Every Lifetime I Fall {COMPLETED but undergoing revisions}

Chapter 91: The Mortal Realm - Black Market

Landing in a pile of bushes, I groan as the pain slowly spreads throughout my aching body.

Everything still hurts as a spirit, it's just that death won't come!

"Where am I?" Looking around the forest, I realize I'm no longer in the Underworld. I'm really in the mortal realm! The world of the living!

"The market shouldn't be too far from here!"

Following the noises of a bustling town, I walk a dirt path leading to a busy area filled with hundreds of businesses! Tables littered with trinkets. Tents and buildings with even more goods inside available for purchase. The customers themselves don't look normal. Ghosts doing business with one another. Rough looking creatures. I'm sure I don't look any different.

Stepping up to a vendor, I browse the objects sprawled onto the table.

A ghostly woman floats over. She has no legs and is almost transparent.

"What are you looking for, Miss?" She asks.

"Do you have anything to stop the effects of the Tea of Forgetfulness?"

Her eyes widen, and she floats away from me. "You can't just say that out loud... Now I don't have anything like that. Too risky. But I do know someone who might be able to help you."

"Really?"

"Yeah, for a few thousand ghost papers." She slyly smiles.

"Fine." Even the dead knows that money makes the world go round. I conjure three hundred thousand for her piece of information, thinking it better be worth it.

After handing it to her, she says, "You're lucky I'm an honest soul. If you walk down this road and take a left, you'll see three pathways. Take the one on the furthest right to an abandoned shack fenced in by a brick wall. Sharp can help you."

Although suspicious, I leave after hearing her words. Following her directions, I come upon the exact abandoned shack she mentioned. The doors were wide open with a run down interior. The only thing that seem of value is this old painting of a cliff.

"What do you want?" A shrill and orderly voice thunders from all around me. I turn to look at the space, but see no one.

"Looking for something to stop the effects of Old Lady Meng's Tea," I said with my nose high. I want to appear confident, and show that I was serious about this.

The person paused for a minute. "Come through the painting!"

"What-- How?"

"Just walk towards it!"

Thinking the voice was a bit snobby, I do as it instructs and walk toward the painting. Instead of walking into the wall, I somehow transport onto a new plane of nature. A cliff overlooking an endless sea. The sun shines high in the sky, the weather mimicking the middle of summer.

A small child, no older than six, wobbles from inside a small cottage. "Follow me."

Is he the seller's apprentice?

I walk behind the child into the cottage, observing the numerous shelves of glowing potions, all shades of different colors. The child takes a seat behind a wooden desk.

"Who sent you? Was it Mimi?" He asks.

"Who?"

"The floating lady from the market."

"Oh, yes. It was her... I'm sorry are you the only one here?"

"Of course, this is my workplace. Why? You think I'm too young to run my own business?"

"Oh no! I just didn't expect you to be... "

"A child?"

"Right."

"Well, I may be a child, but I've been doing business in the market for hundreds of years."

"I see. You have the credibility."

"Very much so! I'm know as Sharp. Quick witted and fast. I escape the clutches of the Underworld security without fail."

I nod energetically to appease him. "Yes, I see you're quite skilled."

He clears his throat, "Anyways I'm afraid you've wasted your time coming here. I've stopped making the Memory Preserver."

"What? Why?"

"There's good reasons why the Underworld makes you drink the Tea of Forgetfulness, you know? Are you sure you want to remember everything?"

"In my case, I need to remember. If I don't then I will die an early death."

"Why do you say that?"

"I always meet the same man every lifetime, and he is the cause of my death each time. I cannot keep meeting him."

"Ah, the intricacies of fate..."

"What was that?"

"Nothing." He stares at his desk for a minute and looks up at me, "How desperately do you want this buffer?"

"Very much. I can give you as much ghost papers as you want. Would a million do?" I grip the table hard, ready to make a deal.

He shakes his head and frowns. "I don't want money. That's useless to me. What I want is the essence of true love."

"Essence of true love?"

What kind of perv-

"Before you get any strange ideas, let me explain to you what I mean."

I straighten out my face to conceal my judgement.

"The essences of joy, hope, fear, and hatred are all strong emotions that can conjure nothing into something. Humans have a certain strength in their stubborn ways. True love is the only essence I've discovered to produce the strongest enchantments and elixirs. I will give you a glass vessel to collect the essence, which you will bring back to me."

"How am I supposed to do that? Collect an essence?"

Locate true love? How would someone like me who has never experienced true love even know what it is?

"Start with the people who knew you when you were alive. Work your way from there. The essence will be drawn to the vessel. And the true love must be directed at you."

"As in they had to have truly loved me?"

"Simple enough?"

Hahahaha. As if anyone's ever shown me a slight feeling of pity strong enough to be love.

I ask, "So if I do this, you will make the Memory Preserver or whatever for me in return?"

"I can do that."

"Then it's a deal."