The thud grew louder as the creature on the other side slammed its fists against the wooden surface. Each strike clips away at the hinges, slowly weakening it. Claude, who stood at the other end of the room, opposite the door, questioned his odds. Would the knife he searched the entire kitchen for be enough to take the demon down? Would the makeshift pepper spray he crafted be effective?
Although he had a very sharp and durable weapon in his hands, its short blade meant he would have to get close to the demon to use it. As for the pepper spray, he wasn't even sure it would be effective at blinding the creature. It was just hot sauce inside a small glass cup, after all. It was never meant to be thrown at someone's face, let alone a creature from another dimension.
As the seeds of doubt sown in his heart grew and blossomed, that familiar feeling of fear that once nearly held him back from entering the house crept back up. It moved through his spine, sending shivers along the way, before reaching his mind. As it took over, his muscles stiffened and froze, while his lungs gasped for more air.
However, instead of paralyzing Claude with a dozen or more horrible futures where he is mauled to death by a demon, it gave him some advice to follow, to help him survive. It tells Claude to hide somewhere, to wait until the creature reveals itself, and then strike. If the demons are as strong as he thinks they are, he will have to catch them by surprise if he wants to win.
Claude looks around the room, trying to find a spot. He walks and hides behind a pillar, built just next to the kitchen countertop, separating the section from the dining room. It was the only hiding place that could cover his entire body, all while giving him room to maneuver and strike at a moment's notice. Once he got into place, he patiently waited for the door to break down.
It didn't take long for the door to break off its hinges, sending bits of wood flying into the room. The wooden door quickly falls down and hits the tile floor with an earsplitting thud, sending an echo throughout the entire room. Claude's ears then pick up a series of quiet thumping noises, stepping on a wooden surface.
He leans his head over the pillar ever so slightly to take a glance at the creature. His gaze falls on a towering blue figure, approximately 7 feet in height. It stood atop the wooden door it had broken down while scanning the room with its bulging yellow eyes. Thanks to its bare attire, consisting only of a brown rag covering its crotch, Claude was able to make out the unique features and structure of its body.
It had a very muscular frame, denser than any bodybuilder on steroids Claude had seen. From afar, it almost looked as if its body was wrapped around in thin blue veins of flesh and muscle. Its hands, consisting of only 4 fingers, had short, pointy claws. Meanwhile, its face, although very human in shape and form, had striking animalistic qualities to it that pushed it over to the uncanny valley.
Razor-sharp teeth emerged from its mouth, alongside two short tusks from the bottom of its mouth. Its ears and nose, both long and pointy, had some kind of piercing attached. All these attributes came together to create this vile and horrific beast.
Now that the demon is inside the room, Claude acts without a moment's hesitation. He jumps out of his hiding spot and throws the glass vial filled with spice straight at the beast's face. As the cup stops to kiss its face, the fragile glass breaks, fragmenting into a thousand little shards.
These little pieces of glass pierce its large eyes, causing it to bleed red and making it go blind. Furthermore, the spicy little hot sauce that once resided inside the glass cup seeps down the surface of its eyes and face, causing an immense burning sensation it had never felt before. The demon shrieks out in pain.
SCREECH!
As it attempts to get the pieces of glass off its face, it drops the long spear it carried by its side. Now that the creature was disarmed, Claude sensed the perfect opportunity to strike. Claude once again tightens his grip on the knife before lunging forward at the beast, head-on.
He moves fast, running across the entire dining room in a matter of seconds before sinking his blade deep in the blue demon's chest. The razor edge effortlessly moves through its flesh like butter before finally meeting and puncturing its heart.
Then, just as soon as he stabbed it in the chest, he tried to pull the blade out. However, to his surprise, he finds the Damascus knife stuck in between the demon's flesh as the wound begins to harden. Thinking on his feet, he lets go of the knife and picks up the spear the demon dropped beside itself. He then quickly distances himself from the creature.
The demon, fuming with rage at Claude, who dared to attack a beast as magnificent as itself, struck back. It swiftly pulls the knife out of its chest and tries to throw it straight back at Claude. However, as its eyes were still covered in a concoction of hot sauce and its own blood, it missed its target by a mile. Claude, taking advantage of the demon's blindness, secures the hemp bag with the glass cups.
"Missed me, haha!" he then yells, taunting the demon to come closer. He then throws the spear to the side, signaling to it that he was unarmed. Despite speaking in an alien language, the blue demon appears to understand what Claude was saying.
It responds with a wide grin, followed by a mighty roar. It trudged forward and began lunging towards Claude, thirsting for revenge. Although slow, it makes its way through the room, throwing away any piece of furniture in its way.
As it walked towards him, Claude grabbed multiple glass cups from the bag before throwing them at the demon. However, instead of hitting it in the face, he aims for the feet. As the floor becomes littered with dozens of sharp glass fragments everywhere, it tears through the demon's skin further, significantly immobilizing it.
Taking advantage of the fact that he had shoes on, he runs back to reclaim the spear before lunging forward at the demon once again. As it was distracted by the new wounds inflicted on its feet, he mustered all his strength and struck the spear straight into the back of the demon's head.
The tip slices and drills through flesh and bone in one swoop, reaching the other side, which is its face. Blood immediately spewed out and onto the floor, while the demon suddenly froze in place. Claude lets go of the spear, allowing the demon to go limp and fall on its face. It crashes to the floor with a thud before leaving the room in an eerie silence.
For a moment, he looks down at his hands and chest, now slightly covered with the demon's thick red blood, oozing that pungent and repulsive miasma of urine and tobacco. He had miraculously survived without any injuries, all while killing a beast 8 inches taller than him.
Claude then glances at the decomposing body of the muscular blue demon. The spear was stuck in the middle of the face of the creature, creating a little wall between its two eye sockets. Not that it had much of a face anyway.
Its facial features were distorted by the enormous spear wounds, while its two yellow eyeballs bulged out and fell to the floor. Meanwhile, its face and chest wounds continued to pour out blood like a crimson river.
For a moment, Claude frowned as he shot a look of disgust at the demon's revolting corpse. A city-dwelling New Yorker like him had never seen such an ungodly sight with his bare eyes before. It nearly brought his lunch out of his stomach.
But then, slowly, his disgust washes away, replaced with a widening smile on his face. His mind was flooded with a rising wave of bliss, joy, and a sense of accomplishment. It invigorated his senses. And it sent a blast of energy throughout his entire body.
"Hahahaha... Hahahaha!" A sudden chuckle exits his mouth as the wonderful sensation grows stronger by the second. For Claude, it felt as if he had done something meaningful for the first time in his life. Nothing in his 25 years of pitiful existence had come close to this very moment. He felt alive.
Unfortunately for him, the moment was cut short by the sounds of more footsteps echoing throughout the hallway. Claude quickly pulls out the spear from the demon's head and points it towards the open doorway. His smile disappears, reforming into a more stoic gaze.