Aiden discreetly moved behind Hellen. No matter how many times he tried to reaffirm himself about the combat capability of the ghost against him, it only worked when the ghost wasn’t around. As soon as he saw the scary figure, all his reaffirmations went down the drain.
Hellen wasn’t the same however, indifferent to the terrible smell, she calmly stepped inside and even had the leisure of looking back at Aiden. She had already sneakily put away the gun in her holster, she could always quickly take it out in case of emergencies.
Aiden under stress didn’t notice aunt Hellen’s actions, he stepped forward into the room while trying to hold in his breath. It was proving to be difficult. Everytime he loosened a little, the smell which registered in his brain made it difficult to focus on anything else but enduring it. It was difficult, you couldn’t allocate other tasks to your brain when it was trying its hardest to bear the disgusting stench. He felt thankful that aunt Hellen’s all rooms were air tight, including the cupboard. Was it intention on her behalf? He didn’t know.
Just as Hellen took another step to approach it, as they had thought, the ghost chose to proactively attack, disregarding its intention to hide. It turned over from behind the villa, showcasing its hideous appearance. Its face was the least recognizable, eyes sockets long empty, surrounded by simply a bundle of weathered muscles, with occasional bones in between. It walked, albeit a little fast, towards Hellen while pulling back its fist to prepare a punch. The posture was certainly comical.
Hellen stood ground as it approached with Aiden diagonally behind her. She quickly rolled over to the left as soon as the ghost released its punch, perfectly timing her dodge. Instead of following her, something seemed to click as the ghost turned over to Aiden instead.
Aiden wasn’t extremely weak minded, he just hadn’t experienced this situation before. As sharp as he was, this wasn’t something which he could compensate with his brains. He couldn’t magically get used to the smell and terror of the unknown. The ghost didn’t approach Aiden though, it very likely wouldn’t engage with him as long as he had the golf club.
Fuck fuck fuck shit
His mind was in a mess as the ghost turned its back on him. Watching the ghost prepare for another swing at aunt Hellen, a hint of clarity regained in his eyes as he tightly gripped the golf club.
Not now, not now. It would sense me and turn its attention to me.
This time he wasn’t fighting alone. Aunt Hellen had said she would distract the ghost for him.
There must be a reason for that. Yes. No matter how much it didn’t wish to engage with me, if it senses my approach to attack it, it might retaliate. I have to wait for the perfect moment where its attention is on aunt Hellen.
He didn’t have to wait for long. Aiden kept quiet, the smell occasionally registering in his brain, reminding him of the stench surrounding him. But the adrenaline which had started running through his blood did well to combat it. His mind was focused on the current situation.
Tracing even the most minute movement of the ghost, he snapped out of it and took a huge leap towards the ghost while powerfully swinging the golf bat towards its torso as soon as he saw it release his hand towards aunt Hellen, who once again dodged it.
As expected, the ghost stiffened for a moment when it sensed Aiden had entered its danger range. But it was too late, the ghost didn’t have good enough reflexes to dodge that.
What happened next was unbelievable for him, and to Hellen to an extent. Large cracked sounds resounded as the helping ghost curled over a bit while letting out a loud scream. This was the first time Aiden had heard the ghost make some noise, he thought it was mute. On the other hand, it was out of place for Hellen because the reaction of the ghost was larger than she had expected.
But it makes sense. Only if the side effects were so terrible would it actively hide so much.
She had the leisure to think because the ghost had given up on attacking her. Fully enraged, it turned, rather comically while still a bit curled and attempted to throw a fist at Aiden. By that time, she had already reached Aiden’s side, ready to push him out of harm’s way if he failed to respond in time.
It wasn’t too quick nor too slow from Aiden’s point of view, one moment the ghost curled over, the next moment it had turned around and decided to attack it. Instinctively, he quickly took a couple steps backwards.
In a space as small as a room, the difference between a run — by Aiden — and a quick walk — by the ghost — wasn’t so large. The ghost quickly caught up, forcing Aiden to dodge sidewards. The ghost didn’t halt its punch, which went on to hit the ball. It only left an imprint though. The walls weren’t lightly built. There was a difference between a door of a random unused closet of some room and the walls of the bungalows given to the privileged people.
Breathing heavily, Aiden one handedly swung the golf club in a hurry before the ghost initiated its attack again. The club hit its head, causing it to smash into the wall. Aiden distanced himself more while he kept his gaze locked onto the ghost. It was rendered immobile as its head bounced off the wall, leaving a very nasty stain, a mixture of skin, and mass. Decayed mass.
Within a couple seconds, it was already trying to move its body though. Aiden once again readied his golf bat. The ghost opened its mouth and screeched, heavily clutching its own head. Ironically though, it still began to approach Aiden as it pulled its other arm behind.
Hellen, who was standing nearby, had a doubt gradually forming in her head as she watched the proceedings of the battle.
Why isn’t it using its phaseless ability? It could have easily avoided so many hits. What’s happening? Why can’t it use its phaseless ability? I’ve heard that these both secondary abilities have their own cooldowns, but shouldn’t a couple hours be enough to recharge it? Anyway, it’s good that it can’t use its phaseless ability.
All thoughts of aunt Hellen were thrown out of his mind as he was fully focused on battling the ghost. His eyes took in every minute detail as he once again reacted exactly as soon as the ghost swung its arm. Aiden stepped diagonally behind and tightly swung his club on the hand.
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No sooner than the ghost wailed did Aiden once again swung his club on the other side of its head. There were now two identical dents on its skull, with a few patches of ugly organic matter sticking onto the club. As the ghost took a few steps back due to momentary lack of balance as a result of taking a hit to its head, Aiden closed the gap and swung his club vertically on its head.
