The forums were pretty bare looking compared to ones you've seen on the regular internet portion.

When making a new account in order to post and send messages, the only boxes were for a username and a password. Though in big red letters at the bottom of the password box red.

DON'T USE A IMPORTANT PASSWORD!

Very charming.

Like the market portion, there were subsections of the forum for different types of items and off-topic discussions with weird titles such as "Does Fed-Ex check it's packaging and "Is 'X' item illegal if used this way?" Pretty expected stuff honestly.

Though you looked past all of these, even the ones that were offering to sell some ingredients that were on your list.

The subsection that you were looking for was labeled under barter.

With your newly made account, you started on making a new post with the title.

H-(Ability to communicate with the dead) W-(The ingredients listed here.)

You didn't really expect this plan to work, but it was the only actual idea you could think of for right now so might as well put this here to sit and be read while you thought of other options to get money.

IF you worked a job, you could probably earn enough in a few months, but that would take far to long for you. Fuck you wish you had started working a part-time job earlier and had not been such a lazy ass.

For two days you would check back in on the forums to see if you had gotten response, and you got a few, but all of them were either dead ends or troll posts making fun of your offer, which is what you expected to be honest so it didn't really dampen your spirits all that much.

You actually ended up forgetting about the forums for a day as you were focusing on some schoolwork while also trying to take a break from the whole hunt to try and calm your nerves, though during class you had gotten a mysterious text during class.

Checking it, you see that it was from an unknown caller with a really weird area code.

'Take your post off of the forums, now.'

You didn't really understand what this text meant for a little bit, as it was so random and you posted on a lot of forums.

You reply back.

'huh?'

You get a reply in mere seconds.

'Delete your post of the barter section on Atlantic Trade."

The hairs on the back of your neck instantly stood up as your whole body jumped a little, causing the person sitting next to you to give you a stare for the way you were suddenly acting.

For the time being, you put away your phone and just continued to pay attention to class as your heart was beating at an alarming pace while tiny drops of sweat were forming on your forehead.

It's not like you could really do anything at the time being since you needed your own personal computer to access those forums. But still, who the fuck was this persona and how did they know that you posted on there. The whole process was supposed to be fucking anonymous. Were you careless this time and did something stupid giving away your information. Would you have your identity stolen in the next few days, did anyone else know who you were on that trading site? These type of questions continued to swarm your mind as the school day dragged on in a painful like way as you had raced from your bus stop all the way home when the never-ending school day had finally ended.

Racing up to your room and locking your door, you immediately logged onto what you needed to in order to get back onto the forums. Doing as what you were told, you immediately started to look for your post, and once you had found it, deleted it without hesitation.

With that out of the way, you brought back out your phone and texted back the person who had sent the message.

"Alright it's gone, now who the hell are you."

You got a message pretty quickly, just like last time.

"Do you feel any pain, live severe pain that would make you want to die."

The vagueness and the notion of the message made you feel worse as you just replied with a simple 'no'

"Interesting, I don't know exactly why it didn't get you as I've heard it harming others before even if the words of power were shared online. Nevertheless, you're a lucky man, and so am I since I managed to find you in time before my quota expires."

You didn't understand what this guy was saying, so you decided to start asking him questions on what the hell he was talking about.

You who are you?

"Who exactly are you?" You text him, as he never really got around to answering your question.

"You can refer to me as Nick, that's the name I use to go by online so that's the name you can call me. As to who I am, I'm someone who is need of your help, but in return, I can offer you something you want, and maybe also save your life if what I think will happen is true."

Well at least he was forward with his name, but the second part only stirred more questions into your head.

No more questions

You didn't have any more questions to ask Ned, so you said you were done.

"Don't be too frightened, I'll tell you everyone you need to know in due time and when the situation comes to it. Now, tell me are you in contact with a ghost as of now?"

You didn't really see any reason to lie to him, and a bit of you thought that he would know if you were doing so.

