Gabrielle fell to her knees and tears of blood rolled down her eyes.
She thought she now had the power to escape, and just when she was about to destroy Josh, Weber stepped in.
And Weber now knew ghosts could only have true power with his presence when he used the Abyss's power.
Thus, he powered down and Gabrielle lost her power.
Weber went down on one knee, "when I said earlier I'm the Wraith Keeper, I don't mean I use ghosts. Rather, you just get a contract with me," he said, looking into her hollow eye sockets.
"What's the deal?" she asked.
Weber sighed because he knew this was the part that ghosts exploited him as an upcoming Wraith Keeper. But as Wraith Keeper, he had to let the ghosts know their rights.
"You pick something you want me to give. If I deliver, you fight by my side. If I fail, you can go. So what do you want?" Weber asked.
Gabrielle stood up and held her chin, walking around, "I lost everything because of a murderer. And I can't get revenge without you," she said and met Weber's eyes.
"I ask you let me join you so I can destroy the person that ruined my life," Gabrielle demanded, which sent Weber and Josh aback. Then the room became terribly cold and Weber's eyes and hair bleached white and his hands were enveloped in a black aura.
"I have been given the power of the Abyss," he said, rising to his feet and stretching out his hand to Gabrielle, "join me, and we'll banish all your enemies to the Abyss itself."
Weber spoke, his voice deeper and colder than usual, and Josh was shaking from the cold.
Gabrielle slowly stretched out her hand and took Weber's hand, and a dark sphere enveloped the two of them.
"That's new," Josh said, walking back.
Then the darkness vanished and Gabrielle's eyes were now present, and she had bright white irises like Weber.
"That's odd. All the ghosts I've worked with always have hollow eyes," Weber remarked.
"If you recruit properly, their eyes will manifest like yours. For the eyes are the soul's gateway," the Abyss whispered to Weber, which made Weber smirk.
"I guess I'm getting your attention now," but there was no response.
Gabrielle blinked, and blood was no longer rolling down her eyes. Her aura was bright gray like Weber's instead of black like before.
She smiled and met Weber's eyes, "keep your promise!" And with that, she dissipated into thin air.
Then a teenage boy opened the door to his living room and looked up. The roof was gone because the floor from the home on top had caved in, and his family's living room was wrecked.
Weber and Josh froze and just stared at the teenager for moments without moving.
He ran away from them screaming, "Mom! Dad! Someone—" Weber appeared in front of him with his eyes glowing.
"Hi," he said with his voice and Gabrielle's voice combined, and it sent chills down the boy's spine, and he fainted.
Weber looked at Josh across the room, "let me guess, I shouldn't have done that?" Josh smacked his head with his hand at Weber's rhetorical question, and Weber ran away with Josh next to him.
"What do you expect me to say?" Then they got to the stairs after passing the hallway and ran into Anna, and their breaths stopped for a moment.
"Oh my God! Are you two okay?" Anna asked, looking them over.
Weber cleared his throat, "yes. It seems like there was a cave-in from upstairs. Luckily no one was hurt," Weber said.
Then she squinted her eyes, noticing a few bruises on Josh's neck and dust on both their bodies.
"Oh really, so why are you two so dirty that it looks like you experienced the collapse?" she said, observing them.
Weber and Josh looked at each other for a second, their eyes wide, and neither of them knew what to do.
They just looked at her and shrugged.
"Alright then. Are you two done with duty?" Anna asked.
"No..." Weber confessed, recalling how they were cleaning the crime scene, then the screams and trouble with Gabrielle interrupted them.
"We'll be getting back to it!" Josh said and rushed off with Weber.
"Wait!" Anna yelled, and they stopped, "the building is probably unstable because of that collapse. Best that we, the cleaning crew, contact those that will handle it before people get hurt."
Weber and Josh looked at each other, then turned to her, returned the hazmat suits, and greeted her goodnight.
Anna called the landlord and told him the situation of the collapse.
"I see. I'll send in a structural engineer to come tomorrow," he said and ended the call.
Weber was running, and Josh was next to him.
"Slow down! Where are you going like this!" Josh yelled, running next to him.
Weber looked at him with a smirk, "I've finally understood how the power of Wraith Keeper works just a bit, don't you think that's great?"
Josh shrugged then smiled, "as long as you don't lose yourself to that creepy thing within that gives you power, then all is good."
Then Weber stopped running abruptly, which made Josh go some steps ahead before he stopped and looked back.
Weber furrowed his eyebrows to the left, and it led to a dark alleyway.
"Don't tell me the Abyss is in there looking at us..." Josh said in a low voice, looking intently at the dark direction Weber was facing.
"No," he said and started walking towards the darkness.
Josh sighed and stretched his arms, "I need a gun or something. This jumping into danger powerless is tiring."
"Fear. I feel fear that's not mine," Weber said, his eyes slowly going from hazel to light hazel, then gray, and then bright white.
"Since when can you sense emotions?" Josh asked.
Weber shook his head, "I can't sense emotions. Only fear. And for some reason, it draws me closer to it," he said, walking forward.
Josh followed him with shaky legs and turned on the light of his phone.
Then they stopped when Weber saw a manhole.
Then Josh looked at Weber with a scowl when Weber kicked aside the cover, getting ready to jump down, "are we really going somewhere because 'fear' is calling you?" Josh asked.
Weber shrugged, "if there are ghosts or people that need my help, then I have to go. If you aren't coming, tell Ariel to pick you up," he said and jumped in.
Josh grumbled and used the iron ladder attached to the wall inside the manhole.
When he reached the ground, there was no sign of the sewers, which was what they expected.
Instead, they saw torches on the walls.
The ground was paved, and the air was heavy due to lack of ventilation.
Weber powered down and observed the drawings on the wall.
It showed a robed figure standing before a multitude, showing them a path that was straight, turning them away from one that was crooked and spiked.
Josh took pictures of the scene and looked at another side, and it showed what looked like a process.
A person kneeling before a white being, then in the next image, the being touched the person, and the human gained the power of mana.
And under every drawing on the wall was written, "Rite of Passage."
Weber only furrowed his brows as he stared at each drawing.
"Let's see if we can find more clues of this," Josh said, catching Weber's attention.
"You're not saying we leave?" Weber asked.
Josh nodded affirmatively while smiling, "that's right! At this point, no point wanting to back out of danger when it's always around."
Weber smiled and turned, "let's go." Then he stopped walking and stared at the floor, "how does this fear sensing work? Because, won't that mean everyone nearby that is scared of the rain hitting them you'll be able to sense?"
Weber shook his head and looked forward, "it's clear. That time you drugged Ariel and she passed out. She was terrified. And now I know: I sense the fear of death," he said, running forward in the direction he was receiving the signals.
A mana blast in the form of a sphere flew towards Josh.
Then Weber caught it and tossed it aside, and he gnashed his teeth. His hand was peeling from burns, and it was red.
Weber kept down his head and was catching his breath.
"Weber!" Josh yelled, looking at his injured hand intently. Then he felt a cold wind slowly leaving his body that was all too familiar.
"You will not go any further than this," a robed figure with an orange mana sphere around their hands said, and next to him were several others in the same attire.
Then Weber looked up with a grimace, his hair bleached white and his eyes.
Then they sent blasts to him, seeing his supernatural transformation that mana shouldn't allow, and what worried them was that they felt a menacing aura from him, but he had no mana essence.
As fast and powerful as their blasts were, they were too late as Weber had knelt down to one knee and slammed his uninjured hand to the ground and yelled.
"Wail of the Abyss!"