Chapter 105 - Complications

A mixed feeling washed over Vern as he tried to figure out how to clear the path for Cedric without coming off as insensitive.

But right at that moment—

AGHHHHH

Screams rang throughout the residential block, and a hubbub arose in the whole neighborhood.

Vern snapped his neck to the right, a deep frown etched on his face. What is…

The anxiety he'd just suppressed came flaring right back as the possibilities whirled in his mind. Did it really manage to escape?

Cedric came rushing out, using Vern as a shield against the three men before beelining toward the house numbered 3-31—the closest one where someone had screamed.

Some inhabitants standing on their doors jumped out on the streets, probably scared of the spirit coming for them. Others rushed to their neighbors' houses, shouting their names.

Cedric banged on the door, and when there was no response, he pulled at the latch with all his might. Failing to budge it, he took out his pen and flipped the book to some page.

"Let me take care of this," Vern interjected as he sprinted up to 3-31, the cries of help from within growing more desperate by the second.

Cedric eyed him suspiciously but still moved aside, not dilly-dallying.

Vern put his hands on the door's knob and considered the same balance he'd used back in the Ascendant Council for a similar use case, Integrity.

Kacha

The door clicked open, swinging ajar on its own, and Cedric rushed in with a nod. Vern took a deep breath and made to step in, only to suddenly halt as he remembered something.

He looked at his lamp and debated on whether to leave it out here. That entity had probably used the 'glass' around the metal structure to materialize within the lamp.

What if it used the same tactic again? That was what threw them into disarray last time. He wasn't about to repeat the same mistake.

"HELP!!!"

Vern gritted his teeth. Every moment he wasted on this decision might very well cost the woman in there her life.

So he focused, rapidly analyzed his options, and soon landed on a good one.

He took a deep breath, and a white glow spilled from his eyes and—

Crinkle

The glass around the lamp shattered into the finest particles, which blew away in the cold wind.

However, that wasn't all. The wick inside the lamp began swaying, too. So he quickly chained it with a stabilizing sphere around the fire.

It would be constant work to keep it up, but it was a minor hassle, and his Thought Space was doing most of the heavy lifting anyway.

The flame steadied, casting a firm pool of light around him. With a renewed sense of assurance, he wielded the lamp and hastened inside.

The layout of this one mirrored that of the previous house, though everything was reversed. Maybe the entire block followed a uniform design.

Yet, as he ventured deeper, the reach of the lamp's light dwindled, surrendering the surroundings to an enveloping darkness.

It's that unnatural darkness again. He realized the entity was manipulating the shadows right from the start, making it hard to see and limiting their ability to track its movements, and consequently restrict its movements.

So it really escaped, huh? he cursed under his breath.

As he eyeballed the environment, suddenly, the scream took on an even shriller pitch, "Please save me, mister!" and he chased its sound, reaching the brown glow of Cedric's pendant.

The man was already writing something in his book.

But when Vern turned to look inside the hall, his heart thumped loudly, and he involuntarily clutched the lamp harder.

An outline of arms, legs, torso, and a mouth formed through gleaming droplets just beyond the light. It brutally clenched the screaming woman's face, pulling her back towards the mirror.

Her tearful face and convulsing body disappeared into the dark void beyond his lamp's light, second by second.

Fuck! Vern's body, however, worked faster than his brain for once, and he leaped forward almost instantly, gripping the woman's flailing wrist.

AGHHH! She clutched back with a ferocious grip that was followed by a terrifying wail from the entity.

Dropping the lamp, his other hand clutched at the wall's edge while the right one did its darndest to pull the woman back out.

"Cedric, how long!?"

"Almost there..."

Vern dared not let go as the brown glow intensified. However, right that instant, something completely unexpected transpired, and his breath caught in his throat.

The drenched arms that held onto the woman suddenly switched targets, and an uncanny force gripped his left leg.

He lost his balance and the grip on the woman, and only the arm holding onto the wall saved him from instant doom. His gaze darted frantically as things started slipping out of control.

"Cedric, what the hell!?" he cried out, his head almost hitting the floor.

"It's suddenly become more powerful out of the blue. I need a few more seconds! What did you do!?"

Fuck! I didn't do shit! he cursed under his breath as he tried to focus on his perception.

EHHHHHHHHHH

The drenched entity gave another bloodcurdling screech and pulled at him harder. The bone of his leg felt like it was about to be ground down to powder while the tendons of his arm were ready to unravel any instant.

A viscous liquid seeped inside his skin, and the mere contact sent a cold shiver racing through him. But the adrenaline was real, and he kicked the entity with his other leg, shouting, "Leave me the fuck alone!"

Gritting his teeth, he focused on the mirror on the wall in his perception and soon executed a mental command—

CRACK

The whole surface of the mirror exploded in a burst of particles, and Vern stared at it with a hopeful look, only for the force yanking him to suddenly turn sharper.

It didn't work! And he quickly realized the problem, too. Not all of the glass had shattered.

