Phase Two

A long, grinding scrape ran up the outer wall.

The two arms clinging to the apartment hauled themselves higher. One finger hooked the window frame.

A wet crunch. The rusted iron sill crumpled inward, dented in the exact shape of that finger.

Another scrape. A third arm seized the frame.

Palsigi had looked huge even from below. Up close, it was bigger still. Limbs like human arms pulled long and thin groped along either side of the window.

Once the fourth arm made it up, it would be over. From that point it wouldn't be climbing anymore. It would start tearing the window apart.

I looked around the room. The only things that could generously be called weapons were a kitchen knife, a hammer, and a chair leg I had snapped off years ago.

"Wow. So many weapons."

"Why are you counting that last one?"

"That's the one you grab the most."

I had only ever used it on cockroaches. Palsigi had four pairs of limbs too, so maybe they counted as roughly the same species. The size difference was trivial. No — it was not trivial at all.

I picked up the hammer. It was a small work mallet I had used for odd jobs. If I brought it down on Palsigi's skull, I had a feeling the mallet would die first. Still better than bare hands.

"Let's ask the gallery."

"Right now?"

"They know this kind of thing better than I do."

One of them knew nothing but swords. Another solved every problem by conquest. The last one called modern humans uncivilized. Judging by our usual conversations, they were not exactly reliable. But they were Transcendents who had survived thousands of years in their own worlds. At the very least, they would know more than I did about a monster coming through the window.

I threw up a post in a hurry.

The comments landed the instant the post went up.

Sword5000Years was no help this time either.

That much was true. I took two steps back from the bookshelf.

A crash slammed through the room. The bookshelf lurched forward, and the books stacked on top of it came down in an avalanche. I threw my arms over my head on instinct. Dust and the smell of paper billowed through the air all at once.

"Hey!"

"I know!"

A second impact. The plywood I had braced between the bookshelf and the window split down the middle. A joint that had never been maintained groaned in protest, and through the gap that opened in the center, a dark crimson finger forced its way in.

The nail scraped the wall. Every time the finger moved, its joints folded backward one by one, at angles no ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠human hand could make. Whether it still had anything like human bones left in it was an open question.

The finger closed around the side of the bookshelf. Wood shrieked. The whole thing began to drag, inch by inch, toward the window.

It had taken me three days to move that bookshelf. Palsigi was hauling it with one arm.

"That's not fair."

"It's got four arms."

"It's only using one."

"Then it's even less fair."

The feet of the bookshelf ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scraped across the floor as it slid. Holding it was impossible. Go out the front door and I would meet the countless zombies wandering the hallway. Go out the window and Palsigi was waiting. It looked like two options. In the sense that both of them killed me, it was one.

Turn into a zombie and I would wander without end until something finally put me down. Get caught by Palsigi and I would be eaten alive.

I adjusted my grip on the hammer. The instant it shoved its head through, I would drive the thing into its eye. If it had eyes. If it didn't, the mouth. If it didn't have that either, whatever looked the most unpleasant. A reasonably scientific plan.

That was when Harin stepped in front of me.

"It's dangerous. Get back."

"If you die, I disappear too."

"Even so."

She didn't move. She just stood there with both arms spread, ready to put a body that couldn't touch a single physical thing between me and whatever came through that window. It was meaningless, of course. Palsigi's hand would pass straight through her and reach me anyway. She knew that. She was doing it anyway.

"...Move."

"No."

"I can't see."

"Even better."

"So I should just keep hiding from reality until I die?"

"That's what you're best at."

Harin still didn't so much as twitch. I had never built that into my imaginary friend.

I let out a breath and aimed the hammer over her shoulder.

"Duck."

"It won't even hurt if you hit me."

"It'll make me feel worse."

Harin glanced ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠back at me. The corner of her mouth lifted, just a little.

"Then let's—"

The plywood exploded.

The bookshelf came down. I threw myself aside, and my shoulder hit the floor. The bookshelf crashed into the spot where I had been standing a second before, a thunderous impact that sent book spines and splinters flying in every direction.

