Prodigy

THIRTEEN

I return the scythe

"I now see why you wanted that scythe... and how you know those spells?, no one has seen a familiar, let alone a master familiar in almost 500 years" he says

"he'll come around" I say and place the scythe down

"you know how to reap?"

"well... not something you just pick up overnight?"

"well, you got enlisted for a post... soul reaping, it is something you will do until you reap a million souls, shouldn't be too hard, because reaping it practically a dead practise, you'll find souls everywhere... you are allowed to take a scythe, but of course, if you want a specific scythe, you will need to tame whatever is attached to it" he says, and holds out a pendant, once I accept this role, I will be trapped in it until I reap a million souls, I take it in my hand, immediately feel it become part of me.

"hmm", I look around, the hall.

"he will do... Milo" I say and I hold my hand out, and a scythe comes to me, once it touches my hand, in a burst of black ash, a black crow flaps his wings and lands on the tip of the scythe.

"I see you quickly adapt to it?... you will be clear to go tomorrow at Dusk, will arrange for the gate to open, best to reap souls often, of you may piss off upstairs, sooner you are free, the sooner you may live that private life you want so bad" he says

"I know how it works"

"very good, by the way, if you are in the mood to break a record, a reaper once completed that record within 73 years, that is the shortest time someone had ever collected that many souls" he says, adding a note before walking away.

I ought to get some training in, read up on the manual that comes with Milo, I don't know how to read the ancient language that well, but I understand bits and pieces, thankfully Milo knows how to speak my main language, helped me out with bits and pieces and happy to join me on my journey as a reaper.

And from what he's already heard about me, he knows he's going to get a lot of life essence to eat. We make a deal, for every 10 life I reap, the 11th will be his to eat. No matter how powerful. And we begin to set our route. Apparently, he's never really been with an active reaper, he wasn't even used for reaping before, but as a scout, to scout an area for souls, souls he never got to taste. I tell him, to get used to me and my humour, he's stuck with me for a while. And in some situations I am reckless and he is just going to have to deal with it in those moments. I want to knock this deal out within a century. Not going to try and break a record, the only way I'd be able to break a record in record time would be to start a really shitty war, but I don't want to risk imprisonment, which will leave me stuck in this deal for longer.

The more souls I reap, the more benefits I'll get, like if I were to 800,000 souls, no prison cell would be able to hold me. He tells me, I even have a built-in reaper outfit, if I don't wish to reveal my actual face to others, and souls will never see my actual face, even if I don't wear this disguise, my voice will even change when in this outfit.

I can style it in the future however I wish.

We head to the arch.

"ok... ready?" I asked Milo, I cannonball through the portal, just feeling like I'd end up in a high place, I ended up only dropping like 10 feet before hitting water. 

200 feet from the shore. I was in that realm for a month. Milo does warn me, that not everyone takes a liking to reapers, and if I am killed, since I am bound to my contract, a certain amount of souls that I have already reaped, will either be taken, or if I haven't reaped enough, will be added to my sentence, meaning I cannot die while in this contract.

Because I have a debt.

first, to get dry, figure out where we landed, and figure out where to start next. We ended up landing on a small cliff side city, fishermen live here, population 8,646. Ghost population 2,877. Yeah, got a busy couple of days ahead of me, at first, it'll take me a minute or two to reap each soul, but Milo assures me, once I get a hang of it, I'll be able to eventually reap souls within 2-4 seconds.

Well, I don't have any money, well, I honestly do have some, and I was pardoned of my student loans and given a refund on my dormitory fees, the money was sent to me shortly after, since the cabin was quickly filled after being made vacant.

So, I will need to be careful money wise, Milo estimated it could take a couple weeks for me, so I decide to get a job here, and end up working at the local kitchen, quickly pick up on my skills in seafood cuisine, I work an evening till closing job.

And I reap after work. I work from 5 to 10. Small town, so people don't really stay out late, as most fisherman rise early the next day, so I reap from about 11 to 4 in the morning, and I'll sleep from 4:30 to about 2 in the evening.

Gradually after about two weeks, my reaping speed did begin to speed up, Milo was enjoying tasting souls, but couldn't wait to taste more stronger souls out there, and we've already mapped out our next 3 stops, and I have sent him to scout, who knows, maybe we will break the record?.

As the next town, population 12,284, ghost population 4,092. Yeah, fuck my life. Just can't catch a break, I found it best to work at night, and the reaper outfit is actually pretty comfortable, most ghosts were actually waiting for me, as they were satisfied or just ready to leave this world behind. But all came willingly. As they really had nothing to hold onto.

Some people say, since I arrived, while it was out of the blue, the place just felt lighter?, and was sad to see me go. Milo was happy to get away from that constant fish smell. We were out of there within 3 weeks and 5 days.

Or 26 days, pretty proud about that, 2,877 souls within 26 days, we're on a roll.

We've set a goal of hitting 50,000 souls within a year of reaping. And so far a month in, we're going good. 50,000 souls on my part, that's like I think 5,000 souls for Milo?. Don't judge me on my maths, if I got it wrong.

Which is plenty for him, since he had never had any souls before he'd met me.