>>5448110
>>5448110
>>5448110
Link to the first thread for anyone interested in following along. You're currently doing your best to survive. You have a feeling that creature following you is doing its best to make sure you don't.

>>5499822
>You guess you'll do a once around of the house and see if any of the doors or windows give. It'll take some time, but... well, you don't think you'll be caught up with any time soon.
>>You could always just head down the street and enter the furthest house from here. Give you a bit of distance from the thing.

>>5499822
>You guess you'll do a once around of the house and see if any of the doors or windows give. It'll take some time, but... well, you don't think you'll be caught up with any time soon.
>There are half a dozen other houses to examine, and you're sure one of them is unlocked... probably. You'll just need to look hard enough while keeping a distance from your new stalker.

Rolled 12, 6, 18, 11, 10 = 57 (5d25)

So that I don't have to diagram out every house on this street, I'm just gonna go with an average of two doors and three windows on the ground floor of a house on this street.
I'll say each has a 1/25 chance of being open, so a 25 means something is unlocked and you can get into a home without breaking in.

Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>5499942
>>5500397
A 1 means you make your way to the opposite end of the street and then can start looking for (or make your own way in), a 2 means you start looking house by house.

Rolled 14, 6, 1 = 21 (3d25)

And finally, let's assume you wind up at the back end of the house with two windows and a door you can quickly check without spending much time.

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>>5499942>>5500397
You guess you may as well stick around and check. The thing is moving slow enough to give you some leeway, and if you're actually able to find a way in that you don't have to create by force then you can, well, lock it behind you. Not mentioning the fact that while you're certainly not covering your tracks very well, that if you found a clean way in you, at the very least, wouldn't be leaving behind another broken window screaming "HERE I AM, COME GET ME".

With those hopeful thoughts, you go to check every door and window you can reach from the ground. Without exception, they're locked. You mean, of course they are- who would just leave their doors unlocked while they were sleeping, so that anyone could get in? You certainly wouldn't. You suppose you're just lucky that the amount of fences and hedges are minimal in this neighborhood. Maybe your paranoid uncle putting up fences and hedges and a gate made everyone else not want their yards to look like his.

From there you run around the side of the house and past the next two, before turning into their backyard once again and moving through there. You haven't seen that creature in a while, and while you guess that's a good thing, it does make you a bit uneasy. You unconsciously slow your speed back down to a walk, having gotten winded by... well, everything. You wish you could just sit down for a few minutes, but you have a feeling that won't really make you feel much better. After you're done with this you really want to sleep through your orientation... assuming it's not already happening? You're not particularly sure how time here is relative to time elsewhere- if you're in another world and the orientation is happening right now in some other dimension, if this is some global apocalypse and they're overwhelmed with similar horrors, or what.

Around the time you hit the end of the street, you glance behind you. The thing's back in view again, but you can't make it out very well with the light fog over everything- it's a few yards away, and only seeming to get further away. You make a conscious decision to turn to the right, into the side yard of the last house on the street and out of the thing's line of sight. Then you try a couple windows and a door. All locked, unsurprisingly.

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>>5500508
As you try to figure out what to do next, you spare a glance at the device you were left with. 4 hours, 42 minutes remain. ...Jesus, that long? You were hoping you'd fought that thing for longer than... well, it was probably a few minutes. Anyways, what to do next, what to do next...
>You have a pretty big lead over what's behind you, so it shouldn't hurt to start looking for open entrances into a house, starting with this one and then heading across the street. Maybe you'll get lucky. Probably not, but hey- maybe you will.
>The easiest method at this point just seems to be to break another window open. You need something to keep you warm, you need a chance to find more weapons and medical supplies, and you need a mirror you can reference while you treat your wounds. Whether or not it broadcasts your location you need to get into this house.
>Well, you're close to that massive wall of fog again. It gives you the creeps, but maybe you could just hide in there?
>You can see that the house across the street has a shed, and it looks like the door is open. You don't expect that there will be anything to help warm you in there but, well, at least it will be out of the open.
>Write-in

>>5500510
>>The easiest method at this point just seems to be to break another window open. You need something to keep you warm, you need a chance to find more weapons and medical supplies, and you need a mirror you can reference while you treat your wounds. Whether or not it broadcasts your location you need to get into this house.

>>5500510
>The easiest method at this point just seems to be to break another window open. You need something to keep you warm, you need a chance to find more weapons and medical supplies, and you need a mirror you can reference while you treat your wounds. Whether or not it broadcasts your location you need to get into this house.

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>>5500812 >>5501421
Fuck it. If life isn't going to throw you a bone then you're just going to have to break your own way in. The chance to actually rest for a moment is too tempting. With a grunt you lift up your golf club again and start busting out enough of the window next to the front door to get in. Your right shoulder in particular hurts as you do so, so you put the club underneath your left instead. This time you're a bit faster and more impatient, but fortunately it works out all the same. With a final sweep around the window frame's edge, you step inside.

The crunch of shoes on broken glass sounds out as you enter. You take a hesitant look around the room before you flick on your flashlight, but you're honestly not too worried- the neighborhood has seemed deserted, so at this point you'd welcome anyone thinking you're a home intruder as a pleasant surprise, given that you don't get shot immediately.

Your light reveals a living room in front of you and a kitchen to your right. There's also a stairwell leading upstairs to your right, awkwardly between the two of them. You take a peek into the kitchen, and see that it's adjacent to a dining room, pantry, and what looks like a garage. You ignore it and head down the hallway connected to the living room, on its right. After poking open the first door, you find what you were looking for - a bathroom. Thank fuck.

The ray of your flashlight lights up the mirror as you examine yourself. You look at lot worse than before. Your hair is in complete disarray, and now not only stained with dirt, but what you assume is your own blood. The smear of blood on your face from the bloody nose has now become two smears, and you can still a couple drops roll down your face as you stare. That's just annoying though - what's concerning are the smears of blood you can see on your shirt, all concentrated around several tears near the shoulder.

After a short pause to figure out if you have time, you take off your shirt so you can get a better look. As you do so you shiver slightly- it's way too cold for August. Turning back to the mirror, you crane over your neck and try to get a good look at yourself. You're not pleased with what you find. Three large scratches on your shoulder, still bleeding, and two shallower scratches on your back, also bleeding just a bit. You should deal with that. Now.

You grab the first-aid kit from your backpack, place it in the bathtub just to be doubly-sure that Madness and Folly won't go off exploring, and then quickly treat yourself. There's not much water left in the sink, but fortunately together with what's trapped in the bathtub faucet it's enough to wet the bathroom's hand towel with to clean your wounds. It hurts rubbing against them, but at least it gets most of the dry blood off. After that you apply your disinfectant spray, gritting your teeth slightly due to the burn of whatever's in it. Alcohol or some other disinfectant maybe. You're not sure.

>>5501528
With disinfecting and cleaning dealt with, you decide to quickly bandage everything up. You don't think you have quite enough time to comfortably check if anything small got into your wounds, unfortunately. Unsure of how exactly this works for big stuff, you shove the gauze pads in the first-aid kit on your lacerations, affix them with medical tape, and then quickly put some bandages over them, fixing them in place with more medical tape. That should work? You think?

...If you survive this you're buying a book on first aid.

