My Soul card is a Reaper

Nanjing road, Chaoyang district, Shengzen City;

Above in the skies of Shengzen City, Azzy was seen floating and looking at a map on his smartphone.

"According to the GPS, this must be the neighborhood. But, the houses are completely identical and located very close to each other. Can't rely on the GPS anymore. Now, I must locate No. 56, Oliver Cruz."

Azzy slowly landed in the empty city of Shengzen, which appeared very clean and peaceful at the moment.

After Azzy and others left, the World Federation sent a large team of volunteer army that focused on gathering all corpses and burnt them together.

They were so thorough with their job that Azzy couldn't even find a single corpse, atleast on the way, as he was walking on Nanjing road and checking on the house plates at the entrance.

Eventually, he found the house he was looking for.

Azzy entered the house and started searching for something. After one whole hour, he exited the house in depression and took out his smartphone, "Sigh… I thought I would find some clues that connect to Louis, but there isn't even a photograph. Well, let's go to the next place."

Following the GPS navigation, Azzy reached Princeton Biotechnologies.

Raising his head, he sighed once again, "Oh boy, this is a 28-story building. It won't be easy to find the lab." After a brief pause, he then thought, "Or maybe, it is easy to find one. The Internet in this world is vastly developed. I could use it. Let's see…"

Azzy opened the browser, typed the company name, and added labs to it, in order to check whether there were any articles or any forum or something that could make his job easier.

Little did he expect that there would be an entire video on it with over 100 million views. A famous self-claimed exorcist uploaded it just about six months ago. Surprisingly, this was also his last video.

He clicked on the video with the title, "Exorcism at Princeton Labs part-1."

In the description, however, it was mentioned that there is CGI involved in the editing and the video was made for entertainment purposes only.

"Hello everyone, this is…"

The video features a young man who entered the company, claiming that he was invited by the chairman to exorcise the demon, which was causing chaos at the labs, and abducted his granddaughter.

He goes to the 21st floor's restricted section where no one seems to be there. The place looked like it was abandoned until he entered a lab and saw the dead body of a girl.

"Oh my god." A gasp escaped from the vlogger who was shooting this from first-person view. His camcorder also shook for a couple of seconds before he got a clear view.

But, the focus here wasn't the girl. There was a creature beside her that looked like it was eating her.

This creature looked like it came out of a fantasy TV series, well, especially for the people of this world.

It resembles the blend of a humanoid and an arachnid. Its body is covered in an inky black shimmering exoskeleton, and there is this weird dark energy surrounding it.

However, the footsteps of the exorcist continued to go forward, although looked very hesitant, before some kind of talisman with mysterious drawings was taken out.

"What the hell is this…" Azzy was momentarily stunned when he saw the scene in the video.

As he is from the world of soul energy, whether it is the creature or the dark energy around it felt too real for him.

The exorcist then used an unfamiliar language as he slowly walked forward, step by step.

And then, a blinding flash of golden light escaped from the talisman, making the creature let out a piercing scream.

As the blinding flash of light disappeared, the creature vanished but the supposedly dead girl slowly got up with her eyes bleeding and flesh wounds here and there.

She swayed left and right for a second before jumping at the exorcist.

The video was suddenly cut off and everything went blank. The video ended and the next part was never uploaded, leaving the netizens in either suspense or frustration.

"Okay, it is likely just a movie and I'm just overreacting but for some reason, I feel like it is very real," Azzy mumbled in seriousness.

He typed in the search engine about this incident and a bunch of articles popped up, most of them claiming that the second part of this project was halted due to the sudden demise of the chairman and his associates in a fire accident, not long after the video was published.

Perhaps, this is why the exorcist went into hiding. No one is really sure.

With the elevator going out of service, Azzy took the stairs to go to the 21st floor, but the door seemed to be shut firmly.

He clenched his fist and punched the door, blasting it away before entering the hallway.

Upon entering the lab, Azzy decided to confirm whether it was a monster or just a CGI.

Closing his eyes and sitting down on the floor, Azzy activated his Aura Tracing ability.

A countless number of auras appeared in his vision. "This aura… Hmm?" He furrowed his brows and concentrated on an aura that appeared to be different from the others. "It's very faint but…"

Half a minute later, a smile appeared on his face, "The aura of a monster. I knew it."

Azzy rose to his feet while clenching his fist in happiness, "I don't know if it is another monster but it is quite possible that the aura belonged to the same one that attacked this lab."

He took out the smartphone from his pocket once again and watched the exorcist's videos one after another. Most of them are linked to ghosts but his last twelve videos were about dark creatures.

Surprisingly, all of these creatures were not only man-eaters but also had dark energy surrounding their body.

"I guess I will have to meet this fellow if he is still alive. There must be a link between these dark creatures and Louis. After all, even I cannot use my soul energy or summon my Arcana. How could monsters appear here? Anyway, let's return and… Hmm?"

*Srrrrr*

As he was about to leave the room, a strange sound was heard in the room.

Azzy looked around to check where it was from.

However, before he pinpointed the source, something pierced his neck.

"Argh…" Azzy felt a sharp pain in his neck, followed by experiencing dizziness all of a sudden.

"What's going on?" He felt like the world was spinning around him and fell on one of his knees while touching the back of his neck. He could feel a wound, similar to that of one made by a bullet.

Meanwhile, inside his sealed mindscape, the Reaper was seen merely standing at the edge of the cliff and watching his host in silence.

*Awoooo*

The howl of Vajra grabbed his attention a bit as he saw a strand of Protos energy escape the gem on the black-lighting wolf's forehead and strike the invisible barrier.

"Hmmm, I guess it is time…" The Reaper didn't try to stop it and continued to be a silent spectator.

Back to the outside, Azzy was on his knees, his breathing was becoming harder as each second passed away, his head was spinning, and he was feeling as if something was moving in his body. With his access cut off to both of his soul cores and the Reaper isn't there to help him out this time, Azzy felt like he is going to die.

Several scenes of his life flashed away in his mind, including his family, friends, lover, master, and everyone he was acquainted with.

Even then, there was no regret in his heart. He didn't regret coming for this mission.

He was now almost lying on the stomach, trying his best to stay awake.

It was at this moment, all of a sudden, a piercing scream was heard behind his neck as a creature as small as a mosquito exited from his neck wound before it was struck with a beam of Protos energy.

The insect crashed onto the wall and its size grew into a large winged ant.

All that pain has gone in an instant and Azzy found himself protected by a layer of Protos energy. This time, he wasn't taken over by it. Instead, it was merely acting as a guard.

Azzy slowly got on his feet and took a good look at the creature that looked like it was unconscious but not dead.

"The Jewel of Dark's aura… hateful… hateful… hateful… kill it… kill it now… use my power… use my power…"

Strange whisperings began to fill inside his head, making him unable to think properly.