A/N: Chapter 6 update!
Thank you for LuDeLuu for being my beta reader, you're awesome, man! ^^
And thanks for everyone who've read my story, you guys are the best! I really appreciated it!
For those who wanted romance scene, I'm working on that, trust me, with all of my heart lol. And about the white rose, you'll see soon enough who that was (evil laugh)
Well then, let's begin chapter 6!
I do not Ib. Kouri does.
Chapter 6: The Diary
Their eyes were fixed on the newly found white rose on Eve's hand. It was a real rose, its snow-like petals and stalk were strangely fresh, despite it being inside a dusty, old-looking book. It sure was weird and if there was another real rose around, there was only one possible reason.
There was someone else here…
The thought of someone else being trapped in here, alone, sent a chill down their spine. They knew how scary this place had become and also knew far too well to what extent Mary could go for. What if he, or she, met the ghost girl first?
Garry's pupil darted back at the worn out book as he noticed something on the page, where the white rose was kept. It was some sort of diary entry, written neatly in a nice handwriting. He could imagine the writer's using an expensive-looking quill pen already.
March 13
Tomorrow is her birthday. I want to give her something special. She's always saying that she doesn't like normal gifts and always expects something unusual. Well, she already is an unusual person to begin with, but she's still a woman nonetheless. Probably a bouquet of her favorite white roses and this antique pocket watch will do…
"What's with this entry?" he said to the girl and shoved the book to her. Her eyes carefully scanned each sentence on the dusty paper. "Could it be that this note has something to do with the rose? It said…'a bouquet of white roses'…."
Eve shook her head, implying that she had no idea at all. She flipped the rest of the pages, but it was completely blank. She somehow got a strange feeling about the entry, and she didn't know why, but rather than the white rose, the 'pocket watch' word piqued her interest more.
"This could lead us somewhere…We should bring this stuff…" Seeing a clue, he asked Eve to bring the book, along with the white rose, and put them inside her bag.
While Eve stuffed the things, from the corner of his eyes, Garry saw something glint in the dark corner of the room. Curious, he reached up to the corner and picked the thing from the floor. And the object couldn't surprise him more…
A pocket watch…
Weird…It wasn't even there a few seconds ago, he thought. The pocket watch was actually in bad shape, the chain and half of the surface had been eaten by rust and he couldn't hear any ticking sound from it, meaning that it was probably broken. He flipped the watch open, and true, the needle had stopped working, and the glass covering it was cracked.
Eve tilted her head in confusion as she turned her head and saw her teacher with the watch, "Don't tell me…That's the pocket watch mentioned in the entry?"
He gave her a shrug, "Probably…"
The girl heaved a sigh, "This is getting even weirder…Let's get out of here…"
xXx
Once again, they found themselves wandering aimlessly through the hallway. This place was freakishly huge, it made Guertena's gallery a small box compared to this massive building. And they could feel the increasing chill in the air, as they went deeper into the building.
"Hey, there's a door!" the purplette exclaimed as he caught a glimpse of a rectangular thing far in the end of the hallway. They made a small run for it, and reached the dark-colored door in several seconds. The door was locked, but a small metallic box was hanging beside the door, 10 numbered pads were on it. Above the box, written in black paint, a message was written.
What time is it?
"Time…?" Eve pondered, but she saw her teacher's lips twitched upward as he pulled the watch from his pocket's coat. Now she got the idea…
Garry flipped it open again, and searched where the needle pointing its tip through the cracked glass. And it was actually pretty difficult, since the hallway was almost dark, but after a few seconds he managed to make out the time…
04.59
He pressed the number on the pads, and a clicking sound was heard almost immediately from behind the door. Heck, it was a wooden door, and how it was connected with that metal device, they didn't know, and probably didn't want to. Everything could happen inside this place, after all.
Once they were inside, they were greeted by a bunch of exhibitions. It looked like they stumbled into some kind of medieval exhibition's room. Classic armored-knights were lined up beside the wall, and their huge axes scared the hell out of Eve. A painting of a lady dressed in Victorian style, adorned in golden frame, was hung not far from them. And countless majestic-looking jewelry was inside the casket made of glass. She would be glad to take a look at them if only they weren't in such a scary situation.
And the feeling that someone was watching them intensified here…
"Garry, I don't think entering the room is a good idea…It's just…weird…" Eve's hand pulled Garry's coat, preventing him from going any further into the room. The purplette gave her a confused look,
"I know…But we don't have any choice…Look, there's a door back there." He said to her as his finger pointed another door far in the back of the room. They didn't find another way around, so going back was not an option. But her hand clutched on his coat even tighter, and she shook her head in denial. Garry suddenly realized that the girl's crimson orbs were gazing at the floor and was filled with absolute horror.
