Chapter 26

There existed in this world a deep malice that ordinary people could not comprehend.

And when faced with such malice, there were those who stood against it, and those who succumbed to fear and complied. The butler was clearly the latter. Even while aware that he was becoming a minion of the devil, he could never refuse his master’s orders.

“Finally, when the third madam breathed her last in the room, the young master ordered me to dispose of her body in the forest during the downpour. …Along with the living baby.”

A shallow conscience existed within him, telling him this was wrong, but it was far too weak compared to his desire for life. Regina glared at the butler, filled with shock. The content was so beyond imagination that it made her shudder.

“How could you…! Even if it was an order, how could you follow such a command?!”

The butler hunched his small shoulders at her scornful criticism.

“Then you haven’t seen her since?”

Noah, on the other hand, uninterested in condemning the butler, signaled Regina to be quiet and continued his questions in a calm voice. He wanted to know if the butler had witnessed the third wife who had become a Black Fairy.

Regina, though still seething with anger, closed her mouth at Noah’s restraint. The butler paused for a moment before answering.

“…Yes, if you’re referring to her corpse, it’s as the rumors say. Although I couldn’t help her, I thought it wasn’t right to leave her like that. I was also worried about the young baby. So the next day, I secretly took a servant to the forest without the young master’s knowledge. But when I got there, the body had already vanished without a trace. At the time, I thought an animal had taken it. But thinking about it now, it seems a bit strange.”

“Strange how?”

“Yes, the place where she had been was indented as if a large beast had been sitting there. And right in the middle was the baby. Despite the heavy rain the night before, the baby was sleeping soundly, without any sign of harm. At the time, I was just so relieved to find the baby that I didn’t think much of it, but looking back, it was indeed odd.”

“I see. Thank you.”

Noah nodded, thinking he needed to examine the viscount’s daughter. The butler, who had been answering with his head bowed as if in confession, made a deep bow after Noah stopped questioning and left the room.

“Just a moment, butler!”

Regina, who had barely been containing her anger, followed him into the corridor and called out to stop him. The butler turned to look at Regina with a face that seemed to have aged ten years in that short time.

“…Why didn’t you help the wives? If you knew everything, why didn’t you help them escape from this hell? You could have helped them!”

The butler seemed rather relieved at her resentful reproach. As if he had been waiting for someone to blame him like this.

The butler recalled the young master who had died so easily. He had been so terrified of the man who laughed gleefully while taking people’s lives, but in the end, he too was just an ordinary human. Unable to believe this discrepancy, the butler turned his head with a blank expression to look out the corridor window.

The faces of those abandoned in that dense, dark forest came to mind one by one. At first, it was the young servants of the mansion. Only those who had no connections and were young, who no one would find strange if they left the mansion at any time, were targeted.

He just thought that a devil in the young master’s form was there. But no matter how much he prayed to God, the only one who could protect his life was himself. It didn’t take long for him to submit like a slave in the face of overwhelming fear.

“…I was just scared. I didn’t want to die so meaninglessly. So I turned a blind eye to the deaths of others.”

The butler covered his eyes with trembling hands and answered in what was almost a monologue. He must have been possessed by something. Why had he so readily obeyed the orders of such a devil?

“Why did I do it, I wonder? What was my old life worth, why couldn’t I let go of my attachments?”

The butler’s white gloves darkened with tears as his shoulders shook with deep regret. Watching this, Regina bit her lip hard.

What meaning could there be in regretting now? Although it was the viscount’s order, this man had abandoned even a newborn baby in the forest to preserve his own life.

Perhaps even this small condemnation from her was a luxury for him. Reaching this conclusion, Regina turned away coldly, erasing all expression from her face.

The sun had begun to set, and the sunset was seeping through the mansion’s windows. The sunset, which had suddenly dyed the corridor a deep red, also fell upon the butler’s body. It was like an indelible red bloodstain.

* * *

After dinner, Regina had returned to her room and was sitting on the sofa, hugging a cushion. After hearing the butler’s story, Noah said he had something to check and went to the baby’s room. He had dismissed Regina when she tried to follow him, ordering her to try and recall who she might have come into contact with during this time.

