"So, what should I call you?" I thought out loud as the shadow began to uncrumple and mend the six dead wasps that I had collected over the past two days back together.
"How about Sebastian? No, how about Bainu? No, still doesn't sound right. How about—" I continued listing off names to myself until the wasps were ready for a test run. I looked at my tattoo and saw around a third of it was no longer glowing an azure blue, which meant a third of my spiritual currency that I had put in it was already gone. I gritted my teeth in frustration at seeing just how weak I truly was and then focused my attention on my life energy to see how much of it had recovered. My life energy was recovering faster than when I first took a chunk out of it. It made me wonder if the energy was recovering faster because I took less of it out this time, causing a mild case of lightheadedness compared to the passing-out incident at the playground. I noticed something else about my life energy that made my eyes widen at the discovery. It had grown bigger than it was a few days ago. It was not an enormous difference, but it was noticeable. Not only that, but it still had not fully recovered.
I commanded the wasps to fly around my room in a circle, expending their energy as I thought of what this could possibly mean. I went to call for my supernatural friend, remembering that I still did not have a name for it, and got annoyed again.
"Victor, what does it mean that my life energy is stronger than it was a few days ago?"
The shadow's scarlet red eyes turned to me, and its shapeless form rippled, and a humanoid head began to take shape. After only a few seconds of the shadow twisting and turning, it took on the shape of a young man no older than his early twenties. Its shadowy hair blew in the nonexistent wind, and it smiled at me with its shadowy teeth.
"Is this my new name, master?" it asked in a boyish voice.
"Yes, I think it shall be your new name. Do you like it?" The shadow's humanoid face smiled even wider; its smile threatened to meet the back of its head, causing even me to be slightly disturbed.
"It is a fitting name since we will be victorious and stomp on our enemy's bones and make them cower before us," it said in a menacing voice.
Gods damn it, I thought as I remembered how squeaky and high-pitched my voice was. I wish I had my dark, menacing voice back. The shadow frowned for a second and looked thoughtful, and it melted back into its shapeless form and then continued to speak.
"I, unfortunately, do not have an answer for you on this question. I have never been to this world before, and it seems spiritual currency is made differently here by your kind than it was back in the other world."
My frustration began to flare up again, annoyed at the thought of another mystery I had to solve. I looked at the barely glowing tattoo on my right palm, opened a jar, and commanded the wasps to fly back into it, each one of them landing in the jar and the energy leaving their bodies. They began to crumple back up almost immediately, and I slid the jar back under my bed and decided to take a break.
"Look, you were bonded to me Friday night after school. Today is Sunday, which means tomorrow I have to go back to school. So when we go, I need you to stay out of sight. I don't need the mortals here to react violently."
"Why do we fear them? You are a warlock after all. Should we not be able to have the power to slay any mortal that dares defy us?"
"In my original world, mortals that had no magic—they only had steel swords, shields, and arrows—were only a nuisance to me. The mortals in this world, however, seem to have science as their weapon."
I started to hold an imaginary object and pretended to point it at the door, closing one eye.
"They have weapons in a variety of shapes and sizes called guns that need no magic. They just point at the target, a loud bang is audible, and the target falls over dead."
I stopped holding the imaginary gun and went to stroke my beard out of habit and for the umpteenth time got annoyed that I no longer had one. I growled as I tried to think of a way to acquire one of the weapons for myself. The problem was I didn't have the foggiest idea on how to even find one. Not only that, but I wasn't able to go to many places without an adult to supervise me. An idea popped into my head, and I grinned and turned to Victor.
"Victor, do you have any contacts in the other dimensions that would allow me to speak with a mind-spirit that would be relatively safe to talk to?"
Victor's form twisted and turned for a few moments until he took on the shadowy appearance of an older man that looked to be in his mid-fifties. He wore spectacles and had a bushy beard with a warlock's robe on, holding a book, flipping through the pages slowly. He spoke with an educated voice that had an accent that I was not familiar with and talked to me like I was his apprentice and he was my master.
"There are no such spirits that are relatively safe to deal with when they are not under contract," he said, closing the book, it abruptly vanishing into a puff of shadowy smoke. "But I gather you mean to ask me if there is a way for us to summon one under the right conditions that make it less likely that you will be harmed."
"Don't speak to me like I am a child!" I said hotly.
"But you are a child," Victor said in a jesting voice.
Victor's form went back to being shapeless, his red eyes meeting mine.
"Yes, I can think of a couple of ways to contact a few mind-spirits that I know in a relatively safe manner. Why? What are you thinking about, master?"
I grinned at Victor as excitement began to fill my veins.
"I have a plan to be able for us to acquire a gun."