Not all the pillars here were the creamy, yellowish-white Doric Columns. Some were black, looking a little like obsidian or some other unknown, mysterious metal.
Yet although countless pillars stood here, none reached the dome. This place still had the structure of a sphere's inner surface, and a gravity system beyond comprehension had turned it into a mysterious field beyond cognition.
Atop the pillars stood statues, one after another, in all manner of forms. Some looked like angels, while others resembled demons.
The Angel Sculptures folded their wings and covered their faces as they wept, while the Demon Sculptures spread their bat wings wide, furious and hideous. The former stood atop the White Pillars, the latter atop the Black Pillars. They held one another in check, making the entire floor look like an enormous chessboard.
Iron chains hung from these pillars, with little angel or little demon sculptures at their ends. All their bodies were damaged and incomplete, and every one of them was missing its wings, as though someone had violently torn them off. Without the traces of wing roots in the area extending from their shoulder blades toward their backs, it would have been difficult to tell whether they were little people or little angels, little black imps or little demons.
Bookshelves were scattered around the columns. There were far fewer shelves on this floor than on the first, like little villas in the Nordic wilderness, with only a row or two visible across a great distance.
Although they were still arranged like tiles, their limited numbers made it very difficult to identify the path out of the shelving area with any ease.
Rather than a book storage area, this place was more a forest of pillars.
The old man ran through it as though weaving through an