NOMAMWTM Chapter 28

Charlotte had been feeling somewhat small, discovering without knowing it that she'd earned fear from everyone, that she was being mistaken for something terrible.

Adeline's honest words comforted her more than she'd expected.

At least one person among the many in this estate believed she wasn't a frightening existence.

That alone gave her strength.

Charlotte got up, squeezed her eyes shut, and took a deep breath.

[Where are you going?]

She stood before the corner where the masses were gathered.

She was scared, still thought of Jeina, but she looked bravely at the masses huddled together.

Perhaps because she'd told them not to approach, all the masses in the room were clumped in the corner.

The eyeballs that had been docile, as if reading the room, began to roll around.

"...You guys, you really won't kill me?"

Charlotte asked slowly.

"You won't hurt me?"

Even as she spoke, she knew the answer, and asking wouldn't let her hear a response anyway, but she asked.

Then one of the masses clumped together rolled toward her feet.

Revulsion surged, but she didn't retreat.

Countless eyeballs embedded in the small thing rolled around.

It seemed like an answer that they wouldn't harm her.

Soon, all the gathered masses tumbled down to the floor in a rush.

"...!"

Charlotte flinched.

The masses settled so densely they blackened the floor, then rolled around her madly in all directions.

Rolling this way, rolling that way—chaos.

Were they... happy?

[Really, every time I see it, it's fascinating.]

Nero, who'd been pretending not to care while staying alert, muttered.

"Hey, you guys."

"...What are you doing?"

When Charlotte, who'd been frozen by the chaotic masses, called to them, a crooked voice came.

Michael stood before the open door—she hadn't noticed when he'd entered—his brow furrowed.

He couldn't see the anomalies but could hear them, she'd said.

"...What are they saying?"

Charlotte, who'd been staring at him blankly, asked without thinking.

"Excuse me?"

"Ah, nothing."

But immediately after, when his expression turned sharply worse, she waved her hands hastily.

He'd said he'd suffered a lot because of the masses' sounds.

"You guys, I get it, so stop now."

The masses stopped dead at her words, as they always had.

When the things that had been rolling around like mad stopped, the dizziness disappeared.

She swallowed hard but didn't tell them to go away this time.

She felt she needed to get used to them again.

Things that tore people to death obeyed her words well.

Even looking back, it was a bizarre reality.

Charlotte let out a deep sigh, then stopped when she felt eyes on her and turned her head.

Michael was watching her speak to the masses with icy eyes, arms crossed.

That cold gaze made her shrink a little, but she decided to be strong.

She glanced at him, then spoke.

"...You guys, from now on, be quiet in front of that person. Got it?"

The masses that had been still began to roll.

They seemed to roll somewhat fiercely, as if in rebellion, compared to before.

Charlotte feared for a moment that they were throwing a tantrum refusing, but soon when their movements didn't grow larger, she suppressed it and put force into her eyes.

"If I say be quiet, be quiet."

Michael's eyes watching her grew very slightly larger—so minutely you'd have to look closely to tell.

The masses rolled slowly toward Charlotte's feet.

They seemed to be acting cute.

Did they understand?

"Are they quiet?"

As Charlotte asked and turned her head, Michael brushed past her coldly and entered the bathroom.

Bang.

The sound of the door closing rang coldly through the room.

[How prickly.]

Nero giggled as if watching something entertaining.

"Funny?"

Charlotte, left alone, felt a bit sullen, then glared at the laughing Nero.

But soon, she stretched luxuriously and flopped onto the bed.

On the ceiling, masses had already taken positions throughout the room.

Honestly, yes.

It had been horrible, scary, unfair, frightening, but despair was meaningless.

And if the masses obeyed only her words, unlike with other people...

Charlotte's eyes regained life for the first time in days as something occurred to her.

From that day on, she practically memorized everything in the notebook.

She'd long since memorized the regulations entirely, and she carefully stored in her mind the various other small pieces of information Adeline shared intermittently.

Even after all that, wondering if she really couldn't leave, she'd tried to exit the estate and pass through the barrier just in case, but failed spectacularly and felt sullen briefly before recovering.

Several days passed like that.

"Right, let's go out."

[Oh.]

Charlotte, who'd been holed up in her room for days, declared.

"Do not go out alone."

At the stiff voice from behind her the instant she spoke, she whirled around.

Michael sat on the sofa reading a book.

Sitting by the window would let sunlight in nicely, yet he'd chosen to sit on the corner sofa where masses were particularly numerous.

That beautiful man hadn't left her side even once except the day she'd regained consciousness.

Before, she'd been happy, thinking him a kind husband, but now Charlotte thought she roughly understood why he stuck beside her while thinking her a monster.

"Are you trying to monitor me?"

"I have been monitoring you all along."

"Then we can go together."

She didn't bother looking at Michael's predictably negative reaction and went into the bathroom to change clothes.

When she came out to the room, Michael's gaze flew to her, but she paid him no mind.

She took three deep breaths and opened the door to step into the corridor.

The masses in the hallway rolled around, greeting her with entirely unwelcome enthusiasm.

"...Who are you trying to kill?"

As Charlotte bit her lip slightly, Michael, who'd followed her out, asked with a very somber face.

"If I came out to kill someone every time, someone would've died every time I came out."

"That's exactly what happened."

She flinched for a moment, but she'd perfectly finished organizing her feelings over the past few days. She didn't waver.

"Did anyone die in these past few days?"

Michael's gaze bore down.

"It would be your whim."

So no one died. That was fortunate.

Charlotte didn't want to be hurt anymore, so she stopped talking to him and strode down the corridor with Nero in her arms.

Having finished organizing her feelings and decided to be brave, she'd also determined a direction for what to do going forward.

She would not yield to the misunderstandings of Michael and—

"Ee, eeek!"

"Eek, h-hello—hic."

"P-please spare me."

"Eek, sob!"

—the servants, who, seeing them again like this, clearly showed how much they feared her.

She intended to make these people believe in her no matter what.

Whether she liked it or not, she was trapped in this estate, and this place, though terrible, was her new home.

Michael and the servants were family she'd have to live with from now on.

She didn't want to be misunderstood by such people.

She would clear up the misunderstandings, somehow make this place peaceful, and find a way to escape from here.

She'd married for freedom, and she couldn't live anymore without freedom.

"Where are you going?"

"Who knows? I don't know either."

So she answered his cold question with a beaming smile.

She didn't care about Michael's cold gaze.

She intended to see the peaceful outside world with all these people, with no one dead.

And to do that, she'd try everything she could do first.

Adeline had said so.

That perhaps an extraordinary person could open an escape route.

She didn't want to admit being extraordinary, but since the anomalies obeyed her words like tamed beasts, she had to do what she could.

Charlotte discovered a door with particularly many masses clinging to it as she walked past.

She approached those masses.

Since she hadn't told them to go away, the masses quickly swarmed toward her with a whoosh of rolling.

She swallowed once and spoke.

"...Hey guys, I hate seeing people die. I told you before, right? It's horrible. Don't kill people from now on either."

She planned to go around asking the masses not to kill people.

It might look ridiculous, but Nero had definitely said the masses had stopped killing people after hearing her casual remark that she hated seeing people die.

Then she had to use even that.

[Master, do you think this will work?]

Nero asked from her arms.

[That maid dying last time—it looked like they'd been holding back because they couldn't kill people and finally exploded. They were found out.]

"Then what can I do? This is all I can do."

"Who are you talking to?"

Charlotte stopped.

It wasn't aggressive, but the voice was cold.

While she'd been asking the masses and conversing with Nero, Michael had been staring at her with very cold eyes, silently.