Ice Castle
“There. Who goes there? Identify yourself.”
The question came from Ice Soldier 1, and there was something almost hopeful in the voice.
Honestly, the fact that it spoke at all had caught me off guard, but it wasn't pointing a weapon at me or anything.
If we could talk, I figured there might be a way to talk my way through this.
“I am...”
But what was I supposed to say?
It had presumably been watching since the moment I popped out of thin air.
There didn't seem to be any option other than saying something suitably vague.
“I'm just an adventurer... I don't know how, but I lost my way and ended up here... Might you know where this place is?”
Since facing it head-on would be a bit much for me, I added a little extra courtesy.
“An adventurer...! I see... Could it be that you... At last, we may be freed...”
“Pardon?”
What is this guy saying? He's talking like his new errand-boy just showed up.
“This is where the calamity is bound.”
A clear voice came from Ice Soldier 2.
So this one was a woman, apparently. Though I'm not sure whether that distinction even means anything here.
“The calamity...?”
“A mighty monster that slaughtered the kingdom's people. Countless mages bound it inside a mirror, sealing it through a long winter, then hurled the mirror into another dimension.”
So the monster that had rampaged through the world the ice soldiers came from had been sealed in a mirror and flung into the Backrooms coordinates. And they themselves were its guardians, the ones who had kept watch over it from within.
And then—
“We don't know how much time has passed since we came to guard this place, but it was said that in the far future, one who calls himself an adventurer would surely come—the one who would drive it out.”
“Surely you don't mean me...?”
And I'm the one who has to take it down.
Maybe I should have just said I was an explorer.
There's a monster inside this thing
But they said a hero will come someday to defeat it
And that hero is me
And so I found myself entering the castle.
The great castle's main gate—or so I expected them to open for me.
Ge-ek—
“This is the entrance?”
They gestured for me to enter through a small side door instead.
Made of ice, of course.
“That's right.”
“Then what's the gate up front for?”
“If you open that one, the monster comes out.”
So they said.
“I'm going in alone??”
“Of course.”
And with the two ice soldiers declining to come along, I was on my own.
Ge-ek—
Ah, well, I have Yagwang-i with me, so not entirely alone.
Ge-ge-gak—
Thud!
With the two of them waving goodbye, the side door of the ice castle swung shut.
The moment it closed, the interior went pitch black without a single point of light.
I switched on my flashlight and swept the beam ahead of me.
Click!
If the castle were truly made entirely of ice, light from outside should have filtered in. Maybe it didn't because it was sealed by magic rather than built naturally.
My arms had gone numb with cold, so I rubbed them briskly with my palms.
“Why is this place so creepy...”
Could just be the temperature.
Inside, the castle seemed even vaster than it had from without.
There were patches of blackish ice here and there, and between them the place felt less like an ice castle and more like an ancient fortress.
Hallways, staircases.
Something like a great assembly hall, and a room with tables that were probably dining tables.
Ge-ek—
A room over here. Broken weapons lying about—maybe an armory?
For a place that supposedly sealed a monster, the castle seemed to have everything you'd expect.
Shattered walls, pillars, and furniture were strewn all over the interior.
The only thing missing was windows, and each room was properly divided, with the ice furniture designs looking oddly elegant.
Though most of it was broken.
Crunch—
Fragments of those things crunched underfoot.
I had some idea, maybe, of how formidable this monster might be.
Or maybe not. Anyone would end up like this after being locked away for eons, wouldn't they?
Unlike the bright world outside, the lightless castle interior forced me to rely on a single flashlight.
The situation was so similar that it brought back memories of exploring ancient ruins with nothing but a flashlight.
“Is this a study?”
No wait, even the books are made of ice.
Ice blocks shaped like books filled the shelves from end to end.
The pages spread open on the table were black ice in the shape of letters, but I couldn't make out what they said.
Ice that bends like a page—curious, I'll admit.
The translation the Backrooms Gallery mod had laid down seemed to apply to each gallery member individually—the ice soldiers' speech had come through fine—but apparently written text was beyond it. Or maybe only words within some condition's scope got through.
When I tried lifting a book, it was one solid mass of ice and far too heavy.
For now, I at least took a photo of the open book.
Just in case. It might be a language someone recognizes.
