I stood before the left door—the grand double doors carved with dancing figures.
Up close, the carvings were even more disturbing. The dancers weren't just moving slightly. They were *performing*. A full ballet frozen in wood, but the positions shifted every few seconds. A raised arm here. A turned head there. Feet en pointe that hadn't been a moment ago.
"Ready?" Somi asked, hand on the door handle.
"No," Lucy said honestly. "But let's go anyway."
Somi pushed. The doors swung open silently—too silently, like they'd been oiled recently. Or like they opened so often they'd worn grooves into silence.
We stepped through.
The room beyond stole my breath.
It was massive. A ballroom that could have held hundreds of dancers. Maybe thousands.
Polished hardwood. Dark mahogany that gleamed like glass. My reflection stared back at me from the floor—but it was slightly off. My reflection smiled when I wasn't smiling.
The wood was arranged in an intricate pattern—a massive spiral starting from the center of the room and radiating outward. Like a target. Or a whirlpool pulling everything toward the middle.
Floor-to-ceiling mirrors lined every wall. Hundreds of them. Thousands of reflections staring back.
But the reflections didn't quite match reality. In the mirrors, I saw:
Myself, but standing in different positions
Lucy, but wearing an elaborate ball gown instead of her combat clothes
Gery, dressed in a tuxedo, sword replaced with a cane
Somi, in a crimson evening dress, her jacket gone
The mirror versions of us moved slightly differently too. Half a second delay. Or half a second ahead.
Between the mirrors: more portraits. More sad faces watching. More performers trapped in paint.
I looked up and immediately regretted it.
The ceiling was painted like a night sky—but wrong. Stars arranged in patterns that hurt to look at. Constellations that formed shapes I couldn't quite identify but that made my head ache.
And hanging from the ceiling: strings.
Thousands of them. Thin, nearly invisible threads catching the light. They hung down from the darkness above, swaying gently despite the complete lack of air movement.
Some ended in empty air. Others disappeared into the shadows. A few... a few had things attached to them.
More crystal chandeliers. But these were fully intact, burning bright. The light was warm, inviting—ballroom lighting for a grand performance.
Except the shadows. The shadows were too dark. Too thick. They pooled in corners like spilled ink, and things moved inside them.
The orchestral waltz was louder here. Much louder. I could identify instruments now:
- Violin: sweet but slightly off-pitch
- Piano: elegant but some keys were wrong
- Cello: deep and mournful
- Harpsichord: delicate but discordant
The music came from nowhere. No orchestra visible. Just sound filling the space.
And underneath it: that eternal singing. The chorus of trapped voices.
In the exact center of the ballroom, where the spiral pattern converged, stood a raised platform.
A stage within the ballroom.
And on that stage.I saw figures.
They stood perfectly still. Twelve of them. Arranged in a circle on the central platform.
At first glance, they looked human. Life-sized. Wearing elaborate costumes:
- Ball gowns of silk and velvet
- Tailcoats and top hats
- Victorian dresses with bustles
- Military uniforms with gold braiding
- Theater costumes covered in sequins
But they weren't human. They were puppets.
Their skin was porcelain. Smooth, white, flawless. But painted. I could see the brushstrokes.
Their eyes were glass. Realistic but dead. They didn't blink. Didn't move. Just stared straight ahead with frozen expressions:
- Some smiled
- Some looked sad
- Some showed surprise
- Some appeared terrified
Their joints—wrists, elbows, shoulders, knees—were visible. Ball joints. Like expensive dolls. Like marionettes made from human-sized parts.
And from their backs, shoulders, hands, and heads: strings.
Thin threads extending upward into the darkness. Silver strings catching the chandelier light. Hundreds of strings per marionette, disappearing into the shadow-ceiling above.
They looked almost human. That was what made them so disturbing. Almost, but not quite. Enough to trigger every instinct that screamed *wrong*.
"Are they... alive?" Lucy whispered.
As if in answer, one of the marionettes' heads clicked to the side. The motion was mechanical. Jerky. Like it had been pulled by strings.
Its glass eyes focused on us.
Then another marionette moved. Head turning. Arms rising.
Then all twelve.
CLICK. CLICK. CLICK.
Joints rotating. Strings pulling taut. Porcelain faces turning toward us in unison.
They rose up on their toes—en pointe, like ballet dancers.
And they began to dance.
The marionettes moved in perfect synchronization. A choreographed ballet.
They flowed across the stage in elegant formations—pirouettes, grands jetés, arabesques. Their movements were beautiful. Graceful. Inhuman in their precision.
The waltz music swelled.
The chorus sang louder.
And the marionettes descended from the central platform, dancing toward us across the polished floor.
"They're coming closer," Gery said, raising his Tier 6 sword.
"Don't attack yet," Somi ordered. "We don't know if they're hostile or—"
One of the marionettes lunged.
No warning. No change in expression. One moment it was dancing gracefully. The next, it launched itself at Lucy with impossible speed.
Its porcelain hand—fingers extended like claws—reached for her throat.
"LUCY!" I screamed.
Gery intercepted. His Tier 6 sword swung in a horizontal arc, catching the marionette mid-lunge.
CRACK!
The blade struck porcelain. The marionette's torso cracked—a spiderweb of fractures spreading across its chest.
But it didn't fall. It didn't even slow.
