As I mentioned before, the original work never clarified where Ezra had been all this time.
As a supporting character, I had no chance of meeting Ezra, let alone a way to track him down.
‘Ezra supposedly escaped after being imprisoned somewhere... but beyond that, nothing was ever revealed before the series ended.’
Lost in thought, I walked silently with the lantern in hand. Behind me, Ethan broke the quiet.
"Will you miss me when I’m gone?"
His voice came from behind, and when I glanced back, he was watching me intently, as if expecting a specific answer.
What’s this? What kind of response is he looking for?
After a brief pause, I shrugged and replied, "It’ll probably feel like having a sore tooth pulled."
"...That means you’ll be glad I’m leaving," he retorted with a hint of exasperation.
"Not exactly glad, but..." I trailed off.
In truth, it might feel a bit refreshing. His continued presence here had been unsettling in various ways.
Although I had deviated from the original story early on, the events in the capital seemed to be unfolding as written. Aurora’s cryptic comment over the phone, “They’ll find me,” could have referred to Prince Lloyd’s faction.
Yeah. If that’s the case, there’s no need to worry about it for now...
"I don’t get it—who would create a passage like this, and for what purpose? It doesn’t even seem that old," Ethan said from behind.
I stopped and turned to look at him.
"What do you mean, it doesn’t seem old?"
Ethan nodded, running his hand along the earthen wall. He picked up a bit of soil and rubbed it between his fingers.
"Look at this. The soil is soft, as if it was dug out recently."
I mimicked his actions, touching the wall myself. The surface, while solid, did feel slightly soft and moist, as he described.
"Vanilla said she didn’t know about any underground passage. Maybe it was created by the mansion’s previous owner," I speculated.
"Or perhaps Baron Ruskin had it built without his daughter’s knowledge," Ethan added.
Come to think of it, since the village chief managed all property transactions, it might be a good idea to ask him. Fortunately, he was still alive.
‘I’ll have to ask Vanilla to fetch the sale records from her room at the inn.’
According to Vanilla, the records might contain details from before Baron Ruskin acquired Happy House.
While I was lost in thought, Ethan took the lantern from my hand and walked ahead. A long stretch of silence followed until he finally stopped.
"There’s a fork in the path," he announced.
I stopped beside him and raised my gaze. Sure enough, the passage split into two directions. The darkness was oppressive, and the uncertainty of where each path led sent a chill down my spine.
"How many paths are there? This really is designed like a labyrinth," I muttered.
"Wait, Miss Cherry. Do you see this?" Ethan asked, shining the lantern’s light on the wall between the two paths. There, something was etched, resembling marks made with white chalk.
The markings read: 2 on the left and 3 on the right.
"Huh? Isn’t this...?"
"Aren’t these the numbers written on the back of the mansion’s blueprint you showed me before?" Ethan asked.
Remember this.
1 - Brunel
3 - Spring
6 - Hague
8 - Notium.
That’s right! The numbers were listed just like that on the blueprint. Recalling this, I nodded vigorously.
"Yes, one of the numbers we were told to remember was 3 - Spring. And if I recall, Mr. Ruskin said the handwriting belonged to Baron Ruskin."
"So that means... Baron Ruskin knew about this underground passage. Though we can’t say for certain he was the one who built it."
That much was true. I stared at the numbers scrawled on the wall.
Now that I think about it, the white chalk marks... didn’t I see chalk by the fireplace’s grate alongside some fabric in the ash? They weren’t very old.
If that’s the case, the person who marked these numbers and annotated the blueprint must have been Baron Ruskin.
‘But is Vanilla really uninvolved? Could she truly know nothing?’
When I asked her about the map, her expression seemed genuinely clueless.
Still pondering, I pointed to the number 2.
"There wasn’t a number 2 on the blueprint."
"Then let’s start with the path marked as 3," Ethan suggested, gesturing to the right.
I nodded and followed him down the passage.
This chapter is updated by freēwēbnovel.com.