Flap—
My body, soaked by the blizzard earlier, had apparently dried out, because my notebook slipped out of my half-open bag.
I'd assumed I'd need fire to dry off, but it seemed to shed moisture on its own too. Must be that Magic Book after all.
“Anyway, where is this monster supposed to be...”
Now that there were books around, I might actually stand a chance against it.
Just not on this floor, apparently.
Once I figured I'd covered the first floor well enough, I climbed the staircase I'd spotted earlier.
The basement could wait.
“Huh, there's even a bed.”
Split clean in half, but unmistakably a bed's design.
“Hard...”
An ice bed so rigid it made stone beds look soft.
And cold on top of that?
At this rate I'd sooner sleep on the floor...
“That one's in decent shape, at least.”
An ice chest of drawers that looked relatively intact.
Gik-gik—
I yanked the drawer open with force and pulled out its contents.
Being solid ice, it was enormously heavy.
Inside, there was nothing.
“Well, it's not like I'm farming for items here.”
Then, as I swung my flashlight toward the entrance of another room ahead, something long and protruding vanished in an instant to the side of the doorway.
“Yagwang-i. Did you see that?”
Ge-ek—
I'll take that as a yes. At any rate, I hadn't imagined it.
The monster had to be somewhere up ahead.
“Book, come out.”
Flap—
I had the book slip out of my bag and ready itself as well.
Then, pickaxe in hand, I advanced with care.
Poking just my head and flashlight inside the doorway, I scanned the room this way and that.
...
“...It's completely empty?”
A bare, vacant room.
Even after stepping in and sweeping the flashlight into every corner, not so much as a bug appeared.
No wait—would a bug even be strange here? It'd be an ice bug, after all.
“Did I see it wrong...?”
Maybe the flashlight had just reflected oddly.
And then, as I turned around to check elsewhere—
“Gwahk!”
Clang!
A small ice soldier was standing motionless in the doorway, and the shock made me swing the pickaxe at it.
Even that left only a faint scratch; it didn't shatter.
“It's you, you little...!”
Pickaxe raised, nerves taut—but the small ice soldier didn't move so much as an inch.
“Is it a fake...?”
Given what it was, it was hard to tell whether this was the real thing or just a fragment.
Wondering if it moved when I wasn't looking, I glanced away and looked back—it stood in the same spot, in the same pose.
Tapping it with the pickaxe drew no reaction either.
“Like I'm going to play with you...!”
That monster—if I ever meet it, I won't forgive it.
Well, not me. The book.
One look was enough to tell the monster would be made of ice too, so my attacks obviously wouldn't work.
“Hng-cha...”
With a small ice soldier fragment sitting in the doorway, the entrance had gotten a bit cramped,
but I clambered up through the open space above it and out of the room.
Out in the hallway, I raised my flashlight—and it was packed with small ice soldiers.
“Gwahk!”
No wait, they're not moving, so are these fragments too?
“When did they even...?”
I hadn't heard a single sound of them being placed. When did the hallway fill up like this?
The thought that the thing still had to be lurking somewhere nearby made me shout.
“Come out already!”
Ge-ek—
But only my voice and Yagwang-i's echoed back; nothing else answered.
“Damn it, they could at least tell me what kind of monster it is...!”
I won't forgive those two guard ice soldiers either.
Yes, they said the more I learned, the harder the monster would be to fight, so they couldn't tell me—but still, I won't forgive them.
Gik-gik—
“There you are!”
I swung the flashlight straight toward where the sound had suddenly come from.
Behind one small ice soldier's head, a single sharp hand had sprouted.
“Go, Book!”
Flap—
The book shot toward it at speed.
But the grown ice hand seized the small ice soldier's head with a tap,
Crunch!
then ripped it clean from the body and sank into the floor, gone.
Flap!?
The book sailed through the empty air where the small ice soldier's head had been, then circled back.
“What...”
It tore the head off whole—did that mean the place where that hand had taken root was the small ice soldier's head itself?
As that thought crossed my mind, I shifted the flashlight slightly to the side.
“What the...!”
Another small ice soldier's head was missing.
Startled, I swept the flashlight over the surroundings again.
“What is this...!”
Every one of the small ice soldier fragments nearby had lost its head.