Just as Lucian took cover behind a round table's thick legs, his spinning end table, having covered about half of the distance between where he was initially and the king-sized bed, was sniped by a jagged bolt of crystal blue energy.
In the proverbial blink of an eye, the piece of furniture was encased in a solid coating of ice; causing the room’s temperature, previously pleasantly chilly, to fall significantly even as the end table quickly dropped.
He couldn't tear his eyes away as the frozen piece of furniture arced downward at an even steeper angle before shattering against the dusty ground; carpeting it with small chips of ice and medium-sized chunks of wood.
Although he was simultaneously flabbergasted and fascinated, the raven-haired man didn’t lose sight of his self-assigned objectives:
Reach the fucker. Survive. Kill the fucker.
Lucian immediately slid under the table before springing up from a crouching position, shoulder charging the round table's underside and forcing it onto its side with a loud, resounding crash; table's surface facing the lone-eyed creature.
At the same time, he brought his left arm up to his face, covering his nose and mouth with his hoodie's sleeve and preventing any of the kicked up dust from entering his orifices.
He peeked over the table's round edge after a couple of seconds but failed to see his foe through the murky dust even after he squinted slightly.
Internally castigating himself for creating the obscuration, he ducked back behind cover and waited for the dust to settle back down. Unluckily for him, the first piece of cover he had chosen was situated right by several dunes of dust; causing the cloud to be denser than normal.
While the wait was excruciating, to put it mildly, it did let him come to a certain conclusion. Considering the overturned round table hadn't come under any fire since he had taken cover behind it, it seemed like the creature's frosty eye beams were incapable of reaching him at such a distance.
From time to time, Lucian poked his head above the table's edge before retracting back like a startled turtle hiding back in its shell, making sure he would know the exact moment when the air became clear once more. He must have repeated the act several times over before his wish was finally granted. Unfortunately, his last check caused him to make eye contact with the creature's eerily-coloured eyeball.
Immediately ducking back down, he pressed his back against the round table's underside and thought over what he saw. Though admittedly brief, his glance allowed him to reinspect the route he had mentally established earlier.
The shattered pieces of his poor end table covered parts of the route, making him feel a touch concerned. Something far more concerning, however, were the already melting ice chips carpeting the ground alongside; the debris soon to become a slipping hazard.
Essentially, he now had a time limit if he didn't want things to get too dangerous.
The raven-haired man worried at his bottom lip, gears in his mind whirring to life as he calculated his chances of reaching the creature unscathed.
…
The odds were definitely not in his favour. Not in the fucking slightest.
Quickly peering over the lip of the table again, he filed away the locations of several nearby pieces of furniture before ducking back behind cover; swiftly altering his intended route as he did.
Chair, chair, table, table, chair. Lucian chanted inwardly, making sure to firmly carve the new route in his mind. Chair, chair, table, table, chair…
He gave himself three seconds, burning the route in his mind all the while, before he burst out from behind the round table’s cover in a dead sprint.
He charged for the first chair while furiously pumping his arms, keeping track of the eerie eye in his peripherals – hoping to spot any potential warning signs pre-empting the jagged ray of ice.
Less than a second later, he spotted a nearly imperceptible dark blue glimmer in the depths of the slitted pupil – as if an oasis had sprung to life in the middle of the previously barren desert.
Seeing the faint glow caused his instincts to blare loudly; sensing imminent danger.
Acting on his instincts without second guessing himself, he immediately dropped and rolled.
Mid-roll, the raven-haired man felt the hoarfrost ray's passage. While it was completely silent, every part of his exposed skin sensed as the temperature dropped by several degrees, the suddenly chilled air nipping at his skin and causing goosebumps.
As cold sweat erupted across his back, Lucian sprung up and recovered from his evasive roll – the series of movements so smooth and fluid, it was as if his body had done it hundreds of times before.
He wasn’t sure what that said about his forgotten past, but he didn’t bother dwelling on it as he took shelter behind his target chair; similar in aesthetic to the one he had tossed, padded with maroon upholstery instead of chartreuse.
Regathering his bearings for less than a second, he reached out, fingertips kissing the side of the chair, when it was abruptly coated in a thin layer of crystal blue ice; the only sign preceding its appearance being a soft, crackling hiss.
“Fuck me sideways!” A curse subconsciously fell from his mouth as he jerked his hand backward before blowing on his reddened fingertips, trying to soothe the sudden, heart-wrenching pain.
Less than a second after he started, another crackling hiss rung out before the chair was coated in another layer of ice; its colouration darkening until it was a crystal blue bordering on navy blue.