You shove a couple tissues in your nose temporarily and then let out a sigh of relief. You're still tired, and your body still aches, and you still need to keep an eye out over your shoulder to see if your friendly neighborhood ghoul is coming, but at least you're not slowly bleeding out. Everything from below the waist just feels like more 'normal' pain and aches, so you think you're good there. Now you just need to figure out what to do next.
>Search for something you can use to cover up that broken window. You think you'll try staying in here, and you don't want that thing taking the same route in as last time, particularly when there's no counter they have to crawl over.
>Look through the bathroom and see if you can find any more medical supplies. Your first aid kit is running a little low now, and you'd like a better pain killer than that aspirin.
>Head down the hall and see if you can find the bedrooms. You'd like a cover or two to keep warm with.
>Leave the house. Your most immediate concerns are dealt with, so you should just find a different exit and cut and run. More than likely the thing will notice the broken window and enter, and you can just find another house to squat in. [Specify where you'd like to go.]

>>5501529
>>Search for something you can use to cover up that broken window. You think you'll try staying in here, and you don't want that thing taking the same route in as last time, particularly when there's no counter they have to crawl over.
>Look through the bathroom and see if you can find any more medical supplies. Your first aid kit is running a little low now, and you'd like a better pain killer than that aspirin.

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>>5501551
All things considered, you really don't want to run around any more in the cold than you have to. You've been exhausting yourself for quite some time, and even though you've gotten a chance to rest up a little, you feel like the best move here is to just hunker down and hide again. To that end, you need to deal with that window- either camouflage the fact that you entered via it or block it off from outside entry. Maybe both.

With those goals in mind, you start sweeping through the house. The first thing that stands out is the bookshelf in the living room. There's not much on it, so you'd probably be able to empty it pretty quickly and move it over to the window. From there you could reinforce it with something more weighty. There's not much else that's easy to move but also heavy in the living room or kitchen. The garage perhaps?

Fortunately, the garage answers your hopes, at least in the sense that it has several heavy boxes that you can probably lift. It also has a door leading into the back yard- worth noting. Besides that it seems to have plenty of odds and ends, but unfortunately nothing like two by fours, or a hammer and nails. You're just going to have to makeshift a blockade if you try to block the window off.

As for hiding the face that you broke the window, the only thing you can really think is putting a curtain on the outside of the window. It'd be a bit sloppy and, well, you'd have to take a curtain down from somewhere else, preferably on the second floor, but it'd still do plenty of good in covering up your obvious handiwork. ...Although at this point you think the only feasible way to hang one up would be taping it in place, and you only have medical tape on you.
>Put aside camouflage and just shove the bookshelf in front of the window for now, keeping it in place with those boxes from the garage.
>Poke around to see where you can find some duct tape and then put that curtain up. That should do temporarily.
>Poke around for tape so you can poke the curtain up, and then get to work setting up that barricade. Two layers of defense are better than one.
>Write-in
[The action to look through the bathroom for medical supplies is still kept in the 'queue' so to speak, it'll just be processed after this vote.]

>>5501785
>>Poke around for tape so you can poke the curtain up, and then get to work setting up that barricade. Two layers of defense are better than one.

>>5501785
>>Poke around for tape so you can poke the curtain up, and then get to work setting up that barricade. Two layers of defense are better than one.

Rolled 52 (1d100)

Rolling on whether there's a proper first aid kit lying around.

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Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>5502834 >>5502973
That thing was, what, limping along three houses behind you? You should have a minute to go looking for tape and get a curtain up. It's much better if it just doesn't notice that you've been staying in here in the first place

...Where exactly does the average person keep their tape, now that you think about it? Your family always kept the tape and some other random crap in the pantry, so you head into the room to the right of the kitchen slash dining room first. It is, unsurprisingly, a pantry, but unfortunately there's no tape, or other odds and ends. Just food. You take a moment to shove a granola bar in your pocket before heading out to the garage.

The garage is a lot better than the last house you were in, but it's still rather cluttered. Garages and basements are where a family's "stuff" goes to die you suppose. Just as you're about to put a "one more minute" limit on your short search, you do manage to find some packing tape, conveniently fallen in between two of the boxes you plan to use to keep that bookshelf in place. With that you go to find a curtain that you can tear down.

You make a point of moving around the house quickly to figure out where's best to grab from one, and in the process figure out the layout. On the hallway to the right of the living room is a bathroom, office, and what you'd best describe as a 'man cave'. The living room, office, and man cave all have windows, but the curtains aren't all drawn- you make a point of doing so. The kitchen also has a window, but it's a long, short thing above one of the countertops. Not big enough to worry about anything getting in through, but also lacking in curtains, which makes you a bit uneasy.

On the second floor is a hallway leading into two bedrooms. The first is a master bedroom with an attached bathroom, while the second appears to be a child's bedroom. The beds in both rooms have empty pairs of clothing under the covers, reinforcing the idea that everyone else simply... disappeared, leaving only you and the physical neighborhood behind.

Well, and your guinea pigs.

The hallway and bedrooms on the second floor all have a window. That gives you six different places you get one from, three on the first floor and three on the second.
>Choose a location to grab a curtain from.

With a curtain and tape acquired, you quickly head back downstairs, step through the window, look around quickly to make sure it's still safe, and then tape the curtain over the window. It's a bit narrow, so you have to fold the edges, but it looks... well, not completely out of place if you don't notice the tape. It's dark out, and the tape is clear, so you think there's a decent chance of that. Now to get the barricade in place.
Rolling for which room it's in.

>>5503643
You want to take a moment again after all the running around, but unfortunately there's no time. You'll just have to power through it. You quickly unload the few books and pictures on the bookshelf before grabbing at the sides with both arms. Lift with the back, lift with the back... or was it the legs? You think it was the back. Ultimately the bookcase turns out to be a little too wide for you to a get a good grip on it, but given that it's not very far from the window you do manage to get it into place, the back facing outside. From there you hurry out to the garage and start bringing boxes through the kitchen and dining room and up to the front window, breathing a bit heavier each time. You hope you never have to work as a mover.

After a bit longer than you would have liked, you have the entrance blocked off, right and proper. The barricade isn't insurmountable or anything, but, well, it's there. Now, what were you going to do next... right, rummage through the bathroom and see if they had anything else for your first aid kit.

There's, uh... god, how many combs do people keep in their houses? There's a ton here too. Band-aids you guess, aspirin again... yeah, you're not seeing much of use in the bathroom. You take a look under the sink to double check, but unfortunately it's all just toilet paper down there. Not useless but, well, not useful for you.

With your most immediate priorities dealt with and the way you entered in blocked off, you start to calm down again, and are once again reminded about all the throbbing pains across your body and the desire to just rest. Unfortunately you can't really do that, or, well, at least not properly. You guess you could wrap yourself up in covers and take a breather in one of the bedrooms if you wanted, but maybe there are more productive things to do.
>Look for more stuff to reinforce that barricade with. It will block the hallway there and make it kind of hard to use the front door, but it will also make it very, very difficult to get in through that window as well.
>Look around and see if there's anything that might be of use to you. There was plenty of stuff in the garage, so maybe there's something you could use there.
>Look around and see if there's anything that might be of use to you. There was plenty of stuff in the closet, so maybe there's something you could use there.
>Honestly, maybe it's just time to rest for a while. The more you keep your head down the less likely you are to be noticed. You think you'll just grab some covers, find a place to relax, and wait. You could even grab one of those books you left in the living room. [Specify where you'd like to rest.]
>Write-in

>>5503650
>>Look for more stuff to reinforce that barricade with. It will block the hallway there and make it kind of hard to use the front door, but it will also make it very, very difficult to get in through that window as well.

>>5503650
>Look for more stuff to reinforce that barricade with. It will block the hallway there and make it kind of hard to use the front door, but it will also make it very, very difficult to get in through that window as well.

We must fortify this position.

