“Aww~! How’d you die, Peri?! Was it Verna?”

“What? No, of course not!” Peridot snickered and scratched her messy blonde hair, the hardhat had already long since disappeared. Then she sighed and explained, “It was the freaking government! We were assassinated by a freaking Legendary Anthropologist! I mean, we killed him eventually, but Ollie was dying… So I saved him. I hope.”

“A Legend! You two actually killed a Legend?! Shit! Nice job! Hahaha~!” Moss removed his mask, grinned and gave his daughter a high five.

“Wow! An Anthropologist too! Is that some kind of ant scientist?”

“I think it covers all bugs? I don’t really get it. He looked like a giant ant-person though.” Peridot shrugged, “Wait… If I killed him, doesn’t that mean his soul is probably lurking in the city somewhere?!”

“Probably.” Verda waved her hand dismissively, “Don’t worry Honey, Green Heart City’s a big place. If he was a Legend before, then he’s probably too busy tryna escape now.”

“That’s even worse! What if he escapes and gets revenge on Verde?!”

“Maybe he already did?” Verda sighed and pointed out across the street, “Ain’t that Emy?”

“Emy?!” Peridot screamed in shock when she saw Emerald chatting with her father in front of a coffee shop!

“Peri?!” Obviously Emerald heard the familiar voice and crossed the street while pulling her ghostly father along. Even after death, Greenstone still looked like an old man. Though his body was much healthier now, more like when he was a few years younger, instead of on his deathbed. “How did you die?!”

“That’s what I wanted to say!” Peridot grimaced, “Was it that asshole Anthropologist?!”

Emerald was stunned, “An Anthropologist? What’d they do? Study your behavior as they tortured you to death, slowly and painfully-”

“Wait, what?” Peri was confused.

“Emi…” The tall, bald old man laughed and patted his daughter’s blonde head, “I believe Peridot meant to say ‘Entomologist’. I think I saw the so-called Legendary Entomologist earlier.”

“You did?! Do you know where he is now?! How long ago was this?!” Peri shouted anxiously.

“He turned into a giant wasp and flew away.” Grandpa Greenstone shrugged his muscular shoulders, “It was probably an hour or so… He was ranting and raving about getting revenge, completing some mission, destroying Verde Village… It was all very dramatic.”

“And you’re not worried at all?!” Emerald retorted angrily, “Wait! Damn it! So what if he wants to destroy Verde?! I just remembered how I died! That bitch Woods murdered me! She… Oh no! I need to find my daughter! Crystal must be down here somewhere! And the others! I need to find my students too!”

“Wait, you’re saying that Verde… Those bastards really destroyed Verde?!” Peridot’s eyes reddened a bit, “What the hell was Klein doing?! He didn’t protect anyone?! Did they send a bunch of Legends at once?!”

“Klein… It happened so fast.” Emerald sniffled and shook her head, “No, I can’t dwell on this shit here! My daughter is only three years old! Who knows what might happen to her in this haunted hellhole of a city?!”

“I’ll go with you!”

“Hold your horses!” The old man shouted and pressed their shoulders down to keep the two young women from running away, “Don’t forget that you’re ghosts now!”

“So what?” Peridot rolled her eyes and complained, “What, you wanna hold a seance or some shit?”

“Uh, yeah, actually, seances and shit work down here. We’re ghosts, remember?” Moss snickered and took a pack of cigarettes from behind the counter, lit one up and started smoking.

“I’m putting that on your tab.” Verda smirked and started looking through the bags that the two of them brought over, “Wow, this… You really hit the jackpot this time, Mossy~!”

“Hahaha~! You know I’ve always been lucky, Baby~!”

“You two brats stop flirting and help us with the summoning ritual!” Grandpa Greenstone shouted angrily, then patiently explained to everyone: “To perform the ritual, it’s best to have an item from the person while they were alive… But obviously that’s impossible. The next best thing is the full name of the person, an image of them shortly before their demise, a relative or someone with a close personal relationship…”

Emerald started lighting some incense, conjured up some portraits using her abilities as a Teacher, then wrote their names, birthdays, hobbies, all sorts of important details about every one of her students. There were also a bunch of babies she hadn’t started teaching yet. For toddlers, maybe they wouldn’t need to go to school yet in the city, but Emerald has always taken care of the kids around town. She treated all of them almost as well as her actual daughter Crystal. Of course, she also remembered the teenagers and even the adults around the village. It was less than two hundred people and many of them might not actually be dead, since they weren’t in Verde at the time.

“This… This is going to take a while.” Greenstone smiled wryly on his wrinkled and thickly bearded old face, “Emi, we’ll start with my granddaughter first, okay? I only know how to summon one person at a time. But I need your help so…”

“Why didn’t you say that sooner, Dad?!” 

“Alright, just do the freakin seance already!” Peridot shouted at the two of them and looked out the window anxiously, “I keep feeling like somebody’s watching us…”

“Boo~!”

“Ah!” She punched the little ghost girl in the face by reflex, sending the small body flying back out through the big green glass window.

“Hahahaha~!” However, that kid’s smashed head recovered back to normal in a few seconds, “Peri~! That’s you, right? It’s been so long~! I missed my best buddy~!”

“Wait… You’re…” Peridot looked down at the little girl with blonde hair and green eyes. Even her facial features were very similar to her own… But she had a conspicuous tiny black mole under her right eye and a scar on the left side of her chin. “Orina?”

“Hah~! You almost didn’t recognize me, right?! I’ve grown up a lot in the past eight years!”

“Yeah… Yeah, you have…” Peridot hugged her tightly, almost too tightly, but eventually the naughty kid turned into mist and slipped out of her arms.

“Aunty Emy~! I missed you too~! I wuv you lots~! Hehehe~!”

“Orina!”

“What’cha up to anyway~! Holdin a seance? Hehe~! Why don’t you let me help?”