Ash left the basement after his mind had calmed. He knew sitting in a dark corner alone feeling bad about himself would make no progress for what was happening to him. More so, he needed to get rid of the evidence of what happened, remove anything that could link him to Casper's murder, and get the system to be discovered.
Even with the ability stones, books, and scrolls, humanity was still as greedy as it always was. Finding someone with a system that could increase their abilities without restrictions and multiple options was too good to pass up.
Normally when anyone gets an ability they can level up their ability the more they use it or acquire another stone of the same value. The problem with abilities was that when you leveled them to a certain grade like Casper's wind level you were stuck with that ability. Anything below a C-level could be reset for another if you got an erase stone, skills you could carry at most were at most three without damaging the body's nervous system. Divinity Arts were not limited but it was difficult to master many if you didn't have the talent for it.
Most didn't have the talent to learn all three, two at most, or maybe one. People like Lita were unable to learn anything at all.
That's what made Ash more worried about being discovered, if he had been caught there would be no end to the experiments done to him to find out how the system worked.
Ash had to hurry and clean the scene up, the basement thankfully had cleaning supplies that were left being albeit expired due to neglect. Ash hurried to clean the blood off his hands and face, the more he saw the blood coming off the more it freaked him out. The hatchet and knives were present on the ground, they didn't have his prints since he wore gloves when he touched them for the first time. He would never use the knives Lita bought him on Casper, she spent a fortune to buy those for him.
Ash went to retrieve Casper's body, he dragged it to the back room, where he was trying to come up with a plan that would hide the body and mask the smell so it wouldn't be discovered quickly before he could come up with a story to keep himself from being discovered.
{Alert!!! Detection of outside presence approaching the area. Continue to clean up the scene and dispose of the body before the presence arrives. Time limit 12min 32secs.}
Ash panicked hearing the announcement. He had no time to get rid of Casper's body properly and if he escaped someone would just find it and question him first as the number one suspect because of the bad history between the two. He had to think, come up with a solution quickly, not just to rid the evidence but keep his involvement out.
"System. I know I'm asking a lot but is there anything you can give me to help make this quicker? I don't care what price I'll pay but I'm asking for your help."
The system ran their it's numbers and answered him when it came to a conclusion.
{Answer. The user can trade abilities and stats earned for another ability or skill from the system shop. Now that you have collected your first trophy you have been authorized access to the shop. However, any trades or purchases made can not be undone, and you can only deal with currency in stats, skills, abilities, weapons, or souls collected from trophies for purchase. Items obtained from the shop are exclusive to the shop's personal inventory and are not available to the outside world. Does the user wish to proceed?}
Ash answered yes with a head nod. The system ran through its number sequence again followed by an ominous glow. Ash nervously looked at the clock on the screen. 8 minutes were left, and he was running low on time, making him more aware of the time it took the system to update. Once it was done he was down to 6 1/2min to spare.
The screen changed its style showing four blocks for its shop, the labels on them read buy, trade, sell, and locked. Ash didn't care for the locked part and sell was not in the cards yet till he was gone. He tapped on the trade box to see what he could get now that his time was dwindling to the wire.
Nothing was acceptable for his situation at the beginning of the list, it went in order of weakest to strongest and the system wouldn't allow him trade a high grade for a weaker one, it had to be of equal value or towards a stronger level with additional trade.
"C'mon, something has to work. Just this one time can I get lucky? Just this once." Ash begged to be answered with a miracle. His fingers scroll then they stopped when an ability popped up that felt like it was calling to him.
"What's this? Grade S-level Hell's Fire? Not possible, there's no ability with that name. And it's a high level you would need to be Elon Musk rich to buy. Why did I stop at this one?"
{Warning 3min and 15secs remaining. User is in danger of failing the mission and receiving punishment.}
"Damnitt, fine, system I want this one now. I'll trade the wind ability and the stats I got from Casper for this. I don't want those stats in me anyways the idea of them makes me want to puke."
The system acknowledged. Ash felt a jolt go through his body as the system took away Capser's wind ability and stats for the trade to commence. Ash could feel intense heat in his body, so much that he fell to one knee on the ground panting from the sudden rush of internal heat inside him. He was doing his best to maintain his composure and not collapse, if he did than everything he was doing now would be a waste and make his anxiety of getting caught worse.
The system finished the transfer with only two minutes left to spare, Ash's body started to smoke from the heat emanating off him. He was greeted by a message telling him the transfer was successful and that the ability allowed him to make fire only an Arch Demon could create, and even able to generate heat into an object.
Ash didn't read the rest of the details he just by instinct grabbed the corpse and used all the heat he was generating to endow onto Casper's body.
The heat went from a slow burn to disintegrating the clothes, flesh, and muscles. Ash pushed harder in expelling the heat from his power into the corpse, the timer was running out he needed to burn the body to the point where not even burnt ashes were left to discover for analysis.
"Burn, burn…..burn damn you, BURN!!!!" He screamed out as Casper soon faded away to nothingness, leaving behind nothing as Ash wanted.
The heat subsided inside Ash. He was feeling better and still had a minute left to spare in the timer. He dissipated quickly with Phantom Stride to escape before he was caught, leaving nothing behind for him to get caught.
The door to the room opened, and walking inside wasn't any of Casper's friends or faculty. It was the little girl from before humming a tune as she entered.
She felt the ground where Casper's body was, even with no traces left there was still a black spot where the body burned. She bent over and with her breathe blew the spot erasing the black marks away. After which she opened up the screen Ash used for the system.
"System, reward him with more money. Erase records of this mission as well. He must not know I was the one who set this up."
The system complied. It sent Ash a reward of $500,000 to his personal account. All records of the mission were deleted as well.
"Sorry, but you needed that ability for our plans in the future. I didn't want to trick you but I waited too long for this moment." The little pulled out a locket, she opened it, and inside was a photo of her and a soldier from the same area as her. "Papa, your revenge is finally happening. Soon, they'll all pay, the Kraegans, the order, and him most of all. All descendants of Ichabod Crane will pay for killing you and almost ending the world. They'll all pay Papa."
The little girl closed her eyes, fighting back her tears from escaping. She put the locket away to vanish again before her presence was felt.
"Good luck Ash. Hopefully, you won't become the Pale Rider my Papa was made to become. I pray you'll get your soul back before that happens."
*****
Ash escaped back to the outside of the school where he entered before when he grabbed his gear. He burned the helmet, coat, knives, and hatchet too to rid the last of the evidence of his deed. He did his best to control the flames to make the fire compact so it wouldn't set off the alarm system. The metal of the hatchet and knives took longer but soon they melted down burning into the dirt they were laid on. The ground had no grass and vegetation near it so it was easier to blend in without raising suspicion. Finally free of the anxiety of being caught he saw the system award him his money for the mission complete. He didn't care about the money, to him the only thing that mattered was that he actually killed someone. The images wouldn't go away he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
He retreated to the nurses' office to see Lita still lying on the bed sleeping, the nurse told him they had two hours left till they needed to leave. Ash understood, he walked over to the bed, lying down behind Lita as he wrapped his arms around her waist. Ash buried his face in her back, where he began to sob softly, though no tears came out he still went through the motion almost on muscle memory to cry. Lita opened her eyes partially, she could hear Ash behind her breaking down. Not since his brother's death had he wailed his emotions out. Without alerting him she reached down with one hand to hold his while the other gripped her pillow tight. Her eyes were crying slowly as she shed tears for both of them, being his conduit to express his pain.