"When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil."
— Max Lerner
***
Adam had learnt a bit about the stars, about where the brightest ones twinkled in the night sky. About the tales, folklore behind the most common constellations.
Placing a foot on the elevated platform beneath the back door, Adam looked back at the starry sky.
"That... isn't either the northern or the southern hemisphere."
If any single shred of uncertainty about this place was left in his mind, it was blown away like a dry leaf in the wind.
Even if the world turns to rubble, the one thing that remains constant is the starry sky. It was the anchor, the cornerstone of our species.
When we were nothing but a species of slightly more cognitively advanced mammals than others, the stars were our compass and guides; they never failed to lead us to our sanctuaries.
But if the starry sky failed you, then you were screwed... totally screwed.
'haah'
Adam let out a tired exhale, turned around and pushed the door to this damn place open.
The courtyard was clearly visible from here, as were the entrance doors ahead.
The floor creaked as he stepped forward on the floorboard.
He had two choices as of now, one was to remain outside this wretched place; unfortunately, the dark things just ahead of the boundary walls gave him the creeps, who knew when they would change their minds and decide to have an Adam-kabab.
That would be a worse way to die than getting shot, at least dying by a bullet didn't take that long, but those things might just have the mind of a bear that eats half an alive salmon while letting the other half rot away. He wanted none of that. The other option was to hide or at least find some clues inside this place.
From the looks of it, he wasn't going to get out of this place any time soon. Because the very concept of 'time' seemed to have fallen flat on its face like a toddler at this weird place.
The scribbles on the parchment from earlier were looking more and more truthful by the minute. After all, what else would explain the things present here?
But still, he didn't believe in them entirely. The ending of those words was more harrowing than he dared to imagine.
The words had implied that he'd have to kill himself to escape from this.... world?
The survival instinct buried deep within his marrow and covering his existence itself was in vehement opposition to that action.
After all, which healthy and perfectly sane living being would go against their survival instinct?
He grimaced and scowled slightly with a bitter face.
'I can't bank on those words... even if they're true in the end. I don't have nine lives like a damn cat. One wrong step and it's over for me.'
He couldn't come to terms with those words, even if a deity itself had written them.
His face seemed to darken a little, and a chilling gleam appeared in his eyes.
'If nothing works... and it's do or die anyways... I'll at least take one of those damn things with me straight to hell.'
He was a very, very vindictive person. He never forgot his grievances and never forgave those who wronged him.
Moving through the unchecked rooms from earlier, he mumbled quietly. "How in the hell am I going to kill a wraith?"
This question slumped him. After all, he hadn't tried ghostbusting before.
In the dead of the night, his footsteps were the only thing echoing hollowly in the place. The scenes inside the rooms were the same as earlier, just more broken and tattered stuff.
After arriving at the last room, he pushed it open. This one was the only one with double doors, unlike the other rooms.
Entering inside, a pungent smell wafted to his nose, which made him cover his nose while flinching back.
The smell was horrendous. From his memories, it smelled like rancid fish... or at least something organic?
He wanted to puke after inhaling some of the putrid smell.
Hurriedly putting some distance from the room, he tried peeking from the outside to see what caused the smell.
After a few seconds had passed and the smell had lessened a bit, he stepped inside while still pinching his nose and frowning.
"Damn this place... what the fu*k is it now?"
Getting a good look at the culprit, he stopped halfway through the path.
Some pieces of rotten flesh were scattered inside the washbasin of a kitchen; it appeared that someone had attempted to make a witch potion but had stopped halfway.
The flesh smelled rancid due to some of them being submerged in water, where some bugs and maggots were crawling on them.
He was ready to chicken out of this room at any moment.
Fortunately, everything that should have been dead was dead. And nothing was trying to reanimate itself and jump his a*s.
Wiping a drop of sweat from his face, he looked around for any knives or sharp objects.
Opening up a tattered drawer, his heart nearly jumped out of his mouth due to excitement. Knives... knives were occupying the entire drawer; there was a variety of them, even.
He didn't even know so many varieties of knives even existed.
Picking up the most familiar ones, a pair of huge a*s cleavers, he grinned from ear to ear.
"Well, at least I can slash sh*t now."
He also picked up some other knives, which were a bit smaller and stuffed them into his bathrobes.
As his weary mind was getting relaxed due to the now-acquired weapons, a shrill scream came from the upper floors, his body jerked back, and his smile instantly dropped.
'Goddamnit... just when something was going my way...'
He groaned internally while his mind sharpened and his body began heating up due to the spike of adrenaline.
'Fu*k my life...'
Lamenting is shit*y luck. He peeked outside and looked at the upper floors.
His eyes widened as he saw the same scene of a white foggy figure getting torn apart behind a window and eaten by some strange... thing.
The thing had no distinguishing feature and was entirely grey, its open maw laced with needle-pointed teeth, which were the only thing that caught his attention in earnest because the rest of its face was nothing but a jungle of tangled hair growing from every skin pore and orifice.
It looked like someone had tried mixing a pig, a werewolf and an eldritch abomination.
That made him do a double-take, then his spine straightened as the thing snapped its head to him and widened its maw.
.
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[A/N]
Gimme comments people
P.S.- I might not upload till Monday because I'm on a trip, let's see if I can write on my mobile; If I can, well... good for you guys.
Plz 🥺🥺