NOMAMWTM Chapter 21

Splish.

Spl—ish.

Just one more corner to turn before she'd see her room. Charlotte hesitated right before doing so.

Her slippers had gotten wet. She must have stepped in something wrong.

Charlotte looked down.

Moonlight didn't reach here—she squinted and saw what looked like a puddle.

Had the maids spilled something while cleaning? The liquid seeping into her feet felt unpleasant.

It was oddly sticky, not just water.

She'd need to wash her feet first when she got back.

Charlotte lifted her toes to escape the puddle and turned the corner.

But again.

Splish.

Liquid pressed under her feet.

"Ugh…"

She didn't know what it was, but the lukewarm stuff felt truly awful.

She tried to step where it wasn't wet, but somehow the floor was damp everywhere she stepped.

What kind of cleaning job was this—

Charlotte, who'd been carefully placing her feet while looking down, suddenly hesitated.

The dim corridor had grown a bit brighter.

A gentle light illuminated the liquid pooled on the floor.

Something reflected in the unidentifiable, dark-red liquid.

"…..."

Splish.

Nero leapt from her arms.

Masses appeared from somewhere and flew through the air in a rush.

Charlotte raised her head.

A person stood before her holding a candelabra.

Jeina.

"…Je, ina?"

Charlotte took one step back.

The candle flame rippled.

Red undulated through the pitch-black corridor.

Jeina—her maid uniform stained with something in various places, her skirt hem soaked through—looked at her and grinned.

Charlotte stared blankly at what lay behind Jeina.

Sticky liquid pooled there in abundance.

What she'd stepped in earlier seemed like nothing—it flowed like a river.

And on top of it, people lay collapsed.

Three people.

The one collapsed closest was someone she knew well.

Tom.

The servant who'd said he hated Michael like a madman along with Jeina—he lay there with his eyes rolled back.

What is this?

The question floated up in her numbed mind.

Dark-red liquid seeped into the cracks between marble stones.

Liquid dripped over the railing in droplets. Drip, drip.

What, is this?

The question crossed her mind again.

Her head spun, unable to accept the scene unfolding before her eyes.

How many seconds passed?

"Maaa, daaam."

Jeina twisted her head toward Charlotte—standing there stupidly—with a crack, bizarrely.

"M'laady."

Drawing out her words, she took one step toward Charlotte.

Something in Jeina's hand reflected the candlelight, glinting.

Jeina's arm, her hand were stained entirely black. A grotesque hand caked with dried dark-red held a dagger.

Drip, drip.

Fresh, blood-red liquid falling.

Drip. Driip.

Blood. Falling.

Thump.

Only then did her heart—which seemed to have stopped for a moment—sink.

Charlotte, all color drained from her face, took another step back.

One step back, then another step back.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Her heartbeat rang in her ears like a drum.

So.

Jeina had killed people.

Tom, and the others.

The moment she finally recognized this, Charlotte felt like her insides were turning over.

Fear and terror, nausea—all tangled together and rose up.

The fishy smell she hadn't noticed until just now hit her forcefully.

Her throat closed completely.

What, what is this?

Did she see it right?

Is this, is this really—

Splash.

Hot liquid splattered on her ankle.

"M'laady."

Jeina approached her, smiling.

"…Don't."

Charlotte squeezed out a voice that wouldn't come, on legs that swayed.

"Don't come."

Her breath trembled violently.

"Don't come closer."

A voice that didn't seem like her own squeezed out and rang dully in her head.

Jeina twisted her head to the other side with a crack.

"Whyyy?"

Goosebumps prickled at the drawn-out speech.

With each step Jeina took forward, pitch-black shadows and eerie red light alternately descended on her face and repeated.

She needed to run.

Her body stiffened rigid at the horrific scene utterly beyond common sense.

Her retreating feet froze, unable to move.

Charlotte breathed raggedly, struggling to move her legs. But her body wouldn't obey.

Jeina still approached her with that smiling face.

Splish.

Splosh.

Spliiish.

Beyond her dulled ears, the sound of sticky liquid being stepped on rang excessively loud.

Her terror-stricken body trembled violently.

"M'laa—aaady."

Then.

Jeina—who'd approached close enough to graze Charlotte if she swung the dagger—suddenly stopped.

"It huuurts!"

A chilling scream echoed.

Charlotte's eyes shook.

Nero—who'd leapt from her arms earlier—was biting Jeina's ankle.

Nero's eyes glowed red, creating the illusion that red light shimmered like heat haze.

"Ow, ow, owowow!"

Though a tiny rabbit's bite couldn't possibly hurt, Jeina shrieked and shook her leg.

"Ah, it huuurts, ahhhhh!"

The rabbit flew helplessly from the force and fell at Charlotte's feet, but Jeina kept shaking her leg like someone deranged.

It felt like being doused with ice water.

Charlotte—who'd come to her senses—picked up Nero with trembling hands.

Her legs started moving.

