NOMAMWTM Chapter 9

Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump.

Michael gritted his teeth in the pitch-black darkness, trying to calm his pounding heart.

He'd nearly lost control of everything and let his face contort.

If that happened, both he and the owner of the gaze he felt on his back would know the performance was over.

As more people died, his patience grew shorter.

During the day, after that terrible conversation with his mother through the door for the first time in ages, he'd briefly stopped by his office and learned that Charlotte Zelova, who was supposed to arrive, had been found dead at the temple.

Though not surprising, as deaths piled up, the weight of the stone pressing on his chest dragged him down further and further.

He'd grown sickeningly accustomed to the weight of death and farewells, yet recent deaths—even the death of the 'real' Charlotte whose face he'd never seen—felt so burdensome that each one seemed to batter and break him apart.

Still, he forced down what he could barely swallow.

[Keke-keke-keke-keke-keke-keke]

The moment he left his office, a maid's life crumbled before his eyes.

The chorus of fanatical worship rang blackly in his ears.

Jeina, who had followed Becky and witnessed her death just as he had, muttered "My lady... my lady..." in a daze, her words forming a horrific dissonance with the eerie creatures' hymns of praise to Charlotte.

His reason wavered. He couldn't seem to think at all. He left the sole remaining maid with a nearby head maid and walked through countless corridors before entering the master bedroom.

Unlike six days ago when it had been covered in dust, the room was now neatly organized, with an incomplete magic circle in its center.

The original one had been too steeped in the creatures' power, so he'd destroyed it and was redrawing it.

The circle to expel the creatures consumed excessive mana each time he drew it, which was why it remained unfinished—but now he had to complete it whether he could or not.

He barely regained his senses while completing the circle, unaware of his dangerously wavering mana.

Only after thinking of the lives hanging on his shoulders, erasing the scene of the maid's death from his mind, wiping away his emotions, and pulling an expressionless mask over his contorted face did he leave the room.

It was familiar, yet this time it wasn't. No—it seemed like it hadn't been familiar for some time now.

But once again forcing it all down, he went to the beautiful monster lurking in a corner of the estate.

She asked what had happened.

It was a malicious question—asking when she already knew.

He answered that nothing had. He didn't waver at such things. He couldn't.

But that wasn't the end.

Michael saw Nero—his dead familiar.

Charlotte brazenly picked up the rabbit.

Memories of the agonizing pain when his rampage was triggered by the severing of their soul connection when the small rabbit died to a creature flashed through his mind.

Charlotte's eyes gleamed as she spun the lie that she'd found Nero—or something that wasn't Nero—in the garden, a lie both he and she knew.

Her asking if she could raise it was utterly horrifying.

"It's fine. Everything is fine, so do as you wish."

The words telling her to do as she pleased had slipped out because he couldn't fully control his emotions.

'I wanted to be free. And magic... I know about it.'

A beat too late, he realized he'd told the monster who'd answered that she came to this estate to freely reap lives to do as she pleased.

"Thank you."

But the words had already left his mouth.

Charlotte smiled again with spine-chilling beauty, as if she could see right through him.

It was a pitch-black smile worn by death so beautiful it was suffocating.

Ah.

For a moment, he felt that vertiginous sensation of falling into an abyss again.

Weight and fatigue assailed him.

Having made one mistake, the urge to let everything collapse rose within him.

—If you give up, it'll be easier.

The demon within whispered in the voice of the little girl who'd been his only conversation partner in childhood, his fleeting comfort.

But as always, he thought of his mother, Adin, the children in the annex, the household members he couldn't get close to.

More precisely, the light of life that would vanish from everyone's eyes the moment he let go.

He recalled how many had died the moment his father released his grip on life.

Michael barely managed to grasp hold of his will that tried to slip away like sand between his palms.

He couldn't keep getting tired.

He barely held onto his wavering reason.

He had to manage this.

