Wazzap, I'm just deciding on finalising my book cover, if you look at my other fan-fic all of them are showing the main character.
My MC. Soooo, I think I need to do this Fan-fic the same justice tho it's kinda hard atm deciding which picture.
I'll put several images below for potential book cover, you can gimme your 2 cents.
OR just keep the current book cover, I'm too fucking indecisive rn!
New book cover.
Keep the current one.
- - - - - - - - - -
Flashback: 27-year-old Rod.
Rod's desk looked like the aftermath of a cosmic bar fight between philosophy, mysticism, and quantum mechanics.
Soul diagrams hovered in the air, spinning on axes that shouldn't exist, each overlaid with equations written in a dozen languages—some human, most not.
His notes on "Soul Resonance Field Manipulation" are now tangled with sketches of mythical beasts, half-completed soul-binding runes, and what might've been a grocery list.
He stared at the mess.
Scratch that—he glared at it like it had personally betrayed him.
"Alright… nope," Rod muttered, rubbing his temples.
His brain felt like someone had stuffed a black hole into a pressure cooker.
"That's it. I'm officially in a slump. A soul slump. A slump-soul? Yeah, whatever."
For weeks, he'd been pushing through research, chasing breakthroughs, and smashing through mental walls like they were made of wet paper.
Now, though, the walls were reinforced with smugness.
Every new lead spiralled into more dead ends.
Every theory folded in on itself like a smug origami crane whispering 'You suck!'.
Rod leaned back, staring at the ceiling like maybe it would feel sorry enough for him to drop an answer. It didn't.
"Right. Screw this," he sighed, shoving his chair back and standing up.
"Time to pull the old 'walk away until the universe gives you a sign' trick.
Or… the 'find a weird dimension and accidentally get in trouble' trick.
Either works."
He flicked his wrist, and the air in front of him cracked open into a swirling oval of shimmering blue and violet.
The portal hummed with that familiar layered sound—half a soft whisper, half a giant cosmic stomach growling.
His fingers lingered on the edge of the rift.
"Somewhere relaxing," he told it, like the portal actually took requests.
"But maybe… somewhere that could give me a little soul inspiration.
No eldritch horrors this time.
No angry time worms.
No dimension where sentient furniture tries to adopt me."
The portal pulsed in response—ominously.
Rod rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, I totally trust you."
He stepped through.
Rod's portal flickered open with a shimmer of green light that immediately felt… wrong.
Not the "ah, peaceful alien beach vacation" wrong—more like the "oops, I may have opened a gateway to purgatory" wrong.
He stepped through, expecting maybe a quiet dimension with low ambient soul energy to help him untangle his research slump.
Instead, the ground—or rather, the absence of it—fell away beneath him, and he floated in a weightless, endless expanse.
Everywhere he looked, there was green.
Not the pleasant green of forests, but the sickly, glowing hue of ectoplasm, stretching into infinity.
The air—or whatever counted as air here—had that strange, thick feeling, like breathing through a memory.
Massive doors drifted lazily through the void, some ancient and cracked, others gleaming like they'd been polished by a ghost butler.
Each one pulsed faintly with a signature—different rules, different vibes.
Rod could feel it in his soul, like each door belonged to a tiny pocket reality stitched together with its own brand of chaos.
"Ectoplasm," he muttered to himself, scanning with his wrist device.
"Pure soul energy residue, unstable in certain wavelengths… okay, not the worst place to get unstuck on a soul project."
But then the implications hit—this entire place was a parallel counterpart to Earth.
Two sides of the same coin, sharing influence.
Whatever happened here could bleed over there.
He watched one distant door slam open on its own, releasing a wave of frost into the void, and couldn't help but think, yep, that's going to give someone on Earth pneumonia.
The space felt fractured.
Sections of it hung apart like floating islands, each glowing faintly in different hues.
His HUD flagged some with radiation warnings, others with high hostility.
In the distance, he spotted one island shaped like a fortress—probably a prison.
Another looked like a frozen castle stuck in perpetual twilight.