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“Soothe pain later, squish demonic eye now.” Lucian chided himself, before poking his head out of cover to get a read on the nearby surroundings.
At a rough estimate, he was less than 15 but definitely more than 10 metres away from the king-sized bed and the mostly hidden lone-eyed creature beneath it.
Failing to spot a dark blue glimmer in the vertically slitted black pupil, Lucian wasted no time and immediately broke out from behind the chair’s cover, sprinting for the next chair along his selected route.
He snatched up another end table in his left hand after a couple of steps, concentration dialled up to the max to ensure his stride didn't suffer while doing so. Just as he did, another dark blue light started glimmering in the depths of the solitary eye’s pupil; foreshadowing another jagged bolt of freezing energy.
Instead of immediately dropping and rolling like before, he continued running while keeping an eye out for the mystical projectile, intending to test out a sneaking suspicion by employing a last minute evasion.
Duck… duck… goose!
Lucian sidestepped and juked aside on the last mental word – just in time to avoid the jagged crystal blue bolt as it zigzagged a hair’s breadth away to his side.
If the raven-haired man hadn’t been running for his life, he would have pumped his fist up in victory; having managed to confirm his guess through the risky test.
Evidently, , the supernatural projectile could only travel along a mostly straight path after it was fired off from the lone-eyed creature’s slitted pupil.
Though he tried his best, conducting his little test caused him to slow down a touch. Nevertheless, he managed to reach his next target on the route—another chartreuse-padded chair, incidentally enough—before another bolt of hoarfrost was fired at him.
Having learned his lesson from the previous time, he only waited long enough for the chair to be flash frozen before he was off like a shot and sprinting towards the next—more solid—piece of cover; a five-legged squarish dinner table.
Though the end table was rather light, it still hampered his speed to an extent. As a consequence, he was forced to evade another crystal blue bolt before reaching his third piece of cover.
Lucian immediately shouldered the squarish table onto its side before the second bolt could fly his way. Unlike just before, instead of immediately charging for the next piece of cover, he paused and mentally went over his chosen route, knowing the final stretch would be the most perilous by far.
From the number of bolts fired his way and the rough timing in between each, he estimated the solitary demonic eye had an approximate firing rate of about one per every two seconds or so.
Though nowhere close to a rapid firing rate or anything, it was still fast enough that he would have to avoid several more bolts while crossing the final stretch; increasing his chances of becoming a human popsicle by a significant degree.
Lucian’s thoughts were interrupted by another crackling hiss; the squarish table acquiring a new frosty sheen an instant after.
Mentally counting out two seconds, he broke out from behind cover in a sprint just as it acquired another layer of frost; pushing 120% of his energy into running so he didn't have to tangle with the next bolt
He kept an even warier eye on the creature as he ran. Luckily for his fraying nerves, he reached the second, and more importantly last table, on his route right as the crystal blue ray lanced out and struck one of its thin legs.
One more chair, one more chair, Lucian repeated inwardly, keeping his eyes on the prize, so to speak, irritation continuing to build up like a sleeping volcano; ready to blow and erupt the instant he reached the damn creature.
Much like every other time before, he crouched then erupted upwards, shoulder charging the table's underside and turning it onto its side; increasing the amount of cover he had to hide behind.
The instant it was covered in a layer of hoarfrost, he sprinted out of cover once more.
While the raven-haired man had been zigzagging back and forth, something he had failed to notice was the clouds of dust kicked up in his wake. It was only natural though. Considering his attention had been glued forward, things happening behind him would be of little concern. He didn't fail to notice the soft crunches of shattering ice underfoot as well as the unsteady footing it brought about as a consequence, however.
Rapid, heavy pants left Lucian’s mouth as he ran, attention split in multiple directions – to the sinister eye, to the crunching of his feet, to the end table as it swung back and forth in his left hand, and even partially inwards, to quash his ever mounting nerves.
And so it wasn’t much of a surprise when he failed to fully evade the next bolt of hoarfrost, reaction speed dragged down by his split in focus.
It was unfortunate, as his body was almost fully blocked by the last chair before the jagged bolt lanced into his right side, clipping it ever so slightly.
Lucian felt the spot immediately go numb; a sinister chill forking out from the epicentre even as the entire right side of his body suddenly felt weighed down by an intangible weight.
He quickly overturned and huddled behind the chair, making sure no part of his body would poke out of cover as he inspected the damage.
Lucian had felt a brief flare up of panic after the ice bolt had landed, but examining the actual effects allayed it significantly.
