Liam walked down the torch-lit hallway, his gait slow and controlled. He had absolutely no idea what to expect, but it was easy to predict danger was most likely nearby.
For a brief second, he actually gave the torches a quick inspection. Putting his hand over it, he felt the opposite of warmth. It was cold, almost freezingly.
’Uh... what’s the point of that, even?’ Liam thought, estranged. ’Oh well.’
Liam moved on. Forward.
Before long, a wall presented itself over to him, accompanied with identical pathways leading to the left and right.
Liam squinted his eyes, and they widened with shock.
There were letters written over the wall!
Liam instantly put the monocle on his eye. The ornate eye-wear flickered on as soon as it recognized the sparse, faded, yet barely understandable letters:
"Vroxhan... pathos... thwae... of... wryohas... uramabasta."
...Liam didn’t understand a single word except ’pathos’, and it probably didn’t have the sa aning he thought it did.
The sentences were being scanned and recognized, a few letters changing to a different form... but none of them were comprehensive enough for him to accurately understand.
A sha, honestly. Understanding this little piece of text would have made his exploration so much easier, since it was at its very beginning and most likely held so sort of instruction.
"Are you telling to choose a path, you dead coot?" Liam asked the wall of text, estimating what it ant.
Liam looked right. Past the darkness, there was nothing.
He looked right. Still darkness.
Both felt the exact sa, yet would no doubt lead to different outcos.
’Choose one or the other makes no difference,’ Liam thought. ’I literally can’t make a distinction.’
Liam paused for a second, then moved to the right.
...Then he stopped.
Should he really give this a thought?
No... there was no need to doubt himself.
Right.
Liam took the right and continued in the direction, sensing yet another plate with his ntal energy.
Just stepping foot on it would most likely send him sowhere else, either through teleportation or otherwise.
Liam stepped foot on it.
And the plate burst forth with green flas.
Liam’s face twisted. His reaction ti was imnsely fast. Before the fla so much as touched him, he pulled his foot back and ran back to where the paths intersected.
The flas surged upwards and, had he not moved back, would have devoured him in seconds.
Then, the flas disappeared just as fast.
Liam grimaced, cursing.
’What was that?!’
Wasn’t this a simple decision of direction? Why the heck was he being punished for choosing to go right?
Liam frowned, clearly disturbed. His eyes turned to the plate on the left side. Would the sa happen if he put his foot down?
’One way to find out.’
Liam put his foot on it. Instead of fire, there was a strange feeling of inertia and sickness that invaded his very being.
He blinked...
...and the surroundings had changed.
It was a teleportation platform... an old school one, judging by the strange twist in his gut.
Thankfully, there was no hidden twist this ti. Instead, he was transported to so sort of convergence point that led to four different paths.
Left, right, front and back.
Above each pathway was a small string of ancient text... which, of course, Liam’s shabby monocle was struggling to translate.
Then, Liam spotted a wall of text inscribed over the ceiling. To his genuine and pleasant surprise, the monocle took just a few seconds to get it translated!
It read:
"Glorious Victor, Blessed With Might!"
Liam smiled. It was just one line, yet it made anyone who read it beco excited to conquer whatever was ahead.
Then, Liam shifted his attention back to the strings of text above each door.
A few seconds later, all of them were finished being scanned. As he looked at each one individually, his face twisted with annoyance.
Three of them were beyond comprehension. Like before, it was just a mouthful of words that made no sense.
Just one, though, was barely understandable... as in, the words were translated mostly fine, but Liam still couldn’t make out what he was supposed to get from it.
"Guardian Xoronvah Williv Yorsnn Ghrinookh..."
The only word accurately translated here was ’Guardian,’ but the following words were still foreign to him.
Liam looked contemplative. ’Guardian... as in, Guardian of the Tomb? If that’s the case, I don’t want to imagine whatever creature has the power to guard this place.’
But Liam was on the fence. It could also an sothing else.
There were several reasons that translating this language was so difficult.
The ancient language was extrely layered and versatile. A simple alteration of a letter, a stroke, a line, could change the aning into sothing else entirely.
The reason the ceiling translation had been done so well was most likely because the ruins had depicted sothing similar.
Whatever it was, Liam had to take a risk.
’I won’t go inside that path, then.’
’I just have to play my chances and hope I get a good hand.’
There were three paths available for him to choose, but any one of them posed the sa amount of risk as the other. It made no difference whatever he ended up picking.
’Guess I’ll go with you,’ Liam thought, picking one of the doors. He had no clue what the text above it said, but hey, it was the shortest.
That ant the easiest, right?
He hoped it did.
***
As Liam took a step towards the door’s direction, it clunked open loudly, like a deep, living chanism had been abruptly thrust into action.
The remaining three paths closed imdiately, their walls sinking into the floor below like snow to a hot surface, replaced by a blank, impregnable wall.
Watching with intrigue, Liam connected the scene with Alucard’s shape shifting palace.
’I feel like I have to make one of my own so day.’
A palace of his own, rigged with his own tastes, controllable and customizable to how he saw fit. It’d be a domain of sorts that would amplify his strength beyond the norm.
But that would an settling down, and Liam would never settle.
Nevertheless, his focus switched back to the door.
It was open.
A long corridor t Liam’s eyes. He hadn’t even walked through the door yet, but he could actually see what was lying in wait. Sensing no particular danger, he stepped foot inside.
KRK!
And the door behind him closed.
Liam rolled his eyes.
’Cliche.’
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