* * *
Leaving Locke in the basement, I went up and immediately sought out the butler, Howard.
He was entirely my father’s man, one of the few people beyond Cassian’s influence.
When I found him in a hurry, he calmly set down his book and stood up.
“What is the matter, Young Master? Why are you sweating so much?”
“No time to explain. Go to the square immediately and deliver this letter to Hagen the blacksmith. No one must see you. And send this one to Mother.”
Howard took the letters respectfully, tucked them into his inner pocket, and asked me with a serious expression.
“Is this related to what happened last night?”
“Sorry, I have to move first. I’ll tell you everything when Mother returns.”
“Wait a moment, Young Master. I have also heard the rumors.”
I had turned to leave but looked back again.
“Rumors? What rumors?”
“That you are treating a certain servant with special favor.”
“…….”
Was treating my own person well something worth spreading rumors about?
I stared at Howard without answering.
“If this matter is also related to him, it would be best if you did not step forward personally. Such a scandal will help neither you nor that child.”
A scandal.
It seemed the rumors weren’t just about me looking after a servant.
I was speechless.
“Howard. It’s not that I’m giving Locke special treatment; it’s that Locke is the only one by my side. If you side with me, Howard, I intend to do my best to protect you, too. Is that strange?”
I spoke calmly.
“As you know, my illness gets worse every day, and my appearance grows more haggard. I told him it was painful—watching myself change like this. If a servant listened to those words and gifted me a rose, wouldn’t it be natural to feel affection for him?”
“But a rose is a gift of romantic love.”
“That only applies among nobles. How would a servant who works the fields, tends the garden, and serves a sick young master know the fine details of noble customs?”
“This old man must have been oversensitive. Please forgive me, Young Master.”
Fortunately, Howard didn’t ask further and simply bowed his head with a slightly dark expression.
“Oh, Howard. Prepare lunch for two. I’m going to eat down in the basement.”
Howard’s lips twitched as if he wanted to say something.
Anticipating a negative response, I spoke once more with determination.
“If my brother cuts the throat of an innocent fellow while I’m not looking? Now that would be the true disgrace of the family.”
“……I will have it ready shortly.”
“Thank you, Howard. It would be a great relief to have you on my side.”
My business with Howard was finished.
I left the office and headed straight for the barracks where the estate’s knights stayed.
I needed to move the corpse inside the barrier with them.
I don’t know what spirit possessed me to run there in the middle of the night, but Allure’s territory was not a place I should enter alone—someone who can’t use a sword, let alone magic.
Panting, I finally reached the barracks after an hour’s walk.
But it was strange.
At this hour, the knights should have been practicing their swordsmanship, yet not one was in sight.
‘What? Why is nobody here?’
While wandering through the empty quarters and training grounds, I ran into the servant in charge of the barracks who was hanging laundry.
My heart sank when I asked him why everyone was gone.
He said Cassian had come by early this morning.
Apparently, the atmosphere was serious for some reason, and as soon as Cassian left, all the knights packed their bags and left for cavalry training.
The marching route was supposedly split into two directions.
It was obvious he had sent them out on the pretext of fixing their lack of discipline.
The reason was clear.
If they left for training, only a minimum number of personnel would remain to guard the mansion.
And Cassian would have decided their posts.
By splitting the knights and scattering them here and there, the disappearance of a single knight could easily be brushed off as him deserting his assigned post without permission.
He was buying a thin slice of time until our parents returned.
‘So, you want to play it this way?’
At this point, it felt like a test to see whose feet were faster.
I couldn’t catch him with speed.
Therefore, there was only one way for me to keep up.
With my brain.
After leaving the barracks, I began searching for knights to help move the body.
After much trouble, I found a knight returning from outer perimeter duty and persuaded him over and over.
Fortunately, Cassian’s influence hadn’t reached this far corner yet, so I managed to settle it cheaply with a single gold bracelet.
I headed to the forest with the knight.
I described the place where I found the body in great detail.
When I mentioned the large rock and the zelkova tree as big as a hill, he recognized it immediately, saying he had hunted there with Cassian before.
I could only call it good luck that I happened to meet this specific knight.
Unexpectedly, the problem occurred once we arrived at the spot.
Though the location seemed correct, no matter how much we searched, the knight’s body was nowhere to be found.
