The world vanished into cold, rolling vapor, as if engulfing Melvin into whatever truth of the Bastion he had almost revealed moments before.
Just as quickly as this situation came, it ended, leaving Melvin with senses tangled in confusion.
Standing amidst a massive hall, he thought he had been dragged elsewhere. Maybe dragged to another hall in another realm, but as the fog in his mind slowly dissipated and his vision became clear, he realized that nothing had changed.
He was still in the Bastion Hall with the same towering pillars that rose endlessly into darkness that seemed to swallow what little light the green lanterns offered. Those lanterns, suspended between the pillars like dying stars, were what barely held back the immense blackness that loomed over this hall.
The hall felt just as ancient as before; only there was just a little difference.
The circular formation of pictorial carvings was no longer in place, and the celestial wall of drifting clouds that had stood ahead of him had vanished as well.
Instead, a thick, swirling fog was now occupying the far end of the hall, slowly dissipating with each second that ticked by.
Melvin frowned.
Not wishing to dwell on this new development, he took a step forward and, in that instant, froze in place.
Beneath the foot that had been thrown out was a mark… a rune of heptagon shape. Its edges were sharp and precise. Melvin had not noticed it and stepped on it.
The instant his boot touched its surface, the mark seemed to activate.
Following the activation, the hall began to tremble… not as violently as though there was an incoming disaster. It was the subtle tremor of awakening something superficial after centuries of slumber.
Melvin's breath hitched.
Soon, his costly patience was torn apart as something began to move.
From within the shadows between the tall, wide pillars, a faint figure of something familiar… something he had seen before began to come to light, seeking to get bathed under the dim glow of the flickering green lights.
Stones scraped the marble floor, and after a fleeting but unnerving moment, the full structure of the figures became clear to Melvin.
They belonged to the seven statues he had seen depicted within the circular formations earlier. The towering knightly figures clad in archaic armor, with their faces… horse-like faces hidden beneath carved helms.
Each of them slid forward without lifting their feet, gliding across the floor as though the hall itself was theirs. Oh… well, it did belong to them.
As they approached, the heptagon beneath Melvin's foot, which had been tiny to the eyes, began to glow a dim green light that spilled outward, its lines expanding rapidly, stretching until the shape grew large enough… with Melvin standing in between.
Within the stretched moment, the knightly statues finally reached closer. Each one stood at a point of the glowing heptagon, perfectly positioned, forming a silent, symmetrical prison around him.
Melvin swallowed.
After the knightly statues took position, he noticed something odd.
The statues were similar to the depictions he had seen earlier… only that they weren't holding a key in their right hands, and no servants were standing behind them.
'Are they incomplete? Or perhaps… this was how they were meant to be? What could this possibly mean?'
Melvin frowned as he silently searched for meaning in the stillness of the whole situation. At the end, what could come to his mind was to approach any of the knightly statues.
What was he even thinking?
He didn't have a weapon with him or anything to defend himself should any of the sculptures suddenly spring to life. But he was going to make his move regardless.
He was about to make a move when his gaze drifted downward. From the center of the heptagon on which he stood, thin, glowing lines extended outward, one to each statue. They looked like pathways guiding him toward every possible choice.
This only solidified Melvin's decision, as he assumed that paths had appeared for him to trudge on. However, he understood that whichever choice he made wasn't going to be reversible.
At the same time, he assumed that his safety was going to be assured as long as he didn't step off the heptagon randomly. As an adept reader of novels, and with his experience in his previous world, he understood the implication too well.
It was going to mean provoking an attack against these knightly statues… and that was the last thing he wanted in his weaponless state.
Melvin exhaled slowly and stepped forward, following one glowing path until he stood directly before the statue blocking his path forward.
The moment stretched until—
What happened next left him dazed. The knightly statue moved. Its raised left arm descended with a sharp, sudden motion, stone grinding loudly as it plunged downward.
Melvin flinched with his eyes closed, instinctively bracing himself, throwing a foot backward, almost stepping off the path out of fear of being struck. But the strike never came.
Instead, the statue's arm halted inches from his chest before thrusting forward towards Melvin… harmlessly.
Having waited for a few seconds with no misfortune befalling him, Melvin opened his eyes, and they widened at the same time.
The knight was handing him over the long whip it held in its left hand.
"A whip…?" Melvin murmured.
What was he going to use it for? Why would he need a weapon?
Then it dawned on him. What was a person ever going to need a weapon for anyway, if not to fight?
A cold certainty settled in his gut. He concluded that if the knightly statue was handing out its weapon, it could only mean it was somehow informing him of an impending danger… an inevitable battle.
Even then, how useful was a stone weapon he wasn't even so sure of moving going to be in such a battle? How was he even going to take it out of the knight's concreted hand?
He felt that if he had approached the other knights, they would behave in the same way, but it was already late since that path only provided a way forward and required him to make a choice.
His choice had led him to choose the long whip.
Melvin stretched out his hands, and as soon as he placed them on the long whip, a chime from the system interrupted him for a moment.
[You have received a Soul Signature.]
Before he could call out the notification in detail, he got distracted as the stone whip disappeared from the knight's hand and its form began to crumble. Its stone body dissolved into pale dust, then sank into the marble floor, vanishing without a trace.
From the edge of his eyes, he noticed the other knights had vanished too.
At that same time, the glowing pathway beneath his feet shifted, extending straight forward beyond the heptagon. The marble floor of the ancient bastion hall soon groaned as thick, broad lines carved themselves outward, forming a sloped passage that plunged downward.
Then, the path tilted so fast that all Melvin could take note of was himself dropping violently, air rushing and tearing past him.
Melvin landed face-first, slamming onto a soft, widened surface, the force knocking the breath from his lungs.
"What… is this?" he groaned and scrambled upright, drawing a disgusting, sticky, white substance from his face.
'How can the ground be so soft? And what is this disgusting mucus?' Melvin mused, placing his free hand on the surface to feel it.
As his hand rested on the surface, it stuck, and as if to spell his doom, the surface beneath him quivered. Slowly, ominously, it began to rise.
'Oh… my… God!'
Melvin's blood ran cold. He had not landed on the floor.
Whatever he had landed on was waking up.