Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

The castle was awfully quiet, if someone dropped even a small thing on the floor, it would echo throughout the entire architecture and be heard by all within it- Despite the near complete silence, Griar did not delude himself by thinking for even a second that this place was truly devoid of people, Countess Ada was supposed to reside here, and that woman was supposedly a major player in the region, so her castle had to be teeming with guards and ways to deal with intruders, especially since they seemed to be under attack by foreign countries.

Although the massive castle appeared rather simplistic on the outside, appearing like a fortress only built for defence and nothing else, the interior was actually quite luxurious, magnificent carpets were placed alongside the ground, muffling one's steps, pieces of furnitures were placed everywhere, each decorated with what looked like valuable items, including those bizarre, incredibly realistic-looking small paintings.

What made it stranger is that there were plenty of paintings like he was used to as well, some of them were truly enormous in size, depicting hunting scenes, broad views of nature, the castle itself, and of course, people, which Griar assumed had been previous lords or family members of those who ruled over the castle in the past.

Countess Ada might be amongst those portraits, but Griar would not know, he didn't even have the first idea about what she looked like, the intruder looked around for a few minutes but found nothing of interest, and was faced with only one choice, which was to step into the main hall, its vastness felt dwarfing, the young man had known that the structure was enormous, but seeing it the inside of just this one room told him that he had underestimated just how expansive it truly was.

He did not want to be in such a wide open space, especially since it was brightly lit by what looked like hundreds of candles, each of them appearing that have been recently placed, it just looked like an obvious trap, or perhaps invitation, but he did not see how could anyone know that anyone would be coming in uninvited, so he assumed that perhaps someone was expected, or had arrived earlier than he did to warrant such grandioseness despite the night falling.

'Still, why is no one around, or anyone making even the slightest bit of noise?' he carefully walked into the main hall, swiftly heading for a pillar and hiding behind it, Griar did not know why, but there were quite a few credenza cabinets and cupboards around the edges of the hall, displaying refined plates and dishwares, as well as two massive paintings that had, without a doubt, been painted directly where they currently were, as they never would have fitted through the door to get there, both of which were quite confusing pieces of art that seemed to represent heaven and hell respectively.

He looked up at a balcony that overlooked the entire hall, presumably were the castle's lord would stand, almost expecting someone to pop up there, but nothing occurred, and Griar moved through the great hall without anything occurring, leaving him to guess where to go next, as the amount of doors to choose was rather high, five different ways to go to, and from what he could see, all of them truly led into whole different wings of the castle, and would all take him to series of other hallways and rooms.

He had no idea where to go.

'If they are keeping Flor here, then she should be in an area with rooms to accommodate her, right?' he reasoned, checking every door again to see if any of them seemed to lead to an area meant to allow guests to sleep.

"A bit lost on your first visit, boy?"

Griar froze as a voice rang out from behind him, it was a somewhat high pitched voice, rather unthreatening on its own, but the simple fact that someone- Anyone, had been behind his back without him realising was well enough to make his heart beat faster with fear.

At least, the voice was well-spoken and clear, allowing him to understand what he was told.

"Huh… I suppose so…?" he swiftly turned around and back off, blinking confusedly, despite the voice, he had been expecting something horrifying or at least an imposing figure, but from what he could see, it was a little girl dressed like a noble boy, wearing a wide, white cravat loosely wrapped around her neck with the lace of fringed ends twisted together and tucked into a button-hole.

Dressed in a marine blue decorated with gold, the girl had refined blonde hair and ocean blue eyes.

All in all, she just looked like a young noble girl, but Griar could not help but find her off, like there was something wrong with her face that he just could not quite figure out.

"What might an outsider like yourself be looking for inside of this magnificent architecture? There were plenty of precious items to take already, why did you not do so and leave? Could it be that you are looking for something far more precious?" that little girl was oddly eloquent and well-spoken.

Griar would have liked to lie through his teeth and make something up, but his grasp of the language was not great enough for him to spew out made-up nonsense on the spot.

"H-Hey, little girl… Maybe you should just go to bed before your parents learn that you are roaming around?" what he ended up saying out loud wasn't very convincing, and moreover, it visibly upset the noble girl.

"Here I am, being polite with you filthy intruder, and what do I get? 'Little girl', you really just called me a little girl? You must really not know anything then… Are you the boy Isabela wrote to me about? You must be!"

"Let me educate you then, I am Ada, Countess of this ancestral and glorious castle, and you… You are a dirty trespasser- Now, I am kind hearted, even when people intrude upon the home of my family, I always offer options, however, you just insulted me"

"How old are you?" she asked, and Griar eyed a nearby door before glancing at the Countess.

"Fifteen years old"

"Fifteen? Well, I suppose I can forgive your ignorance then, but you should know to respect your elders- And stop looking at this open door, you can run all you want but you won't be able to hide… Be honest with me and tell me what it is that you want, who knows, maybe we can be civil about this, I am not in the habit of murdering children" Countess Ada was being oddly nice, which only made Griar more worried.

The little girl, who was apparently only little in size, looked at him with a neutral expression.

"What are you waiting for? Speak, or do you lack the words to express yourself? Where are you from anyways? Maybe I can speak your language- Oh, and here he goes running…"

Ada sighed.

"Well then, don't blame me"

"Go and tear him limb from limb"

A swift shadow took off after Griar.