It matched the old stories he'd heard in scattered multiversal data feeds: when Pariah Dark, the so-called Ghost King, was overthrown by the ancients, the Ghost Zone splintered into territories.
Now, each was ruled by a ghost with their own laws, their own sense of reality.
That explained the dissonance—why nothing here followed the same physics twice.
Rod drifted forward, boots finding shaky "ground" as he oriented himself.
Alone, away from his family's noise and constant motion, his mind slipped into its bolder gear—eyes scanning every anomaly, lips curled in that grin that said trouble was about to befriend him.
Somewhere out here, he figured, there might be a ghost who could teach him something about soul resonance that no mortal scholar could.
Rod adjusted his coat, flicking on a thin-layer phase shield—not because he thought the ghosts would kill him outright, but because he didn't trust ectoplasmic splatter on his clothes.
The green haze swirled lazily around him as he started walking—if you could call half-floating, half-striding on a surface that didn't really exist "walking."
Here and there, smaller ghosts drifted past, most giving him a curious glance but keeping their distance.
A few braver ones floated closer, only to recoil when his scanners hummed to life.
He stopped at one particularly weird intersection of the Ghost Zone: a narrow bridge of condensed ectoplasm suspended between two islands, both pulsing with different hues.
One side shimmered blue, the other flickered red—two territories brushing against each other.
His readings spiked.
"Perfect test site," he muttered.
He unhooked a small containment sphere from his belt and with a flick of his wrist, sent it spinning toward a ghost that looked like a cross between a jellyfish and a grumpy librarian.
The sphere snapped shut with a pop, sealing the ghost inside.
"Sorry, buddy. Science."
Over the next half-hour, Rod collected half a dozen different specimens—some willingly, some not so much.
He took tissue samples, measured resonance frequencies, and even convinced one chatty ghost to let him run a "temporary soul density calibration" in exchange for a candy bar he'd been saving.
The results fascinated him.
Ghost ectoplasm reacted to his own soul energy in unpredictable ways—sometimes amplifying it, sometimes dampening it entirely.
In one test, the ectoplasm flared bright green when he poured in a pulse of willpower; in another, it turned almost black when he pushed in raw curiosity.
"Ectoplasm's… not just dead soul residue," he murmured, jotting notes on his holo-pad.
"It's… adaptable. Almost like it wants to sync with the living.
If I can figure out the right bridge—"
He stopped, narrowing his eyes as a faint rhythm reached his ears—like a bassline echoing through the void.
Somewhere nearby, someone was playing music.
And for reasons he couldn't quite explain, Rod felt the urge to follow it.
The bassline grew sharper as Rod followed the sound through the drifting haze of the Ghost Zone, each note vibrating faintly through the ectoplasmic mist.
He stepped through a floating doorway framed with graffiti-like scorch marks and found himself standing on an island that pulsed with neon light.
The "ground" was a glowing stage—amps stacked high, wires snaking out into the void, and in the center… her.
Blue hair, leather jacket, and a guitar slung low like she owned the whole damn place.
Ember McLain didn't just play.
Each strum of her guitar sent out a visible ripple of sound, and the handful of ghosts scattered around her swayed like they were tethered to her rhythm.
Rod leaned on a broken amp, watching.
Not because he was mesmerized—though he'd admit she was easy on the eyes—but because she wasn't just playing music.
He could feel the ectoplasmic frequencies twisting with each chord.
This was soul manipulation disguised as a jam session.
She noticed him halfway through her riff, eyes narrowing in a way that said she was deciding whether he was worth her time.
"You lost, dipstick?" she called over the noise, voice dripping with mockery.
"Or you here to request a song?"
Rod smirked, unbothered.
"Neither. I'm here because you're leaking enough ecto-resonance to light up half the Zone.
Figured I'd see who was stupid or cocky enough to do that."
Her grin turned sharp.
"Guess that makes me both." She strummed another chord, a soundwave brushing against him.
"And you? Lemme guess—you're another ghost here to tell me to 'turn it down.'"