"Eve? What is it?" he placed his hand on her shoulder worriedly, feeling that Eve's fear wasn't something normal. She had been pretty scared this whole time, but notthis scared…
Her body trembled slightly as a strangely cold air crept up on her skin. The eerie silent given by the room was not helping at all. She could feel a cold sweat down her temple. Something bad is going to happen if we pass that door, was what she wanted to say, but somehow, her mouth refused to open. And what thing could cause her feeling that way, she didn't know.
"Eve, you're scaring me…" his eyebrow furrowed and his grip on her shoulder tightened. He started to panic. There's something wrong with her, he thought.
When she turned upward to face Garry, something emerged behind his back.
"GARRY LOOK OUT!"
Startled by her scream, Garry involuntarily side-stepped and pushed Eve away from him, and was utterly shocked when a flick of light swung from above and smashed the floor beneath.
It was an axe. A freaking huge axe, held by an armored knight.
Now this is serious business. Lifeless pieces of armor attacked them. What could be worse than that?
Eve couldn't help but scream as her eyes stared in absolute fright on that axe-carrying creature, or whatever it was. Had she not screamed earlier, Garry would've been split in two, an image too horrible for her to imagine. Feeling her feet suddenly disappeared, she used the wall behind her as support, while grasping her chest to relieve her pounding heart.
In the other hand, Garry managed to escape death, barely. When he avoided the attack, he had almost hit a display, and thank god he hadn't. He had been quick enough to gain his footing back before he collided with it. His glasses were misplaced at the edge of his nose but strangely enough they didn't fall to the floor. His heartbeat was faster than ever after the sudden attack.
What the heck was that? He screamed inside his head, and found out that it was a moving, polished knight armor with axe in its hand.
Its metallic head slowly turned to him, much to his dismay, and lifted its axe from the floor. From inside the helmet, blue light emanated, as if it was its eyes, staring intense hatred at the man. Garry was so screwed…
Within a second, another swing was directed at him, breaking some display that blocked the creature from Garry. Fortunately, his brain wasn't as messed up so that he couldn't think properly. He immediately made his run, as far away as possible from the knight, and yelled Eve's name. Snapped from her fear, Eve forced her legs to run toward him, through the casket that served like a hurdle on her run. Seeing no point of return, they reached the back door.
She didn't want to pass the door, but she also didn't want to spend any other second inside a room with a walking armor trying to kill them…
"Damn! It's locked!" Garry angrily shouted as he pulled the knob in vain. He tried to break down the door, but it wouldn't budge even a bit. And the knight was slowly heading toward their direction.
"Stay here, Eve…" the older man said, his hand shielding her trembling body. She could tell from his eyes, and his shaky legs, that he was scared, especially after he found out that the knight was targeting him, but he had this determination written all over his face. "I won't let it hurt you..."
He stepped forward, and grabbed a lance from nearby armor (luckily it wasn't alive), and held it tight like it was his life line. And now that he had the lance, he felt like a hero and an idiot in the same time. He obviously didn't have a clue of how to defeat a walking armor. Heck, he wasn't especially good at any sport, let alone fighting. This whole thing was just plain ridiculous that he had started to doubt his own sanity, for challenging the knight. But one thing he knew for sure, that this thing was going to kill them if they, or he, didn't do something about it.
Seeing a dead girl in front of his eyes would be the last thing he ever wanted to see…
"Garry, don't! It's impossible!"Eve frantically yelled at him.
"Oh, come on, Eve…Don't ruin my heroic effort here…" he forced a smile and cracked a joke, although it was clear that fear was reflected on his eyes.
The girl gritted her teeth in frustration, and rushed to his side. "Ugh, I don't want to be protected forever. I'm 16!" she said, almost yelled, to him. She had always been protected by him 7 years ago, and she hadn't even repayed him. There must be something she could do!
Garry stared at her with disbelief. He knew Eve was a strong girl, but this Eve…who was willing to stand beside him against a creature he himself didn't know how to deal with, was definitely not the same little girl he used to know. He couldn't help but his smile growing wider…
"Wait, that's- Garry, it has a key!" the brunette pointed her finger as her eyes caught a sight of a metal key slung around the knight's head.
"Whoa, you're right!" he exclaimed as his eyes took a glimpse of the object, "Alright, let's do this! I'll take its arms first…"
"And I'll get the key!" Eve grinned to him. Her eyes suddenly filled with excitement, all the fear from a minute ago completely forgotten.
With the two of them together, there's nothing that could stop them…
They reached the knight with full caution. Since the knight moved slowly, it was actually pretty easy to predict its movements. After the creature swung his axe twice, Garry saw an opening, and using the lance's tip, he split the wooden handle of the axe in two, rendered the knight armless, and ripped its metallic arms, before he thrust the lance to its helmet, effectively piercing it and the knight's fell on its back.
