The room was shrouded in darkness, as we hadn’t yet lit a torch. Ethan stepped inside cautiously, though the moonlight streaming through the window provided enough illumination to make out the general layout.
I pulled a lighter from the desk drawer and lit a torch, as well as a few candles, while Ethan and Harrison began inspecting the room.
"This is creepy. What if it’s a ghost? This place is practically a haunted house. Maybe someone died here and left it abandoned," Amy muttered as she followed us inside.
Her suggestion seemed plausible enough, but Jose clicked his tongue in disapproval.
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"Ghosts? Seriously? There’s no such thing."
"You’ve got such a narrow view. Did you expect there’d be monsters like this in the world?"
Ethan, who had been scanning the room, shot an irritated glare in their direction.
"Enough. You kids should stay out of this."
From his spot by the door, Nox gestured toward Amy and Jose.
"Yeah, kids, go on," Nox added.
Amy and Jose protested indignantly, claiming they weren’t children.
While they squabbled, the rest of us thoroughly searched the room. However, no matter how carefully we looked, we couldn’t find anything that could’ve caused the noise.
Amy’s earlier speculation about ghosts seemed increasingly plausible.
"Help me...."
The sudden voice sent a chill down my spine.
The room fell into a stunned silence as we all exchanged startled glances.
"See? I told you it’s a ghost!" Amy shrieked, breaking the silence. Jose, trying to save face, quickly dragged her back to the banquet hall.
Ethan and Harrison continued their search with renewed urgency, while Nox stood by the fireplace, staring at it intently.
"What is it?" I asked, noticing the unusual focus in Nox’s expression.
He turned to look at me, breaking his gaze from the fireplace. Ethan and Harrison paused to watch him as well.
"Miss Cherry, don’t you think there’s something odd about this fireplace?" Nox asked.
We all turned to face the fireplace.
‘Now that he mentions it....’
I remembered how I’d tried to use this fireplace before, only to discover that there was no visible flue for the smoke to escape. It was as though the fireplace wasn’t designed to function as a real one.
I crouched in front of it, recalling the fragment of a men’s jacket I’d found inside the grate last time.
Could the sound have come from the chimney? I leaned in to examine the fireplace more closely.
"Doesn’t seem like anything’s unusual," Ethan murmured behind me. His low voice was so close to my ear that I jumped slightly.
Harrison knelt down beside me, carefully inspecting the grate.
"What’s this?"
He found the same fragments of a men’s jacket that I had, along with a piece of chalk.
‘Why would there be chalk here?’
There was no reason to use something like that in this room.
Thud.
A noise traveled down the wall of the fireplace.
Startled, I nearly fell backward, but Ethan caught me before I could hit the ground.
"Thanks," I said, regaining my balance and turning back to the fireplace.
Harrison and Nox were now running their hands over the inside of the fireplace, carefully examining it.
"The sound is definitely coming from beyond the wall," Nox said, and Harrison nodded in agreement as he continued feeling along the surface.
Thud, thud.
The noise came again, like something—or someone—knocking on the other side. Ethan, still supporting me, looked visibly unnerved.
"What is this? There’s definitely something behind that wall. Should we break it down?"
"There could be a monster in there," I murmured.
Ethan pulled a revolver from his holster.
"If it’s a monster, I’ll blow its head off," he said, cocking the gun.
Just as Ethan prepared his weapon, I noticed the ashes in the grate shifting slightly, as if disturbed by a breeze.
‘But the chimney’s blocked... where is the air coming from?’
"Wait a second," I said, stepping closer to the fireplace. Gripping the grate, I gave it a tug.
Clunk.
The wall suddenly shifted.
"Goddamn," Ethan muttered.
"Well, this is a first," Nox added, his tone dry.
Harrison stepped in to help me, and together we pulled the grate out, revealing a hidden mechanism.
As we dragged the grate toward us, the floor shifted, and the wall slid open, revealing a hidden passage.
Thud.
The wall came to a stop, fully open now.
Beyond the wall was a pitch-black corridor. Without a torch, it was impossible to see far inside. But at the entrance to the dark passage, I saw a figure lying on the ground.
A young girl.
Her light brown hair, styled in a low bun, was disheveled, and her hands were bloodied.
I knew who she was.
"Susanna!"
I called out her name instinctively and reached into the fireplace, but the sleeve of my dress caught on something and tore with a loud rip.
It was then that I realized why the scraps of fabric had been inside the grate to begin with.
But that didn’t matter now—what mattered was Susanna.
"Are you alright?"
I pushed past Harrison and scooped Susanna into my arms, carrying her out of the hidden passage.
My mind was a whirlwind. How had this happened? Susanna hadn’t turned into a monster after all? Then what about the monster in the banquet hall wearing her clothes?
It was only then that I noticed Susanna was dressed in nothing but a chemise.
