No More Regrets!

5- Hotel Check out.

I woke up in the middle of the night. I was just too excited for what I had just discovered about my innate -- which was actually an inherited -- cursed technique. 

The book explained them as appliances that can be used by feeding them cursed energy. Mine was the ten shadows. A legendary technique passed down the Zen'in clan. Essentially I didn't just have the divine Dogs as my summons. 

I discovered it in the middle of a blackjack match. To gain another Shikigami, or summon, I had to exorcise it first. In other words, fight it. Unfortunately for me, I had no training whatsoever. I had to form many different kinds of Binding Vows*. 

I would have to think about what kind of Binding vow I could add. I snuck out of the room with an extra room key and went downstairs. There were still people playing inside the building. I found it weird, maybe it was my sudden exposure to sorcery, but something was up. 

I kept my eyes peeled just in case but didn't notice something out of place. I was sure it wasn't something major. Everyone just wanted to have some fun and play games with each other. I walked to the cashier, and he smiled and me and leaned forward.

"Ah yes, Nico Di Angelo, correct?" He already knew who I was. Maybe it was because Bianca and I were VIPs. Being known by someone and having them smile at you like you were important felt really nice, I was not used to it at all. 

"Yes," I scratched my elbow -- some random itch I got sometimes -- and asked if there were any places in the hotel I could go to do things privately, big empty rooms or anything of the sort. 

He looked at me with a raised eyebrow but didn't question my request at all. He put a hand on his chin and scratched his well-kept beard while humming and nodding. "There is the basketball field, no one should be using it at these hours." The man waved so I would follow and I did. 

As I walked through the machines, toward the elevator, I noticed something strange. 

This elevator. Shouldn't it look older?

The elevator seemed to have gotten a reform. Before it was an old model, with doors made of wood which you had to open to get inside. Now the doors were automatic and made of metal. It was definitely weird, but I shoved my suspicions aside and walked inside with him. 

He pressed a button and the elevator moved down. The doors opened and we looked at a large room with audience stands. There were two tall hoops on either side and goals behind them. I looked around, it was very well-kept and clean. There was a small metal rack full of basketballs. I spotted a small door leading to a warehouse and from what I could see of it there were several other kinds of playing balls, like volleyballs and dodgeballs. 

"Is this what you wanted?" He asked, I turned around and nodded. I told him I would like to be alone inside and he complied, leaving and going up in the elevator. With him gone, I was ready to begin. Putting my index and middle finger up, I took a small breath and prepared myself. 

"Emerge from the darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure" I felt a bit of my cursed energy leave me -- almost none really. For a few seconds, nothing happened. I wondered if I had failed in forming a barrier, and just wasted cursed energy. 

Darkness veiled the court as the lights above were hidden by a murky ink-like substance that fell from the sky. A jolt of excitement made my body twitch. I succeeded. 

Now that I did it, it didn't seem as impossible anymore. I looked at my hands, even though I had pulled off the curtain perfectly there was no guarantee that I would live through what I was going to do next. The Ten Shadows actually gave its user ten shadows, that being ten shikigami -- the two dogs only counted as one weirdly enough. The thought of possibly dying because of my own hubris scared me.