Chapter 147
"That's enough waiting," he said in a voice that needed no repetition, loud yet not shouting, deep yet not whispering, like a bell struck in the middle of the quietest midnight.
"We move. We enter the castle. Not a single person stays behind here, and not a single one turns back before I give the order."
And for a moment, silence greeted the command.
Not the silence of doubt, but the silence of more than a hundred soldiers taking their final breaths before stepping into an uncertainty they could never have imagined before.
They moved.
Together, in a nearly synchronized motion, the captains of Team Xirkushkartum along with their subordinates, the Satanist leaders in their black robes, and the entire force gathered before the gates of the Castle of Thalyssra Blessed by the Great Sanse began to advance forward.
The black iron gate did not open on its own—they opened it themselves, twelve members of the Orbit Severance Unit working in silence, sweat running down their temples even though the night air was cold.
And when the gate finally opened wide enough to pass through, they entered one by one into the shadow of the castle, a darkness deeper than the night itself, while behind them, outside the walls, the Angels and Holy Beings continued spinning faster and faster, as though celebrating the arrival of guests they had never invited.
The moment the final foot crossed the threshold, the light from outside—which had once been fairly bright despite coming only from the moonlight and the gleam of the Angels' wings—dimmed instantly, like a candle blown out by an unseen hand, like eyes slowly being closed by something that no longer wished to see further.
Inside the castle's first chamber, the darkness was so thick it almost felt tangible, and without waiting for orders, the captains of Team Xirkushkartum switched on their flashlights—pale beams of light piercing through the dark, dancing along neatly arranged stone walls with a strangeness that disturbed the mind.
"So tidy," Onigakure muttered, his voice lowered to a whisper even though there was no reason to whisper.
"Too tidy. This isn't how our people live."
Shaqar, standing beside him, merely nodded, his eyes tracing the wide corridor before them—clean, without dust, without cobwebs, without filth, like a place freshly swept by hands that despised disorder.
"A clean and healthy environment," Makakushi said bitterly, "the greatest enemy of Satanist ways of life. We are standing in the enemy's home, even before that enemy has shown its face."
They walked.
Six thousand steps.
No one measured with instruments, yet every soldier knew it within their own bones—from the silently counted footsteps, from the breaths that had begun to feel heavy despite the flat ground, from the foreboding pulse throbbing endlessly in their temples—that they had crossed a distance far too long for an entrance corridor with no turns.
"Six thousand," Arkhaz whispered suddenly, and no one asked how he knew because they all felt the same thing.
And at that exact second, at the threshold between the six-thousandth and six-thousand-and-first step, something appeared in the middle of the chamber before them.
Not a solid figure.
Not a shadow.
But something like smoke condensing out of nothingness—like winter breath suddenly freezing in hot air, like light reflecting from a mirror that had never existed.
The flashlights were immediately aimed toward it, and beneath the trembling beams held by hands that were no longer entirely steady, the gas began to speak.
"Thank you."
The voice of the gas did not emerge from a mouth, because it had no mouth—its voice came from everywhere, from the walls, from the floor, from the ceiling, from within their own lungs, like a whisper whose delivery had long been delayed.
"My deepest gratitude to the leaders of the Zhulumat Banner. To Zhulumat Katamtum—the name most frequently spoken within insults we never had the chance to offer."
Zhulumat stood still, his expression unchanged, though behind him several captains exchanged glances from the corners of their eyes.
The gas pulsed softly, expanding and contracting like the lungs of a giant breathing in its sleep.
"You have crossed the ground floor," the gas continued, and its tone sounded almost cheerful—as cheerful as a gas could possibly sound.
"And if you decide to take…" it paused briefly, "…twenty-two more steps, you will arrive at the first floor. One of the three floors within this castle."
Arkhaz turned toward Zhulumat, and without making a sound, his lips formed a single word.
"Trap?"
Zhulumat did not answer, yet his eyes never left the pulsating gas before them.
"The first floor," Shaqar repeated softly, almost as though speaking to himself.
No one laughed.
No one moved.
The gas waited with the patience possessed only by something that did not wear the clock of life upon its wrist.
At last, Zhulumat Katamtum raised his left hand—not to signal retreat, but to signal preparation.
"Twenty-two steps," he said, and his voice was no louder than a whisper, yet every person in the chamber heard it as it echoed against the spotless walls that had never once belonged to them.
Makakushi stepped forward half a pace—only half, enough to show his courage but not enough to place himself ahead of Zhulumat.
With his flashlight still pointed directly at the pulsating gas, he raised his voice, breaking the silence that had until then been filled only by breathing and competing heartbeats.
"Are you merely a method?" he asked, his tone sharp as a freshly honed blade.
"A method created by the Angels and Holy Beings out there to obstruct our journey toward the highest floor?"
Arkhaz let out a faint snort behind him, perhaps because of Makakushi's boldness, perhaps because of the question itself, while Shaqar merely furrowed his brows, staring at the gas with the same suspicion that had never truly slept within his chest.
The gas did not answer immediately—it expanded, contracted, expanded again, as though deciding whether it should become angry or laugh, and when it finally chose, the sound that emerged was not anger.
Laughter.
Not quiet laughter nor hesitant laughter, but cheerful laughter echoing from every direction at once, from above their heads, beneath the soles of their feet, from between the fingers gripping flashlights with cold sweat.
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds.
The laughter kept rolling like waves that never reached the shore, like the ringing of a bell falling into a bottomless well.
By the ninth second, several soldiers in the back ranks had begun exchanging uneasy glances.
By the fourteenth second, Onigakure bit his lower lip until it nearly bled.
And by the nineteenth second, the laughter stopped—not gradually, not slowly fading away, but like a door violently slammed shut in the middle of a sentence.
"Idealism," the gas said afterward, and now its tone no longer sounded cheerful, but filled with something resembling pity—as much pity as a gas could possibly feel.
"Idealism such as yours, Captain Makakushi, believing that one can cross the three floors of this castle as easily as walking across sand…" it paused, and within that silence everyone could hear the unseen smile, "…is the primary reason why Satanists so often meet death so quickly from the death line already assigned to them."
To be continued…