I'm a house. Zachary didn't know whether he should freak out or cry or what. Should he just be grateful to have a house? But... he wanted to live in a house. Not become one.

If he still had arms he'd be pulling his hair. What did I do to deserve this?

Monstrous House

Class: Daemon

Size: Small Dwelling

Spirit Rank: Bronze (1/5)

He wanted to scream, but houses couldn't scream. And worst of all, houses couldn't sleep. The little girl, Sophronia - what kind of name was that? - had started snoring after a while, curled up on her side, the blanket over her head. She might've been four or five, but she said she'd summoned him. What did that mean? And how? Summon? Did she bond his spirit to the house? That sounded nonsensical, he wasn’t even dead. All he’d done was go to bed after a long day. If it wasn’t for the intense rain pelting him from every side, every angle, Zachary wouldn’t have believed it.

He had so much surface area. Instead of a head, he had a roof. There was an attic crawlspace and everything. And bedrooms filled his insides; he no longer had organs. No lungs. No heart. No limbs! He couldn’t move or reach for anything; he couldn’t even scratch his ass. The only thing resembling a face now was the front door and the windows on either side of it. He was a tiny little house, and he didn’t know what the hell to do.

He tried to quiet his mind, trying to accept what he was. I’m a house now. He pushed his thoughts around Sophronia’s bedroom. There was a shelf full of books and a desk with more books and papers spread messily over it. The girl must be studious. As his consciousness, or mind, or whatever it was, he wasn’t really sure, moved across the books, he felt a flicker. A strange sensation as though he could move these things.

Poltergeist: Silver (1/5)

With his mind, he pulled on one of the books, yanking it. It fell off the shelf to land on the floor with a thud. Sophronia stirred. She turned over to her other side, kicking at the blanket while grumbling something, and Zachary retreated. His mind pushed away from the shelf and back to the ceiling. These sensations were so strange and interesting, but he didn’t want to disturb the girl.

But why not?

Was it rude?

Isn't it more rude to turn someone into a house?

No, that wasn't why. She'd sounded so afraid of the storm. He didn't want to wake her up and have her be frightened again. He'd ask her questions in the morning. Why had she summoned him? How? And could she send him back?

But she was just a little girl! Would she even know what was going on? None of this made any sense.

Oh!

Maybe I'm dreaming! Giddiness filled his insides. This was a lucid dream! He must be so stressed out from work, from the party, and the storm sounds must be from his headphones. The girl Sophronia must represent his inner child or something. The house was his mental health, and the storm... the storm was the party! The storm represented his life right now. That had to be it. The girl’s name must’ve come from one of the party guests. Some random thing that his subconscious must’ve picked up on. That had to be it!

Okay, then I'll just go exploring. He pushed his consciousness out of the girl's room. Even though it was a dream and she might represent his inner child, he didn’t feel comfortable being there.

The door led into a small dining area. He didn’t have to open it to leave; he simply passed through the wood. He felt like a ghost.

There was a circular wooden table and three chairs around it. Everything seemed hand-carved. A rug sat on the floor beneath the table. The kitchen area took up a third of the space. It was tidy, he thought, much tidier than the kitchen back in his apartment where everyone left a mess. This one even had some potted plants. One was a pepper plant, and he could see the peppers growing on small white flowers. He wondered what the plants represented in his dream. Inner peace? But why peppers? He wasn’t a big fan of spicy things.

There was a sink, a stove, a countertop, and lots of drawers and cabinets filled with things. They popped open as soon as he wondered what was inside, and then he couldn't figure out how to close them, so he left them like that. The family kept containers of dried rice. Jars of fruit and honey. Packets of flour. There were utensils in the smaller drawers, and he got the sense that the family wasn’t well off. They were living within their means. A part of him wanted to go into the parents' bedroom and see what Sophronia's parents were like, what his dream decided to create, but that felt like an intrusion. What if they were his parents? He didn’t want to see them. He didn't want to go back to the girl's room either, it was only because she'd summoned him that he'd been there in the first place.

Zachary tried to relax. There were too many details. Maybe this wasn’t a dream... maybe he was actually here. His brief reprieve was fading. So, if it wasn’t a dream, then what was he?

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A floating disembodied mind? No. The wooden floors creaked as the house settled in the storm, and he felt the shift in his bones. The wood was his bones. The wind howled and raged against the outside of the walls, and he felt it as though he was right out there, trying to withstand a storm. The walls were his skin, and the plumbing, the pipes and things that were routed through his body, were his intestines and veins. Water and air coursed through him like blood. There was even a heating mechanism, a large container that sat just below the kitchen... huh. He had a basement. Or was it a cellar?

He was a little bigger than he thought, and he pressed his mind through the floor, right into the ground. It was like dunking his head in a bowl of water.

The underground space was cramped and gross. It was dark, and he tried to feel for a light switch or something... but he recoiled. What he felt instead were tiny legs, tiny hairy, crawling legs, and if he had a throat, if he had a voice, he would’ve screamed at the top of his lungs. Spiders and other critters moved across the floor of the cellar. They crawled up the walls and the ceiling.

