Too silent. Professional. Alert. Assassin-maid mode engaged. We reached the end of the corridor. The space opened into a massive receiving chamber.
Then.
Candles. So. Many. Candles. They were everywhere—on iron stands, on stone shelves, melted into grotesque little wax mountains on the floor. Some had burned so long the wax had fused with the stone itself, like the chamber had been crying for centuries and no one ever bothered to wipe its face.
Wax dripped down the iron stands like frozen tears.
Very emo. Very "we listened to dark chanting before it was mainstream." The air was thick—smoke, incense, old magic layered on top of each other until it felt chewable. It sat on my tongue, bitter and metallic, like licking a mana crystal that had gone bad.
If smells could judge you, this one was deeply disappointed in my life choices. Then I looked at the walls. Instant regret. Paintings. Big ones. Dark ones. The kind that screamed this artist was not okay and no one stopped them.