Her outer clothes must have been torn to shreds during her escape. Given her current state, it was the only explanation that made sense.
Susanna was unconscious and utterly weak. She hadn’t eaten anything—probably for weeks—and had been trapped in that suffocating space. It was no wonder she was in such a condition.
I quickly laid her on my bed, checked her breathing, and called out, "Mr. Ludfisher, hurry. Please, come here!"
Nox, who had been frozen in shock, finally snapped out of it and rushed to my side. Ethan and Harrison also gathered by the bed, leaving their respective posts.
Hearing the commotion, the others crowded near the door, but I couldn’t spare them a thought.
Susanna’s body burned with fever. Her hands were bloodied, likely from pounding on the walls behind the fireplace.
The wounds on her shoulders and arms suggested she’d also used her body to forcefully ram the walls. Thankfully, there were no signs of a monster’s bite.
"For now, we need water and towels to bring her fever down. Once that’s done, we’ll treat her injuries," Nox instructed.
Vanilla hurried to the kitchen to fetch water from the supply barrel.
Amy and Jose, who had quietly slipped back into the room, sat obediently in a corner while the rest of us focused on Susanna, who continued to groan faintly.
"I thought she was dead," I muttered, sitting beside the bed and gently holding Susanna’s hand. Her hair, damp with sweat, clung to her forehead, and I carefully brushed it back.
"I should have searched harder... just a little more..."
The words escaped me as I recalled the haunting sounds I had heard earlier in this room.
"Don’t go."
"Help me."
Those had been Susanna’s desperate cries for help before she lost consciousness. My hand trembled as I held hers.
How terrified she must have been. The thought of what might have happened if we had been just a little later made my chest tighten.
"This isn’t your fault," Ethan said gently. Harrison silently draped a blanket over my shoulders, his actions full of quiet understanding.
"Who is she?" Amy asked, her curiosity finally getting the better of her.
Her question echoed the unspoken thoughts of everyone else as they looked at me expectantly.
"She’s my maid," I replied softly. "She disappeared right after the world fell apart. I had no idea she’d been trapped here..."
Vanilla returned with water, and Emma immediately took over, carefully wiping Susanna’s face and hands with a towel to clean her wounds.
Nox sat by the bed, focusing on treating Susanna’s injuries, while Emma continued to cool her fevered body with a damp towel.
I sat on the floor beside them, my gaze fixed on Susanna. Her angelic face, which had once been so full of warmth, was now pale and lifeless.
How much had she endured in that dark, cramped space? Despite it all, I was overwhelmed with gratitude that she had survived.
"Shouldn’t we check it out? Are we just going to leave it open?" Jose’s voice broke the moment. He was inspecting the fireplace again.
Ethan and Harrison both turned to glare at him, their eyes clearly saying, Read the room. Jose, now visibly pale, quickly shut his mouth.
"She’s showing signs of severe dehydration. We’ll need more water," Nox said as he finished treating her hands.
"I’ll go this time," Emma offered, rising from her seat.
"Thank you, Emma. There’s a water barrel in the kitchen. You can fetch it from there," I said, and she nodded knowingly before leaving the room.
Ethan remained stationed by the fireplace, while Harrison stood watch at the foot of the bed, his expression tense.
As I looked back at Susanna, I turned to Nox.
"How has she survived this long without water? It’s been at least two weeks, hasn’t it?"
"It’s impossible for a human to go without water for more than three days," Nox replied, his tone grave.
Yet Susanna had somehow survived in that pitch-black passage for nearly two weeks.
I looked at the fireplace with a sense of doubt.
The inside of the fireplace was so deep and dark that it seemed impossible to determine where it ended. Ethan, who had pulled a chair in front of the fireplace and was sitting there, spoke up.
“This fireplace... I checked it out briefly, but it’s too dark to see anything. We should bring a lantern or something to get a proper look.”
At Ethan’s words, Nox and I exchanged a glance before turning back to Susanna.
“For now...”
I began to speak, gently stroking Susanna’s pale and terror-stricken face.
“Mr. Ludfisher, please take care of Emma and Susanna. I’ll go examine the fireplace with Sir Ethan.”
Ethan nodded and immediately pulled out the revolver’s cylinder to reload the bullets.
By the fireplace, Amy and Jose were already peering inside with curious expressions.
“Move.”
Ethan shoved the two of them aside and stood in front of the fireplace. Amy, who was flipping him off with her fingers, quickly put on a bright smile when our eyes met. Jose, meanwhile, looked at her as though he’d just seen something bizarre.
At that moment, Harrison approached with a sigh, blocking my path.
“I understand your intentions, but the two of you shouldn’t rush. How about waiting until Susanna wakes up? It might be safer to act after hearing about the situation from her.”
Now that I thought about it, he was right. I was quickly convinced by Harrison’s reasoning.