The strings from above yanked it backward, pulling it away from Gery's sword. It spun in mid-air, landed on its feet, and immediately resumed its ballet pose.
The crack in its chest remained, but it didn't bleed. Didn't show pain. Just... adjusted position and continued dancing.
"They're puppets," Somi said, eyes wide. "The strings control them. Even if we damage them, the strings pull them back."
All twelve marionettes stopped dancing in unison.
CLICK. CLICK. CLICK.
Their heads all turned toward us.
Their glass eyes all focused.Watching Us
And as one, they attacked.
Twelve marionettes rushed us simultaneously.
Not running but Dancing. They pirouetted across the floor at impossible speeds, using ballet movements as attacks.
One leaped high—a grand jeté that covered thirty feet—and came down toward Somi with both feet aimed at her head.
Somi rolled aside. The marionette's feet struck the floor with enough force to crack the wood.
Another spun in rapid pirouettes, building speed, then launched itself at Gery like a spinning top of porcelain death.
Gery swung his Tier 6 sword. The blade caught it mid-spin.
CRACK! SHATTER!
The marionette's arm broke off, spinning away. But the puppet didn't stop. It kept spinning, one-armed, using the momentum to attack with its remaining hand and feet.
"They don't feel pain!" Gery shouted. "Destroying body parts doesn't stop them!"
Three marionettes surrounded Lucy, moving in perfect coordination. They attacked from three sides simultaneously—a rehearsed formation.
Lucy's fire erupted. Crimson flames engulfed one of the marionettes.
The puppet's beautiful costume caught fire. Its porcelain skin blackened. But it kept moving. Kept dancing. Even as it burned.
I darted forward, fear dagger ready.
Touched one of the marionettes attacking Lucy.
Fear.
The emotion flooded into the puppet.As I Was getting ready Before the Time Went off For my Fear Attack.
Nothing happened.
No freezing. No terror. The marionette's glass eyes didn't change. It felt nothing.
"They're not alive!" I shouted. "My fear doesn't work! They have no emotions!"
"Then we break them!" Somi yelled back.
Her crimson jacket began glowing as it absorbed kinetic impacts. Two marionettes attacked her simultaneously—one with a spinning kick, another with a backflip strike.
The jacket absorbed both hits, storing the energy.
I backed away from the chaos, trying to think strategically.
The marionettes were tough. Gery's Tier 6 sword could damage them, but even breaking their limbs didn't stop them. They just adapted, kept fighting with whatever body parts remained.
But they weren't invincible. They were puppets.
They May be Controlled By someone Or something.
I looked up at the ceiling. Followed the silver threads from the marionettes upward into the darkness.
What if we cut the strings?
"THE STRINGS!" I shouted over the battle. "We need to cut their strings!"
Somi heard me. Her red eyes flicked upward, following the silver threads. "Good thinking! But they're too high!"
She was right. The strings extended twenty, maybe thirty feet up into the shadowy ceiling. We couldn't reach them.
Unless...
"Lucy!" I called. "Can your fire reach the ceiling?"
Lucy was backing away from a marionette doing an aggressive pas de deux, using another puppet as a partner to attack her in stereo.
"I can try!" she shouted back.
She pointed her wand upward.Closed Her eyes and Concentrated.
A stream of fire shot up, targeting the strings above one of the marionettes attacking her.
The flames struck the silver threads—
—and bounced off.
The strings glowed briefly, then returned to normal. Undamaged.
"They're enchanted!" Lucy screamed. "Fire doesn't work!"
Damn it.
Gery was holding off four marionettes at once. His Tier 6 sword moved in powerful arcs, each strike cracking porcelain, breaking joints.
One marionette lost its head. The head rolled across the floor, glass eyes still watching. But the body kept fighting, headless, guided by strings alone.
Another lost both arms. It compensated by using kicks—brutal, precise, deadly.
Gery was bleeding from dozens of cuts. The marionettes' porcelain hands were sharp—every touch drew blood.
"I can't destroy them fast enough!" Gery roared. "They just keep coming!"
He was right. Even with his Tier 6 strength, even breaking them apart, the marionettes adapted. Kept attacking. The strings guided their broken bodies with mechanical efficiency.
We were being overwhelmed.
"REGROUP!" Somi commanded. "DEFENSIVE CIRCLE! NOW!"
We scrambled to form a circle, backs together, facing outward.
The twelve marionettes surrounded us. They'd stopped attacking. Just circled us, dancing slowly, waiting for an opening.
The waltz music continued. Mocking Us.
"We can't win by destroying them," Somi said, breathing hard. "They're puppets. As long as the strings exist, they'll keep fighting even as broken pieces."
"So what do we do?" Lucy asked, voice shaking.
Somi looked around the ballroom. The mirrors. The portraits. The ceiling. The central platform.
Her eyes narrowed. "The strings don't come from nowhere. Puppet shows need a puppeteer. Or a control mechanism."
She pointed to the central platform where the marionettes had first stood.
"There. That stage. It's the center. The spiral pattern on the floor leads to it. I think that's the control point."
"You think there's something there that controls the strings?" I asked.
"Only one way to find out," Somi replied. "Gery, you and I will break through. Lucy and Sidd, cover us with ranged attacks. We reach that platform and destroy whatever's controlling these things."
It was a desperate plan. But it was better than slowly getting cut apart.
"On three," Somi said. "One... two... THREE!"