Light poured in through the broken wall. Unobstructed sunlight, for the first time in three months.

And standing against that light, something with four arms pushed its head up over the windowsill.

After months of this push and pull, it was our first real meeting.

Skin flushed a raw, fevered red. No hair anywhere. Muscle and vein writhed plainly beneath the surface. The face had been stripped of skin, and there were no eyes. In their place, a mouth split open vertically.

"Neither one."

No eyes. No proper mouth. The plan was dead on arrival.

I still couldn't get up. I just whipped the hammer as hard as I could.

A dull, heavy thud. The mallet struck Palsigi square in the forehead, and its head snapped back, losing its center for a moment.

Did that land?

The head was still tipping, a fraction of a second from going all the way over — and then it stopped. A grinding halt, forced in the middle of the motion. The head began to come forward again.

A chime rang in my ear.

It was not a message worth checking in a situation like this. And then I saw the sender.

Advance royalties. Under the original arrangement, that money was supposed to come as rice and groceries. But gathering the goods and sending them across worlds took time. The time I had was however long it took Palsigi to turn its head back around.

The shop flashed through my mind. Instant noodles. A purification unit. A mana furnace. And beneath them, an endless row of every kind of thing. The single currency you needed to buy any of it.

"......Coins!"

I fired back a reply as fast as my fingers would move.

The read receipt appeared.

The next instant, a gold notification flooded my vision.

I opened the shop at once. Weapons. Lowest price first.

There were several options. I skipped the iron sword. It was longer than the kitchen knife, which was a point in its favor, but I would still have to close the distance and swing it myself. I knew my physical talents perfectly well. I did not have any.

I had survived three years of a zombie apocalypse, yes. But I had spent most of that time hiding. Experience and skill were not the same word.

I passed on the flame staff too. One look was enough. I had never learned mana or magic in my life, so if I picked that thing up it would just be a club that happened to be good for hitting people with. And even if a spell did come out of it, the moment I started a fire inside the apartment I would die right along with everything else.

My finger stopped on the fourth item.

Three rounds. Honestly, one would be enough.

I hit confirm without a second of hesitation.

A black pistol dropped out of empty air. I caught it in both hands. It was cold, and it was heavy. The moment my fingers closed around the grip, the instructions poured into my head. Aim. Put your will into it. Pull the trigger.

I had fired a gun in the military. I couldn't remember what I had scored. Only that it had been enough to defend the country. Probably.

A wet crunch of bone. Palsigi's head finished turning all the way back around. The vertically split mouth pointed straight at me. It looked the same as before, but the air coming off it had changed. Open, unmistakable hostility.

I had changed too, though. The heart that had been hammering without rest finally settled. I had a gun now.

"Palsigi."

I put the muzzle on its head. The distance was barely eight steps. I could have hit it with my eyes closed.

"Phase two."

The shot cracked. A blue flash cut the room in half.

The magic round didn't so much as graze Palsigi's cheek. It sailed past and vanished out the window.

It flinched. I flinched. A short, stunned silence filled the space between us.

Harin spoke first.

"......Hey."

"Don't."

"You really have zero talent for shooting."

Palsigi uncoiled the body it had pulled in. Whether the gun had startled it or just the sudden noise, I couldn't tell. What I knew for certain was that it had registered the miss.

It came over the sill and into the room. Four arms planted themselves on the wall and the floor. One step. Two steps.

I still had two rounds left. The first shot had been for zeroing. The second was the real one.

I aimed at the center of its chest. Far bigger than the head. This time I couldn't have missed if I had tried.

The second shot cracked harder. A blue round passed cleanly, perfectly, between Palsigi's left armpit and its torso.

It flinched again. It looked like it couldn't believe it hadn't been hit. I couldn't believe it either.

"......Fuck."

That was as far as it went.

One of Palsigi's arms smashed the floor.

The whole room shook.