She grunted. “Ow—Mashiro!”
“Sorry! Survival reflexes!” I hissed, clutching my hands like I hadn’t just assaulted my teammate mid-haunting. “I’m a very kinetic panicker!”
Meanwhile, the crying loop continued on in the background, like a haunted Spotify track set to ‘repeat forever.’ Sniffle… sob… I didn’t mean to… The same heart-wrenching line, the same shuddering figure, the same eerie stillness afterward, like the whole world held its breath for the next sob. The monster inched closer this time, and I could hear a faint scraping sound as its bony limbs dragged against the cracked stone beneath it. I couldn’t tell if it was gliding or crawling, but either way, I was not here for that energy.
I panicked. Naturally. “Quick!” I said, gripping Lyra’s arm again. “Say something comforting! Something healing! Something loop-breaking! Channel your inner priestess or emotionally mature anime protagonist!”
Lyra gave me a look. Not just any look, that look. The “how are you my responsibility right now” look. “I—I don’t know!” she snapped. “What do you even say to a memory ghost?! ‘Thoughts and prayers’?!”
“I don’t know! You’re the serious one! You were raised by a grandma exorcist!” I hissed.
Lyra groaned like she aged twenty years in five seconds. “Oh my gods, fine!” She took a deep breath, stepped forward with the same energy as someone preparing for a public speech they didn’t write, and in the most solemn, trying-her-best voice I’d ever heard, she decred: “Hey. Um. Your sadness is… very valid.”
There was silence. The sobbing paused. The creature froze mid-step.
I turned to her with the widest eyes possible. “That’s it? That’s your epic soul-healing speech?”
“I panicked!” she whispered through gritted teeth. “Do you have something better?!”
Challenge accepted.
I stepped forward dramatically, arms wide like I was about to perform a stage monologue. My voice rose with exaggerated crity, like I was auditioning for the role of “supportive ghost therapist” in a supernatural soap opera. “Beloved ghost person!” I cried. “You did your best, and your best was enough! Also, crying is healthy! Therapy is cool! And if your ghost kid’s still mad, we’ll bake them ghost cookies or something!” I paused. “Probably with ectopsm sprinkles!”
Something changed. The air around us shimmered, subtle at first, like a ripple through invisible water. A soft hum bloomed from the ground, resonating through the tombstones like the graveyard itself had exhaled. The looped sobbing cut off mid-sniffle. The figure vanished, no dramatic fsh, no swirl of mist, just gone, as if it had never been there. Only the feeling remained, like a weight had been lifted.
And the monster? It just stood there. Not frozen. Not confused. Just… still. It stared at the empty space where the loop had been, like someone who just arrived at the bus stop to find the st ride already left. Then, very slowly, it turned its head.
And fixed its eyeless gaze on us.
Lyra sighed, lowering her bow just a bit. “I liked it better when it was just being a creep in the background.”
“Yeah,” I whispered, swallowing. “Now it looks like it wants to file a compint with management.”
The creature didn’t charge us. It didn’t hiss or scream or melt into a puddle of bck goo. Honestly, I would’ve preferred that. At least then I could’ve screamed dramatically and run in a direction that felt heroic. But no. It just stood there. Unmoving. Judging. Like a ghostly middle manager who caught us scking on haunted overtime.
“I—I think it’s mad,” I whispered to Lyra. “That ghost loop was probably its emotional support memory and we just deleted it!”
Lyra raised an eyebrow. “So we helped it process trauma. That’s what heroes do, right?”
“Maybe you helped. I threatened to bake cookies and talk about feelings!”
I started rummaging through my cloak pockets. Panic-mode loot hunt. I had no idea what I was even looking for, sage? Garlic? A holy rubber duck? But my fingers brushed something small and solid. Of course. One of my gold coins.
“It wants payment,” I said dramatically. “For spiritual damages.”
“You’re not bribing the crypt monster.”
“Too te!” I tossed the coin forward with all the grace of someone throwing bread at pigeons. “There! A peace offering from my inventory of questionable life choices!”
The coin hit the ground with a satisfying plink, spun once, then nded perfectly upright.
The monster looked at it. Then at me. Then back at the coin.
I grabbed Lyra’s arm. “I think it’s considering a counteroffer.”
