MTLNOVEL Chapter 9: chapter 9: shape
Tw: light gore, death, ect
Theo slumped against the cool stone wall of his dorm, his head throbbing. What is this place? His thoughts swirled like smoke, the pain making it hard to grab onto anything solid. Fira sat beside him, staring out the window toward the mall, her shoulders slumped. They'd agreed – Shun and Orion would stay in the South, he and Fira in the North. It made sense. The archers had only targeted Shun, and he was hurt. Fira was a better fighter than him, but she didn't have her wand.
Theo sighed, burying his face in his hands. It's all wrong. The air felt thick, the colors too bright, even the water was too blue. Everything felt…off. Unnatural. He glanced at Fira. Her text box was gone. Weird.
"Hey, Fira," he mumbled, his voice rough. She looked over, her green eyes shadowed. "I'm going for a walk. Need to…clear my head." He stood and left, before she could say anything. He felt like he was being watched, like invisible eyes were following his every move.
He headed toward the arcade. There was a crowd by the circus, and…what was that? A new building, a blocky gray thing with streaks of green, had sprung up near the arcade. A dungeon. Engravings covered the heavy iron door. A riddle was carved beside it:
I shine like a diamond, I dance with flair,
A modern-day rocker with style to spare.
With glamour and swagger, I take the stage,
Bringing back echoes of a golden age.
Who am I?
Theo frowned at the riddle. Rock star…glamour…golden age… He ran through names in his head. Freddie Mercury? Mick Jagger? Then he noticed something. The capitalization was all messed up. Wait a minute… He read the riddle again, focusing on the capital letters. "Luke Spiller of The Struts!" he blurted out. The iron slab slid open with a groan. Yes!
Inside, it was dark and damp. A shiver ran down Theo's spine, but it wasn't from fear. It was…excitement? Like exploring old ruins with…with who? He couldn't quite remember.
The floor creaked beneath him. He shifted his gravity, making himself lighter, just in case. His Titan catalyst pulsed – purple and gold. He tapped his temple, and his yellow sight flickered on, illuminating the damp stone walls covered in vines. He landed softly a minute later, in a thick bed of moss. A large room stretched before him. A desk and chair sat on one side, chests on the other.
"Yeah, right," Theo muttered. "One of you is a mimic, I bet." He used the chair to nudge the chests open from a distance. Empty. All of them, except one. A chain, attached to a heavy, blunt metal ball. A meteor hammer. He picked it up. It was heavier than he expected. The chain was thin but strong.
He walked down a dark hallway, lit by flickering torches. The air smelled like…copper. A strange, metallic scent. Then, the torches stopped. A wall of pure darkness blocked the way. Theo grabbed a torch from the wall. The darkness barely budged. He tapped his left temple. A question mark popped up in his yellow sight. Abnormal. Risk: Intermediate.
He crept along the wall, the torch and his yellow sight barely illuminating anything. Then, he felt something wet. The copper smell intensified. He touched his left shoulder. Wet. And…chunky. Oh no. His right hand slipped. The torch fell. Red. Broken wood. Crushed metal. A hand. No, no, no. He stumbled forward. The torch lay in a pool of blood and went out. A yellow outline of a body appeared in his yellow sight. The archer. Crushed. His stomach lurched. He wanted to throw up.
He stumbled on, the meteor hammer dragging behind him. This isn't camp. This can't be camp. He could handle pressure, talk his way out of trouble. But this…this was too much. He ran, the darkness pressing in on him. There was light ahead. Then a sound behind him. He threw himself toward the light, tumbling down a short flight of stairs. He rolled, trying to get up, but fear held him frozen. He heard footsteps. He looked around. A drained hot spring. Four empty ditches. A walkway. Then he saw it. White cloth. Burnt. Recent. Melted into the stone. Embers glowed. The stone was warm. Bone was melted into it. Oh gods. He scrambled out of the ditch, using the half-burnt staff of the healer, also melted into the stone. He glanced back. The yellow sight showed a frowny face. An exclamation point appeared. A humanoid outline in the darkness. It flickered, turned to static. He ran, the meteor hammer bouncing against his leg. His left thigh throbbed. He'd landed on the hammer head. No time for that.
He ran into another room. A body. The knight. Suffocated. He kept moving. These were kids. He was a kid. He entered the darkness again. His footsteps were wet. Blood. He ran into another room. Someone was standing there. "Hey!" he croaked. They didn't move. They had a shredded sack. Theo approached. The kid fell forward, a pressure plate clicking beneath him. The kid was…shredded. Theo felt numb. Footsteps came from the darkness. "Face me!" he yelled, throwing a pebble into the darkness. He heard it hit, bounce, skid. "If you did this, you're a sicko!" he screamed. He felt sick, enraged, terrified. He staggered to the side, leaning against the wall, gagging. The room reeked of copper. If I ever smell that again…
He slid around the body. The footsteps mocked him. The darkness twisted around him. "What, do you feel bad? Do you regret it?!" He slammed his fist into the wall. Something snapped. His mind was a mess.
The last room was ahead but it felt like he'd been walking for months, years. His eyes were red, cold. He'd been walking for years he had to have been. He felt the ground. Cold stone. Everything was cold. The air was stuffy, bitter. Copper. He'd been scratching his left hand. His skin broke. Wet. It didn't hurt. His knees buckled. How long was he in there? Every exit was a dead end. Spiders. Mocking voices. He was in a deep ocean. His vision blurred. His breath was ragged. The darkness stopped.and he snapped out of whatever delusion he was in. A room. Empty? Then something shifted. Purple-gray. A person. Alive. He ran forward, crouching. Old, thin, the warmth gone from their eyes. "You're…you're alive," he rasped. "What…what happened here?" The person looked at him like he was the devil. "He…he is here. He took my youth, my magic. For he craves- oouh…" The person rasped, then the light in their eyes faded. They went limp. Their breathing stopped.