NOMAMWTM Chapter 24

She was afraid.

Afraid, but excitement wouldn't help.

She built a wall against the clamoring emotions and forced herself calm.

It was something only she could do—something learned from living with fear for so long, standing on top of it, walking across it.

[Oh.]

She breathed slowly, evening her breath, and stared at Nero.

This place wasn't the peaceful Cardium Estate she'd known, the one she'd been thinking of.

Then—hop.

A small sound.

Charlotte turned her head slowly, very slowly.

Her lips parted slightly.

[You came?]

Nero lifted one front paw, casual as anything.

Before her appeared the rabbit she'd been thinking of as Nero all this time.

White fur, golden eyes. The one that had led her to Michael's mother.

The white rabbit stared at her, then hopped away, slipping through the gap in the slightly open door.

Just like that day.

Even though she'd built a dam against her emotions and barely held it back, fear still lingered, making her whole body tremble, but Charlotte slowly rose from the bed.

That rabbit seemed like it would show her some kind of solution to this chaotic situation.

She wondered if following an illogical judgment at a time like this was right, but she was already struggling to maintain her sanity. She followed her instinct.

At least that rabbit had helped save one person.

[When I talk, you don't even listen, Master.]

Ignoring Nero grumbling behind her, Charlotte staggered out of the room on legs that kept trying to give out.

The dim corridor was quiet.

So quiet it seemed like the corpses, the pool of blood, Jeina, the conversation with Michael—all of it might never have happened.

But it was real.

Fear surged that she might see another corpse, or something terrifying.

But soon the rabbit hopping far ahead, turning back to look at her, gave her the courage to step forward.

She walked toward the rabbit that had paused, forcing herself step by step through the silent corridor.

Unfortunately or fortunately, there was nothing in the corridor except the lumps.

The lumps positioned in the darkness saw her and came rolling down to the floor. Clatter-clatter-clatter.

"...Hic!"

Charlotte clamped her hand over her mouth and struggled desperately not to collapse in fear.

Up ahead, the rabbit that had stopped again stared at her.

"...Don't, come closer."

She barely managed to whisper, face drained white.

The lumps hesitated, then rumble-rumble, headed elsewhere.

[Well, isn't that curious.]

She didn't even hear Nero's words. She struggled to calm her trembling breath and followed the white rabbit that had started hopping away again.

Past a corridor that felt unusually long, and past another, and another.

Just when fear was about to overflow the dam of her emotions again, flooding back over her with memories of what she'd seen in this darkness—

She and the rabbit arrived before a door.

Charlotte, nearly consumed by fear, stared at the door with shaking eyes.

"Go, in here?"

When she asked haltingly, the rabbit's golden eyes stared at her as if to say yes.

[Hurry up and go in.]

Nero spoke carelessly from behind.

Click.

Charlotte opened the door with bloodless hands.

As soon as she did, she realized this was a familiar room.

The door opened, and inside the room flooded with moonlight—

A middle-aged woman sitting at a table looking out the window turned her head.

"...Oh my."

Green eyes widened as if completely unexpected.

A face similar to Michael's.

Adeline Cardium, her mother-in-law.

The one she'd definitely thought was bad, thought was cold-hearted, thought was strange.

Charlotte couldn't bring herself to enter the room rashly and looked down at the rabbit that had brought her here, but the white rabbit had already vanished somewhere.

[Not going in?]

Only Nero remained, scratching his ear with his hind leg. Scratch-scratch-scratch-scratch.

Charlotte raised her head again to look at the woman before her, Adeline.

"Oh..."

She had risen from her seat awkwardly, at a loss.

This woman—she was the one Charlotte had thought must be strange all along, must be wicked.

But Charlotte strangely felt none of the negative impressions she'd expected from the awake Adeline.

Just suddenly—

'Though I think you must be different from ordinary people, I still ask because the estate is what it is. I do hope you're faring well.'

The words from the letter she'd received from Adeline flashed through Charlotte's mind as she stared blankly at Adeline Cardium.

'...Michael seems to have some strange misunderstanding, but I hope my son is behaving well without committing any errors before such an honored person.'

Words she'd thought were truly strange.

'I hope the darkness of this estate doesn't touch such an honored person...'

Words she'd thought strangely described an utterly peaceful estate.

...Oh.