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>>5503920 >>5504569
Well, the bookshelf is definitely fixed in place but... couldn't you shove more in front of it? Get it really wedged in there? It'd make it a pain to use the front door, for better or worse, and might clog up the entryway, but you think the good outweighs the bad here. But, uh, what would be best here? Something you can move, something that's heavy... uh... you saw a couple of solid-looking end tables in the living room? You guess those would work. Or the dry goods that are presumably in the pantry. If they buy in bulk you can't think of much better than 10 or 20 pounds of rice to keep something out.

You poke your head into the pantry first, going over everything with your flashlight to find any good candidates. Much to your pleasant surprise you do find a large bag of rice, a large bag of pasta, and a cardboard box filled with canned food and such that you can shove in front of the door. You put the bags down first, and then put the end tables over them. You decide to put the box of food on top in order to weigh everything down, even though it already, well, does that by itself.

Just as you're admiring your handiwork, you get a bad feeling. You were a bit numb to those earlier, but now that death is not so clearly staring you in the face you have some energy to put towards that. Why would you be having a bad feeling? Anxiety? A premonition? Your subconscious trying to remind you of something? The monster is behind you? Er- not the last one. You guess in an overabundance of caution, you'll assume it's two or three.

Now, what could go wrong right now. You guess you could have another wound and be bleeding out right now, but given that you feel fine that seems unlikely. Oh, or the thing could be inside, but you'd have to have left something unlocked for that to happen.

...Oh, you didn't check the locks. Well, you checked some trying to get in, but not all of the ones on the ground floor. You should get to that.

Much to your relief there is no obvious reason to panic. Everything was locked all along and there is, to your knowledge, no way for anything to sneakily enter the house. Unless your pursuer can climb walls and enter in through the second floor, but that would give you a whole new host of problems, none of which you think are likely.

With your search done, you notice that it has been some time since you entered the house. You feel much safer, but at the same time, you no longer have any idea where your opponent is. In the time that has elapsed they could have gotten, well, basically anywhere. Including outside the house.
>Bunker down and choose a room to take a rest and wait in. You'll stay quiet unless something else makes a noise. [Specify which room]
>Do your best to be quiet as you comb the house for supplies. You're not 100% sure what you need right now, but, well, you'll know it when you see it.
>Try to survey the surrounding area via the windows. Hopefully you can figure out where that thing went.
>Write-in

>>5505087
>>Do your best to be quiet as you comb the house for supplies. You're not 100% sure what you need right now, but, well, you'll know it when you see it.

Rolled 73, 23, 55, 78, 72, 5, 34, 48, 60, 35, 38, 76, 13 = 610 (13d100)

Just rolling a bunch of dice for looting, don't mind me.
bo3/bo3/loot

>>5505840
Why did I say bo3, I've been rolling on successes over a set number this entire quest.
Anyways, I'll get to writing in a bit.

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>>5505329
You suppose there is a risk of being found out if you just keep lumbering on around the house, but as long as you keep your footfalls light and your movements swift then you imagine it will be fine even if something passes by outside. The walls shouldn't be so thin as to let every little noise through, after all.

With that, you begin looking through the house in hopes of finding something useful. You start with the "closet" down the hall. It's rather large and, well, not quite like a cramped closet, but given that it's just packed with random crap and shelving you think it's an appropriate name. Besides extra towels, all sorts of soaps, scented and unscented, spare toothbrushes, toothpastes, athletes foot ointments, et cetera, you find something of immediate use to you. A bathrobe that fits you. It's soft, and warm, and not terribly inconvenient for running in since it doesn't drag against the ground. You guess you'll wear it, at least for now.

The spare bedroom down the hall is rather sterile. Bed well made, closet empty, and an extremely generic painting of a field hung up on the wall. You stumble upon something poking around in a nightstand though- cold, hard cash! You're not quite sure how someone ended up leaving what comes out to $83 in the guest room, but you're not just going to leave it there, given the lack of... well, all other human beings. It's a victimless crime, hopefully. ...Although unless things go back to normal you suppose it's also one with no benefit to you. As you head out the room you think you hear something, but when you stop to listen you don't hear it again. Just your nerves, perhaps.

You go across the hall next, to what you have deemed the mancave. It is full of sports banners and comfy-looking chairs. A large television sits in the corner, a no-longer functioning mini-fridge full of Natty Lights sitting next to it. What draws the most attention though, is the room's centerpiece- a pool table. Several pool cues hang on the wall next to it. Several very sturdy looking pool cues, nearly as long as you are tall...
>Take one and try shoving your golf club in between your belt and pants. You could probably get some solid hits in with this.
>Take one and try finding a place to stow it on you. It could make for a good back-up weapon.
>Leave them where they are. They seem too long to use effectively.

>>5505904
From there you take a short detour to the kitchen. You feel awkward standing there, and try ducking under the window so that nothing can see you from outside. In the process you bang your head on the counter- brilliant. You end up grabbing the biggest knife you can find, even though it's not much better than a steak knife, and putting it on your belt before heading to the garage. The garage doesn't have much of anything either. Just the family car and lots of random stuff. Among said random stuff is one of those lighters used for starting grills though, and it works fine. You don't have any reason to commit arson now, but maybe you will later- you take it with you.

Upstairs is the jackpot. In the nightstand next to the bed you find two wallets and a pair of car keys. You slip the 100-something from the wallets and the car keys into your pocket. The garage door is still down and you're not sure if it can go up without electricity, but perhaps if you're cornered you could just... ram through it. Hopefully it won't come to that though. The real pièce de résistance is in the bathroom though. One of those pill cases, with pills laid out for each day of the week. A piece of tape on the top has instructions written on it: "TAKE ONE PAINKILLER, MORNING AND NIGHT, WITH MEAL. TAKE ONE LAXATIVE IN THE MORNING. TAKE HEART MEDICINE AT NIGHT, NO DRINK THREE HOURS BEFORE OR AFTER."

Some quick deduction allows you to figure out which pills are which, and you sort out the painkillers from the rest. Finally, something that can properly help with all the bangs and knocks you've taken today.
>Get something to eat and take one. You should be able to move better if you don't randomly hurt everywhere.
>Get something to eat and take two. Given the gash in your shoulder that seems appropriate, right?
>You'll refrain from taking any for the time being. While you doubt there would be any severe side-effects, you don't want to take anything that might slow your thinking right now.
>Write-in

Before doing anything else, you do poke your head into the children's bedroom next door, where you took the curtain for the front window. Nothing stands out as useful. With that your once-over of the house is done, and you think you have most of what seems immediately useful. Now just to figure out what to do next.
>Grab a cover and find a place to rest. You need a break. [Specify where]
>The master bedroom can be locked from the inside and even has its own bathroom. Perhaps you should lock yourself up in there?
>Go around the windows and take a look outside. Maybe you can figure out where that thing went... or maybe you'll expose your location trying.
>Barricade the rest of the windows you guess? It will be a loud undertaking, and perhaps unnecessary, but it could make the house more secure.
>Write-in

>>5505904
>>5505906
>Take one and try shoving your golf club in between your belt and pants. You could probably get some solid hits in with this.
>Get something to eat and take one. You should be able to move better if you don't randomly hurt everywhere.
>The master bedroom can be locked from the inside and even has its own bathroom. Perhaps you should lock yourself up in there?

>>5505904
>>5505906
>Take one and try finding a place to stow it on you. It could make for a good back-up weapon.
>Get something to eat and take one. You should be able to move better if you don't randomly hurt everywhere.
>The master bedroom can be locked from the inside and even has its own bathroom. Perhaps you should lock yourself up in there?