However, we soon discovered this path was blocked. It looked like we’d need to dig through it with shovels to proceed.
Reluctantly, we returned to the fork and tried the path marked as 2. But that one was blocked as well.
"It seems these paths were intentionally sealed off," Ethan observed, crouching to inspect the blocked end.
"To prevent anyone from finding them?"
If these tunnels connected to other areas like the Brunel police station, it meant someone from the other side could potentially come through.
"That’s the most likely explanation for now," Ethan said.
"Hmm. Should we head back? It’s getting late, so it might be better to clear the passage tomorrow."
Ethan agreed. It was already time for dinner. Since Ethan was leaving tomorrow, tonight would be our last evening together.
‘Yeah. I’ll discuss the underground passage with Harrison.’
With that thought in mind, I retraced my steps with Ethan. He kept glancing at me, lips parting as if to speak, but ultimately remained silent. For someone usually so outspoken, his restraint was unusual.
*****
"How was it? Did you find anything?"
Vanilla and Amy asked as they stood by the entrance. I shook my head.
"The path is blocked. It looks like we’ll have to dig again with the shovels."
"Again? There’s no way this is just natural collapses. It’s too precise, with dirt piled only at the entrances," Amy replied insightfully, though she grumbled about the inconvenience of more digging. I chuckled and lightly patted her head, then turned to Vanilla.
"Miss Ruskin, are you sure you don’t know anything about this underground passage? There were numbers marked in chalk at the fork, matching those Baron Ruskin wrote on the back of the blueprint."
"I wish I did, but I don’t know anything about the properties my father left behind," Vanilla replied with a frustrated expression. She ran her fingers through her hair, letting out a long sigh.
"Honestly, my father left me nothing but debt and worthless properties. What’s the point of being a noble if you’re broke?"
"That’s why you like money so much, huh?"
"I had to sell off all those properties just to pay off the debts," Vanilla said.
Amy looked at her with genuine sympathy, but what Vanilla said next left me stunned.
"My father was scammed in a real estate scheme."
A real estate scam?
The memory of my father from my past life flashed in my mind—how he’d been swindled while trying to buy farmland. I couldn’t help but feel a pang of understanding. Vanilla continued her lament.
"Foolishly, he believed the claim that buying dozens of mansions and renting them out would provide a steady income."
So, her father had dreams of being a landlord.
"But it was all a scam. The properties he purchased were all like this one," she said, gesturing toward my Happy House.
"That’s why I was so surprised when the famous Sinclair heiress bought this useless mansion."
I had no response to that. She wasn’t wrong—if I hadn’t been preparing for the apocalypse, I wouldn’t have purchased this mansion either. As the villagers said, it was practically a ruin.
"What happened to the scammer?" I asked, thinking we might learn something if they had been the original owner of this mansion.
Vanilla shook her head grimly.
"I don’t know. I think they were a noble, but every time I tried to ask, my father would dodge the question. He kept defending the person who scammed him."
That sounded incredibly suspicious. Baron Ruskin must have been far too kind for his own good, to the point of being exploited.
"I only remember one thing about the person. They visited the Ruskin estate once, and I caught a glimpse of their hair. They were completely covered in robes, but their long, deep pink hair stood out. It was a middle-aged man, about my father’s age."
Wait a second. Long, deep pink hair on a middle-aged man? That was an extremely unusual combination.
The description sounded eerily similar to my own father.
No way... My father wouldn’t...
But then again, if we were talking about the Sinclair family patriarch—the ruthless chairman of a corrupt corporation—this wasn’t entirely impossible.
Feeling unsettled, I quickly clamped my mouth shut.
"But if the man had deep pink hair, it’s the same color as Sugar Star’s," Amy remarked with a hint of unease.
Vanilla, however, waved it off.
"Uncommon, sure, but not unheard of. There are plenty of people with pink hair."
Yet for some reason, the pit in my stomach only grew deeper.
Something about this feels wrong.