Mad Hatter's Guide to Clearing The Game
Chapter 123: Ch121. Challenge for answers

Chapter 123: Ch121. Challenge for answers

The Master’s voice echoed through the chamber, reverberating off the metal walls as his eyes flicked over Miles. The silent observers, the masked figures, remained unmoving, as if the air itself had thickened with the tension in the room.

For a moment, the Master’s stillness was unbroken, but his eyes, dark, calculating, and wide, betrayed an emotion that did not quite fit the control he had carefully crafted.

Shock.

It was subtle, a flicker of something behind his cracked porcelain mask. His lips parted slightly, and the air seemed to grow colder.

"How do you know of the Card Soldiers?" The words came softly, as though he had not quite processed them fully. His fingers twitched almost imperceptibly.

Miles did not flinch. His stance was firm, and his grip on the scythe had tightened, not out of aggression but from sheer readiness. The moment hung in the air between them, the question suspended like a challenge Miles had no intention of avoiding.

"I’ve seen them before." Miles replied, his voice steady and sharp, betraying none of the weight that lurked beneath.

The Master’s expression shifted, his gaze narrowing just a fraction, his posture slowly becoming less casual. He regarded Miles with renewed scrutiny, as if sizing him up in a different way now.

"And what of it?" The Master said after a brief, heavy silence, his voice flat but his eyes flashing with a dangerous gleam.

"I won’t say anything more until you answer my question. Why do you have them? What is their purpose?" Miles stood his ground.

The Master took a step forward, his long coat rustling as if reacting to the question, but he did not answer right away. Instead, he regarded Miles with a cold calculation, as if measuring the depth of his resolve.

"I see." The Master’s voice dropped to a low murmur. "You have made your demands, outsider. But you are not in a position to bargain with me."

Miles felt the weight of the room closing in, the flickering neon lights casting sharp shadows against the walls. His heart was a steady drumbeat in his chest, not from fear but anticipation. He had crossed the line into something deeper, something far more dangerous.

But he was not going to back down now. Not after everything.

The Master’s eyes narrowed again, his mask tilting slightly, studying Miles. Then, without warning, he stepped forward. A slow, deliberate movement. Every step carried a kind of inevitability, like the final act of a long-played symphony.

"You are not in a position to bargain with me," the Master said quietly, "but that does not mean I won’t grant you something."

Miles did not speak, but his heart skipped a beat. The tension in the room reached a new high, and Kurt, still standing beside him, for the first time in gods knew how long, did not dare to move or speak, his eyes locked onto the Master.

The Master held out his hand, palm up.

"A duel," he said, his voice laced with a deep, almost predatory calm. "If you seek your answers, outsider, you will have to earn them."

"What kind of duel?" Miles asked, his voice cutting through the heavy silence.

"The kind that tests everything. Your strength. Your resolve. Your very being. You will be tested in ways you cannot yet imagine. And should you survive... Then I will give you your answers." The Master’s lips curled slightly beneath the cracks of his mask.

Miles’ chest tightened as the words sank in. The weight of what was being offered pressed against his shoulders, but he refused to let it show. His gaze never wavered from the Master, unflinching.

"And if I fail?" Miles asked, his voice sharp and clear.

The Master’s response was immediate, his voice lower now, a hard edge to it.

"Then your journey ends here, and you will have nothing but death to look forward to."

Kurt gave a soft snort, clearly amused, though his eyes were narrowed with caution.

"Yeah, well, nothing too out of the ordinary, huh?" He muttered under his breath.

The Master ignored Kurt’s comment and continued, his gaze fixated on Miles.

"This will not be a mere combat of strength. It will be a battle for everything you have within you. Your will, your wits, your endurance. Should you prevail, you will prove yourself worthy of challenging The Last Verse and getting the answers you seek from me. If you cannot, then you will fall, and your questions will remain unanswered, for the rest of your inexistence."

Miles could feel the words like a pulse in the air, a call to action, to decide right then and there if he was willing to step into the storm of whatever this trial would be.

"Fine," Miles said, voice steady as rock. "But I will not be toyed with. I won’t take one step into this if you don’t answer my question first. Why do you have [Card Soldiers] in your arsenal? What is their purpose?"

The Master’s eyes glinted with something sharper, something knowing. His gaze locked onto Miles’ with an intensity that seemed to weigh every word spoken.

"That, outsider, is a question you will not get answered until you prove yourself worthy of it." The Master’s tone held a finality, but there was a challenge in it too.

"You may think you understand, but there is more to The Horizon than you know. The [Card Soldiers], like everything here, are only a fraction of what’s at play. What they represent, what they are truly capable of... These are things you cannot grasp until you’ve reached the very heart of The Horizon."

Miles met his gaze with a fierce intensity.

"Then let’s get it over with. I’m ready."

"As you wish. Prepare yourself." The Master smiled beneath his mask, a slow, dangerous curve of his lips.

The air in the chamber seemed to thrum with energy, a tension that made the hairs on the back of Miles’ neck stand up. He could feel the Master’s presence, the weight of his power, pressing against him.

Without another word, the Master raised his hand, and the ground beneath them shifted, the room reconfiguring once again. The metallic walls groaned, and from the shadows, more masked figures emerged. Their presence was a silent warning, a reminder that Miles was not in control here.

"Your trial begins now." The Master intoned, his voice low and foreboding. "The path you seek is a long one. A difficult one. It is not just strength that will carry you. It is everything you have learned... And everything you will become."

The ground beneath Miles’ feet began to crack and split, forming a raised platform in the center of the chamber. Miles took a steadying breath, his hands gripping the [Harbinger’s Scythe] tightly. The vambraces on his wrists pulsed in response, as though they too sensed the coming storm.

He stood tall, facing the Master, his heart steady, his mind clear.

The Master stepped back, his eyes glinting with something akin to amusement.

"Come, then, outsider. Show me what you are truly capable of."

The world seemed to shrink around them, the air thick with the promise of danger. This was it, the moment of truth.

But before Miles could even think of reacting, the Master appeared in front of him, and Miles’ world became pain.