Charlotte still didn't understand at all what kind of place this estate was, why Michael had come at her so frightfully, what this situation even was, but the moment she remembered those words, she felt a strange relief.

"Um... child?"

She looked at Adeline again.

From Adeline, who had wiped away her confusion and was looking at her, she felt no wariness, no malice.

She even looked like a kind person.

Perhaps.

If the letter Adeline had sent her wasn't strange after all.

Perhaps.

The strange one was Charlotte herself—that thought occurred to her.

Maybe she'd been thinking something wrong, maybe the truth she didn't know was truly frightening, and as those thoughts came—

Tears streamed down her face.

[Uh, Master?]

"Oh, child?"

Flustered voices.

"...Sob."

Charlotte began to cry.

The dam she'd held back briefly broke.

She was afraid. Terrified. She didn't know what any of this was.

Emotions rushed in all at once.

She'd only gotten married to gain freedom, all she'd wanted was to grow closer to her husband, but the things that had happened were too eerie, too chilling.

But the thought that the woman before her might tell her the answers, that alone was enough relief—

She cried like a child for a long while.

Adeline, like someone accustomed to comforting crying people, gently whispered that it was all right, that it was okay, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief.

"What, hic, is all this?"

The first words that burst from Charlotte's mouth when she'd barely calmed down.

Adeline gently stroked her back and murmured.

"I thought you'd be all right... but it seems you weren't."

"What, hic, do you mean?"

"You miraculously drove away the illness, so I'd secretly thought you weren't an ordinary person."

When Charlotte asked between sniffles, Adeline answered readily.

So there really was something in this estate.

Charlotte tried to say that she didn't know how she'd done that either, but Adeline's question came faster than Charlotte could speak through her clogged, sniffling throat.

"What's your name, child?"

"Hic, Char, hic, lotte."

"Charlotte, that's a pretty name."

The gentle voice helped her calm down.

"What did you see?"

Adeline asked softly while massaging her hand, as if she knew everything.

A scene flashed through her mind.

Charlotte hic, reflexively drew in a breath.

Soon honest words spilled from her mouth.

About Jeina, the first maid who hadn't been afraid of her, who'd killed three servants and tried to kill her too.

About how the lumps she'd thought were Michael's familiars all this time had killed Jeina, how Michael had come and rebuked her for killing another person. How he'd said the lumps weren't his familiars. How he'd been kind to her all this time but suddenly changed. It was strange.

...She just, didn't understand anything at all.

Adeline listened to everything silently.

"What did you think this estate was, Charlotte?"

When Charlotte's words finally ended, Adeline asked quietly.

"Anything is fine. Tell me."

Charlotte hesitated, then spoke haltingly.

"...Because of the lumps, they obey well, but they're disgustingly shaped, so familiars are, mages are, not well known, so the servants are afraid of Michael, and—"

She gauged Adeline's reaction.

Adeline still listened to her words kindly.

She hadn't said anything about it being strange talk yet. Charlotte gathered courage and finished.

"...I thought Adeline, hic, was afraid of Michael too."

Adeline's eyes widened round, as if that was something she hadn't expected.

"...Mm."

She seemed to choose her words, then massaged Charlotte's trembling hand again.

"First, Charlotte."

She bobbed her head, tears still hanging from her eyes.

"Starting with the most important thing—those, lumps, you called them?"

"...They're shaped like lumps, so I called them that."

Wondering if there was another name, she murmured softly.

Adeline smiled as if troubled.

"...First, those lumps, as Michael told you, aren't that child's familiars. They're not even similar to that."

"......"

She'd heard it once, but now that someone was confirming it with their own mouth, she suddenly felt distant again.

Somehow tears seemed about to come again.

"...Then what are they?"

At her words, pressed down firmly, Adeline slowly opened her mouth.

"Everyone knows those lumps Charlotte mentioned exist here, but we can't see them with our eyes."

Charlotte's eyes shook and widened.

"We've been calling them oddities."

"Oddities...?"

She murmured blankly.

Adeline stroked her shoulder, then got up and retrieved a thick sheet of paper from a drawer before returning.

She handed it to Charlotte.

"These are the regulations we give new servants who come to Cardium. Read it."

At first she thought, why this?

But—

Charlotte's hands began to tremble gradually as she read down through the regulations.

It was the moment truth reached her.