"Not a ghost," Rod replied, taking a step closer.
"And definitely not asking you to turn it down.
In fact, I'd wanna ask you to turn it up!"
That seemed to catch her interest.
She tilted her head, giving him a once-over.
"Huh. Not a ghost, not an adult—technically—aaand not running away from me.
You either don't know who I am, or you're crazy."
"Probably the second one," Rod said, smiling like he meant it.
She snorted. "Finally! Someone who doesn't bore me," while she's twirling her hair.
Rod took in the scene—her followers, the rebellious spark in her eyes, the little thread of dangerous loneliness under all that noise.
"Miss, you're not just playing music, are you?" he said.
"You notice you're bending their emotions.
That's… kinda reckless, and how did you even do that?"
Her smirk widened.
"You say reckless like it's a bad thing.
Hm...I don't know?
When I came into existence.. I just know how to do this."
"And someday it's the only thing you have left, hahaha.
My name's Roderick Sanchez, just call me Rod or whatever you want. I don't mind." Rod shot back.
Ember nodded, "Aha, aha. I'm a ghost, so why do I need to care about what I have left?
I'm Ember, Ember McLain!"
They locked eyes for a beat—two different brands of chaos recognizing something familiar.
Then Ember strummed again, this time sending a controlled wave of ectoplasmic energy toward him, testing.
Rod didn't flinch.
The wave broke against his phase shield and scattered harmlessly into the air.
"…Okay," she said, intrigued.
"You might actually be fun, dipstick."
He leaned forward, grin widening.
"You have no idea, Firehead."
- - - - - - - - - -
The crowd of drifting ghosts was already swaying when Rod stepped off the stage edge, motioning Ember over.
She shot him a glare—she didn't like breaking a set mid-song—but the way he was standing, hands in pockets, eyes sharp, made her curious enough to float down to him.
"This better be good, dipstick," she said, crossing her arms.
"I was in the zone."
Rod leaned in, lowering his voice like he was letting her in on a secret.
"You're good, Firehead. Really good. But… you're not maxing out."
She arched an eyebrow. "Maxing out? You think you can read my power better than I can?"
"Of course not," Rod corrected, tapping his temple.
"But I can and want to understand it—all of it.
You're using your ghost energy—ectoplasmic resonance, yeah?—to hook emotions and pull loyalty out of them.
But the numbers don't add up."
"The numbers?" she repeated, looking at him like he'd asked her to recite tax codes.
Rod nodded, ignoring the attitude.
"Ghosts feed on energy, right?
It's what keeps you together, keeps you anchored here.
Some of you take it from fear, some from attention, some from—" He gestured to her guitar.
"—this. But can you make it permanent? Can you lock it in so you don't have to keep feeding all the time?
And if so… how much can you store? Can you evolve?"
Her eyes narrowed. "Why do you even care?"
"Because I want to know if it can be adapted," he said plainly.
"If I can use it. If it can be modified.
But I can't get the data unless you're in front of a real crowd, pulling at full capacity.
And before you get prickly about it—" He smirked.
"—I'm not saying you're weak. I'm saying I want to see what you look like when you're at your absolute limit."
Ember tilted her head, suspicious.
"So… what, you drag me away from my gig to tell me you're my number one fan now?"
Rod grinned wider, pulling one hand out of his pocket to gesture animatedly.
"Not a fan.
More like… thinks me like your lovely and handsome manager who wants to help you break your own ceiling.
Look, I've got some ideas—little tweaks.
Change your tempo here, hit sharper resonance on the bridge, modulate the wavelength when you target multiple people…"
"Okay, stop," she said, holding up a hand. "You're talking like I'm some kind of… science project."
He stepped closer, dropping his voice again.
"You're not a project, Ember. You're my Firehead, no?," Rod grinned.
"I just want to watch the fireworks… up close."
She stared at him for a moment, the edge in her eyes softening just slightly.
"You're seriously obsessed with this, huh?"
"Obsessed enough to be begging," Rod admitted, his grin turning wolfish.
