“Well, this is not what I was expecting to find under a freaking bar - did you run DNA match on them?” Thomas walked into the room, while still paying attention to the array on the ground and avoiding the lines and nodes inside.
“We did, but none found in any databases.” Agent Hall said: “We found out what species they were though. Out of the six of them, three were human, one lycan, one vampire, and one shapeshifter - an ancient shapeshifter at that, something that hasn’t been sighted or appeared in any historical record for about a few decades.”
“I’m not familiar with shapeshifters, we should ask Jason and Aimee, and maybe Laura since they’re the booksmart type. Did they say what this room is for? ” Caroline concentrated her powers on her eyes and cast a true sight spell to look around the room, then she focused her sight on the ceiling - in which she found another array made of metal embedded. There were six small metal lanterns hanging not far from the ceiling, each of which corresponded to the metal plates on the ground. At the center of the array above, there was one single reflective metal plate with some linings and patterns around the edge. “Fuck, a mirror? In this kind of setting?”
“What? Oh - yeah.” Agent Hall looked up at the metal mirror with a hint of fear on his face and adjusted his earbuds: “Please be careful if you want to examine it or probe it - it has some sort of reactive curse cast on it - Ms. Pei and Master Nameless had cleansed it, but it’s still - a little disturbing.”
“What’s in these plates?” Thomas knelt down by one of the metal plates and tried to examine the burnt substance at the bottom: “From the texture - it looks like some kind of oil or wax?”
“Oil, and traces of human DNA. Our suspicion was that it’s oil made of human - ” Agent Hall shook his head and adjusted his earbuds once more: “From what we could tell from the ledger and the information provided by the half succubus, this room is reserved for some high level crew members only and is off limits to most of the people who ran this bar. It has something to do with some operations being conducted by some unknown higher ups.”
“And these higher ups, any idea on who they are?” Caroline looked around for a ladder, but there was none in sight so she asked Agent Hall while walking towards the door: “Agent Hall, do you have anything around here that I can stand on? I want to take a look at those lanterns.”
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“Oh, wait wait wait don’t! there’s this thing in this room - you can’t use ladders or anything in here.” Agent Hall immediately stood between Caroline and the door: “The first agent that tried almost lost his head, luckily he had a protective suit so he just lost his palm. So, we banned all the ladders and chairs and - everything from entering this room.”
“I thought this room was already cleansed?” Caroline asked with a frown.
“Yes, but - ” Agent Hall scratched his nose and then his face, and finally answered after a sigh: “Okay, first - let me explain a little - I have this gift with hearing, okay? Apparently it’s a relatively rare strand from a not-so-rare general category, basically, I can hear the flow of energy, and, and - after Ms. Pei and Master Nameless cleansed it due to some agents getting injured in this room, I stopped hearing this creepy energy flow for a while. But - but just earlier today, I started hearing things from this room again - it’s not the same, but similar kind of flow of energy and power. I was wondering if I should report it, because we’re so understaffed - ”
“There’s indeed something wrong with this room, I can’t tell what it is but I can tell it’s there.” Caroline nodded: “Now, tell me, how did it hurt the last agent who tried to stand on a ladder?”
“Um, he stood on a chair, and tried to peek into one of the metal lanterns and pick some samples of any substance that might have been left inside.” Agent Hall pointed at a position on his left side: “Then, some kind of energy blade just swept through the space, like that laser beam from that - that movie, you know? And he immediately ducked and tried to block the blade, and it just sliced through his forearm. ”
“Okay, did you see where that blade came from?” Caroline looked at the round ceiling, and when she focused she saw a very thin, barely noticeable line running across all directions at a certain height: “And what elemental properties did this blade possess?”
“It came from that direction, but it was too quick so nobody noticed what kind of elemental properties it had.”
“Okay, only one way to see for ourselves.” Caroline nodded at Thomas: “Thomas, can you lift me up?”
“Wait, me?” Thomas was stunned for a brief moment, then he came to the same conclusion as Caroline: “Sure!”
After intense training, Thomas and Aimee, just like Jason and Caroline but to a lesser extent, had already gained superhuman strength without them noticing as much, while their body weight had not grown much. With Thomas merely kneeling down and extending his arms, it was enough for Caroline to stand on his horizontally placed forearms just like a stool or a chair.
When Caroline tried to examine the metal lanterns from Thomas’ arms, she could see some kind of dark red ashes or tar inside of the lantern, and there were traces of burnt candle wicks, which indicated that these lanterns were indeed used traditionally with some kind of candles inside.
With a True Sight spell active, Caroline could see that there were traces of some kind of dark and cold energy remaining on the lanterns, especially on the inside. Not only that, she could also see that there were traces of the same energy along the metal chains that attached these lanterns to the ceiling, and eventually, these traces led to the metal mirror at the center.
“Caroline.” Just this moment, someone whispered to her, and it sounded just like Caroline herself - to be precise, it sounded like her voice being replayed from somewhere close to her, and not like the voice she would hear when she was talking.