That entity was already halfway inside the mirror, and being invisible to his perception, that part of the mirror wasn't destabilized at all.

DAMN!

It continued to pull him harder with another screech, going as far as to bring out another hand from inside the mirror to pull on his right leg.

SCREEEEEEECHHH

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

He shoved his other flailing arm into the holster and pulled out the vapor blaster. Aiming it toward his assailant, he shot it point blank…

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

BANGG

BANG

BANG

BANG

The entity squealed louder with every hit, but its grip only seemed to grow tenser. Liquid burst out of the entity's body, but it barely helped the situation.

The vapor chamber glowed—steam bursting out of it. It was overheating. These were heated shots, after all.

If only I had mastered duality, he thought, envisioning how differently the battle would have unfolded. That destabilized purple edge would've easily severed the monstrous arms that were inexorably dragging him closer to doom.

But the intense pain wracking his body caused him to cut off this line of thought. There was no point in thinking about what-ifs right now.

He couldn't have mastered the weapon, no matter what. Not even if he'd infused the old blood already.

However, before the vapor chamber could cool down for another barrage of shots—

Thud

The entity let go of him for a second, and in the moment, his body relaxed involuntarily, but the next instant, it pulled him again, harder than ever.

The unexpected jerk messed with his grip, and the force behind him didn't miss the chance—dragging him towards the mirror. "Ahh!" he roared, barely getting the arm in place to cushion his head's fall.

He scratched at the floor, trying to get a hold of anything to stop the momentum. Unfortunately for him, it had nothing to perch on.

The woman had retreated all the way to the back of the room—looking at the ground vacantly, her arms holding onto her head as her body trembled violently.

She was in no condition to help him, and Cedric was completely focused on the pendant. Why the hell did the brown light still not cleanse this monstrosity?

Fuck! He continued to flail around, but his body didn't have the strength to extricate himself directly.

For some reason, however, he felt a weird sense of discordance within his Thought Space like before, and he didn't understand it. What the fuck did it even mean?

But he knew one thing for sure. It's nothing that can help me right now! So he threw it out of his mind and racked his brains for a solution.

What else can I do?!

His mind flitted past all the myriads of objects in his perception, and he soon had an insane idea.

He focused on the wall behind the mirror. Even though it was dark for his eyes, he extrapolated the shades of objects according to the layout of the previous house.

With a ferocious look, he took the fulcrums of the wall above the entity and destabilized the damned things.

Thud

CRUMBLE

CRRRASHH

Furniture, windowsill, mirror frame, everything came crashing down, exploding into chunks that fell all around him.

It didn't crumble the whole house, but a big chunk of the wall and ceiling did—some of the debris hitting the entity straight in its extended torso.

And there, for the briefest of moments, the grip on his legs came loose.

But that was all he needed.

YES!

He kicked hard at the entity and extricated his legs, rolling out of its immediate range and falling debris.

However, his perception depicted a horrifying future. The entity that was darker than black in his shades of gray was already pouncing back at him—its claws reaching out for him.

Vern debated going ahead and destabilizing everything around him.

That won't do! he hissed. Doing so might very well destroy the whole house. He would be buried in the rubble alongside everything else.

Desperate, he looked towards Cedric, and unbelievably, the man was rushing towards him, book in one hand and a pendant in the other.

Is this… His thoughts were cut short, and a thunderclap went off in his mind, followed by the flare of the brown light.

EAAAAAHHHHHHH

The terrifying entity squealed, and all Vern saw in his perception were ropes constricting around the imperceptible mass of darkness, searing through its mass at a terrifying pace.

Vern backed away, his heart thumping madly. The drenched outline being corroded away by the brown light, became a little clearer.

His leg throbbed with pain, and his heart rammed into his chest faster than a carriage as he tried to come to terms with what had just happened. That was too close!

From the half-torn parts he could make out, it was…a humanoid, except it had an utterly pale flesh, drenched in something like water—but thicker.

Its burning eye-sockets were pure black, yet the features on the face were otherwise very…human.

One deep breath after another, Vern stared at the horrifying entity disintegrating into nothingness as he massaged his shin and pulled out small chunks of glass stuck on his coat.

The last minute or so played in his mind on a loop, the possibilities sending him into a panic. What would have happened if that entity managed to drag him back into the mirror?

Would he have turned into one of them? He shuddered at the mere thought.

After a few more seconds, the brown light died down. Correcting the angle of his hat, Cedric dusted his coat and turned towards Vern with sharp eyes.

"You need to calm down, kid! Don't ever jump in like that without a plan. I'd be nothing but bones if Prince found out I let you commit suicide on your very first mission."

Vern opened his mouth to speak but swallowed his words right after.

He knew.

It was his fault for jumping in like that. Still, what else was he supposed to do? That woman would've surely been dragged back into the mirror if he hadn't done anything.

Cedric had a point, but things weren't as black and white as they seemed in this situation. When Vern came in, Cedric didn't even try to help the woman physically.

