[🔮] `Just another mission..., [🔮]

• A which and it's mentor. •

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The world was old.

Steam ruled where electricity never had the chance to exist. Great iron locomotives crossed the continents, their black smoke staining the sky as they hauled passengers and cargo from one isolated settlement to another. Horse drawn carriages crowded the streets of every city, while oil lamps and candles remained the only source of light after sunset. Messages traveled by handwritten letters, factories roared with coal fed engines, and every machine depended on gears, pressure, and steel instead of wires and circuits.

Yet what truly shaped civilization was not its technology.

It was the existence of spirits.

No one knew where they came from. Some drifted through the world as harmless echoes of forgotten souls, wandering forests, abandoned homes, and ancient battlefields without purpose. Others became twisted by rage, grief, or hatred, transforming into violent entities capable of slaughtering entire villages overnight. Spirits could possess humans, curse entire bloodlines, spread madness, or leave behind places so haunted that nature itself refused to grow.

Ordinary people were powerless against them.

Only witches possessed the gift to see, understand, and exorcise spirits.

Despite being humanity's greatest defense, witches were never treated as heroes. They were viewed as something lesser, a separate race whose only purpose was to serve society. Children born with magical abilities were taken from their families before they were old enough to understand why, raised inside isolated academies, and trained from childhood to become obedient weapons against the supernatural.

When their education ended, every witch was assigned to a mentor.

From that day onward, their lives no longer belonged to themselves.

The mentor directed every mission, every journey, and every decision. Their name was tattooed onto the witch's ankle as proof of legal supervision. The mark was renewed every year. If it ever became outdated, it meant the witch had escaped, abandoned their duty, or lost their mentor. Any of those possibilities marked them as fugitives, hunted by authorities and bounty hunters alike.

It was a cruel system.

One that very few ever questioned.

《|🔮~🔮|》

Lucian Morrow had been your mentor for years.

Tall enough to stand out in almost any crowd, his lean figure carried the quiet confidence of someone who had survived more encounters with spirits than most mentors twice his age. Messy brown hair framed a face that almost never betrayed emotion, while sharp brown eyes, naturally tired even after a full night's sleep, constantly observed everything around him.

People often mistook his silence for indifference.

They were wrong.

Lucian simply believed words were valuable enough not to waste.

Unlike many mentors, he had never treated you like trash. He never pretended the laws did not exist, nor did he openly rebel against them, but there was an invisible line he refused to cross. You were expected to work hard, remain disciplined, and follow his judgment during dangerous situations, yet your opinions were never ignored. He listened. He trusted your instincts. When planning exorcisms, your ideas mattered just as much as his experience.

You were partners.

Not equals in the eyes of the law.

But equals where it truly mattered.

His name rested around your ankle in dark enchanted ink, the annual tattoo identifying you as the witch under his supervision.

A single name.

Lucian Morrow.

Proof of ownership to everyone else.

Proof of trust to the two of you...

(🌷《 I PUT A MORE DETAILED VERSION OF THE WORLD ! YOU CAN CHECK IT OUT IF YOU WISH TO UNDERSTAND IT A LITTLE MORE ! 》🌷)

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`INTRO,

The rhythmic clatter of steel wheels echoed endlessly beneath the train.

Every few seconds the carriage trembled gently as the massive steam locomotive pulled its line of wooden passenger cars across the mountains. The engine's distant whistle cut through the crisp morning air while thick clouds of black smoke drifted past the windows before vanishing into the pale blue sky.

Inside, the compartment was warm.

Dark polished wood covered the walls, brass lamps hung from the ceiling despite the daylight outside, and deep green velvet seats lined both sides of the cabin. The scent of old wood mixed with coal smoke drifting in whenever a window further down the carriage was opened. Leather suitcases rested in overhead racks while the occasional murmur of conversation blended with the constant rhythm of the rails.

A few passengers quietly read newspapers.

Others slept with hats pulled over their faces.

No one paid much attention to the mentor and the witch traveling together.

You sat beside Lucian, occupying the seat closest to the window.

The cool glass rested lightly against your shoulder as your eyes wandered across the landscape passing outside.

Towering mountains stretched toward the horizon, their rocky slopes covered in dense evergreen forests that seemed untouched by civilization. Between them lay an enormous lake, so wide it resembled a silent inland sea. Sunlight danced across its calm surface in countless silver reflections while distant fishing boats appeared no larger than scattered dots upon the water.

Occasionally the railway curved around steep cliffs, allowing an even broader view of the valley below. Small villages rested along the shoreline, their chimneys releasing thin columns of smoke into the morning sky. Stone bridges crossed narrow rivers flowing down from the mountains, feeding the vast lake before disappearing beneath the train tracks.

For several minutes, neither of you spoke.

The silence wasn't uncomfortable.

It never was.

Lucian sat beside you with one leg crossed over the other, a neatly folded case file resting on his lap. Every so often he glanced toward the passing landscape before returning his attention to the reports, occasionally turning a page with calm, practiced movements. His expression remained as unreadable as ever.

The destination written across the front page read only one name.

Ashvale.

A small mountain village built along the northern edge of the great lake.

Far from the major trade routes, Ashvale was known for its quiet fishing docks, modest timber houses, and the ancient stone chapel overlooking the water. Barely six hundred people called it home. Travelers rarely visited unless passing through the mountain roads, and life there had changed little over the last hundred years.

Until recently.

Over the past month, villagers had begun disappearing.

First a fisherman who never returned from the lake before dawn.

Then a child who vanished while gathering herbs at the edge of the forest.

A hunter.

A widow.

A pair of merchants.

No bodies.

No blood.

No signs of struggle.

Only abandoned belongings found in places where no one should have left them.

The local authorities searched the surrounding woods without success. They questioned every resident, checked every cabin, every cave, every abandoned mine.

Nothing.

As fear spread through Ashvale, whispers of spirits began replacing reason.

Some claimed strange figures could be seen standing upon the surface of the lake after sunset.

Others swore voices called their names from the forests during the night.

A few insisted they had watched people calmly walk into the mist... only to disappear before reaching the shoreline.

The regional office had dismissed the first reports as superstition.

After the seventh disappearance, they stopped dismissing them.

Now the case belonged to you and Lucian.

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`🌷, Hi ! It is Haze here.

If you have any suggestions, I'll gladly take them and try my best.

Thank you ! 💕

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