"C'mon. Let me see what you can really do."
She huffed, rolling her eyes. "You're annoying. You know that?"
"Absolutely," he said without hesitation, resting his hands on her shoulders.
His thumbs pressed lightly, massaging with an almost casual familiarity.
"But I'm an annoying guy who's really interested in seeing you blow the roof off this place."
Ember crossed her arms but didn't step away.
"Fine. But only because you look like a puppy that's gonna cry if I say no."
Rod's smile widened dangerously. "That's all I needed to hear."
- - - - - - - - - -
The stage in the Ghost Zone wasn't really a stage—more like a jagged platform of crystallized ectoplasm floating in the void, pulsing faintly with the beat of Ember's warm-up strums.
But when she swung her guitar strap over her shoulder this time, something had shifted.
Her fingers skimmed the frets like she was trying to set them on fire.
The first chord ripped through the air, a serrated wave of sound that hit the crowd like a physical shove.
Ghosts who'd been lazily drifting before snapped to attention.
The colors in their eyes changed—brightened, sharpened—locking onto her.
Rod stood off to the side, looking like he was casually leaning against one of the floating crystal spires, but his hands were busy.
A portable scanner, disguised as a battered old camera, clicked with every chord she hit.
Thin, invisible drones zipped between the crowd, collecting data samples from the way their ectoplasmic shells vibrated.
His HUD lit up with readings—energy spikes, harmonic shifts, resonance bleed.
Ember knew.
Every time she hit a high note, she'd throw him a glance like she was checking if he was watching.
And Rod… well, he didn't bother hiding it.
His eyes were on her.
On the way the ectoplasmic wavelengths wrapped around her voice.
On the way her aura flared when the crowd roared back.
And, fine—maybe on the way her hair whipped around when she leaned into a solo.
She didn't hold back.
The tempo was faster, harder, and Rod's readings confirmed it—her pull on the crowd was growing exponentially.
Their energy didn't just ebb toward her anymore; it snapped to her like a current finding ground.
And instead of fading when she hit the next verse, it stuck.
Stayed in her, evolve her ghost physique.
She hit the final chord like she was splitting the zone in half.
The ectoplasmic light from the crowd swirled toward her, and for the first time since she'd started, she laughed mid-performance—a sharp, cocky sound.
Rod's screen showed what he'd been hoping for: a clean retention of energy in her core, no dissipation.
His grin widened without him realizing.
Yeah, this was it.
This was what he wanted to see!
He didn't know why he'd pushed her so hard.
Sure, the data was gold for his research.
But if he was being honest with himself, part of him just wanted to see her like this—alive in a way that didn't make sense for a ghost.
When she finally hopped down from the stage, guitar still buzzing faintly in her hands, she smirked.
"Well, genius? Did I pass your little test?"
Rod slipped the scanner back into his coat and met her gaze.
"You didn't pass. You broke the scale, Firehead."
Her smirk widened, satisfied.
"Heh. Of course I am!"
- - - - - - - - - -
One day, after several concerts they had around the Ghost Zone, Ember found him leaning against a broken shard of an old castle wall, flicking through the readings on his scanner like they were sports scores.
"Well?" she said, arms crossed, eyebrow arched.
"You've been grinning like a creep since I started my set.
What's the deal, Rod?
Do you really that into my music, or was this all just another one of your little science fair projects?"
Rod didn't look up right away. "Bit of both."
"Bit of both," she repeated, rolling the words in her mouth like they tasted weird.
"You're not even trying to hide it.
Most people would at least pretend they weren't running tests on me."
He finally looked up at her, smiling in that infuriatingly calm way he had.
"Why would I hide it?
You're a walking energy reactor with a killer soundtrack.
I'd be an idiot not to take notes.
And most importantly, I'm your lovely and handsome manager, remember?"
Her lip quirked, somewhere between flattered and annoyed.
"You're weird, you know that?"
"Takes one to know one," he shot back.
She stared at him for a second longer, like she was weighing how much of that was a dodge and how much was real, then shook her head with a huff.
