The Origin Warden

Chapter 5 : Silent Night Phantom

Somehow a grotesque mouth with red lips appeared beneath the mirror. The mouth opened itself, revealing broken and decayed teeth, and spoke in an annoying and flattering voice.

“Hellooo… hello there dear, what an honor, truly an honor to see you up close… my god, are you a cat? Yes, of course you are a cat, but not just any cat, no no… you are a masterpiece, a beautiful disaster, a magnificent disaster… look at yourself, those eyes… ah those eyes! They shine, they glow, as if two stars fell and decided to live inside your face… do you know?. If beauty had a voice it would be screaming your name right now…and those teeth! What amazing teeth, sharp, elegant, terrifying… I mean magnificent, yes magnificent! The other cats… or creatures, or whatever they are… must be jealous of you, no, they hate you, yes yes, they hate you because you are more beautiful than them… and that is natural, very natural…ah, and I love this color… this blackness, deep, mysterious, as if night swallowed all the stars and kept them for itself… has anyone ever told you how special you are? No? What a shame… humans truly have no taste…come closer, let me see you more clearly, yes yes… don’t be shy, I don’t bite… usually…”

The monster roared at the mirror or rather at its reflection. Sticky saliva dripped onto the mirror and some into the mouth cavity making it cough. It raised its paw and brought it down revealing its long sharp silver claws with the intention of destroying it.

While pouring its anger onto the mirror that would not stop talking, the monster forgot about its prey for a moment.

Suddenly the monster felt the resistance coming from the prey it restrained with its tentacles stop. It raised its head shifting its attention away from the mirror but at the same moment Jack who had gotten back onto his feet approached the monster.

With a dark ugly expression on his face he jumped toward the monster holding the bone with both hands and forcefully drove the sharp end of the bone into the cavity of the monster’s right eye.

“I always hated these damned eyes”

He shouted angrily venting his emotions while forcefully pushing deeper into the cavity intending to reach the brain.

The monster released a thunderous terrifying scream so loud that Jack felt pain in his ears but it was overshadowed by the pain coming from his thigh. The monster’s claws had pierced his flesh leaving three deep scratches enough to expose the white bone.

Jack let out a wailing scream at the top of his lungs. The pain coming from his leg was unbearable. Fortunately adrenaline played a role in preventing him from losing his composure.

The monster released an enraged roar and began thrashing violently trying to get rid of its affliction. It even bit hard onto Jack’s waist but fortunately the armor protected the area.

“Aagh. You bastard. Just die already”

Jack shouted through gritted teeth while trying with all his strength to push the bone deeper but the strength of his arms was weak especially with those tentacles wrapping around his arms.

The monster slammed him into the wall forcefully crashing him against the hard concrete so hard that Jack lost consciousness for a fraction of a second. His hands loosened from the bone seemingly surrendering to his grim fate.

The memories of his short life collapsed before his eyes like a fast forwarded video tape.

' Is this my life, it’s empty and meaningless. More than 20 years of life and my greatest achievement is buying a second hand phone. Amazing, even my dreams were trivial. While others strive to become millionaires my dream was simple. A house neither small nor large and marry a wife who is neither very beautiful nor extremely ugly. No that wasn’t my first dream. My first dream was treating my mother’s chronic illness...

No wonder that teacher said I would never achieve anything in my life. A real fortune teller who predicted my miserable life when I was 11 '

“But no... no...”

“No. I... refuse... to die here”

These words came out of his mouth with extreme difficulty. His eyes hardened with hatred.

Then with a sudden movement he slammed his forehead against the bone protruding from the monster’s eye, then once again pulled his head back and struck.

Again and again and again until his face became covered in blood. His own blood.

After slight resistance the monster released a sorrowful whine before collapsing onto its stomach. Life disappeared from its remaining eye. The tentacles holding Jack’s arms lost their strength and hung lifelessly though they still glowed with blue light.

Jack fell with it onto his knees into a pool of blood mixed from both the monster’s blood and his own.

[ You have killed a level 47 rooted creature : Silent Night Phantom ]

[ .... ]

[ .... ]

He did not stop even with the system voice sounding in his mind and the familiar sensation of something entering deep into his body. He thought it was only a hallucination to make him surrender. He kept stabbing whatever was before him as if his life depended on it.

But he was not conscious enough to realize he was stabbing empty air.

What awakened him from this state was the appearance of dark red light coming from the monster’s corpse.

Jack stared with dazed eyes and a confused expression on his blood covered face as blood dripped from his chin onto the ground.

The red light gathered above the giant cat’s corpse in the form of two dark red energy spheres floating calmly while ignoring the laws of physics.

Instinctively he raised both his hands together with difficulty and grabbed the two spheres then crushed them. They transformed into light particles and entered his body.

Jack was in an extremely critical state, not only because of the huge amount of blood from the deep wound left by the monster but also because of the dizziness caused by the concussion he suffered from smashing the bone with his forehead.

At this time a crowd of zombies gathered in front of the police station limping clumsily. They bumped into one another and fell to the ground and got trampled by their companions.

The zombies did not possess the ability to see at night but in exchange for this weakness their sense of hearing was much stronger.

And the noise made by both the monster and Jack was loud enough to alert every zombie nearby and their number was in the dozens.

' Fuck!! '

' Misfortunes never come singly '

Jack cursed in his mind with anger and resentment. The annoying raspy sounds coming from the zombie crowd reached his ears. When he raised his head he saw dozens of crimson red eyes glowing in the darkness.

' Damn it. I’m not in good condition to fight them. I can’t even feel my legs anymore. Was everything before this useless '

He released a hollow laugh that ended in a sharp cough. The expression of despair on his face deepened as he watched the zombie crowd approach.

Suddenly he remembered the reason for his current predicament, not the monster, of course the monster was the main reason but Jack had convinced it to leave if not for... that damned sound that provoked the monster.

When Jack earlier saw some zombie corpses in front of the station entrance and also the closed door he assumed someone had visited the place and his second guess was that there was already one or more people inside.

He turned his head with difficulty to look behind him over his shoulder into the depths of the hallway and opened his mouth saying in the loudest voice he could manage in his current state.

“Hey you... you there... save me, you are the reason for my predicament. Quickly close the door just don’t let the zombies enter or you too will be in danger...”

He fell silent for a moment before weakly adding,

“...please”

That was the last word to leave his mouth before he collapsed unconscious onto the monster’s corpse due to losing too much blood, and as if the items were supported by his consciousness, the moment he lost consciousness both the mirror and the armor transformed into small green lights and rushed into his body.