Born in Blood-Chapter 569: Cliche

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.’ frёeweɓηovel.coɱ

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 same meaning 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 shame, 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 some sort of instruction.

"Are you telling me to choose a path, you dead coot?" Liam asked the wall of text, estimating what it meant.

Liam looked right. Past the darkness, there was nothing.

He looked right. Still darkness.

Both felt the exact same, yet would no doubt lead to different outcomes.

’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 mental energy.

Just stepping foot on it would most likely send him somewhere else, either through teleportation or otherwise.

Liam stepped foot on it.

And the plate burst forth with green flames.

Liam’s face twisted. His reaction time was immensely fast. Before the flame so much as touched him, he pulled his foot back and ran back to where the paths intersected.

The flames surged upwards and, had he not moved back, would have devoured him in seconds.

Then, the flames 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 same 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 time. Instead, he was transported to some 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 become 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 mean something else.

There were several reasons that translating this language was so difficult.

The ancient language was extremely layered and versatile. A simple alteration of a letter, a stroke, a line, could change the meaning into something else entirely.

The reason the ceiling translation had been done so well was most likely because the ruins had depicted something 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 same 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 meant 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 mechanism had been abruptly thrust into action.

The remaining three paths closed immediately, 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 some 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 mean settling down, and Liam would never settle.

Nevertheless, his focus switched back to the door.

It was open.

A long corridor met 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.’