The old wooden door opened slowly, emitting a creak that testified to its age.
Alioth noticed a slight resistance as he opened it, as if it were resisting its purpose.
The boy had to use force to open it all the way.
Then, a stagnant smell of death and dried blood hit him full on, enveloping him in an ominous stench.
All his warning instincts activated.
Every hair on his skin stood on end, every muscle in his body tensed, every cell in his body screamed, warning him to run out of there.
The boy could feel how Abzu was practically solidified on his head, as if he had frozen from fear.
"LET GO OF ME, IDIOT! DON'T TOUCH ME!" Alioth then heard.
A female voice, young, of someone who probably shared the same age as Nora.
That sound snapped him out of his trance. As if they had thrown a bucket of cold water on him.
That had brought him back to reality and reminded him of his purpose. He wasn't here for sightseeing, he was there to save lives.
"Alright Alioth, you can do this," Alioth said to himself, to give himself courage.
The boy took a step forward, entering the room.
It looked practically like a labyrinth made of tall shelves full of books, strange artifacts, jars with liquids or strange organs, and test tubes or potions.
The only illumination came from the hallway and the light emanating from certain jars with spirits inside.
"Run! Save us! Escape! Rescue me! Help me! Danger! Watch out! Help!"
Alioth could hear the voices of the spirits inside the jars, however he didn't act yet, he couldn't make noise.
"Wait a bit, I'll get you out of here," the boy commented quietly, seeking to comfort the spirits and calm them down.
Their "voices" calmed down, which made him more relaxed.
The boy kept walking carefully through that labyrinth of shelves, taking special care not to step on some of the jars spilled on the floor.
"DAMN OLD BASTARD! I TOLD YOU TO LET ME GO!!!" the voice screamed again with more aggression than before, which forced Alioth to quicken his pace.
Then, another voice was heard.
A voice that Alioth knew very well, and that made his blood run cold.
"Pffft, you really struggle a lot for a brat," the voice laughed, a cruel and twisted voice. "But I don't have time for games, [Stop moving and shut up]," the old man then ordered.
An ominous silence fell over the room, as if sound itself had been banished.
The girl stopped struggling and screaming, as if that order were absolute.
As if [not moving] and [not speaking] were new and unbreakable axioms established in reality.
Alioth knew what that was. It was heka, the power of the word, the power to impose your will on others with a simple phrase.
Though witnessing that phenomenon wasn't going to discourage Alioth.
It was true that he didn't want trouble. He didn't know who was being held captive there either.
Normally he would have preferred to run.
However, perhaps because Nora inspired him, or perhaps because of the hatred he had for that voice, Alioth decided to intervene.
The boy finally reached the last shelf, hidden behind it he could observe the scene, through a gap between a jar with three medium spirits and a dissected fungal frog.
There he could see how a girl with brown hair lay on a table, with her limbs tied.
Though looking closer, Alioth realized that her hair wasn't actually hair but snakes, something that reminded him of Medusa, a monster from Greek mythology.
"Perfect, if you're this still it'll be much easier to extract your blood," another voice then said.
Alioth recognized him instantly.
He was an old man, who wore a white tunic with gold and silver embroidery. He had gray, graying hair, and exaggeratedly wrinkled skin, as if he were wearing a layer of fake skin.
It was him, that bastard who had ruined his life.
That priest who when he saw him as a child, decided it was a good idea to get rid of him in the middle of winter.
The one who upon discovering that he hadn't awakened in the awakening ceremony almost murdered him right there.
He was the constant reminder that he had no Ka, and that he belonged to this world.
Alioth felt his blood boil just from breathing the same oxygen as him.
However, he also felt some uncertainty about whether he could really beat that guy.
'No Alioth, focus, your objective is to rescue that girl, not defeat that old bastard, you just need a distraction.'
Alioth took a deep breath of air, while the old man took a strange syringe, rustic, like a medieval and evil version of a needle.
That didn't give the boy a good feeling, who hurried to act, and with a gesture, Abzu deformed.
The small sphere of water divided into hundreds of pressurized micro-jets in the shape of arrows.
Each water arrow shot out at tremendous speed, traveling throughout the room.
A large part of the arrows traveled at high speed destroying all the jars with spirits in the room, but also traveling toward the girl.
The arrows traveled cutting the leather bindings that restrained the girl, to later become ropes that grabbed her.
The shelf in front of Alioth was thrown at the priest, who reacted with a scream and putting his hands in front of him to protect himself.
"What the hell?" the man cursed as the shelf fell on him without any mercy.
Mercy that he certainly didn't deserve anyway.
The water threads pulled the girl, who still had a hollow expression on her face, the same expression that elf in the mansion had.
The expression of someone whose will has been taken away.
"Watch out!" the boy warned, as he caught the girl in the air, taking her with difficulty in his arms. "Hey, are you okay?" the young man hurried to ask.
The girl took a few seconds to get the color back in her eyes, to then finally react.
"What the hell just happened!? And who the fuck are you?" the girl exclaimed, confused.
Alioth just felt relieved that she was okay.
"There's no time for questions, we need to get out of here."