Kiew nodded.
"I am what is called a Spirit Speaker. Spirits, apparitions, ghosts, shades, all are open to me...or, they will be soon. Sometime in the future." Kiew cleared her throat.
"Anyway," she continues, "I have to do hours and hours of research in order to fully...hm, understand the tales, I guess you would say. I have to feel the essence of the spirits in my mind, and write about their stories over and over until it just happens. Poof, I create a sentence to call them, and there they are." Kiew motions towards the fox spirit, who calmly remains in Alycia's lap.
"Well, about four years ago, I wasn't as careful in my studies as I am now. I was on the trail of a particular being called 'The Robe of a Thousand Minds.' You see, every fictional tale has a grain of truth in it, and when I began to find these series of stories, I knew I was onto something. Each story concerned the main character coming into possession of a unimportant-looking robe. But, when put on, they committed horrific acts. I began to see small patterns in the contents and morals of the stories.
So, one day, in my school's library, I come across a seemingly unrelated, but this time factual, story about Chu the Ripper, a serial killer of olden times. His number of victims reached double digits before he suddenly vanished. Eventually, Chu's hideout was found and identified as his by various belongings and evidence, including a tattered brown robe that witnesses testified a enigmatic man was often seen wearing at the scenes of his victims' disappearances. His last victim? An unimportant, but incredibly powerful necromancer."
Kiew pauses to scratch her head.
"Well, the robe in the 'Thousand Minds' story was also described as 'brown and tattered' at some point in each passage. I then realized that I realized the coat wasn't of a thousand minds, but one. Even though the stories never really matched Chu's methods, it was actually his bound and dark soul lashing out at the world, just like he had done in life."
"And then my...talent kicked in. But, not in the way you may think, and certainly not in a way I had experienced before."