Rolled 1 (1d2)

>>5506146
>>5506385
1: You use the pool cue out as your main weapon.
2: You keep the pool as a back-up weapon.

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Meant to get an update out yesterday but got swept away by the holidays, so I'll see you on Christmas night or the 26th! Merry Christmas!

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Rolled 84, 63, 73 = 220 (3d100)

>>5506146 >>5506385
Well, you can't think of anything else to do for now. You guess you could just take a bit and rest- it'll probably be more useful than anything else you find looking around. First you'll head downstairs though. Your stomach's not quite empty, but since it said to take the pill with food, you will take the pill with food.

You try your best to get through the curtain quickly given the lack of a curtain on the window. You crouch down, out of view, open up the fridge, and are greeted by a lovely sight: leftovers. Looks like they got pizza the other night, and you'd never turn down pizza. Especially not with cheese bread.

Spirits raised, you take the pizza box upstairs to the bedroom, lock the door, and then bundle the covers around you. It's positively toasty compared to the... what, 40 degree weather outside? 50 at best? Regardless, being somewhat warm is a pleasant change. Shame the house doesn't have a fireplace, but you guess you couldn't use it even if it did- literal smoke signals to your location seem like a bad idea.

You down a slice of pizza, use the water caught in the kitchen tap to help swallow the pill, and then get back to eating. After two slices and a large hunk of garlic cheese bread you're satisfied. Cold, but palatable. The wounds on your elbow and back are still searing, but you're happier than you have been for the last 90 minutes or so. Now just to take a breather and prepare for what might come next.
The more successes the better, 20 to beat.

>>5509197
You lie there for some time. Not quite thinking, not quite not, just... resting, you suppose. Eventually you feel the pain around your body fade, much to your relief. Instead being covered in various aches and pains from slamming into a fence, having it dig into your side, and so on and so forth, you now only hurt in three places. Your nose, your shoulder, and your back. Your nose doesn't hurt unless you touch it, while your shoulder and back are honestly not that bad if you don't move, so you'll call that a job well done. Taking a look at your bandages in the bathroom, you find that the wound on your back has stopped bleeding completely, while your shoulder is down to a crawl.

With a grunt you get rid of a few of the heavily-stained bandages on your shoulder and replace them with fresh ones. You don't have too many bandages left, but fortunately with the reduced bleeding that should hold for quite a while. Well, as long as you don't tear it open again. You should probably be careful about that. With not much else to attend to, you lie back into bed and look at the time. 3 hours, 43 minutes remain. A little awkward. A little short to make big, sweeping, preparations, but too long to just cut and run. Well, at least you've made it past the halfway point. Hopefully the second is easier than the first.

After a few more minutes, you come up with a few ideas on how to proceed, and decide to pick between them.
>Gather all the linens in the house and barricade yourself in the master bathroom. It worked well last time, so why not again? It will limit your range of mobility, but with an attached bathroom you don't see any reason to go out. If things go south you can always try to head out the window again- this time you can use the bed as an anchor.
>Gather all the linens in the house and try to barricade yourself upstairs. The stairway is a bit narrow, and if you just dump enough furniture into it you could see it getting blocked off. It would probably take a lot of grit and effort, but maybe it could allow you to easily protect yourself... although you could see yourself struggling to undo it later.
>Pore through every inch of the house and find the best hiding place possible. Even if the thing comes by, you don't believe it can look through every single nook and cranny of the place for you. If you look hard enough you're sure to find a place that it will overlook.
>Grab as much that's highly flammable as you can and try to set a trap somewhere. You have a lighter, and there should be gasoline in the garage so... why not just torch the thing if it steps a foot inside? [Specify where you want to place the trap, or if you would just prefer to prepare a bucket of stuff you can set on fire and throw at it.]
>You have a few ideas, but... honestly, things are working out fine right now. Why don't you just grab a book and get back into bed? You're sure there's a good book around here.
>Write-in

>>5509207
>>Gather all the linens in the house and try to barricade yourself upstairs. The stairway is a bit narrow, and if you just dump enough furniture into it you could see it getting blocked off. It would probably take a lot of grit and effort, but maybe it could allow you to easily protect yourself... although you could see yourself struggling to undo it later.
>Grab as much that's highly flammable as you can and try to set a trap somewhere. You have a lighter, and there should be gasoline in the garage so... why not just torch the thing if it steps a foot inside? [Specify where you want to place the trap, or if you would just prefer to prepare a bucket of stuff you can set on fire and throw at it.]
Just prepare a bucket

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>>5510555
Now that you think about, it the stairway is rather narrow- narrow enough that you're wondering what hell the home owners went through to get their bed up here. If you were to barricade it, it'd probably be harder to get through than a door. But how would you get out if that were the case?

Given that the stairway is out, that leaves the three windows on the second floor. There's one in each bedroom which face out over the garage and kitchen, towards the front yard, and one in the hallway leading towards the roof. Just a glance at the hallway window reveals that it's rather narrow though, and peeking under the curtain shows that it's the kind that only slides part of the way up. If you were to have any hope of getting through it at all you'd have to break the window out, glass and plastic and all, so you'll leave that route for now.

As for the other bedroom's windows, they do appear to be a valid escape route. They're big, and they look like the type that slides open to the side. It shouldn't be any trouble for you to slide one pane open and exit through that. There are beds in each rooms can serve as anchors as well. That said... you can't guarantee that these windows aren't stuck, or don't actually open, and you're a bit afraid to try something so eye-catching before you have that barricade set up. This troubles you for a good few moments, until you remember that if worst comes to worst you can just smash one open, and call that that.

That leaves the barricade... and perhaps something flammable as insurance. You have a lighter, so you may as well make use of it. You head downstairs and start scouring through the house. Collecting linens to weave into escape ropes, keeping an eye out for furniture small enough that you can feasibly move it into place, and seeing if there's a suitable container for your pyrophilic backup plan.

Some time later you have a pile of blankets, sheets, and so on on the master bed. The curtains are left downstairs given the risk of being seen from outside if you remove them. A bucket sits in the bathtub in the master bathroom, some rags and a jerry can of gasoline lying inside it. You'll arrange that into a more immediately useful form later. For now, it's time to block off the second floor.

In order to achieve your objective quickly, you engage in what can be best described as abuse of the homeowner's worldly possessions. The computer? Dragged into the pile. The TV? Dragged into the pile. Minifridge? You know where that's going! Knowing that actually blocking off the stairway will stop you from going downstairs for more material for it, you try to keep the stairway navigable at first, with small pieces of furniture. But then the time comes, and you start blocking it off completely.

>>5511105
While paying a great amount of care towards your shoulder, you barely manage to drag a piece of empty shelving in from the garage. It becomes the great stopper in what you have so far. And so you are blocked upstairs, a mish-mash of furniture and objects in your way.

A great deal of grunting and tiredness later, a dresser and two more end tables are added to the blockade. You'd say it's a right and proper barricade right now- a sea of furniture, of which you can only get a tiny glimpse of the landing in the middle through. You'd thought you'd gotten a good rest but that really has tired you out again. You wonder how long that took.

2 hours and 50 minutes remain.

Huh, longer than you thought. You're surprised that went so smoothly. Maybe you got lucky and that thing went in some other direction completely, leaving you to your own devices. Looks like you have a couple hours left.
>Lie back down and recover your energy. You still have those escape ropes to tie together, so you can do that while you rest.
>Get back to moving things. You will not rest instead everything but those two beds are in the way. If there's enough shit in the way then it doesn't matter if you're exhausted behind it.
>Check that all the windows open and a get view of outside perhaps? Now that you've blocked yourself off, you feel a bit more secure risking been seen.
>Write-in

>>5511107
>Get back to moving things. You will not rest instead everything but those two beds are in the way. If there's enough shit in the way then it doesn't matter if you're exhausted behind it.

