Wait, it's been two months already? Oh, come on, it didn't feel that long....
I really need to work on my discipline.
Anyway, after a long wait, here's the next chapter. Enjoy~
~Chapter IV~
Sana looked around in the kitchen she was standing in. It was quite big and spacey, housing several stoves and a large amount of cooking equipment. Of course, this was to be expected, as the mansion had to have the capabilities to house a large number of guests at once.
Lunch was still a few hours away, as far as the girl could tell, so the kitchen was empty except for her and the maid that had led her.
Sana sighed.
Finding out what Jana wanted to know would be a pain. She would have to check all the tools in this room for clues, every last one of them.
She turned around to the maid behind her.
"Do you know if any equipment from here has been reported missing recently? Especially knives or skewers?", Sana asked.
Matsuri kept silent for a while, closing her eyes as she searched her memories. Upon opening her eyes again, she spoke slowly and expressionless as usual.
"To my knowledge, there has only been one event. One of the smaller knives had been lost yesterday, but Si- Nobu has found it and brought it to me this morning. It is currently stored in the servant's room. You should not be concerned though, this kind of thing happens from time to time, mostly because of Nobu's clumsiness."
Sana frowned.
"It might be a regular thing, but with this timing? This isn't good.... Anything else?"
"No, nothing that I would know of."
Sana sighed again. Of course that bit of information she got just now was useful, but Jana's would be angry if she didn't investigate properly.
"Well then..."
She walked closer to the first set of tools hanging on the wall. A number of knives, small ones as well as giant butcher knives, were there, as well as some skewers and a number of objects that only a psychopath would even think about to use for murder.
'Though that might be exactly the kind of person we have to deal with here', the girl thought, before randomly grabbing one of the skewers and examining it.
First, she turned it in different ways to look at it from every possible angle.
Then, she stared at it for one minute without moving.
After that, she brought the pointy end of the skewer close to her eyes, squinting as she looked at it closely.
Then she ran her finger along it, concentrating so that she would feel even the slightest difference in the structure.
Suddenly, Sana's eyes flew open and she stared at the part of the skewer she had just touched.
"....."
Then she sighed and her shoulders dropped.
"Haaah, that's useless."
She put the skewer back.
"How can I find any clues without having equipment? That's impossible! Jana's stupid for even suggesting that!"
Without much motivation, Sana walked through the room randomly, picking up a tool from time to time and examining it half-heartedly. But she knew that she wouldn't find anything, she just wanted to calm her conscience.
After a few minutes, she went back to the entrance and informed the maid that she would leave.
"Do you require any further assistance?", Matsuri asked.
"No, thanks. I'll go back to Jana and see what is to be done next.", Sana sighed.
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Half an hour later, Sana was standing in the shadow of the trees beyond the mansion's garden. She was shivering from the coldness of the rain that had completely soaked her clothes.
Despite the fact that it should be daytime, she couldn't see too far. No matter where she turned, everything looked the same.
"I'm... lost...."
Sana tried to remember what had happened to make her end up here.
After she had inspected the kitchen, she had roamed the mansion, hoping to maybe stumble across something that would help Jana with the investigation.
And indeed, she had made an interesting observation as she had passed one of the guest rooms.
The door had only been half-closed, so she had been able to see the inside of the room. There, sitting at a desk and apparently writing something, had been one of the Librarians.
Sana couldn't remember her name, but the girl was unmistakable: There was only one person in the whole mansion in posession of a floating tuna.
What caught Sana's attention was not what the girl was doing, writing things down could be assumed a normal activity for someone working at a library. It was the way she did it that made Sana's eyes go wide in surprise.
Instead of using any common equipment like quills or pencils, the girl used that which always followed her as a tool. While Sana watched silently, Sakana grabbed her tuna and dipped one of the pointy fins into a small ink-bottle. As she raised it again, some ink slowly dripped down from the fins, shining in the light of the candles on the table.
Then she proceeded to write on the paperscroll before her, moving the tuna swiftly and with skill.
As Sana slowly backed away from the door, her thoughts were racing. If what she was thinking turned out to be true, the time she spent in the kitchen would have been a waste. They might have been thinking too conventional. But what would that mean for the case? Would Jana be able to figure something out from that, or would it just misguide them away from the truth?
While she had been thinking all that, she must somehow have left the mansion and crossed the garden, to end up where she was now.
Sana sighed.
Her getting lost was a common occurance, but this had to be one of the worst times by far. Leaving the house and stumbling into the rain without even noticing? She hadn't managed that before.