He gave a plausible excuse—that an ordinary person would naturally find it strange—that he would dismiss the maids and personally attend to her in order to stay close and monitor her.

Whether she didn't know human behavior despite having human form, or whether his attempt to stop her was so utterly insignificant—like an ant trying to stop a person—that she didn't even care, the beautiful monster said a few words and accepted.

A night sickeningly exhausting.

Michael lay beside the woman most beautiful and horrifying.

His mind had reached its limit.

Deaths he might face, deaths he'd heard of, deaths he'd witnessed, deaths he'd witnessed before.

In just this one day, four deaths had brushed past him, and creatures that had crawled even into the room they shouldn't be able to enter—whether due to Charlotte's influence or because of the magic circle—whispered endless horrific curses and praises in his ears.

[Diediediediediediediediediediediediediediediediediediediedie]

"Michael."

When he no longer had the strength to hide his inner thoughts, a warm hand touched his cheek.

Warm, he thought.

When the tension melted from his body just slightly at the human warmth he hadn't felt in so long, Michael realized who the hand's owner was and felt nauseated.

Had she perfectly learned to imitate humans in those six days? Charlotte's hand, which had been cold all along, was warm.

He hastily blew out the candle.

Because his face, lacking the strength to maintain the mask, had contorted.

Scenes stained with blood seemed to close before his eyes with a click-click-click.

He wanted to carve out the place the monster's hand had touched. Nausea rose.

[Touchedtouchedtouchedtouchedtouchedtouched]

[Avoidedavoidedavoidedavoidedavoidedavoidedavoided]

[Diediediediediediediediediedie]

The screaming creatures made his stomach churn.

He felt gazes from all directions.

So he thought he absolutely couldn't sleep, but...

Perhaps this cursed day had at least one breathing hole—at some point the creatures' voices grew distant, and drowsiness came.

His eyelids grew heavy, and just before his lashes fully settled, he thought he saw golden eyes resembling dead Nero's.

But it quickly blurred in the pouring sleep, the only refuge where he could escape reality.

In an instant.

Pitch black.

Charlotte stood in a space.

The space covered in darkness so thick she couldn't see an inch ahead was very quiet.

Nothing visible, nothing audible.

Like a subterranean tunnel with not a speck of light, as if it had swallowed everything.

Why, how did I end up in a place like this?

Charlotte blinked.

Her mind was pitch black too, as if consumed by the space.

She reached out into the void to see if there was a wall, but touched nothing.

Darkness where she couldn't see where it ended or where it began.

"......"

While looking around at the surroundings where nothing was visible, Charlotte heard some sound.

She couldn't tell if it was a voice or the sound of an object, but she moved her feet toward where the sound had come from.

Thunk. Something bumped her foot.

She hesitated and swept the area with her foot, but nothing caught.

Charlotte tilted her head and started walking again.

"...give."

How long had she walked? Another sound came.

This time she heard it a bit more clearly than before. It sounded like a human voice.

At the same time—grab.

"...!"

Charlotte froze stiff. Something had grabbed her ankle.

She reflexively pulled her foot away sharply, and when she carefully stepped down again, nothing was there as before.

"...What?"

Only her mutter scattered in the void.

"Save me."

"!"

Then, suddenly a clear voice came.

Save me? Charlotte whipped her head around.

Naturally, nothing was visible.

"Where are you?"

She asked.

The voice was extremely clear, yet it was hard to distinguish which direction it came from.

Charlotte turned her head this way and that, then at some point realized she could now see her hand, which hadn't been visible before, through the darkness.

A very faint but soft white light was leaking from her hand.

When she stood dazed by the light she somehow couldn't look away from, a black hand stretched out from the darkness and grabbed her wrist.

"Save me."

"!"

Charlotte snapped her head up.

The black hand gripping her wrist instantly melted away.

But something. Over there.

A black, human form.

"S a v e m e"

"Savemesav emesavemesav emesav eme savemesaveme savemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesavemesav..."

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