Castlevania: Let the Symphony Last for Eternity
Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix
Beta By: Lady Lunar Phoenix
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"So... You didn't experience what we went through regarding the doors?" Leon inquired as the pair walked through the hallways that seemed to herald when a new area was being approached.
"No, and I've been thinking about that, as I find it hard to believe that Soma could have done that by himself. Even if he is the reincarnation of my father, what I sensed when I met him lacked the strength to do this. Subduing the Chaos of the Castle when he has so little power of his own should be impossible. Although I suppose he could have been using what power he had to perform such a task," Alucard answered. "Nor have I ever heard of any type of 'hall of paintings' or floating musical instruments. Which is quite peculiar I confess," Alucard noted as well, having returned to the topic that hadn't been discussed since they were with the others. Yet now they had reached this point where it felt like they were constructing Soma retroactively. Trying to figure out who or what the stranger was, besides Dracula in a new body.
After all, why reincarnate when you've been resurrecting repeatedly? What was the point in going through the whole cycle of rebirth and have to learn things all over again? Yet, surprisingly, both had settled with similar possible explanations.
Dracula just got bored.
And that just felt wrong, Mathias became a vampire in defiance of Heaven after the first death of Elizabetha. He then began a war against humanity due to her murder at their hands. So why would he suddenly decide that he wanted to reincarnate when it meant risking having to live all over again? Seemingly as part of the self same human species he had come to ragingly hate.
There was also the problem of figuring out how to activate the painting once they reached it. Neither were good with curse breaking, Alucards' knowledge of the arcane was purely battle magics and self healing, while Leon was pure battle. He knew how to activate the arcane weapons and items he possessed, otherwise he would have deferred to Rinaldo regarding such questions. Even Sophia learned far more into battle magic from what Alucard had noted.
Either Jonathan or Charlotte would have known what to do with the painting, as well as Mathias possibly. However Charlotte had disappeared when the time changed and undoubtedly so to did Jonathan.
The door on the other side of the hallway opened up into a painfully dark room, while high above there was an ever gentle glow just a bit of light from outside. At their level there was something glowing with a flowing emerald green light in the center of the room. While the chilled winds of outside the castle flowed easily into the room from above. Though that was from only Leon's human vision could see, taking longer to adjust to the sharp change in lighting.
For Alucard the room was brightened enough that he could see the lion heads mounted along the wall. In the faint green light of the platform he could see the lions mouths were open and with something seemingly mounted in each. Two by two these proud, lush maned lions were placed on both left and right walls with the platform in the center, while above another four heads were mounted and above that another four.
They were close enough now that he could feel his father's power stifling in its grandeur leaving him feeling woefully unprepared to face his Lord Father. He strode into the room, refusing to show weakness or intimidation, ever defiant despite his lack power after all he could out plan. Only to find the sound of his own footsteps filling the room and realizing that Leon had hung back. Glancing behind him, he saw Leon finally taking slower steps, but he also saw Leon's eyes were wider than normal and he was moving like a blind man.
The frailty of humans, even among the bravest of warriors.
It brought to mind a spiders web, deceptively delicate, seemingly fragile, yet strong enough to topple larger bodies of prey. "Here, the green light you see is a floating platform." Alucard spoke into the darkness, watching as Leon instantly zeroed in towards him and took a few more ready steps. "The floor is empty of obstructions."
Leon nodded and with more confidence began walking towards the softly glowing runes engraved around the side of the platform. His eyes were still working to adjust from the vastly more lit hallways to this near pitch black darkness. The sound of his boots clicking along the ground as did the boots that Alucard wore helping him give him some sense of the room. Clicks rebounded off the walls and into the air high above him. The Vampire Killer was almost painfully warm at his hip, seemingly screaming for blood and he couldn't say he blamed it. Sara was rapidly approaching the man who brought about her turn to a vampire and now bound to the whip.
And now the greatest source of conflict given the painting and the existence of Soma.
The pair jumped up to the platform, the solid weight of the stone below them, yet rising into the air effortlessly. As they ascended, candles placed in the mouths of the lion heads ignited illuminating the room with a sudden splash of vivid gold light. Casting the shadows back from the faces so that Leon could see... well.. Lion faces.
"It would appear father never forgot you..." Alucard began.
"Apparently... I suppose I should be happy that he remembered me all these centuries..." Leon replied politely, while wanting to tell off Mathias. Because Mathias 'knew' how much Leon hated when people drew parallels with him and actual lions. Not that there was anything 'bad' about the association the first time...