As staying where she was wouldn't get her anywhere, Sana chose a random direction and started walking. A few minutes nothing around her changed, but then something caught her attention.
Shining faintly through the darkness in front of her was a small light.
As she recalled what Jana had told her about the mansion, she reached the conclusion that this was probably some kind of shed for the gardener. In that case, it should be close to the garden itself, and she would probably be able to find her way back to the mansion from there.
Sana quickened her steps as she headed towards the light, but suddenly, she stopped. There was something there, at the edge of her vision.
She tried to concentrate and see through the darkness and rain.
Did she just imagine it?
No, she was sure there was something there.
But why couldn't she see it now?
Careful, so as not to get lost again, Sana made her way towards whatever it was she had seen, while making sure to keep the light of the shed in view as well.
Soon, her surroundings changed. Where there had only been grass between the trees before, there were now bushes and wild flowers all around her.
Then, she reached a dead end. Bushes were blocking the way in the direction she was walking towards and Sana couldn't see any way to get around them.
For a moment, she thougt about turning back, as she had almost lost sight of the light and hadn't been able to glimpse that strange thing again either.
Just as she was about to give up, a strong gust of wind hit her. Quickly Sana reached towards her hat and pressed it down to prevent it from being blown away.
Suddenly, she saw it again. The wind had made the bushes before her sway, and through the gap the girl could see the same white shimmer that had led her here. As she got closer, she noticed a small path leading through the bushes. The bushes had blocked it from view, but now that she could see it, Sana had no doubts that it had been hidden intentionally, as the path itself was well maintained and free of any plants.
Sana had started to ignore the rain. Her heart was beating fast and all her sense were focused in front of her as she made her way along the path. When she reached the path's end, she stood in silence.
What had she expected?
She didn't know. She only knew that it wasn't that.
Slowly, her mind began to understand what it was that she was looking at.
Her eyes widened....
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A moment before her hand touched the doorknob, Roukan stopped.
She was dragging her suitcase behind her and was currently standing in front of Ruro's room.
But just as she had wanted to enter, she heard a small sound.
Irritated, she let her hand hover over the doorknob and held her breath. For a moment she thought it might just have been her mind playing tricks on her, when she suddenly heard the sound again.
Her eyes grew wide.
The sound definitely came from within the room, and it most definitely came from Ruro.
But it was a sound that Roukan would never have expected to hear.
What reached her ears from within the room... was the sound of Ruro crying...
Roukan swallowed hard as a wave of different feelings rushed through her body. She put down her suitcase and then, slowly, carefully, grabbed the doorknob.
Part of her wanted to resist the temptation. It was telling her to leave the girl in the room alone, to just wait until later and act as if nothing ever happened.
But the voice of reason couldn't stand against the force of her feelings. Her body craved to open this door, to not only hear the sounds, but to lay eyes upon the girl inside.
She twisted the knob without a sound and opened the door just enough to step into the room.
The room was dark. None of the lights had been turned on, so Roukan could only barely see thanks to the illumination that the lightning outside granted.
The Librarian let her eyes wander through the room.
There, on the large bed on the wall, she could make out a shape she would never mistake, shivering and sobbing.
Roukan grit her teeth as she slowly closed the door behind her. She didn't move a single step into the room. Instead, she stood perfectly still at the door, keeping silent and watching her superior as she cried.
Ruro hadn't noticed the girl that had entered the room. Her back was facing the door as she lay on the bed, crying and sobbing.
She didn't want to cry.
She cursed herself for feeling so weak.
She cursed her feelings for bringing her down like that.
Everything had been going wrong since she came to this mansion, it had been too much. She had only been sitting in her room thinking about what had happened today, when the tears had started to flow.
She hadn't been able to stop it.
Soon she had been crying bitterly, crying to get rid of all of the feelings, all the frustration that had built up inside her.
She didn't have the will to stop.
She didn't have the strength left to stop.
She just wanted it to end, to stop feeling, to stop thinking, to sleep.
But her mind refused to give her any rest.
Memories that she had hoped to be long forgotten were once again appearing before her eyes, clearer than ever before.
She shouldn't have come here ever again, she knew that. She had avoided all contact to the Scarlet Mansion for five years. She knew that nothing good could come from being here.
But that man's plan had caught her off guard. She hadn't expected him to do things this way, to spread rumors that she and the Librarians would be unable to ignore.
She could have tried to find an excuse, some reason for her to not take part in this mission, or proof that the rumor had no substance in reality. But she had been too surprised, too confused to react in time.
Thus, she had to come here again, after five long years of regrets and suffering.