"Wow, that was actually easy…You didn't even have to do anything, Eve…" he breathed heavily as he saw the fallen knight. The blue light inside its helmet was gone, leaving only a scattered piece of metal lying on the floor. With that, they knew that the knight was officially 'dead'. He was actually proud with his job, just how many chemistry teachers could take down a ghost knight with a lance?He thought as his lips twitched in satisfaction. And hey, his surname was Lancer!Coincidence…or not?
Leaving Garry with his proud moment, Eve ducked and picked the key from the floor. It was a rusty silver key, but it was still durable enough to be used. Now that the knight was gone, she felt slightly relieved, but the bad feeling she had of passing the back door never left her mind. But as Garry had said earlier, they had no choice…
She could only pray that something wouldn't ambush them again…
"We should get going…" The man reached her arms and pulled it upward. Eve gave him the key. "Are you okay?" he asked in slight worry.
Eve nodded weakly, not wanting to worry him any longer. "Yes…I'm probably being paranoid…You're right, we shouldn't be scared so much…"
Garry gave her a playful smile, obviously happy with the sudden turn of events "We beat that thing, didn't we? How cool was that? Maybe I should open a battle academy…"
"Yeah, yeah, you're cool…" Eve jokingly replied. Now that she saw him all happy like that, she had nothing to worry about. "By the way, are you going to bring that lance?"
"You're kidding me? That lance was freakishly heavy! I'll have two broken arms if I carry it another second!"
"Okay then…" she sighed.
The two then opened the door with the silver key, and were greeted by more hallways. And they could only sigh…When are this hallways going to end? They thought.
As they passed through the door, it was slammed shut, and once again, its knob covered in black vine. They gulped at the sight…It seemed that their whole new nightmare gallery had a mechanism of closing the door that had been passed, which meant that they could not return to where they had come from.
New mechanism sucks….
xXx
A giggling sound played inside the exhibition room, echoing throughout the empty room. The temperature inside went down suddenly. Out of the shadow, a small, blonde girl emerged. Walking through the display with a deformed doll on her hand, she was heading toward the place where the ghost knight was.
Her azure eyes flickered menacingly through the dark as she fixed her gaze on the scattered piece of metal that was once moving. Her eyebrow furrowed slightly, and her grip on her doll tightened.
"The knight failed…" she whispered.
"Don't worry, Mary…" a giggle suddenly echoed the room. "We still have plenty to play…"
"You're right…" the blonde girl heaved a sigh.
"The Mourning Lady said she wanted to have fun too…"a deep voice joined their conversation.
"Really…? Then let's give her what she wants…" Mary hugged the doll, while a malicious smile formed on her lips.
"We'll get him this time…"
xXx
"Another hallway…I'm getting tired with this…" he took his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose. The girl couldn't agree with him more, so she nodded.
She had lost count after the five. They were facing intersection after intersection…With the completely blank red wall, they felt even more lost than before.
This is getting boring…she thought, although she shouldn't really say that after what had happened earlier. They had been cautious all the way down here, but after some time, that caution was slowly wearing off.
"Hmm…I wonder how our roses are doing…" she opened the bag, and was about to pull her rose when her hand accidentally stumbled on the golden diary, and dropped it to the floor.
The book opened in a new page, and something, which wasn't there before, was written on it.
"Wait…I thought there was only one entry…" Garry stared at the page perplexed. He was the one who had checked it, and he was sure as hell that the other pages were blank.
July 26
She asked me to accompany her to the museum. It was summer and she wanted to go to the museum? I don't understand how her brains works…Shouldn't girls want to go to the beach or something? She's really weird…And then again, maybe that's what makes her cute.
She said she wanted to makes an essay about medieval ages. And she made a joke of how she wanted an armor for our anniversary. Her strangeness is far beyond imagination…
"Armor…" she murmured. She felt a strange connection between the entry and what they had seen in the exhibition earlier. First, the white rose and the pocket watch, and now the armor?
"This is…far too weird for a coincidence…" Garry cupped his chin after he read the entry, "Try next page…"
Eve carefully flipped the page, not wanting to rip the fragile paper. And another entry was written on it…
October 30
Tomorrow is Halloween. I wanted to take her to the festival. But it seemed that it had to be cancelled. Her mother died on a car crash last night. I feel very sorry for her. Her mother was eager with our marriage next month. Life is not fair…
'Died'…This word didn't seem good on their ears…
Suddenly, a chilling wind, coming out of nowhere, caressed their face, and they could sense a presence at the end of the dark hallway behind them. They turned around…
An elder woman in mourning clothes, her eyes glinted in blue, was standing among the shadows…
I'll be waiting for your….you-know-what lol
Happy reading readers! \(^_^)/