I was standing in front of the secret passage with my group ready to fight when the same voice I heard in my dreams speaks to me from within the darkness.
“Please come in, I’ve been waiting for you.” (mysterious skeleton)
I wonder what to do and then pull three bronze coins out of my storage item and throw them down the hall to see if any traps go off, but nothing happens.
“I’m going in.” (I)
“Kira, Layla, and Diana will go in with me, the others wait for my signal to enter.” (I)
“Let’s go.” (I)
I go in with Kira on one side and Diana on the other, I chose them because they are the ones with the fastest speed in the group and they can react before me if something happens, meanwhile Layla was sitting on my shoulder with each of her four hands glowing with a different color ready to use four different element spells if needed.
After a few steps we walk out of the dark hallway into a room lit by a faint green glow coming from a large glass cylinder with a greenish liquid in it, the skeleton is standing beside the cylinder with his hand pressed against it as he looks at me, the red flames inside the sockets of his skull seem to get bigger when I look at him.
I wanted to check out the surroundings but I’ll leave that to the girls, I don’t want to take my eyes off that skeleton until I know what’s going on and what he wants with me.
“I’m already here, now tell me what you want?” (I)
“I understand your suspicions and the reason for your aggression towards me, but know that I will do nothing against you.” (mysterious skeleton)
“You don’t expect me to believe you, do you?” (I)
“From what I was told, the nightmares were caused by you forcing a telepathic link into my head.” (I)
“I can explain everything, but I think I should introduce myself first.” (mysterious skeleton)
“My name is Ivan, I am the former owner of this mansion.” (mysterious skeleton)
“I already had some suspicions it might be you, Second Prince of Trigan.” (I)
“Huh!?” (Ivan)
“I’m surprised you know who I am.” (Ivan)
“No one would buy a mansion with that much miasma without investigating it first, as you and your family were the only residents of this mansion so I researched them.” (I)
“But I didn’t expect a Prince like you to have become the Undead, let alone have been hiding in this mansion for twenty years.” (I)
“Twenty years? Has it been that long?” (Ivan)
“…” (I)
“It’s hard to pay attention to the passage of time when you don’t need to eat or sleep, not to mention that this place is completely hidden underground, so I can’t see the sky from here.” (Ivan)
“But you don’t need to call me Prince, I gave up the Trigan surname long ago so my brother could become King without other nobles supporting him needing to worry about me.” (Ivan)
“Since then I’m just Ivan.” (Ivan)
“Okay, how about you start giving some explanations Ivan?” (I)
“If you researched me that means you also know about my three wives and my daughter, doesn’t it?” (Ivan)
“Yes.” (I)
“This will make the explanation easier, but first I want you to know that I called you here to ask for your help, so don’t be afraid of anything, I can’t even leave where I am.” (Ivan)
“Why?” (I)
“If you look at the floor I’m on you can see a magic circle with this cylinder in the center, my daughter is in here and this magic circle helps keep her alive, but I don’t have magic cores to use, so I’ve been using mine own mana to keep the magic circle running, so I can’t get out of here.” (Ivan)
“…” (I)
“I see that among your companions there is a Gray Elf, ask her if there are any traps here.” (Ivan)
“There doesn’t seem to be any kind of trap, master.” (Kira)
“It might be better if the others are present too, in case something happens.” (Diana)
Kira and Diana speak in low voices with me giving their opinions, while I still keep my gaze on the skeleton and cylinder, glance at the floor, and confirm that I’m outside the magic circle.
“Diana, ask the others to come in, but stay on guard.” (I)
“Yes.” (Diana)
After a few seconds I start to hear footsteps approaching and stopping behind me, even without looking I know it’s the rest of my group by their presence.