If she were to be dragged in, he would have said something along the lines of, 'We have to try again and capture it later.' But she'd be dead! Why bother at all, then?

The middle-aged scholar shook his head after a while and asked, "Can you get up, or do you need to rest?" He then glanced at his book for a second before adding with a distressed look, "There's at least nine more of these in other houses."

"We need to do something about them right now. If we dally for too long, people will keep turning."

Nine more!?

Pushing himself off the ground, Vern countered, "Didn't you say we were done back in that first house?"

Cedric walked towards the woman and huffed, "Well, you saw what I saw. We cleansed everything, didn't we? I would have divined it to be sure, but I never had the chance. It went right back on offensive the moment it escaped."

"…"

Vern slowly nodded. That was indeed the case. They barely had any time before the screams rang throughout the neighborhood.

"Anyways, I just checked. There were nine a minute ago, but their numbers might grow if we let them snatch any more people."

Grabbing his lamp again, Vern asked with a frown, "Are all of them as powerful as these two?"

Cedric shook his head, "No. I think they have a shared representation. We took care of most of it in the first confrontation, but then it bolstered itself from the other people it consumed while we were stuck here."

Shared representation? Things started to make more and more sense. Still, why didn't it share that representation until Vern was in its grasp?

.

.

.

"Is that how it suddenly became more powerful?" Vern asked.

Cedric's long hat tail bobbed up and down as he gestured at the woman to get out before saying to him, "Seems like it."

Vern was speechless. Nine people had died. Just like that.

Would have been ten if I hadn't pulled her back, he thought, his eyes falling on the woman. And as if noticing his gaze, the woman stood up and rushed right towards Vern, bursting into tears.

Out of the blue, she prostrated on the ground and exclaimed, "Thank you very much, mister!"

She joined her hands in prayer and rubbed her head on the ground, "You…you almost died saving me, mister. It's my…my fault. Thank you. Thank you."

"Please, good sir, I owe you my life, but I—I ran away. Sir, I don't know what happened. I—I was scared. I apologize. I am sorry. I thank you. I am sorry."

Vern stared at her dumbfounded, not sure how to handle this. His mind was already juggling so many things it failed to catch up with her words for a while.

When he came to, he swooped down and stopped the woman. She was rubbing her head on the floor full of chunks of glass. That wasn't good.

He was unsure of how he felt about the process of saving her, but he knew this was the right outcome.

So, he stood her up and guided her towards the exit, replying, "It's…okay. It's not your fault, really. You're the victim here, so don't blame yourself."

That's what he actually felt, too.

Most people might permanently be traumatized after such an experience. The fact that she was already back in her senses was the real shocker here.

Yes, he'd felt a little betrayed in the heat of the moment that she had run away instead of helping him, but that was his desperation speaking. How could a normal civilian have the mind to handle that?

Dropping the tearful woman outside her house, he warned her to not go back in and followed Cedric.

The man seemed to know exactly where these entities were.

They rushed towards 3-07 on the other side of the street, wading through the crowd that had broken the door but dared not go in.

The throng of people parted at Vern and Cedric's arrival, their eyes fearful and terrified.

Vern ignored them and followed Cedric into this house with an identical interior, the darkness quickly enveloping them.

But this time, Cedric was preparing beforehand. The pendant already radiated with a brown glow.

The scream from this house had long died down, but the fact that the forced darkness still lingered meant that the entity hadn't left just yet.

Vern decided to remain composed this time, no matter what. He couldn't save everyone, especially not when it had been this long. He had to balance the risks to some degree.

A part of him wanted nothing to do with any of this, but even he understood this was life and death for the ones living here.

Maybe Cedric could end this without him, but who was to say the man wouldn't let another dozen die before he could wrap things up?

Ughh! He gritted his teeth and walked on. This was more than just about himself right now, and the balance had yet to tip over to an impossible degree.

Also, this entity shouldn't be as powerful as the previous two. They had already culled their representation twice, so it should be running on fumes right now.

The thought put him further at ease.

TAP

TAP

This time, Cedric headed towards the kitchen instead of the main hall. Vern's stomach churned, but he continued anyway.

But then, the scholar suddenly halted in his steps, and Vern followed suit. Right as he opened his mouth to ask why, he noticed the problem.

The darkness enveloping them was fading away rapidly, and soon, the uncanny chill was completely gone, too.

Cedric frowned and peeked into the kitchen. There was nothing inside. Except for a few scratch marks on the floor, everything seemed normal.

After a dozen seconds, Vern asked the obvious, "Did it…escape?"

Cedric flipped the page of his book and wrote, 'There's another mirror spirit in 3-01.'

Vern peeked at the statement with puzzlement. Wasn't 3-01 the first house we cleansed? How could it be—

But soon, the room number morphed and settled into '3-04.'

"Shit!" cried Cedric, "There was no spirit in that house a couple minutes ago. It fled there instead—"

However, before the man could even finish his conjecture, a scream confirmed it, "PAPA!!"