Immediately, he pulled back, hurtling up through the floor and back into the dining room, unable to shake the sensation that things were crawling all over him. And they were. Now that he was aware of the feeling, he felt it EVERYWHERE. Insects and spiders lurked beneath all the beds. They hid behind shelves. They lived in the corners of the roof. They’d made homes underneath the floorboards and inside the walls and... holy fuck. Every single inch of the attic crawlspace was covered with these things. There were even little lizards and some kind of beetle and even a snake, and he was ready to set himself on fire. Burn everything down. No, no, no! He could not deal with bugs at all!

Ingestion: Bronze (1/5)

With a strange feeling, like goosebumps spreading across his body, little tiny bits of him, parts of the walls and the floor and the wooden beams that comprised his insides, caught every single critter. The spiders, the roaches, the beetles. Even the lizards and that one snake. They were stuck to him in the worst possible way, and before he could respond, before he could do anything, he... swallowed. It was an instinct. Some kind of involuntary response, and all those creatures melted into Zachary’s body, and something sugary, like the sweetness of a mouthful of candies spread through his insides.

They left behind shells and hair and things, but all their remains crumbled into dust as shivers spread up and down through the house, through Zachary.

Essence: +203

Essence: 203/100

Spirit Rank: Bronze 1/5 -> Bronze 2/5

Maximum Durability has increased to 1169

Durability: 744/1169

Excess Essence has been converted into Durability

Updated Durability: 847/1169

Ingestion: Bronze 1/5 -> Bronze 2/5

Essence? Ingestion? Did he just eat all those creatures? Oh my god. I’m going to be sick. He wanted to go inspect every nook and cranny, just to make sure they were gone, that he’d eaten them all, but he didn’t have to. That crawling feeling was completely gone no matter where he focused his mind. The crawlspace was empty. The bedrooms were empty. Even the cellar was empty. And for a horrible second, he thought he’d eaten Sophronia and her parents too, but they were still in their beds, snoozing.

What the fuck? What the fuck?

What the fuck?

There was no way this was a dream. He'd just eaten all those bugs and grown stronger. And worst still, he was pretty sure he could taste the creatures. Why did they all taste like candy? This couldn't be happening. That girl's not my inner child. She’s just has some kind of... power? Like how I have abilities as a house? But then... where is this world? Where am I? Why am I a house?

Exhausted and feeling drained, Zachary brought his mind over to the table and pulled one of the chairs back. The legs scraped against the floor. The wind howled outside and rain battered the kitchen window. He felt sluggish and full, like he'd just eaten way too much, a really heavy meal. Something he hadn’t had since he'd left home.

Poltergeist, he thought. A ghost that messes with things. Is that what I am? But then he realized he couldn't actually sit on the chair. He had no legs to bend. No arms. No butt. Nothing. He was just a disembodied... something. Giving up, he hovered around the chair and tried to quiet his mind. Meditation or something. Like those self-help books and videos always taught. That was how people conquered their anxiety, right? How to deal with depression and anger and fear of failure... just meditate!

He’d always thought that stuff was bullshit. Especially at home, trying to survive his mom's overbearing need for his attention and his dad’s condescending remarks. Meditation never did anything for him there. But now he was stuck in this... well, he didn’t know what it was, what he was, so he thought why not? Why not try meditation?

Maybe I can wake up. Or maybe... if I keep eating things, I’ll get stronger. Does that mean? I... I’m a house. Why would a house want to get stronger? Maybe I can... A feeling tugged on the corners of his thoughts. A feeling he recognized. Sleep. It was sleep? Houses could sleep?

That’s possible?

Oh no, he thought, as the house, his body, creaked in the wind. As the rain’s incessant drumming kept pushing him deeper and deeper into sleep. He was full, his belly full and he was so damn sleepy. I'm falling asleep. I'm...

Zachary slept. He wasn't sure how long. But there was nothing but darkness. And when he awoke, the sun was shining on his rooftop, warming him to his bones. It was morning or afternoon, he couldn’t tell, but the sun shone on his front-door face as well. Everything felt warm and comfortable and cozy. A little girl sat on his doorstep; her nose buried in a book. He couldn't tell if it was Sophronia or not. This girl seemed older. Maybe a year or two older than the girl he'd met, but she had to be around ten. She had bushy brown hair tied back, pale skin, and green eyes. She wore a collared green dress with long sleeves and a black skirt.

The girl shuddered and sat straight up, nearly dropping her book. Then she stared at the door over her shoulder, a surprised look on her face. She was staring at him, eyebrows raised. Could she... does she see me?

Hello! I’m in here! Please, help me!

"House," she whispered with a dimpled smile. Her eyes lit up as she twisted her body, reaching out to place a hand on the door. Her fingers were warm, he could feel her heart pulsing beneath her skin, and she looked up at him, a grin stretching across her face. "You're finally awake!"