They found the Ballroom on the first try.

It was weird. They had found it too quickly. Too easily. It was almost as if they'd been led there on purpose, and that made Bada feel extremely unsettled. However, her thoughts were interrupted when she heard the sound of orchestra music coming from inside.

"Is that Mozart?" Bin asked with raised eyebrows and Bada shook her head.

"Its Tchaikovsky. Waltz of the Flowers." Bada said, making all the boys look at her with shocked faces, except Bin, who only nodded.

"What? I'm a music student. It's one of my favourite pieces." She shrugged, walking closer to the ballroom. She peeped in through the window and saw a bunch of people doing the Waltz in clothes that she had only ever seen in movies about the Victorian era.

"What the heck?" She muttered as she continued watching the people dance in the room. The four boys joined her and all of them looked at the dance through the window.

"Let's go in. Maybe those people can give us some answers." Jinwoo said, pushing the door to the ballroom open. The sight they were met with made all five of them gasp.

The room was completely void of people.

"What the..." Sanha started, looking into the empty ballroom with widened eyes.

Bada was the first one to walk in, looking around the massive room. Her footsteps echoed throughout the room as she walked around, tracing the intricate patterns on the walls and pillars of the room. The feeling of dread was increasing every second. Something was terribly wrong.

"Okay, this is officially beyond creepy." Minhyuk voiced out from his position outside the room, where he had retreated after seeing it empty.

"Why? What's up?"

"Because from out here, I can still see people dancing." He stated, making all of them look at each other with widened eyes before they ran out to confirm it with their own eyes.

Bada felt herself get goosebumps as she watched the people dancing inside through the windows. How the hell could that be possible? There was no logical explanation for it.

But then again, nothing happening inside the hotel was logical anyway.

"What do we do now?" Bada asked after a few moments of silence, looking at Jinwoo.

"Let's go in and look around. Maybe we can find something." He said after thinking for a moment, gesturing to the entrance to the big room.

The five of them walked in and started searching through, looking for any clue as to what was going on in the hotel.

Bang!

Bada whirled around and found that the doors to the ballroom had slammed shut. And considering the fact that the boys were right beside her, she knew it wasn't something they had done. She was about to walk towards the doors to enquire when the candles in the giant chandeliers all went out, leaving them in pitch-black darkness.

Bada felt a shiver run down her spine. She could feel another presence in the room. Something unnatural. Something that wasn't human. Something she was very very scared of.

"Now, now, Miss Bada, I thought you were smarter than this." A voice spoke out from the dark, making her blood freeze. It was a smooth, low voice. A dark voice. A sinister voice. A voice that held the silent promise of very bad things to come.

She didn't need to be told who it belonged to. It was him. The one who called himself Le Maître. The Master.

"I warned you, did I not?" The voice continued. "I so graciously warned you of what would happen if you continued this foolish search of yours. Alas, I think I overestimated your intelligence." The voice spoke, taunting her. It seemed to be coming from everywhere, all at once. One second she felt it was coming from right behind her and a split second later, it seemed to be coming from the opposite corner of the room. It was disorienting.

"What–" Bada cleared her throat when her voice came out shaky. "What do you want from us?" She asked with a firm voice this time.

"I believe I made myself perfectly clear in the correspondence I sent you, did I not? I warned you to stay away. You did not listen. Now I have no choice but to, ah, how do you people say it? eliminate you." The voice chuckled and Bada felt herself freeze as she realized the meaning of his words.

"E-eliminate us?" She heard Sanha speak, barely louder than a whisper. A whisper that was deafeningly loud in the silence surrounding them. The meaning of the words was clear.

He wanted to kill them.

"Why, yes. But don't worry too much, young friend. I will not kill you just yet. After all, where's the fun in that?"

"What are you planning on doing to us?" Bada spoke again, hoping her voice didn't sound as shaky as she felt.

"Don't be a spoilsport, Miss Bada. If I told you, that would ruin the surprise. Enough of these silly questions. It's time to go to sleep now."

Bada heard the sound of a body falling to the floor, followed by another, and another and yet another one. She counted four, before she felt a light touch on her forehead and everything went dark.

//

Hey guys. I hope you guys are staying safe! Remember to keep washing your hands properly and stay inside your homes unless it's absolutely necessary to leave.

Hopefully this pandemic will be over soon. Stay safe everyone 💜

- A

P.S. I attached Tchaikovsky's Waltz of the Flowers in the media above, so that you can get a feel of what Bada an the others were hearing! It is actually one of my favourite classical pieces, just like Bada :).