While listening to the sounds outside the door, Isaac continued to squint and keep an eye on the window.
The face outside the window just disappeared; I wonder when it will reappear. The sound in the hallway didn't come again after that one time... Oh, it's back.
And this time, the sound came right next to the door with a creak.
Isaac waited a moment, but the sound didn't ring a third time, which wasn't a good sign.
Rather than the thing making two noises and then tiptoeing away, he felt that, judging from the location where the sound had just come from, the unknown thing outside the door seemed to be standing still at the doorway.
Isaac held his breath. Whether these two groups were strangers, adversaries, or even allies, it wasn't a good thing for him.
They all seem to be targeting him. If he is attacked from both sides, he will be surrounded and trapped with all the doors and windows blocked, leaving him no way to escape.
Isaac gripped the revolver, contemplating whether to strike first and take care of the one by the window, whose location had already been revealed.
But he wasn't sure what the gunshot would attract, and even with the Holy Silver bullets, if he failed to kill the other party, the trouble would be even greater. At the same time, the thing outside the door might also react in a way that was detrimental to him.
"They were ambushed and killed in the middle of the night."
Carlo's voice rang out, tinged with a hint of enjoying the spectacle.
Isaac: "..."
"Let me analyze this. The thing outside the window won't come in for now; it's checking your status and will take its time. As for the one outside the door... we still don't know what it is. Perhaps we could try to sense it directly."
How do I sense it? Sensing something standing still through a door? I'm not at that level yet... Isaac was thinking when he heard Carlo say, " Isaac Lessing, can you directly sense what the thing that just made a sound outside the door looks like? Check value 10, Spirit Mediumship bonus 15, final value 25."
The phantom of the dice appeared in the dim light: 58, check failed.
" Asa, you're not reliable! Why did you let us down at such a crucial moment?"
Isaac: "..."
To be able to sense what's outside through a door panel—even with Spirit Mediumship ability score of 15, that's asking too much of him.
"Never mind, let me use this angle to see what's by the window and outside the door."
What kind of trick is this, using a camera angle trick...? Isaac can only wait for the result.
A moment later, Carlo's voice rang out again. "Good news and bad news, which do you want to hear first?"
Isaac: "..."
"Oh, it's hard to answer you since you're pretending to be asleep. Well, we can't wake someone who's pretending to be asleep, so I'll just say it directly."
"The good news is that although the one outside the window looks a bit creepy, it's just a zombie driven by a Foul Spirit. Its combat power is probably even weaker than Shroud-Wrapped Walking Corpse. It just has a special ability: its arms and legs are exceptionally long, like a spider. Let's call it Spider-Man."
"The bad news is, there's a wall in the way, so we can't see what that thing in the hallway is."
Since that thing outside the window isn't very powerful, it probably isn't after me...
The thought had barely crossed Isaac's mind when Carlo's voice rang out again, "Another piece of bad news, that thing outside is about to come in."
Isaac felt a chill and looked out the window.
This time, it wasn't half a face that reached up, but a slender arm. The arm swayed and grabbed the window frame.
Then, the head slowly emerged from below the windowsill. It had no hair, flat features, and only two holes at the nose.
Under Isaac's watchful gaze, it slowly climbed up the window, its movements slow and seemingly unwilling to make a sound.
As the figure was fully exposed on the windowsill, it could be seen that it was naked, had no discernible gender characteristics, had grayish-white skin, and its limbs were disproportionately long and thin, with arms and legs that were attached to the human body in a way that resembled spider legs.
After climbing onto the windowsill, it didn't jump down immediately. Instead, it lowered its head, curled up into a ball, and squatted on the windowsill, observing the situation inside the room. Its head slowly tilted to the left and then to the right.
It released one hand from the window frame, slid down the windowsill, and landed on the wooden floor. Its knees were bent, its forearms almost touching the ground, and its hands and feet alternated on the floor. Although it was covered in a human body, it looked like... a spider?
Just then, a bang came from the direction of the door. Something slammed into the door panel, causing it to tremble and creak.
The worst had happened; both sides launched an attack simultaneously. Isaac no longer hesitated, sat up abruptly, and pointed his revolver toward the windowsill.
But before he fired, he noticed something and stopped himself from pulling the trigger.
The thing on the windowsill didn't pounce on him; it grabbed his left wrist with its right hand and then did something Isaac couldn't understand at all.
With a snap of his right hand, his left hand was forcibly broken off at the wrist.
What... what does this mean? Isaac was stunned by this move, which resulted in significant self-inflicted damage before even harming the enemy.
Then he was attacked with the severed hand; the Spider-Man threw the severed hand towards Isaac.
Isaac immediately rolled off the bed, the severed hand flying past him and landing on the bed.
At first, its five fingers were still scratching at the sheets, but soon, the severed hand stopped moving.
After staging such a textbook example of "cutting off one's own arm," the Spider-Man turned to escape to the window, but the door was smashed open at the same moment.
Isaac looked quickly and saw a completely black humanoid figure standing in the doorway, almost as tall as the door frame, with exposed skin in a dark gray-black tone.
It had a burlap sack over its head, just like the robbers Isaac and Carlo had played before, but the sack was tied around its neck with a rope, and it held a giant axe in its right hand.
Isaac had seen this image in the church's religious picture books—a typical ancient executioner.
The executioner burst into the room, the wooden floorboards groaning beneath his feet, but he didn't even glance at Isaac. From the moment he entered, he had only one target: the windowsill.
The Spider-Man on the windowsill had already climbed back to the window. It was incredibly fast, gripping the window frame with one hand, and its body was already mostly sticking out.
But without an arm, his movements were somewhat hindered. The executioner grabbed his leg and forcibly pulled Spider-Man back from the window, slamming him to the floor.
Spider-Man struggled, trying to prop himself up, but the executioner had already raised his axe and was about to chop down on his torso.
Thump--
Spider-Man's limbs twitched, and the executioner pulled out his axe, striking him a second time right in the center of his chest.
Isaac: "..."
What's going on?