Connect content

I have created a WordPress-Site which works wir Advanced Custom Fields. There are sites with 1, 2 or 3 columns. For that, I have created a custom field for each column so the content managament is as easy as possible and there can be separate content for each column.

This first step works fine – content is displayed correctly where it should. Now ahead to the problem: a specific site should have links for different categories. This means, in column 1 the categories are listed (for example architecture, culture) which are hyperlinks. If I chose architecture, there should be the related links in column 2. So column 1 is connected with column 2. It would be great to achive this without a site reload. I was thinking about custom post types, but there will be not too many links, so I thought there could be a simplier solution – maybe a plugin with shortcodes?

Thanks for any help!