FORTIFY

Rolled 62, 11, 90 = 163 (3d100)

40 to beat, the more successes the better.

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>>5511415
Securing your escape route IS a rather essential part of leaving, but honestly... why not put more furniture in the way first? It shouldn't take you too terribly long to twist and tie together some blankets and sheets, and the longer it takes that thing to get up here the longer you have to do that. You just have to put some elbow grease in first.

And elbow grease you do put in. Into the top of the stairway and almost up to where the hallway swerves a great many things get moved. Dressers and TVs and closet doors, oh my. While your work does get slower, and your breathing more labored as time goes on, eventually you finish your task. Both of the bedrooms are now rather bare, and another massive pile of things have been shoved into the stairway. A job well done.

While you're pleased with the end result, what you didn't expect was how long it would take- 50 more minutes have passed, and you have only two hours left. Perhaps you'll be lucky enough that the thing will just be unable to find you before this is all over.

Once you finish, you flop down on the bed in the master bathroom. You're exhausted, and your shoulder is aching from all that work. It's just a good thing that the wound on it didn't open up again, you guess. You can't imagine that putting all that strain on it was a good thing. Well, the hard labor is done with. Now you should put together a rope to climb down. You have plenty of good material, so you don't imagine that will be a problem at least.

You take a short break before you start making the first escape rope. As you do, you try to figure out what your plan is. You have enough good material to make... well, a stable rope at the very least. Two, you imagine. But that does make you wonder. Should you be making two separate ropes, so that you can use the other in the other bedroom or as a backup, or should you just be focusing on making one rope as thick and strong as possible? You'll only actually go down on one, and perhaps the lack of choice in where you leave from is worth the additional security.
>Create two ropes. Anchor one to the bed in the master bedroom, and one to the bed in the child's bedroom, so that you have two routes to leave from.
>Create one strong rope and anchor it in the master bedroom. Your main concern should be how strong it is, not having two exits.
>Create two ropes. Anchor one to the bed in the master bedroom, and then leave one to the side. You won't be able to use it unless you anchor it somewhere, but if you do need it as a backup then won't have to waste time untying it from its original location no matter where you plan to use it.
>Write-in

>>5512330
>Create one strong rope and anchor it in the master bedroom. Your main concern should be how strong it is, not having two exits.

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>>5514176
You think the crux of the issue here is that you're only going to use, well, one rope. Having a backup exit with another rope down set up wouldn't be useless, but neither would having a stronger rope for your planned exit route. You should just go for the option that's more likely to have a useful payout- one stronger rope.

With that decided, you plan out how you're going to tie together the rope. Two intertwined pieces of fabric making up each section of the rope, tying together to different places at their top and bottom, a bit like how DNA makes helices or whatever. That way, even if a knot slips, or a piece of fabric tears, there will be a backup that's still holding your weight. Or at least that's what you imagine would happen- you're certainly not an expert in ropemaking or... well, anything else really. Perhaps you'll be considered an expert in fleeing from grotesque corpse-like monsters after this is over.

Creating the rope is a rather calming process. Twisting blankets and linens together, tying them together firmly, and making sure they all stretch taut without slipping or breaking. Not quite tiring, nor resting. Just something to get lost in. Eventually, you're almost done with the rope. Perhaps only one more section remains until what you have scrapes the ground.

But then you hear it again... the knocking. Barely audible through the fortress of furniture, but there nonetheless.

Or, well, slamming this time. It seems that with the 1 hour and 32 minutes remaining that your pursuer may be getting impatient. Only a moment later that disappears though, and you hear the loud sounds of flesh against wood again. It doesn't sound exactly like someone hitting a door though- it sounds a bit, what's the word, dull for that? A door echoes more, so that you can hear the knocking.
>Take a peek out the window and glance towards the front door. You're curious what your visitor is up to.
>Do your best to ignore the noises and finish up your work. Best just to keep your head down.
>Write-in

>>5515207
>>Take a peek out the window and glance towards the front door. You're curious what your visitor is up to.
Fuck it, there's no way they're getting through the barricade this time

>>5515207
>Take a peek out the window and glance towards the front door. You're curious what your visitor is up to.

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>>5516325 >>5516441
Well, it won't hurt to take a look. Judging from the ruckus at the door they should be pretty busy anyways. You lower yourself underneath the curtain and then take a peek out the bedroom window. To your surprise, the front yard is rather well illuminated thanks to a light attached to the garage. That wasn't on when you were out there. One of those motion-sensing ones, you guess?

You focus your attention on the front door. A small awning sits over the entryway, obscuring your view, but from your angle you can make out part of what's going on. The thing from before is out there, that's for sure. You can't see its top half due to that damn awning, but based on where you see the feet it's probably by the window you used to break in. Could it be trying to break through the bookshelf you put in front of it? That probably would be quicker than the door.

As you're thinking about this, you see the thing stop and take a step back. From a location just out of view, it picks up something big with a handle. It looks a bit like an axe, although that seems rather unlikely. You mean, who would nee-

THUNK. THUNK. The sounds are louder now, as it hits whatever it's wielding against the bookshelf.

Ok, yeah, that's probably an axe. That is... concerning. You suppose that means it's smart enough to use tools at least, although you guess that's to be expected given that it's vaguely human. You stare at what you can see of it for a few seconds longer, hoping to see if it has anything else, but just see it swing down again. Stupid awning.

Figuring that you should get a look around before the light goes out on you, you glance around the street. The moon is still sitting still in the sky, raining blood-red light down upon you, and the vaguely fleshy protuberance embedded in the middle of the street is as disturbing as ever. It all seems 'normal' until you notice two small details. The first being that one of the windows on the house across the street is broken. You didn't do that, so you can only imagine [I] that [/I] did. Whether to look for you or to get that axe, you don't know.

The second detail is more minor, and you can't quite decide what to make of it. There's a big puddle of something on the driveway below you. You can't imagine of what, given that it hasn't rained since you got home yesterday. But neither do you spend much time thinking about it. It was almost pitch black when you came inside, and it's entirely possible you just missed something the home owners spilled.

>>5516503
Before you can look further, the light in front of the garage turns off. It seems you're in the dark again, in both senses of the phrase. Another thud sounds out below you. You're rather confident in the barricade you constructed, but... well, you guess you should be preparing for the worst regardless. You're going to finish up your rope first, and then quickly prepare that bucket.
>After that you'll rest. You're tired, and you need to be in tip top shape if you're to face off against that thing, run, or do anything really. The better condition you're in, the better chance of surviving.
>Head across the hallway and start breaking out that little window. If for some reason exiting towards the front is dangerous, then it could be helpful to have an exit to the backyard.
>Write-in

>>5516503
>>After that you'll rest. You're tired, and you need to be in tip top shape if you're to face off against that thing, run, or do anything really. The better condition you're in, the better chance of surviving.

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>>5516959
You can't really do much about what's going on at the front door. Best to just finish this up and rest. It doesn't take long for you to finish the creation of the rope, which you anchor against the foot of the bed closest to the window. In the meantime you think you hear something fall down downstairs, although the sound is so muffled that it's hard to tell.

