Invader

[Warning! The barrier to host's domain has been breached! It will cost 30 life points to repair the barrier. Consume life points to repair the barrier?]

"Well, well, well! I didn't go out hunting yet, but one had already delivered itself to me," Pro couldn't help but chuckle as he observed the evil spirit trying to break in from the stairway.

Through the small window on the door leading to the stairway, Pro was able to see a pale middle aged man with a butcher knife inserted at the top of his head. Trails of blood leaked down his distorted face, and his shaggy, black hair did nothing to stop it. The blood continued its journey down the face until it reached its outlet, a blood soaked goatee on the man's chin.

Seeing the bloody butcher outfit that the man was wearing, Pro decided to simply nickname him the butcher spirit. Right now, the butcher was frantically chopping at the door with two bloody butcher knives in his hands.

"It seems it wants to come in? Based on its slow rate of damage to my domain, it strength should only be ranked at a baleful spirit at most. It's even slower than that mid-level baleful spirit originating from my apartment," Pro calmly concluded before he decided to harvest this spirit, "Well since you have come, it would be impolite of me to deny your entry. So come on-"

Pro was about to let the butcher spirit into his domain so he could harvest it, but his danger senses rung as he backed away from the stairway door immediately.

BOOM!

[Warning! The barrier to host's domain has been breached! It will cost 210 life points to repair the barrier. Consume life points to repair the barrier?]

Pro watched with wide eyes in shock as a thick bloody tentacle, larger than a door, smash right through the entire stairway walls and crashed onto the ground of the hallway, forming a small radial area of cracked ground!

The tip of the tentacle squirmed against the ground as the tentacle bulged a bit as if swallowing something. Gulp! Then, the thick tentacle raised upwards to reveal the tip of the tentacle, which turned out to be a circular mouth with spiky, bloody teeth!

With a glance, Pro was able to notice a broken arm holding a butcher knife stuck in the gaps in between the teeth of the giant mouth. The scariest thing is that the arm was actually smaller than the teeth!

Pro silently watched this giant tentacle squirm around like a worm as it gnashed its teeth together to swallow the arm stuck in its mouth. After finishing its meal, the giant tentacle then waved around as if it was sniffing the surroundings.

Pro tensed up as he held his breathe, hoping this bloody monster won't notice him. He definitely doesn't want to fight this thing, especially since he doesn't know what it is. Even if he did know, why would he go provoking a tentacle that can fit his entire body into its mouth in one gulp!

The squirming tentacle slowly sniffed around as it gradually approached Pro's position, revealing its mouth that seem to have a bottomless black hole hidden behind its teeth. Pro was already close enough to see the drool leaking from its top row of teeth!

Wanting to send this monster away, Pro attempted to activate his hallway's infinite cycle mode, but to his disappointment, the mode had no effect on the destroyed side of the hallway!

A drop of sweat rolled down Pro's face as he shivered in the face of death. Drip.

The sound of the sweat drop hitting the ground seemed to be so loud in the silent hallway. The squirming tentacle had frozen in place for a moment before it slowly turned towards its prey while its teeth chomped together in excitement. Then, it shot forward towards Pro!

"Sh*t!" Pro swiftly dived through the wall and into the nearby apartment 446.

BOOM!

Pro could already imagine the heavy costs for repairs, but he had no time to cry about this now.

"Toi Toi! Go! Distract!" Pro hollered at the bathroom as he dashed towards the bedroom.

A toilet paper roll reluctantly floated out of the bathroom as strips of toilet paper grew out of it to form the figure of a shivering mummy.

BOOM!

Chunks of concrete exploded into the room as half the front wall of apartment 446 was smashed by a bloody tentacle. The tip of the tentacle came to a stop as it swerved back and forth for a moment as if deciding which prey to chase after.

In the end, it decided to swallow the prey in front of it first! The mouth on the tentacle opened wide as it shot towards the toilet paper spirit. Of course, the toilet paper spirit won't stand still and wait for death. It floated sideways towards the kitchen to dodge the attack.

BOOM! The tentacle continued on its trajectory and smashed through the living room wall and into the outer wall of the bathroom, causing a ripple to form on it. Surprisingly, the wall actually stayed intact!