“No matter how much I think about it, I don’t remember bumping into anyone…”

It was just yesterday. While her memory wasn’t exceptional, it wasn’t so poor that she couldn’t remember something from just the day before. It meant that no one had come into contact with Regina.

“I really can’t figure it out.”

Sighing deeply and tugging at the corner of the innocent cushion, she finally got up from the sofa.

“When the answer doesn’t come from thinking, it’s time for action! I’ll retrace my steps from when we arrived here until now, in order.”

Of course, excluding the room with the viscount’s body. It was too scary to enter alone. Besides, she had only been there with Noah, so it could be excluded without issue.

Talking to herself, Regina left the room and headed straight down to the first floor.

Passing servants looked at her curiously as she wandered around the mansion alone, but they didn’t pay much attention. They probably thought Regina was Noah’s assistant or something.

“Hmm, if I go in order from the main entrance, it’s through the first-floor corridor to the reception room. A maid brought in tea, and I was looking at the bird before returning to the sofa when I saw it…”

She reenacted her arrival yesterday, starting from the main entrance and entering the reception room. The maid who had brought the tea at that time had headed for the reception room table, and Regina had been in front of the birdcage, so it definitely wasn’t that maid.

“No matter how I think about it, there’s nothing. Who on earth could have brushed against me, and when?”

As Regina walked around the reception room, tilting her head, her eyes suddenly fell on the birdcage. The colorful and rare bird. Regina approached the cage without much thought and peered inside. It was a bird with striking red wings, a long purple tail, and impressive black eyes.

“…”

The bird, which had been sitting quietly without making a sound, suddenly raised its head as Regina approached. As their eyes met, Regina couldn’t look away due to a strange sense of déjà vu. The bird’s pitch-black eyes. They were like a dark cave without a single point of light.

“…Huh?”

She had seen such eyes before.

With a sudden realization flashing through her mind, Regina hurriedly looked down at the bird’s food bowl. The heap of food hadn’t diminished at all, just like yesterday. Come to think of it, hadn’t she gently stroked the tip of the bird’s wing yesterday, fascinated by its feather color?

“…!”

A bird that doesn’t eat, and the only being Regina had come into contact with.

It wasn’t a human, but a bird.

She couldn’t understand why it wasn’t in human form, but her instincts were telling her this bird was a Black Fairy.

‘But didn’t they say the Black Fairy absorbed the viscountess?’

-Thump.

Regina quickly backed away from the birdcage with a confused expression. As she did so, her elbow hit the cage, causing the ornate silver cage to shake violently, but the bird remained perched, staring at Regina without taking flight.

“…I need to call Noah right away!”

-Peep.

Just as the flustered Regina turned around quickly to call Noah, the bird, which had never made a sound until now, let out a very thin cry. It was a fragile cry that seemed about to break at any moment. At that sound, Regina stopped abruptly with her back turned.

A small, desperate cry. Reason warned that approaching was foolish, but her feet were already moving towards the bird.

‘…I can’t turn my back on it, too.’

For some reason, she had that thought.

Whether it was due to instinct or the influence of being in tune with the Black Fairy’s emotions, she couldn’t tell. Before she knew it, Regina was reaching out her hand. The red bird, which had been staring at her small hand extended into the cage for a while, soon stretched out its neck and rubbed its face against her white palm.

-Rustle.

Did she feel the cold touch of feathers tickling her palm? A moment passed, and the bird lost its form. Like a sand castle crumbling, it turned into black ash and poured onto Regina’s hand with a soft sound. Black powder piled up on Regina’s palm as she tried to catch the collapsing form.

But that was only for a moment.

-Whoosh!

The black powder spread like spores and approached Regina as if it had a will of its own. It seemed as if it had been waiting for this. Approaching like soft petals scattering, it seeped into Regina’s entire body in the blink of an eye. The power absorbed into her body was weak and warm.

“…!”

Regina’s shoulders trembled finely at the unfamiliar sensation running through her body. Before she could come to her senses, suddenly absorbed fragments of memory swirled and enveloped Regina’s vision.