"Yes, I'm talking to a girl that's been bound onto a street, and I've been trying to get her out of there." You text back, giving him the general idea of what you've been doing."

"Hmm, well that would probably fall into the caretaker class. Lucky you to have gotten such a thing, that class is generally rare to come by. That also seems to answer a few of my questions. So let me ask you, do you really want to get this girl out of her set boundary?"

"Yes. more than anything."

"Well then, let me help you with what you need. You were smart enough to find one of the correct ways in order to get the spirits out. Normally most caretakers go the other route instead of this ritual, but this could be relatively easier and faster than that riddle shit in which we would have to go through. Alright, I'll get you all the materials you need, they should come in by the weekend."

"What's the catch?"

"No catch, just hurry up and do the ritual."

You didn't really trust what he had just said, there's no way someone could buy this much stuff for that price just from the kindness of their hearts, but then again who were you to say no to free help.

"How did you know that I could really see ghosts? That I wasn't lying?" You ask, a bit curious.

"Our eyes are more....open than others. It's apart of our hierarchy, so don't you go worrying about it."


After you and Ned had finished exchanging messages, he had again said the date in which the materials would be coming, didn't even need to ask for your address which freaked you out quite a bit when he told you that he already knew.

Nevertheless, you felt extreme joy for finally being able to get Gwen out of that boundary.

---

Ned started messaging on your phone for the rest of the time that you were in contact with him with how the deliveries were going. You were getting the ingredients on separate days individually. They each came in some pretty sketchy looking packages, ignoring this though you started storing everything in your room closet for future use.

Ned was actually be pretty fast about all of this, more than you were expecting him to be considering that this was all free. You just know that there was a catch to all of this, but you didn't know what it could be, hopefully he wasn't the devil or something and you had unknowingly signed away your soul for bird droppings and crushed ants.

It took about two weeks for the final ingredients to come in, to which Ned already knew without you having to tell him.

Ned- Alright listen here. I'm going to tell you how to mix these ingredients carefully. All you really need is a stove and something to mix everything with, you might want to throw away the pot after or just thoroughly bleach it or something but that's all on you.

"I thought the website already gave instructions on how to do everything?"

Ned- You're really going to trust instructions that are run by nerds who think they know our craft? I'll give them credit they got some stuff right, but only about 60% of it, and you need the whole process and ingredients to be perfectly accurate if you're going to make this work. Normally ascending someone would be a snap, but with what we're doing, it's going to be a little more tricky than that.

Ned then sends you a list of instructions on how to prepare the potion or drink it was that you would be making. The number of steps was pretty big, though reading through it a couple of times it didn't seem all that hard, just combining a thing or two and stirring for periods of time.

Ned had told you to get it done as soon as you could, though you were planning on to anyway.

You were lucky that your mom had gone out to go do some things were a friend and your dad was still at work. You could get the first quarter of the list done before any of them were to get home and see what you were doing. Unpacking the ingredients you needed, you got straight to work.

---

Jesus, the temperature that was emitting from the pot kept on fluctuation from hot to cold. You didn't even fucking know pots could let out a cold temperature, though will all of this ghost and stalker shit that you have come across you couldn't really be all that surprised. It must have been no joke when Ned said that the other faux ingredients wouldn't do, to combining these to make such concoctions took someone who knew what the fuck they were planning on making.

You were secretly hoping though that this wouldn't explode in your face and destroy the entire house if you did something wrong, Ned didn't say such things would happen, but then again he didn't bring it up.

The process was slower than you expected it to be as some of the ingredients took awhile to be stirred before they look as if they needed to be going by the instructions. Still, you think you would be able to finish in time before your dad was to get home since he would probably be here first.

Though as time went on, you got more and more worried that he would catch you in the act, and you had no way in knowing how he would react, and it wasn't like you could just stop what you were doing midway into it.

You could skip on stirring all the way, and only do it in half the time. The materials were already mixed enough as they were, it wasn't like they needed to be stirred to perfection.