Although the starburst pattern of frost made the damage look extensive, it was actually pretty superficial. Contrary to his initial expectation, the bolt hadn’t frozen his body into a popsicle, like the numerous objects it had struck thus far.
Instead, all it left behind was an opaque blue layer of hoarfrost on the spot where it had initially landed, the colouration of which lightened substantially as it branched out across the faded gold fabric of his hoodie.
The worst side effect of getting struck was actually the invisible consequences, as the metaphysical weight pushing down on his body dragged down his overall speed and reaction time.
Lucian was torn away from his examination after hearing another soft, crackling hiss; the overturned chair gaining its first coating of ice an instant after.
Looking back down at the icy starburst, he saw that the outermost branches were starting to melt; at an abnormally quick speed in fact, considering it was visible to the naked eye.
“It’s best not to look a gift horse in the mouth.” Lucian mumbled self-consolingly, trying to curtail his impatience and desire to squish the damn eyeball, stat.
Instead of continuing to huddle up, he ascended to a knee and adopted a sprinter's posture; ready to burst out of cover the instant the metaphysical weight pressing down on his body disappeared.
Each second that passed allowed for the weight to lighten, even as the ice coating his final bastion got darker and darker, its initial crystal blue colouration transforming into a dark blue bordering on black.
By the time the restrictive force was more or less negligible, the last chair had been fully subsumed and transformed into a mimicry of a landbound glacier – albeit one that looked like flash frozen oil.
Though it had become a protective bulwark, the chair’s newfound girth prevented Lucian from taking a peek and confirming the disconcerting eye’s exact position for a final time.
Hoping his memory was up to snuff, he waited for a final crackling hiss to enter his ears before pushing off and sprinting around the piece of cover; arm cocked back and ready to swing at a moment’s notice.
Lucian wildly swept his gaze over the area once past the faux glacier, locking on to the solitary eye’s slitted pupil after an infinitesimal moment.
As he sped over, his mind quickly calculated the distance between himself and the king-sized bed; about two metres, the back of his mind idly noted.
Though he had been nervous about the final stretch, the extremely short distance alongside the nicely timed assault, made his approach eminently anticlimactic.
Lucian let his arm fly in an overhead smash the moment he was close enough, end table’s circular top thundering down on the unmoving lone-eyed creature – even in the face of its descending demise.
Unluckily for the raven-haired man, just before the lightweight furniture impacted, it managed to fire off a final jagged bolt of ice; freezing the end table solid.
More importantly, its sudden frozen state caused it to shatter into a storm of razor-sharp ice shards, shredding the maliciously glinting eye into chunks of yellow flesh and crimson goo while leaving gashes on his hand as a final, parting gift.
“Fucking fuckity fuck!” Lucian cursed vehemently as he instinctively balled up his left hand, the combination of the motion, ice burns, and copiously bleeding cuts causing his pain receptors to fire off at full throttle.
He gingerly cradled his appendage while stumbling back, teeth gritted as he tried to suppress the agony coursing through his system.
If not for the mechanical voice starting up its emotionless droning in his ears right at that moment, the raven-haired man would likely have been overwhelmed by the newfound waves of pain assaulting his senses.
> Congratulations on eliminating the second type of creature infesting the Dormitories, Player.
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> Unlike the Closet Horrors, the location of Eyes around the Corner are not restricted to a specific territory.
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> So here is a warning for you, free of charge:
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> Keep your eyes wide open, because they may be watching you, right at this moment.
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In spite of the impassive delivery, the last few words caused a shiver of apprehension to race down Lucian’s spine. His eyes nervously flitted about as he slowly spun on the spot, instinctively trying to catch a glimpse of any more of these so-called Eyes around the Corner.
Though unpleasant, the mixture of fear and apprehension coursing through his veins did have an unforeseen advantage; namely, somewhat suppressing the waves of agony pulsing from his sliced up extremity and pushing it to the back of his mind.
Eventually, Lucian forced himself to stop and stood still; his efforts having proved fruitless.
Intentionally pushing the existence of the Eyes around the Corner to the back of his mind, he started taking stock of the short battle’s aftermath.
As if reacting to his change of heart, the pain radiating up from his palm spiked once again, reminding him of its presence.
Lucian looked down at the mess his palm had become with a frown, a stream of curses on the tip of his tongue. He forcefully bit back on the urge, however, no matter how tempting it was, and jerked his eyes away from the unsightly wound before surveying the room…
Because he knew, as clear as ice, that he needed to find something to stem the blood flow, stat.