After the millionth time after every joke and quip told to him and he could do without another one thank you very much.
Thanks to the candles though, he could see the room in greater detail, such as the approaching set of lion heads from above. Showing a pattern of heads with candles leading up to a shadowed landing high above. A light gust of wind could be felt carrying the scent of the outside world, meaning they were going to be out under the sky soon. For which Leon appreciated given the oddity of the clock tower. The soft sounds of night birds, the song of crickets, the sky full of stars, fresh air and hopefully no fleamen on mounted birds.
Candles after candles lit up until they could finally reach the landing above where they would step off from the platform they were standing on. The landing had a soft sway of carpet that rested on one side of the floor they were approaching. Which, upon reaching said floor they both quickly stepped off, as the platform they rode upon clearly had no 'stop' now that it had been activated. Once it had leveled off with the rest of the floor it began its trip to the ground below.
With a door on either side of them, one flush with the door they took to enter the room. One with two women dressed in painfully short gowns and low cut...
Leon was well aware that fashion had changed over time, Charlotte's own attire had been painfully revealing to the former knight. But he kept his tongue still due to the awareness that times changed and seemingly that's how women dressed in her time. Knees on full display, Shanoa's bare back, all that throat and chest on Maria and just...
These ladies were wearing dresses that stopped at the 'thigh' had no sleeves and seemingly stayed up by the blackest of arts given how large their chests were. Little black belts around their waists and conical hats on their heads, black heeled slender shoes. And Leon just wanted to look away because they weren't attacking and their outfits were so revealing he felt like he was being disrespectful.
"Prince Alucard, Lord Belmont, our Lord and Master sends you greetings."
"And wishes that we aid you up the stairs to the Master Chambers."
The twin witches relayed the message in bright perky tones, yet there was a very subtle flavor of panic in their voices and scents. An underlining of fear when Dracula's name was brought up, making Alucard wonder if he had threatened these witches into helping. For that matter, "what reason do we need of assistance to walk up a set of stairs?"
The witches blinked and glanced behind themselves before a small shrug of the shoulders was given as a physical answer. "Part of the stairs broke."
"Its a rather large gap."
Alucard tried to fathom that his father would allow the castle to fall apart at such a point, the memory that the castle was in the structured design where his father was once more sealed. That he had arrived because while his father was 'gone' the castle and what it represented had returned originally. Without his fathers' presence and possible influence, only when the change happened the castle didn't change in response. But that memory felt distant, almost intangible, and just the realization that 'this' memory that was only a few hours old at 'most' was now so thin and whispish alarmed him. Making him desperately go back to the memory when he met Soma, calling up the surprising image of the young man falling from the sky. While the fog of memories began to roll in, leaving Somas' already pale vestige more faded.
"And how exactly, will you ladies be assisting us..." Leon asked, trying to look in their directions without looking directly 'at' them. Oh this was awkward and painful, he was terrified what women dressed in Soma's time. He'd never be able to look at anyone, he'd be better off learning to fight blind and wear a blindfold.
"Ahh well... on our broomsticks?" The one on the right answered, looking between the two grown men and her twin. All Shaft had said was aid the two up to the Master Chambers, while the maids were working on getting the blood out of the carpet in the dining room. 'Oh that was the Lords new bride' had done wonders on keeping them from arguing.
"I can't..." Leon began as he fumbled over how to even explain his point of view. "Where would one even sit on one? Where would I put my hands?"
The witches looked between each other then back at him, then looked over Alucard wondering if their attire was going to bother him as well. Alucard looked unimpressed, but the knight looked out right embarrassed and like a pair of sharks scenting blood... The pair started sasshaying up to Leon as he stiffened in mounting alarm. He was so cute, with his blond hair covering half his face, and the luminous blush on said face. Knights yelling that Witches needed to die was a thing, but this one was quiet and blushing, he was 'adorable'!
Leon looked up as both witches sidled up to him, latching on to his arm with their own leaving his arms pinned up against their bountiful cleavages...
"We've never met a polite knight before."
"Ladies, about my Lord Father?" Alucard asked, the closest he would come to ever going to someones rescue regarding women. Though Leon's manners would make a trip through the Castle all the more interesting given some of the Dark Children.
But the witches reacted as expected, backing off from Leon and returning to the door promptly, "well to be honest, we were unprepared for this order."
"And have nothing else on hand to assist you..." the other finished, both witches holding out their hands in a uniformed sign of helplessness.