“Now that everyone is here I can explain it once, it must be better for everyone this way.” (Ivan)
“As I said before, my name is Ivan and once a long time ago I was the second Prince of Trigan.” (Ivan)
“When I abandoned my right to the throne, I also abandoned my last name, I came to the city of Valen because that’s where my best friend lived and he was Duke.” (Ivan)
“I was surprised when I received this mansion as a gift, but I had a great time with my three wives and my daughter here.” (Ivan)
“As a former member of a royal family I learned to always have a secret place to protect important treasures or hide me and my family if I needed it, so I built this place without anyone knowing.” (Ivan)
“When I found out about my daughter’s illness I was terrified, the reason for her illness was her talent, she could use the three main types of energy which are mana, spiritual power, and Ki from birth, but as she was young no one noticed until she turns fifteen.” (Ivan)
“On her fifteenth birthday the ballroom chandelier fell next to her, at first I thought it was on purpose, but then I confirmed it was just an accident.” (Ivan)
“The point is that my daughter only used and trained her magic power, her spiritual powers and Ki were dormant, but the scare she got thinking that the chandelier was going to fall on her made these two types of energy awaken at the same time. ” (Ivan)
“At first my wives and I were happy saying that our daughter was a genius, but as time went by her body became weaker and that’s when we realized something was wrong.” (Ivan)
“So this was the illness she had?” (I)
“I spread the word about the disease to protect her, people with as much potential as she showed them don’t always end well.” (Ivan)
“I spread the word that she had an incurable disease but actually her body was not able to adapt to her power and was gradually being destroyed from the inside out.” (Ivan)
“There was nothing I could do, so I got into despair along with my wives, at first we had hope that somehow we would find something to help my daughter, but this hope brought more and more pain and suffering as time passed as we never found anything.” (Ivan)
“There was a possibility to save her, for that we would have to turn her into a member of another race, but the Blessing she received at age twelve from the God of Wisdom made that impossible even as we tried.” (Ivan)
“As time went by and seeing my daughter gradually waning hope turned into despair, that’s when my wives and I started looking for forbidden techniques.” (Ivan)
“Most of the things we encountered were too evil and horrible to do, but one of my wives was a formidable Alchemist and found a way.” (Ivan)
“We studied the possibility of what she suggested and we realized there was a possibility, so despair became an obsession.” (Ivan)
“What did you guys want to do with her?” (I)
“The answer was simple, if my daughter’s body couldn’t handle her potential and we couldn’t transform her own body, then we just needed to give her a body that she could harness her full potential.” (Ivan)
“We were going to create a Homunculus and transfer my daughter’s soul and consciousness to it.” (Ivan)
“You mean this cylinder…” (I)
“Yes, that’s what we created, the process was complex and dangerous, but we managed it, but it couldn’t be a normal Homunculus.” (Ivan)
“Why?” (I)
“The lifespan of a normal Homunculus is very low and their bodies are weaker than those of a Human.” (Ivan)
“But my wife who was an Alchemist found a way to create a strong and highly vital Homunculus, all we needed was to create the Homunculus while modifying its body with monster parts that went through a process my wife created.” (Ivan)
“The creation of the Homunculus was a success, but we needed one more thing, a core that had all three types of energy and that was strong enough to energize the Homunculus, but it wasn’t easy to find something like that.” (Ivan)
“With your money and contacts it shouldn’t be hard to get what you need, should it?” (I)
“The problem is that this type of nucleus is so rare that it becomes a national treasure, as such there was only one that I might be able to get, the one that was in the castle where my brother was the current King.” (Ivan)
“I didn’t want to steal from him, but I knew he wouldn’t give me that core, the reason it was kept unused was that it had a slight trace of miasma coming out of it, also because I had no records of which monster this one belonged to. core.” (Ivan)
“And you used that dangerous core on your daughter?” (I)
“I’m not proud of the things I’ve done and I know it would have been better to let her rest in peace, but at that time I was blind with the obsession to save my daughter and I was consumed by it.” (Ivan)
“Unfortunately there is no remedy or cure for repentance in this world.” (Ivan)
“We had no idea that the result of what we were doing would release that thing, because of that I lost everything I had, even my humanity.” (Ivan)