"Whatever. What now?
You gonna run more tests until the next concert and the next concert after that?"
"Nah," he said, snapping the scanner shut.
"Actually, I was thinking—you've been at this non-stop.
How about you take a break?
Road trip. You can bring your crew if you want."
Ember's face twisted in mock horror.
"If I bring them, it's not a break. It's babysitting."
She smirked.
"We can go with just the two of us."
Rod blinked. "...Just the two of us?"
"What?" she said, tilting her head.
"I mean, unless you need chaperones or something."
He almost laughed.
Almost.
But instead, he slung an arm over her shoulder, giving her fiery-blue hair a deliberate ruffle.
"You don't even know how oblivious you are sometimes, Firehead."
"Hey!" she swatted at his hand, trying to fix her hair, but the grin was already forming on her face.
"There's this place," he continued, "a weird spot on the map I've been meaning to check out.
Supposed to be… different.
It could be fun.
It could be a disaster.
I figure we can study it and have a good time."
Ember gave him a sidelong glance, still smoothing her hair.
"If you mess up my style again, I'm throwing you into a ghost hole."
Rod smirked. "Fair trade."
They laughed, the sound bouncing oddly in the endless green void around them—an easy, unguarded kind of laughter that didn't belong in a place as treacherous as the Ghost Zone.
The portal Rod opened spat them out onto a floating landmass unlike anything Ember had seen in the Ghost Zone before.
The "ground" wasn't rock or mist—it was a glassy sheet of congealed ectoplasm that pulsed faintly, like a slow heartbeat.
Strange spires of crystallized green energy jutted up in spirals, humming in low tones that made the air feel alive.
Ember stepped forward, boots clicking against the surface, then crouched down to tap it with her knuckles.
"This place is weird. I kinda like it."
Rod was already scanning, eyes darting between the readouts and the towering crystal growths.
"It's a resonance chamber.
The whole island's one big amplifier.
Any sound here carries differently… maybe even changes the ectoplasmic frequency itself."
Her eyes lit up instantly.
"So… if I played here…"
He smirked. "You'd probably blow the place apart.
Or supercharge yourself. Or both."
Ember grinned like a kid spotting candy.
"Guess there's only one way to find out."
Rod sighed, half-exasperated, half-amused.
"I knew you'd say that."
She shrugged.
"It's what I do, dipstick." She took a few steps toward one of the taller spires, her fingers brushing along its side, then glanced back.
"What's your angle here, Rod?
This just another one of your experiments, or are you actually here to… y'know… have fun?"
He hesitated, watching her with a faint smile.
"Can't it be both?"
"Hmm." She tilted her head.
"You ever actually have fun without turning it into a project?"
"Sure," he said. "Once. A long time ago."
That got her attention.
"Before all the… portal-jumping, machine-building, universe-hopping stuff?"
He gave a small nod.
"Before things got complicated."
Her voice softened without losing its edge.
"Guess we both had simpler days, huh?"
They walked for a while, swapping small slices of their past—Ember talking about the bands she ran with when she was alive, the gigs that almost got her famous, the dumb fights that kept her from making it.
Rod, in turn, shared the kind of stories that danced just short of giving too much away, but enough to hint at worlds and dangers far bigger than she could imagine.
By the time they reached the center of the island, the pulsing beneath their feet had grown stronger, and the crystal spires sang with a deeper, almost warning tone.
Ember stopped. "...You didn't tell me the place was alive."
Rod's scanner spiked red.
"I didn't know until now." He glanced around at the shifting glow in the crystals.
"And I think it just noticed us."
She strummed her guitar once—just a single sharp note—and the island answered with a shudder that rattled through their bones.
Rod grinned despite the danger. "Yeah… this is about to get interesting."
- - - - - - - - - -
Do you get any of that?
Wazzzzaaaap! How about this chapter? Is it any good?
I wanna do some fight scene and smut scenes in this arc.
I'll put an R-18+ at the start and end of the scene, tho, so it should be no problem.
That's all guys, peace!