Chapter 130: Wax Room
They moved on without comment, entering another corridor that opened into a room that made them all stop.
The entire room was covered in wax.
Every surface was coated in thick layers of hardened wax. It dripped from walls like frozen waterfalls, created stalactites hanging from the ceiling, and created puddles on the floor in uneven layers.
And throughout the space stood wax figures.
Human-shaped sculptures are positioned in elaborate arrangements. Some stood in circles, their blank faces turned toward each other as if engaged in conversations they would never have.
Others stood alone by windows, hands raised as if reaching for light that would never warm wax skin.
Each figure showed detailed work with individual fingers, facial features, and clothing folds. But combined with the setting, the effect was deeply disturbing.
Reinhard and the others stared in disbelief, their expressions ranging from confusion to horror to disgust.
No one spoke initially. What could be said?
They began walking forward slowly, boots touching the wax-covered floor. The substance clung underneath, creating suction that required force to break with each step.
It wasn’t difficult, but it was annoying that every step they took was accompanied by a soft sucking sound as wax released its grip.
They reached the halfway point of the room, weaving between wax figures positioned like obstacles in their path.
Then the figures trembled.
All of them simultaneously, a rippling motion that ran through every sculpture in the room. Then their heads turned, a silent rotation that should have required neck joints but happened anyway.
Blank wax faces fixed on the intruders.
Heads tilted in unison, the gesture eerily synchronized.
Then they moved.
"All of them have threads!" Mimir shouted, his voice sharp with warning. "They’re being controlled, but they’re just wax!"
The figures rushed forward with disturbing speed, their wax bodies moving with fluid grace that living humans rarely achieved.
Their blank faces showed no expression, no awareness, just empty surfaces reflecting lamplight as they converged.
The nearest wax figure lunged at Reinhard, arms extended to grab. He sidestepped the lunging before slashing towards the side of the wax figure, and his blade cut through the torso cleanly, dividing it into upper and lower halves.
But both halves continued moving.
The upper half crawled forward using its arms, dragging itself across the wax-covered floor with scraping sounds. The lower half’s legs kicked and stumbled, still trying to pursue despite having no eyes to see with.
Reinhard’s expression darkened as he brought Zenuken down on the upper half, carving it into quarters. Then he stomped the lower half, his boot breaking through wax with a sickening crunch. The pieces finally stopped moving, and golden threads lay severed among the fragments.
Three more figures lunged at him from different angles. The first reached for his throat, but Reinhard ducked under the grab, his blade sweeping upward to sever the arm at the shoulder. The limb fell, but the figure kept coming, its remaining arm still reaching, and Reinhard grabbed on to it.
Just as the second tried to tackle him from the side, he turned around to use the first as a shield.
They collided, wax bodies crushing together with wet sounds, and then he carved through both with a single diagonal slash, reducing them to fragments.
The third leaped at his back, but Mimir’s warning cry gave him just enough time to spin. Zenuken met the figure mid-air and split it in half with both halves tumbling past him and crashing into other approaching figures.
Marie faced five wax figures that had formed a loose circle around her, trying to attack simultaneously from all directions. Longinus spun in her hands, the crimson-gold spear creating a continuous defensive barrier.
A figure lunged from her right, but the spinning blade pierced through its torso and then lifted it off the ground before she swept it into another attacker on her left. Both figures shattered on impact before she smashed them aside.
Two more closed from behind, but Marie didn’t turn as she simply reversed her grip and thrust Longinus backward without looking. The spear found the first figure’s chest, drove through it, and caught the second figure behind it.
She pulled the weapon forward sharply, and both figures were yanked off balance and thrown to the ground.
Marie jumped, spinning in mid-air, and drove Longinus downward with both hands. The spear punctured through both figures, pinning them to the wax-covered floor. They writhed like insects on a pin until she twisted the weapon, breaking them into pieces too damaged to move.
The fifth figure tried to grab her while she was occupied. Her foot lashed out, the kick catching it in what would be a face on a human. The figure’s head caved in, wax crumpling, and it fell backward into three more approaching figures.
