Chapter 48: Chapter 48: This Place Is Not a Place of Honor

After minutes of walking down the stairs without seeing the bottom, I worried that it would continue down forever, like some sort of otherworldly, bottomless abyss.

But eventually, and with patience, we finally reached the end of it, likely a couple hundred meters underground. Before us was a wooden door, locked with a padlock.

"How much do you think it cost to make this place?" I whispered to Hei.

"Hard to say."

But really, I wondered why they had dug this place so deep.

I put my ear against the door to listen. No noise came from the other side. As I drew my crossbow, I gave Hei the go-ahead. He bludgeoned the lock with the butt of his spear. A few solid blows broke it off the door.

We went through. Inside was a stone-walled room, lined on either side with grand, metal cupboards. Glowing rubies jutted out of the ceiling, casting their crimson glow upon everything here. Hei cautiously approached one of the cupboards and opened it using the shaft of his spear.

Inside were glass bottles that all contained a colorless liquid. They were labeled. I got closer and strained my eyes to read them under the brutally red light.

"H2SO4," I told Hei. "Sulfuric acid? Why are there so many bottles of it?"

I had tried to sound composed, even casual. But my voice came out shaking. And my whole body shook. I knew we weren't supposed to be here, and my nerves screamed unceasingly for me to leave.

"The Seekflower isn't pointing down anymore," Hei noted. Instead, it pointed straight at one of the metal cabinets that stood flush against the wall. This one was locked, but Hei once again broke it open without much trouble. And inside – to neither of our surprise – there was no back panel, but rather a hidden passageway through the wall. Hidden doors really seemed to be a theme here. Hei led the way through, and I followed.

The room on the other side was empty, with a closed wooden door on the wall opposite to us. At this point, closed wooden doors were the least of our concerns.

Beside the door were lines of text graven into the wall. The words had been carved in large and angular letters, and the text stretched from the ceiling to the ground:

 

This place is not a place of honor…

No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here…

Nothing valued is here.

What is here was dangerous and repulsive to us.

This message is a warning about danger.

The danger is in a particular location…

The center of danger is here... ahead down this path.

The danger is still present, in your time, as it was in ours.

The danger is to the body, and it can kill.

The danger is unleashed only if you substantially disturb this place physically.

This place is best shunned and left uninhabited.

 

"W-well?" I stammered, eyeing the text, then the door. "Do we still go?"

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…But what was I saying? We had already risked our lives, and the lives of our comrades, to come this far. How shameful it'd be, for a scary message on the wall to turn us back. Of course we'd still go.

"No," said a voice behind us. A woman's voice.

I spun around, only to see a swarm of swords flying into me. They tore into my flesh and knocked me back into the wall. My vision darkened for a moment as I watched my own blood spray out.

But I didn't fall.

Gritting my teeth and choking back a cry, I launched a Frost Missile at the voice. And even through my blurred vision, I could see the pine-green dress, the silver hair, the bob cut. Headmaster Fink.

She dodged; my attack brushed against her arm and opened a tear in her dress. Hei Voidstepped behind her, into her blindspot. Fink's floating swords withdrew out of me, back to defend herself, but it was too late. He thrusted his spear into her back. Its spearpoint, glistening with blood, jutted out through her chest.

But only for a moment. Fink dissolved into smoke, and even the blood on Hei's spear vanished. I had half-anticipated it, the illusory duplicate. And Hei probably did, too. But even so, I could see how much he now trembled, staring ahead with empty, wide eyes.

For all the training and drills he had put himself through, he probably never trained to kill.

"Surrender," Fink ordered. Her voice rang right beside my ear, much too close. I felt her breath on my skin.

Fink – the real one – appeared out of thin air behind me, close enough that the fabrics of our clothes touched. She held a silver blade to my throat.

"Don't try your Cold Grenade," she added. "Your wounds weren't fatal. If I have to, I will kill you. And I will kill Hei as well."

Disregarding her threat, I formed a Cold Grenade and detonated it as fast as I could. She slashed at my neck, but the freezing blast stopped her right as the blade met my skin.

I maneuvered away with a thin, bleeding scratch on my neck. I followed up with two crossbow shots and a Frost Missile into her center of mass. Hei gathered streaks of light and darkness in his palm; he tightened his grip, forging the energy into a Schwarzschild Trident. He hurled it at Fink, piercing her through, and charged in. With all his weight behind him, he jutted his spear into Fink's abdomen. Gravity pulsed through the weapon and into Fink. The surge of power flung her back into the wall, like a ragdoll.

I checked her HP.

[HP: 722/1150]

So she wasn't invincible, after all.

I shot crossbow bolt after bolt at her, and Hei charged in to press his attack. Fink's swords darted at him, but he weaved past their strikes with blistering-fast legwork. Hei's spear raced toward her throat.

A silvery pane, like a half-transparent mirror, materialized in front of Fink to block the blow.

Hold on. Was the mirror another one of Fink's abilities? How…how many did she have again?

A swarm of translucent, gray hands shot out of the mirror's surface. They grappled onto Hei, pulling him in. He swung his spear at them, but his strikes merely phased through.

Hei Voidstepped, vanishing in a burst of light. But the mirror and hands vanished as well. And when Hei appeared on the other side of the room, the mirror and hands appeared right with him. The hands still clenched onto him, drawing him toward the silver pane.

I shot at the mirror with my crossbow. I launched a Frost Missile and Vortex Shield at it. All my attacks passed through and hit the wall behind.

"Drowning well," Fink muttered. "Crescent eye. Mirror of loss. Offer a flower to the dreamer of dreams."

I turned my crossbow on Fink. Before I had a chance to properly aim, her silver blades impaled me on all sides. They twisted within my flesh, carved into my bones. Pain seared me blind and senseless, and before I knew it, I had fallen to the ground, contorted and screaming soundlessly.

The last thing I saw was Hei disappearing into the mirror.

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