Instead, it was the tentacle that suffered an injury as a couple of broken, spiky teeth danced in the air before falling to the ground. The mouth that gnashed its teeth in confusion for a bit before the tentacle whipped backwards, completely destroying the charred bathroom!

Boom! Accompanying the remnants of the charred bathroom wall, the tentacle's mouth pounced forward at the toilet paper spirit who was dully hiding in the charred kitchen. The toilet paper spirit that let its guard down was then gobbled up with no chance of escaping!

Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!

However, to the tentacle monster's surprise, the spirit it swallowed seemed to have disappear into thin air once it tried to travel towards its main body! Feeling that its snack was gone, the tentacle then angrily whipped around intending to smash through the walls behind it to chomp on its final target. However, it was at this time that Pro showed up in the hallway right outside of the destroyed walls of apartment 446.

Aiming his hand at the wriggling tentacle, Pro held a talisman in his hand as he gritted his teeth in anger, "Go to hell you piece of sh*t! Exorcise!"

As the talisman burned to ashes, Pro felt his surroundings dim as everything around him seemed to grey out. A giant, ancient gate materialized behind Pro, causing Pro to stiffen due to his sense of danger.

Then, the double doors of the gate slowly creaked opened a tiny gap, and an intimidating pressure arose from behind Pro as the lashing tentacle seemed to be locked in place by an unknown power. Pro felt curious about what had appeared behind him but his instincts were telling him to not to look!

"Look at us! Come with us!"

"Come join us! Come!"

A multitude of soft whispers sounded from behind Pro, tempting him to look back, but he resisted his urge! Then, Pro watched as a grey mist flowed out from behind him and towards the tentacle. As the grey mist touched the tentacles, it began to corrode it and transform it into grey mist! Grey hands then grew out of the mist and began to pull the tentacle towards the gate behind Pro.

OWOOOO! A ghastly howl echoed from an unknown floor of the apartment building, causing the ground to vibrate! The tentacle struggled harder against the unknown force in an attempt to escape.

As if the grey mist could sense that the tentacle was not the monster's main body, the grey mist actually began to tumble up the tentacle, as if it intended to seek out its true target by tracing the tentacle!

Sensing that it was being locked onto, the owner of the tentacles gave another ghastly howl. Then, Pro watched in shock as the wriggling tentacle stiffened before it rapidly shriveled up as if its nutrients were sucked out of it.

Sensing this, all the grey mist surrounding the tentacle sped up and left Pro's sight. Another ghastly howl caused the floor to vibrate before the tentacle twitched a couple of times and limply fell to the ground.

With the death of the tentacle, the grey mist that was trying to trace the tentacle to its source also lost its target. The grey mist then silently flowed back into the gate as the gate creaked shut. Hearing the whispers gradually fading away, Pro finally breathed a sigh of relief as cold sweat rolled down his face.

After feeling that the sense of danger was completely gone, Pro finally slumped to the ground weakly.

"That was a level two spell? Why is the danger level so high? Could it be because of its connection to the underworld? What would have happened if I ... looked back?" Pro pondered with a hint of fear as he recalled his urge to look back.

Alice poked her head out from the nearby wall as she glanced around with fearful eyes while asking, "M-Master, is it gone?"

Pro nodded as he gently replied, "It's fine now, Alice. You don't have to hide anymore."

Hearing this, Alice dashed up to Pro and pushed him to the ground as she hugged him tightly while crying, "Wu wu wu! A-Alice thought she would never see master anymore!"

Pro smiled weakly as he comforted Alice by patting her head while hugging her to comfort himself. After embracing each other for a while, Pro finally calmed down. Pro finally had the chance to take a look at his system notifications.

[Warning! The barrier to host's domain has been breached! It will cost 330 life points to repair the barrier. Consume life points to repair the barrier?]

[Warning! An extra toilet of the host has been destroyed.]

[Warning! Host's subordinate, Toilet Paper Spirit, has been destroyed. Consume 25 life points to recover subordinate?]

Pro almost banged his head into the wall once he saw the damage on his domain. This was the heaviest damage to his domain he has suffered so far! This is just the barrier, and there is still the objects within his domain! His mere 420 points from before is simply not enough to repair this!

Sighing to himself while glancing at the destroyed rooms and the open view to the stairway, Pro felt sad, but did not feel despair. After the bad sh*t came the good sh*t!