With the rope dealt with you prepare the bucket of what's effectively gasoline, paper, and rags, and then lie down in bed, using what linens were leftover after the creation of the rope to shelter you from the cold. It is comfortable. Comfortable enough that you wish you could nod off to sleep, but unfortunately the situation is rather unsuitable for that. Instead you just listen to the sounds of axe against furniture as your visitor struggles to make it past your barricade. You can only hope they're unable to with the amount of time left.

57 minutes remaining. The sounds on the stairway continue to draw ever so slightly closer. From what little you can see through all the furniture, it's not even close to reaching the top of the stairs yet, and that doesn't account for what part of the hallway you've clogged up. At the very worst, you should have 20 minutes left. At best, perhaps this thing will actually hold. You can't tell yet, but regardless, you should think over your escape route.

First, you test that the window in the bedroom works, certain that it won't be able to see anything from the stairway. It's a bit stuck at first, but after some grunting and forcing it does slide open, letting the cold air outside in. You quickly close it again, and then open it once more to be certain that it's still fine. No problems- there should be little worry about your method of escape.

What's more worth thinking about is the when, and if there's anything you should do before that.
>If there is anything you wish to do before the time to leave comes, please mention it.

As for the time of leaving...
>What's stopping you from leaving now? The thing is on the stairs, so you may as well go down now.
>No need to leave while you still have a safe buffer. You'll give it until it sounds like it's near the top of the stairs to go.
>You made the whole barricade, so you're going to use the whole barricade. When it's near the top you'll lock the bedroom door behind you and leave. Even with an axe it will take some time to give.
>You made the whole barricade, so you're going to use the whole barricade. And you went through the effort of finding gasoline, so you're going to use that. Once it's near the top you'll douse it and what's immediately surrounding it, set it alight, and then get the fuck out. You doubt the thing will be able to give chase while being burned (back?) to death.
>Write-in

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>>5518012
>>You made the whole barricade, so you're going to use the whole barricade. And you went through the effort of finding gasoline, so you're going to use that. Once it's near the top you'll douse it and what's immediately surrounding it, set it alight, and then get the fuck out. You doubt the thing will be able to give chase while being burned (back?) to death.
Oh yeah baby

>>5518012
>>You made the whole barricade, so you're going to use the whole barricade. And you went through the effort of finding gasoline, so you're going to use that. Once it's near the top you'll douse it and what's immediately surrounding it, set it alight, and then get the fuck out. You doubt the thing will be able to give chase while being burned (back?) to death.
I like fire.

>>5518012
>You made the whole barricade, so you're going to use the whole barricade. And you went through the effort of finding gasoline, so you're going to use that. Once it's near the top you'll douse it and what's immediately surrounding it, set it alight, and then get the fuck out. You doubt the thing will be able to give chase while being burned (back?) to death.

Let's go!

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Rolled 33, 96, 35 = 164 (3d100)

>>5518016
>>5518074
>>5518385
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3eC35LoF4U
25 to beat.

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Rolled 80, 8, 53 = 141 (3d100)

>>5518016
>>5518074
>>5518385
You're not leaving until you damn hell have to. And on the way out... well, suffice to say that you're giving that thing a surprise. Win or lose, you don't back down without a fight.

You return back to bed, staring at the device tick down. 56 minutes, 55, 54...

...30 minutes. 29 minutes, 59 seconds. The sounds are much closer now. You wouldn't be surprised if it's at the top of the stairs by now. Guess you'll head out. You take a deep breath and then prepare yourself for what's to come. Make sure Madness and Folly are both safe and secured in the bathroom, that your giant wooden pool cue isn't in your belt lest it catch on fire, and that your sweatshirt is off and your t-shirt sleeves rolled up. You will not foist yourself by your own petard here. Not now.

16 minutes and 28 seconds remain. Your guest stares at you through the last of the sea of furniture, almost all of it having been forcibly cut apart in its wake. Only one last layer separates the two of you now, and soon, it will be hacked through as well.

But not before it is set ablaze.

It swings at the furniture. You douse everything in front of you in gasoline. Momentary confusion, and then a flicker of recognition. A moment too late though- the flame of the barbecue lighter connects with a green, gasoline covered chair, setting the fabric ablaze. Everything around it catches fire in an instant- you're lucky not to be burnt yourself.

As you step back from the inferno, you see something that makes you involuntarily smile. The thing, on fire, a second layer of burns added onto the long-healed first. Inhuman, indiscernible screeching, interrupts your celebration. Your eyes almost feel as if they'll bleed if you stay here, not to mention the rapidly spreading fire. Time to go.

You return to the bedroom, lock the door behind you, and grab your backpack, ensuring that your guinea pigs are inside. Then you open up the window, throw out the rope, and prepare to exit the home. As you do, you hear banging behind you, but it stops after a moment. A desperate last effort?

The fire above you is worrying, but you take the climb at a moderate pace anyways. If fire spreads to the rope, then... you fall. If you go too fast and slip then... you fall. The consequence is the same, so you may as well take it safely. Eventually, you make it to the bottom and land on the garage. A light splash echoes out as you do so. You'd forgotten about that puddle you saw. You wonder what it is- you don't think it's water. It has an odd smell to it.

Wait...

Relief transforms into anxiety in an instant. You're standing in a puddle of gasoline. Was it planning to stop you from exiting via the window by torching where you'd land?

Just as that thought comes to you, the lighting changes. You glance towards the front door. That thing is visible, flesh running down its face like wax as it burns. Oh fuck. NO. RUN. NOW.
25 to beat.

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>>5518426
By the time it can get to the driveway, you're almost out of the puddle. You feel a flash of heat behind you as you escape, but nothing more. After that you just run. Your feet hurt a lot, but it doesn't matter. You need to get away.

You only calm down and stop once the light from the fire dims. You're nearly at the opposite end of the street at this point. The thing stands in the middle of the street, stationary now, burning down like a candle. You stare on for some time but it just stands there, unmoving. It's over. You've won, right?

5 minutes, 12 seconds remain.
>Go home. You're done.
>Watch. You don't think you'll forget this sight for a long time.
>Write-in

>>5518436
>>Watch. You don't think you'll forget this sight for a long time.
We should be proud of our accomplishments.

>>5518436
>>Watch. You don't think you'll forget this sight for a long time.

>salute it for its effort

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>>5518464 >>5519271
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_-XCUqCHWU

You stand there and watch the body continue to burn down. Burning flesh drips from bone and the scent of burnt meat wafts through the air. If you closed your eyes, then maybe you'd just think that your dad burnt dinner again.

Viewed objectively, this is the most disturbing thing you have, and hopefully will, see. But you aren't really horrified or anything. At least not now. Maybe it's just how many shocks you've taken to the system tonight, but right now you can only view this as a release for... whatever this cursed thing is. Or perhaps that's just you projecting.

Over time the fire begins to dim slightly, the fat used as fuel running out. You salute what's left of the conflagration. As you do so, you feel something vibrate in your pocket. There's no cell reception right no so, that would be... the device. You pull it out.

0 minutes, 0 seconds remaining.

A happy chime comes from somewhere on the device, and the text changes. Congratulations on your survival! Rewards will finish processing, and passage back to your world will be secured within 24 hours.

Due to your splendid performance, the second half of your initiation has been waived. It was truly entertaining. You may join The Game of Games immediately! Once again, congratulations!

Before you can finish processing everything, the text changes one final time.

As part of your reward, you may ask a single question of me.

A single question of... who exactly? And what is The Game of Games? Hell, what has been going on at all tonight- what was that thing, and where are you?

The device awaits input.
>

>>5519666
>>What is the Game of Games?

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>>5519902
You input your question.

>What is the Game of Games?