The hit almost took its head out as it almost looked like the head was hanging downward on its chest, connected to the neck only by a thin margin. With adrenaline in his bones, Aiden breathed deeply, his mind completely filtering out the smell as he took a big swing at its torso.
Hellen who stood to the side for the entire fight had a look of admiration on her face as she witnessed the entire situation. Resisting the urge to find a wine to sip on, she had to settle for watching a nice show empty handed. It was a pleasant surprise for her.
A fucking genius. Brains and brawns both. I couldn't be more surprised. And here I thought he was a scaredy cat, I couldn’t be more wrong. Experience. Experience. He definitely was only lacking in experience. Indeed, how could a man who was a coward stay behind to look for ways to deal with a ghost after sending off his sister? Even if it was for the sake of his sister and himself, it still signified that he had the courage to stand up against the situation. I’ve found a gem.
The ghost wailed extremely loudly as it went tumbling on the floor. Lying completely flat, Aiden panted while gazing at it. Coming a bit down from the high, his attention was caught by aunt Hellen who was looking at him with surprised eyes, and shortly after started laughing out of uncontrollable joy.
Indeed, how could their son be nothing short of extraordinary?
Hellen reminded him, noticing throughout the battle that he seemed to have forgotten about it in the heat of the moment.
“Aim at the heart. Destroy it. The club would work just fine. Want to use the gun?”
Aiden replied without looking at her, already having raised the golf club above his head.
“No thanks, the club is very satisfying to use.”
A heavy metal sound resounded as both Hellen and Aiden looked downwards to witness that the ghost’s body had turned incorporeal, faint.
Hellen softly whispered, “Phaseless.”
Aiden struck the ghost a few more times, but he only hit the floor, completely passing by the ghost as if nothing was situated there. They watched with a sense of regret as the ghost slipped through the floor. Regret for not being able to finish off the ghost. Hellen quickly took out her phone and looked through the feed of all the cameras. The ghost was just below their current room, glancing up at Aiden, she said, “C’mon, there’s still a chance.”
Aiden swiftly nodded and followed Hellen out of the room to rush towards the room below. No sooner had they entered did they witness the sight of it turning incorporeal and passing through another wall.
They chased the ghost through almost a dozen rooms, repeating some in the process, but failed to even catch up to it.
Panting heavily while lying flat on the carpet of the living room, Aiden asked, having completely gotten down from the adrenaline rush he felt earlier.
“What’s up with it being able to use the phaseless ability all of a sudden? Was getting hurt one of its conditions or something?”
Hellen was equally confused as she sat on the sofa nearby, thinking deep about what transpired as she replied.
“Nope, they aren’t that smart to be able to lay out such an elaborate scheme to fulfill one of its conditions. It might have simply angered you using some methods and laid down for you to beat it. Didn’t you see it was aggressively trying to fight back? That’s not someone who wants to get beaten. Also, I don’t know what’s happening either. Not to mention how it could suddenly use the phaseless ability, they generally don’t have the ability to continuously use it so much. The amount of times it was used was a lot.”
Aiden brows furrowed as he listened to aunt Hellen.
Even she doesn’t know? What’s happening exactly?
“I feel sleepy.”
Hellen snapped out of her thoughts and asked in a teasing tone.
“You dare sleep with a ghost present in the house?”
He rolled on one side to face aunt Hellen and replied, “It would be difficult, sure. I didn’t know exactly how ghosts looked or even if they existed at all. I simply assumed they existed and deemed my house haunted, it wasn’t too difficult to sleep in that. But now? Considering I’ve seen it and even battled with it, it certainly feels a little unsafe to be sleeping under the same roof. What if its aggression was high enough to disregard its need to fulfill the conditions?”
Hellen nodded her head at him, “You made good points. We can try and wait a little here. We’ll see if the ghost comes to attack you, if not, I guess sleeping would be safe?”
“You guess?”
“Everything is a guess when you are dealing with them. Neither me nor the Bureau have complete data on them, a lot of parts about them are missing. Well, there’s a higher chance of you being safe if the ghost doesn’t attempt to attack you within the next few dozen minutes. That should be enough time for it to be able to heal its arm enough to swing.”
Aiden just dramatically sighed as he committed the information about their incomplete data to mind. If possible he would keep analyzing them from his own end to resolve questions which hadn’t been answered. It would be unlikely, but keeping hopes wasn’t bad.
They spent the next few minutes doing nothing while basking in the coldness of the air conditioner. Aiden got up, having rested well enough and approached the half eaten apple.
His brows furrowed. Hellen noticed his hands pausing mid air and confused expression as she asked, “What’s up?”
He turned around to ask, “What’s the time right now?”
Hellen didn’t understand why he was asking that but still answered after checking her phone. “12:07am. Why?”
He shifted a little to give her the view of his half eaten apple and pointed at it, “The day has changed, this could be the first attempt of the ghost. I remember putting down the apple and simply following you. I didn’t have the time to set it up nicely. This half eaten apple here has its posture of lying changed as it's now in a more optimal position to hold it. This can be counted as a help right?”
Hellen’s eyebrows raised as she responded in an impressed tone. “That’s one hell of an acute observation for a beginner.”
Aiden simply smiled as he gave the plate a violent shake, toppling the optimal posture it stood in. Only then did he pick it up and give it a bite, sitting by the table waiting to see if the ghost would attack.
It didn’t.
The conflict between them would continue. The stakes had increased. With yet another day, the possibility of the activation period of the helping ghost’s ability coming to an end would increase, making it more dangerous for Aiden.