Joseph’s Arondight moved, each thrust finding a wax figure’s chest, and then he hurled it to the side. Before another figure tried to grab him, he stabbed it before lifting the weapon, raising the figure off the ground, then slamming it down with enough force to shatter it completely.
Two figures converged from opposite sides. Joseph activated Wind Drift briefly, compressed air swirling around him. The sudden pressure wave threw both figures backward before they could reach him. They crashed into walls, and then he smashed his lance onto them and shattered their bodies.
More figures approached, which was a group of four moving in tight formation. Joseph’s lance swept horizontally at waist height, cutting through all four in a single strike. Upper halves toppled one direction, lower halves another, before he followed up with thrusts into each piece.
A figure tried to attack from above, having somehow climbed the wall. Joseph saw it coming, angled his lance upward, and let it impale itself on his weapon as it dropped.
The figure slid down the lance’s length with a horrible scraping sound before he flicked it aside, sending it crashing into a group of approaching figures.
Scáth laughed as her weapon shifted rapidly, adapting to each threat with fluid creativity.
It became a massive hammer, which she swung into a cluster of three figures. The impact pulverized them, sending wax fragments flying like shrapnel that embedded in nearby walls.
Two figures tried to grab her from behind, but her weapon changed, becoming a long staff. She planted one end on the ground and swung her body around it, both legs extending in a kick that caught both figures in their torsos.
And send both of them flying into the walls.
Four figures formed a wall, advancing in lockstep. Her weapon became a massive fan, which she swung with devastating force. The wind pressure blew all four figures backward, their lighter wax bodies unable to resist.
They crashed into the far wall and broke apart on impact.
Eight figures towards her, but then Scath’s weapon became a whip. She lashed out, the whip wrapping around multiple figures simultaneously, and with a sharp pull, she yanked them all together into a crushing mass of wax and broken limbs.
Roana created walls of ice strategically, channeling the wax figures’ movements to limit how many could attack at once. Her ice rapier flashed out when figures got close, the thin blade finding control threads and severing them with surgical precision.
A figure tried to break through her ice wall. She reinforced the barrier, making it thicker, and the figure’s charge ended with it embedded in the ice. Her rapier thrust through the wall, finding the figure’s center and destroying it without ever seeing it directly.
Three figures climbed over the ice barriers, but Roana’s rapier moved in rapid strikes. It pierced through their throat, chest, and abdomen, and severed the golden threads. The figures collapsed mid-climb, tumbling down to shatter on the floor.
When figures got too close, she created ice spikes that erupted from the floor, impaling them from below. The spikes lifted the figures into the air, where they hung like grotesque decorations before she dismissed the ice, letting them fall and shatter.
A figure rushed at Nikki and opened its arm towards her, but her flaming fist punched through its chest, the heat melting wax instantly. She withdrew her hand, and the figure collapsed into a puddle.
Two figures tried to grab her simultaneously, but Nikki spun, her flame-coated leg sweeping in a wide arc. Both figures ignited on contact, burning fiercely and stumbling blindly for seconds before melting completely, leaving only puddles.
More figures approached from behind, leading Niki to jump straight up. Flames erupting from her feet to give her extra height, and then she began spinning with flames rushing out from her. The flames trailing from her extended limbs in a spiral pattern, and when she landed, she was surrounded by a circle of melted wax where figures had been moments before.
Then a particularly large figure made up of multiple wax figures rushed at her. But Niki met it head-on, both fists driving forward simultaneously. The impact created an explosion of flame and melted wax, the figure’s body liquefying instantly. The splash of hot wax spread outward, catching three more figures and melting them as well.
After five minutes, the battle was over.
They stood among the wreckage with wax coating their weapons and boots. While fragments of broken figures covered the floor so thickly that it was impossible to see the original surface beneath.
"This creep sure does know how to make things interesting," Scáth said with a laugh.
Gran shook his head, his expression showing genuine discomfort despite his continued composure. "More like disgusting... I’m hoping he didn’t prepare this for us. At least for my peace of mind."
Marie hummed thoughtfully while cleaning wax from Longinus. "Now that you mention it, I’m really curious if this was always here or if he just added this for us."
Reinhard sighed, looking at the wax coating on his boots. "We can ask him about this after beating him up. Let’s go."