"Please lead the way!"
Hailuot followed the ghost through the reading hall and book stacks, then climbed the stairs to the library's second floor.
The ghost led Hailuot to a room and said, "Could I ask your attendant to wait outside? The binding equipment inside is valuable, and damage would be difficult to repair."
Hailuot said to Bulaishini, "Wait outside. Don't let anyone unrelated disturb us."
"Yes, Master."
Bulaishini gave the Vampire Guards several instructions. The Vampires spread out to guard the passages leading to the room.
The ghost chanted an incantation, and the door opened, the smell of ink wafting out.
Inside, he saw more than a dozen ghosts gathered around a rectangular table piled with paper of various sizes. They formed an efficient assembly line: some cut paper, some sketched Magic Arrays, some made manuscript rubbings, and others sealed Magical Energy into the books they bound.
When the door closed, all the ghosts stopped working and turned toward Hailuot. Their bodies began to vibrate at high frequency, blurring into wisps of black smoke that rushed toward the ghost beside him.
The ghost absorbed and merged with the black smoke, and his form grew clearer. When the last wisp entered his body, he took on the appearance of a middle-aged man.
He wore a double-breasted gentleman's suit and a large handlebar mustache, with a monocle set in his right eye socket.
The ghost bowed to Hailuot with elegant poise. "My name is Frank, and I am the proprietor of this Library. May I have the honor of knowing your name?"
"Bonecrusher!" Hailuot replied. "I didn't expect the proprietor of 63 Tibia Street to be an Undead. I heard this was a stronghold of the Azure Society—it seems my information was mistaken."
Ghost Frank smiled. "How could a Library run by a ghost be a stronghold of the Azure Society? Someone must have been joking with you."
Hailuot said, "I'll ask the Soul Eater to clear things up."
At the name Soul Eater, Frank's smile tightened. "You know the Soul Eater?"
The smile shifted to Hailuot's face as he wiped the ring on his finger and said, "My elder brother is the Soul Eater."
When he saw the Ring of the Old Dominator, Frank's eyes nearly bulged out of his head. "Did the Soul Eater give you An Invitation?"
"Yes, I have An Invitation." Hailuot took it out. "The address is here, too. I don't know whether an invitation from four years ago is still valid."
Frank took the invitation, waved his hand to break the Seal, and pulled out the paper inside to verify its information.
Then he said to Hailuot with delight, "This invitation is valid forever."
"What should I do next?"
Frank handed the paper to Hailuot and said, "This invitation was given by Master Laem to the Soul Eater. My task is to receive the Soul Eater and guide him into joining the Azure Society. Only I can open the seal on the invitation—you can confirm my identity with it first."
Hailuot took the paper.
It read: "Though Frank is a Ghost, he is also the Azure Society's Level-One Liaison Officer in Scorched Earth City. You can trust him."
Beneath the text was a Magic image of Frank himself.
Hailuot tore up the paper and tossed it into the candlestick on a nearby table, then asked Frank, "I'm curious. You're a ghost—how did you come to work for the Azure Society?"
"I work for my ideals." Frank spoke like an impassioned orator. "The outside world believes the Azure Society only wants to claim territory for the Living Beings in the Land of Death. But we actually want to break the Decay of the Land of Death and build a kingdom that has Faith in Death and actively seeks to understand it."
Hailuot was thoroughly confused. "How would that differ from the Land of Death as it is now?"
"There's a huge difference, of course." Frank floated right up in front of Hailuot, nearly pressing against his face as he said, "The Undead don't have faith in death. Most of them simply wait aimlessly for the moment of decay, with no interest at all in what death actually is.
Do you want to know how the Undead come into being? Why can Death Energy condense directly into an Undead without a Corpse? If Death is the next form of Health, what comes after Death?"
Hailuot replied, "Those are interesting subjects for study."
"Exactly! But the Seven Regents disagree. They are so pedantic that their minds seem stuffed with maggots. They believe the Land of Death has been this way since its birth and must remain this way forever—and nearly every Undead believes the same."
But living beings who have faith in death are far more willing to study it, to seek out death's ultimate secrets.
That's why I joined the Azure Society. I want to use my strength to change the Land of Death and create a kingdom that truly has Faith in Death."
As he discussed his ideals, Frank grew excited. He gestured as he described the nation he envisioned for Hailuot.
Hailuot hadn't expected the Azure Society to be not a band of rebels, but a party of revolutionaries.
This would shake the foundations of the Land of Death!
If I were one of the Seven Regents, I'd certainly want to wipe out the Azure Society without mercy too.
Too bad I'm not.
"What does this have to do with me?"
Getting to the important part, Frank said, "Do you know why we keep failing?"
"No, I don't."
"Because we lack an Undead Army! The Azure Society's members are all powerful Mages and Warriors. We can seize an Undead City in a surprise raid, but we cannot withstand the Undead Army that comes swarming after us.
And you, an Old Dominator, control an Olden Cemetery outside the Seven Regents' rule. If you could command an Undead Army to support us, we could carve out a kingdom of our own here!"
Hailuot understood at last why his father had said the Azure Society would do everything it could to win him over.
But...
"You should know the state of the Olden Cemetery—it's full of Chaos Monsters, with almost no Undead left."
Frank said, "That's exactly what we need to solve. The Olden Cemetery is shrouded by some vast, unknown force, one that suppresses its Death Energy and prevents it from being released. The Azure Society's Scorched Earth City Branch has been researching the Olden Cemetery all along, and we've made some progress.
If you join the Azure Society, we can work together to free the Olden Cemetery."
"I'm in!"
Hailuot understood that reclaiming his Family Cemetery by his own strength could take many years. The Azure Society was powerful, and their help would give him far better odds of success than going alone.
"This decision deserves a place in the annals of the Land of Death." Frank praised Hailuot, then said, "Now let's discuss how to rescue Master Laem."