Solflare: The Painter's Secret-Chapter 85: Everyone Sees What They Fear

"How do I feel like I’ve been here before?" Leon asked himself as he walked in the direction Zoe had shown him to sit.

His fingers brushed the smooth, cold wood of the chair back, while his footsteps remained the only sound echoing in the vast room.

The moment he neared the chair and sat down, his gaze flickered up to the far wall, where the largest portrait in the room was.

His blood ran cold while his bones and veins screamed for an escape. In the portrait, rendered in stark, dramatic oils like his father used to mix, was a skeletal being.

It looked almost mythic, but the resemblance it had to the elongated limbs, the hollow eye sockets, and the sense of ancient stillness was so chilling that it made the chair he sat in shake violently.

There, the face of the skeletal being he saw in one of his dreams resurfaced, standing hand in hand with the one painted boldly on the portrait.

"NO! This can’t be." Leon shook his head violently, as if dislodging the image from his eyes, then blinked hard.

Strangely, when he looked again, the picture had changed. Now on the same portrait, and in the same shape, was a man standing proudly and holding a long, gleaming sword pointed toward the sky.

Although the skeletal horror was gone, Leon did not feel relieved. A deep discomfort crawled into his gut and pressed hard on him with an unrelenting pressure.

The eyes of the figure, which were painted black, seemed to follow him, looking through him from across the distance.

Ahem.

A soft clearing of a throat jolted Leon’s attention away from the haunting portrait. At his right-hand side, Zoe stood beside him, a silver, egg-shaped plate balanced in her palms. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

On the plate sat a transparent glass cup filled with a deep red liquid and, beside it, a neat arrangement of thinly sliced red meat, each piece cut into a perfect, chip-like shape.

"Why does your face look so traumatized?" she asked in a measured voice.

Leon blinked, trying to dissolve the afterimage of the skeletal figure from his vision.

"Oh," Zoe said, following Leon’s gaze to the large portrait. "Is that what disturbed you?" She moved forward, placed the silver plate on the table directly in front of Leon with a soft click.

"Don’t worry. Everyone sees what they fear in it the first time their eyes land on it. They say it sees through your soul."

Leon glanced at her with a mixture of shock and disbelief.

"Do you think I’m lying?" she asked, folding her arms across her chest. The stiffness of her arms accentuated the curve of her huge breasts beneath the white fabric of her dress.

She squeezed her lips to the left in a thoughtful pout. "Never mind. Eat. You haven’t eaten anything since we brought you here."

She gave the plate a gentle nudge, sliding it closer to him, then settled gracefully into the chair next to his.

Leon’s eyes dropped to the cup of red liquid. ’What drink is that?’ he thought, swallowing hard.

"Don’t think it’s poison," Zoe said, a faint chuckle escaping her. "If I wanted to poison you, I would have done that a long time ago."

His cheeks warmed slightly as he reached for the fork and knife placed neatly beside the plate. He stared at the meat, its rich, dark color seared perfectly at the edges.

A low, guttural groan erupted from his stomach, so loud it seemed to echo in the quiet room. He felt so embarrassed that his expression shifted in that very moment.

He dropped the fork, picked up a slice of meat with his fingers, and took a tentative bite. The smoky, rich flavor exploded on his tongue.

He devoured the first piece, then another, and within a few moments, he ate like a hungry lion seeing his first meal.

He finished the last piece, wiped his fingers with his tongue, then grabbed the glass cup. He raised it to his lips and took a long, deep swallow of the red liquid.

He felt the sweetness as it washed down the meat with a comforting warmth. He set the empty cup down with a soft thud.

"You’ll die soon," Zoe said and stood up.

Leon froze, the pleasant warmth in his stomach turning into ice as his head snapped toward her. She stood up and began walking toward the far end of the long table, laughing.

"Did you take my words that seriously?" The intensity of her laughter increased as she watched Leon’s expression shift from bad to worse.

"Come," she said, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. "Let me show you around. And stop looking at me in that manner."

Leon stared at the empty plate, the phrase ’you’ll die soon’ repeating in a dull loop in his mind. He pushed his chair back and stood up.

He followed her as she moved toward the doorway opposite the one they had entered earlier.

"This," Zoe said and gestured back at the grand table with a sweep of her hand, "is the dining room. This is where every member of the Qing family has their feasts. No matter who you are."

They stepped out of the dining room and into a large hallway. There, a distant, rhythmic sound greeted them.

Clang-clang-clang.

Leon stopped and turned to Zoe. "Where is that sound coming from?"

"That’s just the training ground," she replied casually, then continued her steps. "We’ll get there after we’re done with the interior tour."

They moved swiftly through the mansion, a maze of polished stone and rich tapestries. They passed through already open archways into corridors lined with more portraits that depicted landscapes and serene scenes.

"Ah-ha!" Zoe exclaimed and rushed a few steps ahead. She stopped at the front of a large door painted in a wine color and folded her arms.

"This," she said in a low but serious tone, "is a no-trespass zone."

She acted boldly, as if protecting it from Leon.

"Whatever is behind this door is only for the elders of this place. That’s my father, my mother, and..." She paused, her face scrunching in thought before settling into a faint grin. "...and you."