The pungent scent of death is what should have tipped him off first, but having a heightened sense of smell always tended to mug things up.  Especially in a cemetery.  He was around all walks of the undead due to his profession, but there was something different about a truly rotting corpse.  There was a sickly sweetness to it that stung the nostrils, that blend of life and death as maggots and other lesser creatures survived off of the carcasses.  All around him were bodies, planted like seeds in the earth to help nourish. While some were in coffins, others had just been thrown straight into the ground, causing the whole process to go even faster.

He wasn’t a fan of cemeteries, and usually did his best to stay out of them, but soft and moist soil was known to house ripe materials and one stone in particular was his target today.  Hopefully he wouldn’t have to disturb anyone’s resting place too much in order to get it.  Nothing was worth disrespecting the dead.  The only thing worse than the scent seeping up from the dirt was the silence.  He couldn’t recall any place in Revaliir having ever been so quiet.  For once, he decided to speak to Minasé, hopefully the daemon sharing his body and mind with him would answer back, “You have to feel right at home don’t you?”  

It was hardly a question, and while he spoke out loud, Minasé always answered in their head, silent to anyone on the outside…good thing he was alone or he might look mad, “Because of all the death?  Hardly.  It’s not as if I put any of them here.”  His nose wrinkled, unsure of whether that was a comforting fact or not.  He decided towards the latter as he chose his steps more carefully as the rings of death began to tighten the closer he got to the center, “Count yourself lucky that you’re on the inside right now and not smelling it.”

A soft chuckle resounded in his head, “You must really be disturbed if you’ve stooped to conversing with me.  And yes, I am quite thankful to avoid this…experience.  What exactly do you intend to do if someone spots you?  Grave robbers aren’t exactly smiled upon, and your sparkling reputation would be muddied.  Something we both know you wouldn’t want.”  He wrinkled his nose, considering his answer before speaking back to him, careful not to walk on top of a grave whose stone had been grown over, “You’re in our mind right now.  You can find the answer yourself.”

“Don’t act as if you don’t want to keep the conversation going: you wouldn’t have started it otherwise.  Certainly not out loud.  Is the silence getting to you that badly?  Do you need your own voice to break through the mists to comfort you…?”  He could hear the smirk in his tone and his own eyes halved in light irritation, “I’m not afraid.”

“I didn’t say that you were.”  He didn’t say anything back to that.  Instead he was considering something he’d said, about being found rooting through the ground for…what?  A ‘rock’, that would hardly sound like an honest explanation in a place where so many people had uprooted the dead for far more valuable items.   “Besides, it doesn’t matter: I’d hear them before they came and be gone before they would notice.”  And frustrated.  

As if on cue he heard a faint rustle and his steps instantly froze, even Minasé kept quiet.  His eyes narrowed and he straightened up, looking out into the darkness.  The mists were so thick that even the moon could barely break through and offer any aid.  But there was nothing there.  No shift, no change.  He closed his eyes, seeing with his other sight, detecting any nearby auras close by…and still there was nothing.  When he opened his eyes it was to the same swirling darkness.  The air suddenly felt colder, his breath lightly fogging in front of him.

His tone was drawn out in hesitation, “Maybe…it’d be best to return with Natsumi.  She knows stones and materials as much as I do…more than I do.  It’d be like plucking a flower for her.”  Which was true, after all it had been she that had forged Torinasu for him.  His fingers brushed along its hilt at his hip, comforted by the touch.   “You’re afraid.”

“I’m not afraid, I’m just not stupid.”  There was no more sound; there hadn’t been since his pause and he decided to keep going to the center.  Were he able to see further he would have teleported himself there by now and if he ever had to come here again that’s exactly what he’d do to bypass all of this.