“You’re out of your mind.”
“No, I’m desperate. There’s a difference!”
The creature didn’t move. It just kept doing that awful still stare, like it was buffering the update to its mood. Then Lyra took a step forward, calm, slow, way braver than I was feeling and in a completely ft voice, she announced:
“Hi. Sorry for the disruption. We’re from Management. There’s been a schedule adjustment for your haunting rotation.”
I choked. “What?!”
She kept going. “Yeah, uh, Ghost 47B was running over their time slot. We had to clear the emotional loop to maintain spiritual flow in the graveyard.”
The monster tilted its head. Again.
She nodded like this was the most normal thing in the world. “Standard policy. Cuse thirteen of the Afterlife Etiquette Agreement. We’ll leave a pamphlet.”
“Lyra,” I hissed, “do you actually have a pamphlet?!”
“No. But I sound like I do, and that’s what matters.”
And somehow… somehow… The creature slowly turned its head back toward the coin. Then it took a step back. Just one.
I held my breath. “Is… is it working?”
Lyra didn’t answer. She pulled another gold coin from my cloak when I wasn’t looking and gently pced it on the ground beside the first one. “For your patience,” she said solemnly.
The creature paused. Then, to my absolute shock and horror and maybe a tiny bit of pride, it bowed. A slow, jerky, creaky little bow. Then it turned, skittered toward the edge of the graveyard like a reverse crab, and vanished into the mist.
We stood there in stunned silence.
“…Did we just bribe a ghost with money and fake HR paperwork?” I asked.
Lyra looked at me and shrugged. “Look, I wasn’t trained for ghost customer service. I just made it up.”
“I think we invented ghost capitalism,” I muttered, staring at the two gold coins gleaming faintly in the dirt. “This is how haunted stock markets start.”
As soon as the horrifying crypt creature skittered off into the mist like a rejected Halloween decoration, I let out a long sigh of relief. But my breath barely even hit the air before the ground began to wobble. Like, actual cartoon wobble. The soil around the gravestones started to churn and bubble, like the cemetery was brewing graveyard soup.
“Uh… Lyra?” I said, taking one cautious step back. “Did we accidentally press the ‘more enemies’ button?”
Before she could answer, something popped out of the ground with a squishy boink. Then another. And another. Until the entire area was suddenly filled with the weirdest army I’d ever seen.
They were small. They were stubby. They had leafy green tops and tiny root feet. One looked like a beet with a grumpy face. Another was a plump little potato humming like it was in a barbershop quartet. They were vegetables. Animated, slightly wiggly, aggressively cheerful vegetables.
Lyra’s eyes lit up, literally. Her irises glowed a bright golden hue as she raised her bow, confidence returning like someone had just reinstalled her combat instincts. “It’s Vegetaloid!” she decred, dramatic as ever. “They’re low-level monsters. It’s mentioned in the quest that they sometimes appear in the graveyard, and we need to get rid of them!”
I blinked. “You’re saying we just went from haunted therapy to vegetable violence?”
She nodded, already lining up a shot. “Exactly.”
I closed my eyes for a moment and activated my Identification skill. Magic shimmered across my vision, and glowing letters appeared in front of me:
<
Description: Harmless little vegetables. If you eat them, they will heal you. They hum little songs in the graveyard.
“…You know, they’re kind of adorable,” I said, crouching beside one that looked like an onion with a little leaf hat. It sang in off-key hums like it was trying to remember a lulby from vegetable kindergarten. “Do we have to fight them?”
“They’re still cssified as monsters,” Lyra said firmly, knocking an arrow. “And if we leave them alone, they’ll overrun the cemetery. Besides, this one’s doing a terrible rendition of ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.’”
I sighed. “Fine. But if they start begging for mercy, I’m switching to the pacifist route.”
I summoned my training sword with a fsh, the familiar weight settling into my hand like an old friend finally returning from vacation. This time, though, it felt different… lighter, somehow. Sharper. Like it knew I was stronger now. My grip tightened around the hilt as a grin crept onto my face. I couldn’t help it. This was my first real test since hitting level five, and I was itching to see what I could do.
“Let’s do this,” I said, sword at the ready.
“Let’s weed the weeds,” Lyra replied.
We locked eyes. And then charged.