle of shampoo I took from the baths. The guards stopped bothering me about it immediately after it disappeared.]

‘Memory?’

[Could be. Or something to do with the contract since you did say that spirits are controlling them.]

‘I’ll keep that in mind. I’m going to do some research now, if you don’t mind?’

[No problem,] Ember smiled. [I’ll go find something to do.]

Yuki nodded and shut her eyes, calling on to her ancestors’ knowledge. When she opened her eyes, the familiar library with its towering bookshelves surrounded her. She looked around to search for someone, but stopped, her chest tightening. Her fists followed.

It was a reminder of what she needed to do. Escape was important.

Revenge was priority.