It disappears, and the device goes dark. Around a minute passes. By the time you've begun to wonder if they actually intended on answering your question at all, something appears.

The Game of the Games is the grand work of The Unblinking Eye, Everlasting Observer Yocnaaldexr-her'dhrarc-aiv'oxh'ro-grethl'lush. It satisfies His hunger for new sights by pushing lesser creatures such as yourself to their brink.

It then goes dark again. You wait for some time, hoping for further explanation, but... nothing. That's it. So you're here just to amuse some mystic, all-seeing torturer? Great.

Leaving that issue behind for the time being, you start going through the houses on the side of the street that is not currently up in flames. Most have already been broken into, thanks to either you or that thing. Inside one you manage to find a proper first aid kit. Bandages, disinfectant, the works. You recall aloe vera being the thing used for burns, so you use the cream that says that on your foot, which is... well, probably not permanently damaged, but hurts like a bitch.

After dealing with that, you look at the device. A counter has appeared again.

Time remaining until return: 23 hours, 30 minutes.

You guess you're on your own until then, then. Just you, Madness, and Folly.

...speaking of Madness and Folly, you should feed them and get them back to their enclosure. They're bound to be upset about, well, everything by now. You should let them rest.

With that thought, you return them home, feed them, and then leave them to their own devices to a bit. Now it's just you- there's not even any crying upstairs. Who even knows what that was.

---

11 hours remaining.

You've slept for, eaten, checked on Madness and Folly, found winter clothing, and taken care of your wounds again. You still don't feel good, but you feel... well, better. You're not sure what to do with the time you have left. Is there even anything of interest here? It's all just fog and darkness, all the time.
>Go through your uncle's study. Something is weird with this place and you're not letting some locked bookshelves stop you at this point.
>Sort through the basement. You'll need to do that sooner or later.
>See if you can't cut through that thing embedded in the middle of the street. It looks like a vein so... will blood come out if you do?
>Try your best to fix up the house. There should enough materials and tools in all the surrounding houses.
>Have some fun. Drive around the yards in some of the cars, get drunk, whatever. If there is a time to unwind, it is now. Not like you're hurting anyone.
>Write-in (or multiple)
[Select as many as you wish, preferably in order of execution in case they take more time then you have left.]

>>5519945
>>Go through your uncle's study. Something is weird with this place and you're not letting some locked bookshelves stop you at this point.
>Sort through the basement. You'll need to do that sooner or later.
>Try your best to fix up the house. There should enough materials and tools in all the surrounding houses.

>>5519945
>Go through your uncle's study. Something is weird with this place and you're not letting some locked bookshelves stop you at this point.

It's time for some answers.

Unless something changes I expect the next update to be the
THE END(tm) of the quest, so it's shaping up to be pretty beefy
Dunno if I'll get it up tonight or tomorrow, just a heads up.

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>>5519958 >>5520015
11 hours until you get to go back. You guess you should get to work then. Won't have too long to do anything later, what with orientation in the morning.

First things first, you need to look through those locked bookshelves. If you were to speak charitably, you'd say you have some idea of what's going on. As for why it has happened to you... well, that's a complete blank. Your hope is that whatever your uncle has decided to keep under another layer of lock and key may hold the answer to that.

You take a quick look at the bookshelves in the office. They weren't built to be locked originally, although they did have doors on the front from the start. That means that the locks for both are just padlocks clasped over the wooden door handles. A certain primal part of you just wants to find another axe and force your way in, but in consideration of the fact that this is your family's house and that you might damage whatever is inside, you decide to just break the handles and slide the locks off instead.

After scavenging an electric drill from someone's garage you bring it back and drill through the top of each door handle, until each has a large enough hole. After that you slip all the locks off the bookcases, one by one, and then open them up.

The first bookcase contains all sorts of books that appear to be about magic, the occult, or fringe conspiracy theories- ancient alien sorts of stuff. Without evening skimming through them you can tell that the combination of books is rather eclectic, to put it lightly. Major religious texts such as The Bible, Quran, The Torah, et cetera. More fringe ones, such as books advertising their affiliation with Scientology or Heaven's Gate. Dusty old books that don't seem to be connected to any particular religion, and simply advertise THE SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE, THE PATTERNS OF ALL THINGS, or FORBIDDEN MAGICKS through their spines and backs. Mixed among it all are even books that were clearly intended for fiction: you can see that your uncle had collected all the Harry Potter books, for one thing.

Turning your attention away from the forest of words in front of you, you open up the second bookshelf. It is somehow more eerie to you. Every single book looks almost exactly the same, like they were copy and pasted. Blank cover, blank spine, blank back, and all very thin. A few at the top with names written on their front help you figure out what's going on. "MARCH 1980. APRIL 1980. MAY 1980."

These are all journals. Probably all in order, maybe going from 1980 until... well, last year. You grab a handful of books from the top shelf, take them over to the desk and then sit down in your uncle's big, comfy chair. Looks like you have a lot of reading ahead of you.

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>>5524637
During your skimming you observe a few things. Your uncle doesn't have much to say about most days, at least not in his 20s. Work was ok. Cheryl made meatloaf for dinner. It was good. I beat my record at the golf course by two strokes. Stuff like that. The only times it does go in depth, he's usually gushing about his fiance or complaining about something going wrong at work. You tend to skim over that. Occasionally he talks about meeting with some of his friends. Roy and Pierce are the names you see repeated among them.

You speed up your pace as you go on, trying to get through them as quick as possible while just getting an idea of what was going on. 24, he gets married to Cheryl and they buy a house. As they hit 25, they're talking about having kids. You do manage to catch a couple mentions of his younger brothers. At some point you see a mention of your 15 year-old father getting caught drinking and being made to join his school's math team as punishment. ...You're going to have to remember that story.

"August 14th, 1982... August 16th, 1982... August 17th, 1982... wait, what?" It skipped a day. That's a first. You look over the entry for August 16th in detail. "Called in sick but got some chores done. Burned the trash and did some yardwork. I'm exhausted. Might have to call out again tomorrow." The next day's entry just says "I called out. Feeling a little better. I decided to plant a tree in the backyard." Nothing of note then. Guess he got the flu or something.

You're not quite sure when it started, but the entries get drier. He doesn't really mention anyone else by name, or interactions with others at all. Just what he did that day. The mood seems gloomier. He mentions being tired a lot, and not getting enough sleep. He considers getting sleeping pills. Maybe what he called out for was a lot worse than the flu.

August 15th, 1983. He hasn't mentioned his wife or friends for the past year. But this entry breaks that. "It's been a year since Cheryl left. I wonder what I did to make her so dissatisfied." Then it continues on, as if nothing happened. The entries don't really tell much- you start skipping through some of them until you hit the next August 15th. "They said I'd feel better with time. They were wrong."

Starting the next year, journal entries on August 15th disappear completely, as if he'd rather not talk about it, even to himself. The mood seems to improve, slightly, slowly. He starts recording how many questions he guesses right on Jeopardy. Sometimes he'll mention having bought a novel and how he liked it.

In 1989 things seem to take a downturn. In early September he starts writing a lot about religious texts, and what they might mean. Not too odd at first, but it gets worse after the new year. Talk of patterns in everything. Mystical powers. Things from beyond that can be reached out to. The Jeopardy scores stay the same, but everything else is nonsensical to you.

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>>5524641
You start skimming more due to the massive increase in how much he writes, putting your focus on Augusts. He gets more paranoid. Says that the police might be watching him. That they have been. He installs locks everywhere, and replaces everything to be burglar-proof. Starts looking into things like working from home and passive income, so that he can leave the house less. Mentions that he stopped using the phone because it's tapped. His grasp on reality seems to be slipping.

