Ch38: Spiritual Assistance
Being led by the spirits of Deckard, Asheara, Hakan, and Rumford, we eventually reached an area where a large flume of ghastly energy was being piled up in a giant sphere. "In order to have us spirits help you, you must break the bonds that hold us spirits here int he fortress," Deckard Cain said as he motioned over towards a far away set of stairs on our current path. Go down those stairs in order to find the area where the souls are being kept. But beware the Reapers, particularly the Winged Assassins, the Exarchs, and the Anarchs," Asheara frowned. "I have a small question first," Leah frowned. "Yes? What is it?" Rumford asked.
"When you say that you'll give us your power... what do you mean by that?" Leah asked. "We mean to say that us and the other spirits will meld our minds and bodies into your beings, each and every one of you. And since we are dead, we'd imbue you with the power of Death," Cain said. "So... you'll become one with our souls?" Hael asked. "Yes... and once we are become one with you... we will be one in the same... two minds in one body..." Hakan said with a small stutter. "So... in a sense, we'd still be able to talk to whichever spirit was in us?" I asked. "Correct, Lisa. Us spirits will go inside your bodies once you free us from captivity in the next level," Asheara said, her visage disappearing into spirit form as she and the others led the way to the staircase.
Our group didn't hesitate and we began to follow them, immediately stopping in place when we had to deal with a few different Winged Assassins in our way. "Hah!" I exclaimed as I sliced the wings off of one of them, making the assassin scream in agony before falling to the ground with a thud. "Hah... hah.." she hissed at the pain of having her wings cut off, her sister assassins not fairing any better against us. "Well, let's continue on," I said, leading my group forward again.
After doing the same with a group of Executioners, Anarchs, and some more Winged Assassins, our group had finally made it to the staircase and we descended it with care. "Okay, let's find out where to free these guys at," mom said as I led our group around the corner and we then saw something that was very impressive and scary. One single Death Maiden was controlling a large ecosystem of souls that were in some weird contraption, which seemed to have them all trapped within. "Let's go kick some butt," Serena smirked as she adjusted her viking helmet (the only part of her previous outfit she still had on her person) and she rushed forward, using her own sword to slice off the head of the Death Maiden with barely a sound.
And just as before, the Death Maiden exploded in a puff of smoke and then reanimated right in front of us... only this Death Maiden didn't look at us with confusion or fear like the ones before her. She looked at us with a face of pure anger and hatred. "Humans in the realm of Pandemonium? Peh!" she scoffed, her voice sounding like a cockney Brit and making me kinda confused. "What's up with you?" I asked her, noticing that she seemed to have retained her memories or something... but then something happened. She gasped loudly and her personality completely changed!
"G-Get out of my body, filthy demon! Get out!" a timid voice exclaimed as she tried to punch herself in the chest, which didn't seem to help her any. "Hey, easy," I said, rushing over to her and actually having to catch her before she ended up falling into the ravine below. The angel then gasped again and immediately growled like a dog at me touching her. "Explain to me how I'm supposed to get myself outta this mess, Lisa! TELL ME!" the cockney voice exclaimed once again, which finally made me realize something huge. The voice was starting to be recognizable to me and I knew exactly who it was. "Wait a minute... is that you, Ortensia? Ortensia Buckingham? From the British division of the Olympic fencers?" I asked, making her eyes go wide... before she gasped again, that is.
"You know this demon inside of me?! Get her out! Please! I'm so scared..." the angel voice said again, her inflection making it sound like she was truly terrified. "Listen, miss..." I frowned at her. "Aria," she frowned. "Aria... the person inside of you may not be the most glamorous person I know, but I can assure you that she is no demon. She is a human from my world," I said to her. "Wait... you know the weird-accented girl's voice?" mom asked me. "She was my biggest rival in the Olympics every year we fenced together. Ortensia Buckingham," I said.
The angel then gasped again and Ortensia came out once more. "Please, Lisa! Tell me how to get out of this predicament! One minute I remember being sent here by a lightning strike, then I get killed by being breathed on by some weird monster, and now I'm stuck in the body of a timid angel! I want to know how to get back to normal!" she exclaimed. "Sadly, there is no way to fix this," said the voice of Asheara as she motioned me over to a small chain nearby. "But before we discuss anything else, you should hit this chain here. It will enable you all to be imbued with the power of Death to defeat Malthael," she said. I sighed and did just that. And when all the different spirits poured out, each one entered our bodies one by one.
Deckard Cain went into Leah, Asheara went for mom, Rumford went into Serena, and Hakan went into myself. But the other spirits, those being that of a woman and a man, both shocked me. The woman was none other than Karyna, the woman that we rescued in the Spider Caves. And the man was none other than Aiden, the Dark Wanderer. Karyna went into Lilith while Aiden went into Hael. "Hah... that felt very weird..." I said as I felt my body become lighter than normal and I saw something on everyone's essences. Light blue aura. I looked at my hands and I saw that I too was imbued with that aura. "Now could you tell us what you meant by there was no fixing this?" Aria asked. "Once a person merges with a spirit, they cannot be separated by any means unless one of them experiences a near-death experience. Only then would one of the souls move onto the afterlife while the other stays behind," I ended up saying... but it wasn't my voice at all. It was a more feminine-sounding Emperor Hakan!