It had been days since professor Ericson got to the human civilization nearest to Golden Lake University which was roughly some tens of kilometres away; New Cresthill, but since his arrival, he had not accomplished the reason he had stopped in such a shabby town when he could easily have moved to big cities and metropolises such as Cleethorpes, MillerVille or even Hillfar where he had grown with his aged parents before leaving them one night to a university located in the middle of an almost impenetrable woodland where he was told he will meet people like him, Werewolves.
Upon driving out of the sheets after sheets of wood, trees, shrubs after a painful thirty-hour drive with little to no rest, he disposed the car which was battered to pulp next to some factory with peeling walls and wobbly infrastructure and got for himself a second-rate hotel room on one of the most notorious streets, Knife's Edge.
On his first night, he slept for about fifteen ho
“Have you packed all what professor Ericson mentioned?” Trisha asked Harold as he zipped up his bag with much difficulty because of the too many cans of food he had in it.Harold picked up the letter, brushed through the many wordings till he got to where professor Ericson had listed the things he should take. “It all remains a pocket knife,” he said, dropped the paper on his bed and zipped up the remaining space that was left at once.“And where are you going to get that?” she challenged him, folding her arms. Wilkes sat on his own bed, watching the couple. They were always breathing down each other's necks and although it didn't look like it most times, it was because they cared for each other.“Uhm, I don't know,” Harold replied, swinging his heavy bag over his shoulder.“Are you sure you want to carry such an heavy bag everywhere you go for three days?” Wilkes asked, eyeing Harold's brown leather bag that protru
The moment professor Ericson took a step into the shabby house, a thick stench of poop hit his nostrils but he managed to keep a straight face as he walked on although he was internally disgusted by the lack of good hygiene.‘If this was where Francis lived’, he thought, ‘then the contest did far worse than mouths could say’.As he walked through a small passage with walls that had large holes burrowed into them, a few lizards ran into them to hide because they viewed him as a predator and for a second, professor Ericson thought Francis fed on them. He quickly took his mind off it, though, for his mental state and brooded on how Francis was back then in 1989; Long, blonde, curly hair, perfectly neat set of clothes changed everyday—coupled with a blameless hygiene which his snowy teeth were a testimony of, although with a small frame, an intimidating aura that brought the biggest bullies to their knees. Francis had a brigh
"Where are our bags?" Wilkes whispered in an alarming tone as him and Trisha watched Harold, Derek and Penelope walk to a grey limousine that was parked beside the auditorium.Four men all dressed in black tuxedos, tinted glasses and wristwatches that beeped with a red light walked before them like bodyguards and Dr. Peyton Giovanni walked behind them with a vile smile."They're at my hostel. We have to get them now and meet Harold at the gate," Trisha said pretty loudly so that Wilkes could hear her over the cheers from the students that watched their representative leave.They both gave Harold a long, lasting look as he sunk into the limousine then with a lot of struggle, they forced their way through the noisy crowd and began running. They had to beat the limousine."Any shortcuts?" Wilkes asked as they ran past a lamp post that was blackish with rust. It had stopped functioning for years and hadn't b
Penelope was the first to get out of the limousine that had transported them from the auditorium to the school's gate. When she was out, Derek who was quite confident of himself retrieving the orb and making enchanters like him proud stepped out, too, and lastly, Harold Girard, who had an expressionless look on his face exited the limousine.The three of them looked all around the intimidating green trees that could make the tallest of giants look like a midget. They were so absorbed in the experience that had started whether they were prepared or not to the extent that they weren't aware of the limousine steering its way back to the school until it was long gone.So far for Harold, though, things were going as professor Ericson had predicted. Penelope brought two guns; a very small-sized pistol and an hunting rifle that was slung over her shoulder. She had a a lot of cartridge in her bag, too, and barely brought any meals.D
If Harold, Penelope and Derek thought the forest was dark, it only got darker when the sun disappeared into the sky completely. It got so dark they couldn't see each other's silhouettes and had to use their flashlights to navigate past the naturally grown hedges of their odd environment.Having trekked what Harold calculated to be one-fourth the total landmass of the forest, they were physically tired and when they got to a snug location that gave them an almost 360° of the trees that surrounded them, they decided to rest there for the night because they couldn't take the chances of continuing only to be devoured or to find a place that wasn't as good as the one they had come across at that moment.As they settled on the small space that had soft grasses that popped out of the ground like they were on a picnic—without its luxuries, they continued their discussion, this time being Penelope's turn to talk.“I grew up with my grandmoth
Professor Ericson woke up with a gentle hammer that persisted at a soft and timely rhythm. He looked all around with his blurry vision, trying to remember where he was when the whiff of poop whacked his nostrils again and immediately, he remembered all that had happened.In short, he had visited Francis for help and had been drugged to sleep. Thankfully, it wasn't poison.Professor Ericson sniffed out the nasty foul from his nostrils as his eyes cleared even more, showing him the walls with peeling colour and white ceiling that had turned creamy with swipes here and there of grime that had accumulated over years. His sense of touch came back to him and he felt the heated and very uncomfortable surface he was on. Gradually, he sat up and he remembered it as the cushion he sat on before he fainted. No wonder it was uncomfortable and extremely hurt.A throat cleared and spoke up, “I was wondering when you
The stunning, orange-coloured embers of the wood Harold and the two others had set ablaze danced into the benighted atmosphere in permed curls with occasional hisses and fizzles as Harold, Derek and Penelope sat round the bonfire—for its warmth, whilst giving each other enough room to operate as their pupils tended to the hypnotizing flame.A cold, night wind swept through the forest and threatened to extinguish the flames which Derek was now holding a piece of meat over, but the flame although wavered, survived the gust.“You were saying something, Penny?” Derek said, as he moved away from the heat that was boiling his skin and heating his blood. The meat was fairly roasted but he wasn't going to grill himself for a chunk of meat. ‘That will be stupid’, he thought as he sat and looked at the meat for a part that could assuage his craving.Penelope's eyes shifted from the flame which was keepi
Harold's brows twitched at their edges as they knotted together in an intimidating frown. His breath, too, was mild and regular as sighs escaped through his lips and although he was in an unmoving stance like a statue, he was so in tune with the environment he was in—the forest, that he almost knew of every cricket that crawled past him on the earth and every bird that flew above them to safety.His knees which were a little bent ached as he stood still but he paid no regard to it as he held his sharp knife tightly in his right hand like his life was banked on it, him and the others waiting for the wild animal—not ghoul, he hoped, to come out from behind the thick trees.The only parts of his body which were moving were his heart which was pumping an incredible amount of adrenaline through his veins, ready to spring into action and his eyeballs which sometimes shifted to Derek who Harold thought had been behaving diffe