She had hoped that maybe she was overthinking things. That nothing would happen after all. That the big group gathered here would grant her safety from the past.
But the ways of fate are cruel.
Far too easily had small memories of five years ago managed to break through her mental defenses and strike her heart, one by one.
The colourful garden, the smell of the air inside the mansion, the oddly-sized pictures on the wall... and above them all, that one beautiful flower...
She didn't know why he had done it. She didn't know why he had lured her here.
Was it for revenge? She couldn't even blame him if it was that.
She had no idea why he had orchestrated the murders, but she was sure that they were his doing in some way. No other possibility made sense to her.
Did he want her to suffer by witnessing the deaths of others? No, she didn't think so. She had suffered more than enough, and he knew it.
He knew that just being in this mansion would be an unbearable torture to her.
He knew that she would be reminded of the days that she had practically spend living here happily.
He knew that she would remember that one day.
The day when she had witnessed the light in her lover's eyes slowly fading...
She cried.
There was nothing else she could do.
There was nothing else she wanted to do.
So she cried...
Then, after what felt like an eternity to her, her body grew tired.
There were no more tears left for her to cry, and her throat was sore from the sobbing.
Slowly, her breathing became calmer, her mind just ceased functioning and she sunk into a deep sleep.
For a while, nothing moved in the room.
Then, slowly and carefully, Roukan began moving.
Her steps were unsteady as she walked over to the large bed.
Her expression was blank, but her face was stained with tears.
Seeing her superior, the girl she looked up to and admired, in such a weak state had devastated her.
She hadn't been able to say a single word, move a single muscle as she had watched the crying Ruro.
But Roukan had been crying as well. She had been crying silent tears, trying to share some of the suffering Ruro had been going through.
She would never have expected that this girl, this strong-willed girl, the one always ordering her around, joking with her, comforting her, could fall into such a state.
Carefully Roukan sat down on the bed.
She looked down at the red-haired girl sleeping peacefully on the sheets.
For a minute, she only stared at Ruro silently, then, slowly, she extended her hand.
Her hand was shaking the closer she brought it to the girl. Then, she touched her hair.
Gently, she started stroking Ruro's hair, repeating the same motion again and again.
After a while, Roukan started smiling. It was a small, gentle smile.
She moved to the other side of the bed and laid down.
Roukan reached out for Ruro's hand and gently held it in her own, then she slowly closed her eyes...
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Sana was standing in a small clearing.
Bushes and trees blocked it from any outside interference and the only way to get to it was the small path she had used.
Whoever had designed this place, they didn't want it to be found, that much was sure.
Most of the clearing was filled with flowers. Not only a few wild ones, like she had come across before. The whole clearing seemed to be a patchwork of flowers of every kind and color.
'It would be a beautiful sight', Sana thought to herself, 'if it wasn't for the storm... and for that'
She slowly stepped forward towards 'that', taking care not to trample down any of the flowers.
There, in the middle of the clearing, surrounded by white roses, stood a single gravestone.
Silently, Sana stopped in front of the stone.
It was a simple grave without any fancy designs, yet the whole arrangment around it created an atmosphere of dignity. The girl felt as if one false move could disturb the sacred air of this place.
Then, she slowly lowered her gaze to read the words one the gravestone.
Sana's eyes moved across the stone.
At first, her mind refused to accept what she saw. But as she read the lines again and again, the reality of what she was looking at slowly sunk into her mind.
With all she knew, this shouldn't be possible.
With all she knew, this grave shouldn't be here.
And yet, here it was, right in front of her, hidden in the depths of the woods behind the mansion's garden.
What did it mean?
Sana didn't know.
But she was sure that the events happening in the mansion and this grave were not without connection. She would have to tell Jana about this as soon as possible.
Snapping out of her thoughts, Sana turned around and went back the path she had come. Then she once again looked for the light of what she assumed was a shed, and used it to judge which direction the mansion would most likely be in.
In the middle of the rain and darkness, the girl started running......
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Because she was running, she didn't notice.
Because it was dark, she didn't notice.
Because she was still shocked from her discovery, she didn't notice.
She didn't notice she shadow that had been watching silently from beneath the trees, wearing an umbrella to ward off the rain.
The person hadn't been able to properly see who it was that had found the grave, but she knew that it shouldn't have happened.
Under normal circumstances, it might not be much of a problem. But tonight, with all that happened in the mansion, was the worst time for someone to discover that place.
For a while, the figure kept quiet. Then, she started to move.
"I should report this to the Master...."
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~Chapter IV End~
