Chapter 18

Something was stirred up within the ghost. How much more does this boy have to lose?

His emotions, his eyes, and now his memories.

He didn't like to be burdened with the knowledge of that immense pain.

He thought the boy was as lonely as any other ghosts roaming around the depths of this forest's darkness.

"I've been wanting to ask this," Uriel broke the silence. "How does one become a ghost like you? Surely, you weren't like that for the entirety of your life, right? I mean, if you were created to be like that from the beginning, you wouldn't be able to understand the concept of human emotions. Or am I wrong? Were you really born a ghost?"

Sinclair's flame weakened as he recalled his century-long past.

"You're right, kiddo. I was a human once and turned into a ghost. We become what we are because of the remainders we have in this world."

Uriel looked up, so much more interested than himself. "What does that mean?"

"If our purpose stays unfulfilled or if our emotions overwhelm the flesh we have, we turn into a ghost. That dust of remainders you have determines your limits and capabilities as a ghost. If a revolutionary or world changing kind of purpose was left unfulfilled, you become capable of everything a human can do and even beyond that. But if it's just a dust of your own miserable or corrupted circumstance, they most likely wouldn't be able to stand daylight or excessive movements. I'm not sure about limitations and whatnot about others, but I'm sure of what they are about myself."

"Sinclair, what remained here for you then? Were perhaps regretting something? Is that why you can't die?"

Sinclair was about to answer, caught up in the moment until he glanced down back to the child's worried eyes.

The same boy he met back then wouldn't show that much of an emotion towards him.

If this was his honest feelings right from the start, he wouldn't know how to respond to it. In fact, it was making him uncomfortably warm.

It was quite unknown and frightening for him since for more than decades, he lived along darkness and coldness and emotional discomfort.

He couldn't trust the world.

"Enough about me," Sinclair said. "The reason you came here was because you needed information and a lead to find your lost memories, right? You should be asking things about yourself, then."

"Before that, I want to ask about the cemetery nearby. Do you happen to know about the alleged war involving that mountain of corpses?"

"No," Sinclair weakly said. "It was just an immature, pathetic, and uninteresting war. It was simply a huge misunderstanding among people that was cursed by their ignorance. Nothing more, nothing less."

"I see," Uriel whispered. "That's unfortunate, then."

Sinclair sighed and shook his head in disappointment.

"I think you just came here by whim after being overjoyed since I allowed you to visit here. But the next time you come, make sure you've already thought things through and you're already prepared! It seems to me that you're not even planning things ahead! If you really want your memories back, you'll need to have an organized conversation with me to extract everything I know about you. And I told you that you'd have to entertain me in exchange for the information I give you, right? That was our condition!"

"Y-Yeah, I agreed to that too," Uriel stood up and began brushing off dirt from his clothes.

Sinclair instructed him to stay put for a while and suddenly went off somewhere deeper until his flame was no longer visible.

A minute later, he returned with the kerosene lamp that Uriel dropped off back then.

The boy thanked him with a cheerful smile before finally going back to the house and sleeping like nothing happened.

Meanwhile, the azure ghost went back deep into the abyss of darkness, inside a little deformed cave where he usually resides.

And at the murky edges of that hidden cave were his favorite deep blue roses.