Swaying as if she'd fall, Charlotte ran.

"M'LAAAAADY! Where, are you goiiing!"

Jeina wailed behind her.

The sound was loud enough to make the corridor ring, but no one came to look.

No one, was there anyone at all?

Michael.

Where was Michael?

Charlotte ran. Closed room doors flashed past.

Michael.

I'm scared.

Michael.

As if he were the only person who could pull her from this terrible nightmare, Charlotte ran, desperately seeking Michael.

She ran through the East Wing corridor she'd come through,

Crossed into the West Wing and ran,

Ran past the gallery she'd visited before.

Ran past countless rooms.

How much time passed?

She discovered one miraculously open door.

Familiar golden magical power rippled.

Masses swarmed and blocked the entrance, but she shoved them aside roughly, not caring.

Between the black things, she saw a white man.

Relief washed over her like a wave.

She barely managed to catch her breath as she rushed to Michael.

"…Charlotte."

"Mich, ael."

Charlotte grabbed his arms and barely squeezed out her voice.

She didn't register that his complexion was somehow very dark.

Her vision blurred with terror, then cleared, then blurred again.

"Michael, Michael."

She gasped for breath and tightened her grip.

Michael's beautiful blue eyes narrowed.

Her voice flowed out trembling.

"Jeina… the maid, killed people, killed people."

"...…"

His eyes sank distantly.

Thump thump thump thump went her heart.

Was he shocked? He didn't answer.

She gasped and spoke again.

"The maid, killed people…"

People, were dead.

Even as she spoke, the horrific scene of bodies sprawled played through her mind.

"…"

But what descended was silence.

Michael only stared down at her fixedly. Why wasn't he saying anything? Didn't he believe her?

"Michael!"

Unable to escape her terror, she finally screamed.

The gruesome scene kept circling in her head. Her heart beat painfully.

She felt like vomiting, like collapsing right now.

But she had to tell him.

The terrible thing, tell him, and then…

"People, people are dead, I'm telling you? It's not a lie, people—"

"…So?"

Charlotte, rambling incoherently, stopped short at the word Michael spat out.

The masses rolled about with a whoooosh.

The rabbit in her arms flinched and trembled.

"…What?"

Charlotte blinked.

So?

…She must have, heard wrong.

She must have heard wrong.

People were dead, and he said so? What did that even mean?

Those weren't words that should come from the mouth of the kind, gentle husband she knew.

Only then did Charlotte look properly at Michael's face.

He looked like someone ill.

His white face was too pale.

His beautiful blue eyes were hollow.

Like someone who'd let go of something, his body seemed powerless.

No sign of shock, or confusion, or even worry for her after she'd run to him—nothing.

"…People, are dead, Michael…"

Even while sensing something, something was wrong, she kept speaking.

His face still showed no change whatsoever.

This was strange.

Her fingertips grew gradually colder.

"…Ha."

Finally, a sound flowed from the mouth of the man standing wordlessly.

A scoff.

"I can't do this anymore."

Words she couldn't understand.

"So? What do you want from me?"

An excessively cold voice.

An excessively frigid face looked at her.

The man she'd known until now, the man she'd thought she was getting to know—he was nowhere to be found.

Charlotte's eyes shook. Her deathly pale lips trembled.

She stumbled backward.

"People, are dead, I'm telling you? Michael?"

She squeezed out a voice clogged with something, like wringing it out.

Like a broken music box, she repeated the same words.

"…I said I can't do this anymore."

A reaction beyond common sense.

His expression didn't change.

People were dead.

"How do you want me to react?"

Only an emotionless face gazed at her.

What, is this?

What is this?

A murder had occurred, and this was his reaction?

Charlotte gasped for breath.

And then finally. Even him.

Even her husband.

…She was scared.

She was terrified.

She took one step back.

Michael didn't hold her back.

Two steps, three steps back.

Behind him, the masses—which she'd never once thought frightening until now—spread eeriness and flew up with a whoosh.

No explanation came.

None of the reactions a normal person should show appeared anywhere.

This was strange.

She felt trapped in a strange place.

What is this?

She was scared. Terrified.

At some point she started running.

Michael didn't move, didn't chase her.

Charlotte ran.

She ran without knowing where she was headed.

Only the thought that she had to escape filled her.

Her vision turned hazy.

Physiological tears leaked out.

But, why?

"…Why?"

Charlotte stopped and asked breathlessly.

Before her stood Jeina—when had she chased her here?

"M'LAAAAADY."

Jeina—blood-soaked, gripping the dagger—rushed toward her like an arrow.

They were close enough to feel each other's breath.

Jeina raised her arm.

Charlotte couldn't move.

Couldn't do anything.

[…F*ck!]

Even when red light flashed with an unfamiliar voice from somewhere, she couldn't react.

Simply, Jeina's dagger flew toward her.

I'm going to die.

Charlotte stared blankly at Jeina's arm and dagger descending slowly as if time had stretched.