I hadn’t mistaken the place.
The lamp I dropped that night was sitting right there, buried in the mud.
The knight, who had been searching the bushes for a while, approached with a puzzled look.
“Forget a body, I don’t even see a bloodstain.”
“It rained a lot that night, so the traces must have been washed away. Even so, it’s definitely strange that the body disappeared without a trace.”
That wasn’t the only strange thing.
Even though we had been inside the monster’s territory for a while, the surroundings were excessively quiet.
Aiden once told me that from halfway up the mountain, you can hear the bizarre howling of monsters, which makes his own hunting instincts kick in.
But now, I couldn’t even hear the common sound of birds that you could hear from the mansion.
“It was this quiet back then, too…….”
Rustle.
Just then, I heard the sound of leaves brushing together.
The knight heard it too and gripped his sword hilt tighter.
He cautiously approached the source of the sound.
However, he shook his head as if he found nothing.
He said that since he didn’t feel any magic, it must be a small animal living in the forest.
“Are there no monsters that can hide their presence?”
“If it’s something that can hide its presence so well that even I can’t feel it, that would be a Special Grade monster that even Young Master Cassian couldn’t catch.”
“Then that’s a huge problem!”
“You don’t need to worry. Such a creature couldn’t be here in the first place.”
“Why?”
“Because of Allure’s barrier. Neither humans nor monsters can pass through this barrier as they please. The only ones who can open the gate are those with the blood of the Hestian family. All the monsters here are ones that Young Master Cassian brought in himself.”
Hearing the knight’s words made even me, someone with no abilities, feel like I had become something grand.
“I see.”
However, despite hearing that, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched by something formless.
Furthermore, even the knight, who was trained regarding monsters, rubbed the goosebumps on his arms, saying he had been feeling a chilly and sharp energy for a while.
“It feels strangely unpleasant. We should head back. Young Master, the body was either carried away by a monster, or…….”
“Or I saw it wrong?”
I answered for the knight, who couldn’t finish his sentence out of caution toward me.
His guess was wrong. I wasn’t the only one who saw the body.
Besides, if it were an illusion, I wouldn’t be able to explain the broken blade I found by reaching into the man’s stomach myself.
“Sigh…….”
As the knight said, there was certainly a chance a monster dragged the body away.
But the fact that Cassian moved since early morning left a bad taste in my mouth.
Since he knows the habits of monsters well, I couldn’t rule out the possibility that he came out early and moved the body to a path where they frequent.
He might have gone to find the knights only after finishing everything.
If he really used a monster to dispose of the body, it was as good as saying he wouldn’t admit to the crime.
If there is no body, he can’t even prove that the knight is dead.
I don’t know the exact circumstances, but since we can’t find the body, I have to change the plan.
“Fine, let’s head back for now.”
If the opponent is going to act like this, shouldn’t I write the story a bit more broadly?
First, I had to catch Howard, who had left for the square.
It seemed I needed to revise the contents of the letter.
I began to descend the mountain again with the knight.
As the sun dipped behind the mountain, a red glow gradually stained the sky.
Only then was I able to finish most of my tasks.
After running around like crazy for hours to handle everything, I hurried back to the mansion and first asked about Cassian’s whereabouts.
Only after hearing from Howard that he hadn’t arrived yet did I feel relieved, stumbling toward the kitchen.
My stamina was already at rock bottom, but it was highly likely the knights hadn’t properly fed Locke while I was away.
On the kitchen table sat the dinner that Marianne, the cook, had carefully prepared.
I picked up the basket containing meals for two and hurried to the basement.
“Locke!”
I peeked my face through the iron bars of the solitary cell.
I couldn’t move my hands because I was holding a large basket, and since the door was locked from the inside, he had to open it for me to enter.
“Locke?”
There was no response even when I called his name, so I leaned against the door to get a closer look inside.
When I did, there was a clack and the door swung open, making me stumble.
I entered with a bright smile, thinking Locke had opened it, but he was lying on the bed.
Because he was tall with long limbs, one arm and his legs from the knees down were sticking out past the bed.
It wasn’t that he had opened it; the poorly closed door had simply slipped open.
“Ah, what the. You promised you’d keep it tightly locked…….”
I slowly approached and set the basket down on the floor.
Then, I peered quietly into his sleeping face.
* * *