[Remnant of an intruder is detected. Domain is now absorbing the remains of the intruder ...]

[Absorption completed. After absorbing a powerful spirit's body part, host gains 3720 life points.]

"Sh*tty plot device for the win!" Pro couldn't help but cheer as he saw the free delivery of points.

"Although it was extremely dangerous, and I suffered heavy losses, but luck was on my side as I just so happened to get that dangerous exorcism talisman," Pro concluded with a wry smile.

Even though he may be lucky now, Pro knew he couldn't always rely on luck in the future.

"Only strength matters. If I was as strong as the existence behind the underworld, then that monster would have escape once it encounters me!" Pro thought while lamenting his weakness once more.

"Still, that powerful monster is a bit worrying. Based on the points I got from its body part that it left behind, it should be at least a top-level blood spirit! After all, it's only a body part and it almost gave as much points as the mid-level blood spirit I harvested the other time," Pro speculated with a hint of fear.

"Although it failed the attack this time, it could attack again in the future as it may have held a grudge due to having to leave a body part behind. Great, just another reason to get stronger and escape from this building," Pro complained with a hint of frustration.

Pro then patted himself on the face as he brushed his worries aside, "Well, I'll worry about that later. Now, let's repair the domain first."

[Consuming 330 life points to repair the barrier of the domain ...]

With a command, Pro saw his points reduce from 4140 to 3810. Then, he hugged Alice as he watched the walls of his domain recover as the river of time flowed backwards.

[Domain barrier repaired. It is discovered there are damage in the objects bound to host's domain. Does host want to consume 200 life points to repair them?]

"Yes."

Pro watched as all the objects and wall within his domain get repaired as well, but unfortunately, there was no notification saying that he has regained his extra toilet. Pro could only sigh and count it as a loss.

Standing up and lending a hand to the cute Alice to help her up, Pro examined the charred apartment 446 that now had all of its walls and room back in place. Pro then held his chin as he felt something was missing.

"Master! What about Toi Toi?" Alice cutely wrinkled her nose as she stared at Pro with watery eyes.

"Oh yea, Alice's Toi Toi is missing," Pro chuckled as Alice pouted.

With a thought, 25 points was deducted. Pro then watched in amazement as the space in front of him distorted to show an image of the tentacle swallowing the toilet paper spirit. Pro watched as the toilet paper spirit slid down the tentacle monster's mouth, but then the spirit was suddenly sucked out of the image by an unknown force.

The distorted space returned to normal and a toilet paper roll now floated in that space. Pro raised his eyebrow a bit while he was internally shocked, "It seems to have pulled the spirit back from the past to the future? What kind of power is needed to do this? Just how powerful is my system? Why are powerful things popping up one after another?"

Pro's muddled thoughts were interrupted by Alice's cheerful voice, "Toi Toi, you are back!"

Pro chuckled as he watched Alice happily danced in circles while hugging the toilet paper roll, "I guess it's not too bad for Alice to have a toy huh."

Releasing the toilet paper roll, Alice then skipped back over to Pro and hugged his arms with a carefree smile. The abandoned toilet paper spirit condensed a toilet paper mummy and sat on the ground in sadness.

Seeing the sad spirit, Alice cheerfully comforted, "Toi Toi, Alice will play with you later! Alice needs to make master happy first~"

A feeling of euphoria warmed Pro's worried heart as he couldn't help but pinch Alice's cute face, "I'm lucky to have you Alice."

"Hehehe~" Alice giggled charmingly as she led her master to the bedroom.

After a wonderful 'counseling' session, Pro truly felt his worries being swept away. Pro recovered his calmness and began to plan his future once again.

"Although the weak spirit guard is not that great for guarding against powerful spirits, it should still be able to warn me about humans. Another security guard will spawn tomorrow, and I can station it to guard the stairway door. Since spirits can invade from there, so can humans, and my system doesn't seem to prevent humans from invading," Pro thought before moving onto the the main topic.

With his 3585 life points, Pro could feel the next level approaching him like a plane crashing from the sky.

"After all, pies do fall from the sky. I'm getting closer to my escape, but the danger is still chasing right behind. It's time to step up my game and take some risks! Others can invade me, but I can also invade them!"