While Alucard was fine with merely holding on to the broom and being air lifted across, somehow the idea of being below a witch didn't sound like Leon would agree.
"Oh... but we could use the carpet..."
"Ah! A magic carpet ride!"
The two witches conspired between each other, beaming at the solution they had come up with. They walked over, between the Prince and the Hunter, and used their magic to lift up the plush rug on the floor leading to the other door. Carrying over the rug with a mutually cast spell they brought it out of the tower and shook out any potential dust from the carpet. Then letting it hang down until it was settled and flat so they could pivot it up until it was parallel against the ground below.
They called forth their broomsticks, and side saddle sat down, while keeping the rug between them. Using their magics they settled the rug on level with their brooms and floated off to the gap in the stairs. Letting the wind play with their hair as they moved, gliding over the stairs and looking back to see that their Lords' esteemed guests could see what they were doing.
"Well... That will work," Alucard finally spoke as he moved forward, now able to see the gap that they mentioned. It would be too far for either he or Leon to jump, but with the witches using the carpet to carry them up the gap. Well the only downside would be that they intentionally posted themselves in such a way that Leon would have no choice 'but' to see down their dresses if he looked down.
The idea of someone like Soma running the castle felt rather interesting in moments like this, undoubtedly he would assume that what made the Castle evil was blood thirsty monsters, demons and such. But this was also a valid form of pure evil. Not that this level of lack of dress was allowed when Alucard was a child, his favorite witch wore a full purple gown and had long blond hair. A bit scattered brained, but a nice woman all around.
Leon finally stepped out of the tower following Alucard onto the landing that extended past the door. It was a solid stone landing revealing a sharp drop off all around save a long stairwell that was covered in a thick, deep red, rug that ran up it. The carpet directing the eyes up to the gaping hole the twin witches spoke of. The staircase was reasonably wide enough for a pair to walk up side by side, though it lacked any handrails to use. But it was broken as though some large boulder crashed down through it, ripping the rug right through leaving a ragged tear where the rug resumed up above with the stairs. Like with Walter there was a single room high above with a closed door waiting for them to enter.
Though Walter had the decency to not post the bodies of the dead outside their door.
Pierced through the head, the red headed stranger was spitted through the head against the outer wall of the room. The clothes the stranger wore was dark and made it difficult to identify who the person was. Did he belong to this new time line? Was he someone who also came from Trevors' time like that Isaac fellow? Whoever he was, he now hung as a warning to others who would dare enter the Master Chamber.
Far to the right Leon could see the Clock Tower, but there was no sign of how the battle between Trevor and company fared against the monsters. There were no 'new' enemies coming after them, but at the same time the witches made it sound like the pair were actually invited. So any threat may just be fixated on the other group. While on the far left he could see nothing of note, just another wall while below them was the roof and landscape of another passage that would probably lead a person up to where they now stood.
The pair began the final trek up the stairs with the carpet cushioning their feet and muffling the sound of their footfalls. Wind blew as strongly as one would expect from a castle adopt a hill overlooking a lake. Causing a steady stream of air to constantly buffet against a person who walked up the passage to the Master Chamber. It would be impossible for a fully armored knight to make the jumps up to higher platforms, or even climb. At the same time taking off the armor would have left them vulnerable.
Making the possibility of ascending the castle impossible,the weight of the metal would make it valuable only here where the winds could easily be whipped up to a strength to lift a man off the stairwell. It was cruel and sadistic, but it was also something Mathias did while using a name that wasn't his own. Causing Leon to question if Mathias was trying to hide who he used to be, or if he preferred the mind games.
But as Leon walked up the stairs he realized that Mathias might very well have 'been' striving to avoid getting attention drawn to his real identity. The man wasn't the last of his family after all, there 'would' be people who shared in his blood. So perhaps his name change choice was to protect his kin who may still have shared the name?
The pair reached the rug that the two witches were maintaining and Leon struggled to blindly walk onto the carpet after Alucard. His gaze stayed elevated as he felt the pair of witches raise them up and carry them to the stairs beyond the broken portion of staircase. While Alucard studied the corpse they would soon be approaching. Already the scent of blood made him assume that the 'red' hair was undoubtedly something else. The dark clothes brought to mind the Devil Forgemasters that his father kept under his command. He could just see the hints of silver in the tips trying to still shine under the hints blood, and the only other Forgemaster he could think of was that silver haired one.
Well that was a head piercing...