In 1992 he seems to recover slightly. Maybe not because he's more sane, but because he found a focus. For the first time in years, there's an entry for August 15th. "I want Cheryl back. Jeopardy, 28/61."

More mystic ramblings. Rituals that can be said to find what was lost. Spells to bring the dead back to life. Fortune-telling and astrology, to attempt to peer into future, fate, and the fabric of reality. He carries them out one after another. Sometimes he claims he performed them wrong and tries them again. In the end he usually decides that they were fake, that he lacks the needed power, or that some mystic entity has decided to ignore his pleas.

This continues for the rest of his life. More rituals, spells, and pleas to things beyond. Almost all he claims fail, although you presume a few worked, and drew the attention of something, or some things, out there. More paranoia. Talk of his burgeoning VHS collection. Complaints of age catching up to him, and a lack of time.

August 15th, 2006. "Maybe everything I've tried worked and she just doesn't want to come back. It's all my fault. I should've held in my anger. I don't know if it was ultimately Pierce or I who did it, but it doesn't matter. It's all my fault. Jeopardy, 48/61."

He continues with his mystical ramblings, but in a bit of a downcast tone. After yet another year of endless rituals, in mid 2007 the content changes drastically.

"July 18th, 2007. It worked. It worked. I wish it did not work. She is knocking at my bedroom door. I do not know how she got in."
"It is now sunrise. I am a sobbing mess, but she has left."
"July 19th, 2007. She is back. Jeopardy, 25/61."
"July 25th, 2007. I thought to finally give in and open the door. To accept my fate. Nothing was there, but I still heard the knocking. I felt something there, but it refused to come in. Perhaps because this is where it happened. Jeopardy, 39/61."
"August 8th, 2007. At least it's her and not that adulterer Pierce that came back. Jeopardy, 46/61."
"August 14th, 2007. I bought myself noise-cancelling headphones, meant for construction. Jeopardy, 45/61."

>>5524642
Future entries mention knocking and banging at his door each night, but he gradually goes numb to them and carries on with his life. He is still a bit paranoid, but mentions of mysticism and religion quickly die down. The why can be aptly summed up by a quote you see in one journal entry: "Fooled into cursing myself once, shame on you. Fooled into cursing myself twice trying to undo it... shame on me."

The final entry. August 15th, 2011. "Despite what others may think, I believe I have managed to live a decent life. It cannot have said to be a normal life, but everyone's normal is different. Even your wife's spirit harassing you becomes normal eventually. I'm exhausted to the bone, mentally. I cannot stand this normal anymore. I still have the bottle of wine from our wedding. I've taken good care of it, but I imagine it's vinegar by this point. I'll down it and some other liquid courage, and then leave the bedroom when she comes. Whatever is to happen, I will embrace it. It is better than the dulled fear and monotony I live under now."

"I have considered burning all these journals and books of mine, to prevent someone from repeating my mistakes, but have decided against it. Perhaps they will be needed. If something happens to me, and someone is to read this, then avoid construction around the tree. Jack and Henry, you were good brothers. I should have written more often. Roy, you were a great friend, although I haven't spoken to you in decades. Mom and Dad, I miss you, and hope to meet you again, even if whatever life is after death clearly isn't pleasant. Cheryl... I don't love you, but it seems that I couldn't live without you. I've had 30 years to think about it, but I still don't know if it's my fault, or if I need to apologize. I have flip-flopped over the latter over and over across the past 30 years. I can hear you knocking. I guess I'll let you decide."

"I never did get a perfect game of Jeopardy. Goodbye, for now."

It is the last entry. You notice that your mouth is dry and your stomach hungry. It must have been a while.

2 hours remaining.

Even with the massive amounts of skimming, it took that long. That makes sense. There's still the other bookshelf left, but you will leave it. Given what you know, nothing good can come of poking too far into its contents. A short break, and then you'll go through the basement.

To be continued later tonight, probably. If something in the post makes you want to do something else than go through the basement, then feel free to respond with it. Otherwise, I will go with what has already been voted on.

>>5524644
Well, that might've been useful. Oh well, we lit shit on fire, it was worth it in the end.

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>>5519958 >>5520015 >>5525072
Some food and can of RC later, and you're back in your basement. Without any real system in mind, you start poring through the boxes. You figure that if they're not sorted, you'll start making piles, and if they are, then you'll just figure what's in each and then put it all back in.

Golf clubs and equipment. Basic tools and things for repairs. Locks. A lot of locks. Several musty boxes of trivia books. Several boxes of what you can only describe as "weird things" that were probably used in those so-called rituals and spills. All vestiges of a life once lived, telling you quite a lot about the man who once lived here, but not quite the whole story. What you see is the surface.

Box after box, you grow closer to the end of your task. Everything seems more or less sorted, thankfully. You're just learning the system. After removing a third sweater with the local football team's logo on it, you think of something and glance at the device. 5 minutes, 23 seconds remaining.

That's about it then. Guess you'll put everything back and wait. You can't help but feel nervous about whatever's going to happen, given that you were asleep when you came here. No choice but to wait and hope for the best though.

You stand on your front lawn, near the road, waiting to go back. A thick fog in the distance obscures your vision, although you can't make out much with just this red moonlight anyways. Just torched houses and that blood vessel buried in the middle of the street. Cold air bites against the skin, and the smell of ashes wafts over from the other side of the street. You take a deep breath.

5...4...3...2...1

You wanted to catch sight of what happened, but instead you don't even process anything happening. One moment you're standing by the street, and the next you're lying in bed. You sit back and glance through the curtains behind you. The moon is still up, but it's not red anymore. It's just a normal moon. And there's no fog, no anything- just a normal August night outside. Everything's gone, just like a dream. It feels surreal. Almost as surreal as what you saw over there, in fact.

You blankly poke around the house and discover some good news, and some bad news. The good news being that you are no longer injured. The bad news being that the same doesn't not apply to the house. ...You do not have the money to replace doors, but you guess you'll have to figure out how. Still rather out of it, you stroll out of the house, to the front door, and out the gate, still in your pajamas.

You're not sure how long you just stare at the still-standing, unburnt houses and the potholes in the road. All you know is that you're interrupted by the revving of a car blaring Free Bird. The headlights blind you, and then you feel something hit you in the head as one of the passengers yells something incoherent. You glance down. A beer can. It's a beer can.

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>>5526127
Somehow, that's what snaps you out of your reverie. This is reality. That's reality, but this is reality too. Otherworldly monsters, drunk college students, ghosts, hazing, and The Unblinking Eye, Everlasting Observer Yocnaaldexr-her'dhrarc-aiv'oxh'ro-grethl'lush, all real. Just part and parcel of the human experience. Or at least yours specifically.

Something vibrates in your pocket. The game will resume in a week. Use your time well. Rewards being distributed...

Fucking... oh, who gives a shit anymore. It's just another thing you have to deal with. You'll look at it later. For now... well, you're hungry. You didn't eat much earlier. Waffle House should be open.

Yeah, screw Yocnaaldexr-her'dhrarc-aiv'oxh'ro-grethl'lush. He can wait. You're going to Waffle House.
THE END

Thanks for participating and/or reading. I'll back this up to Suptg in the bit, if anyone has anything to say about the writing/choice of mostly AI-generated art/whatever feel free. Regardless, glad to have you all, it was a good time.

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I enjoyed this quest. It was a bit of a deviation from the norm, but I don't think that's a bad thing.

>>5526137
Much better writer than I. I liked how you dealt with the write-ins.