In The Basement Of Duke Ivanstein's Mansion - Chapter 6

It was knowledge she had never heard before. At ten years old, an age busy with being curious about everything in the world and learning to accept it all, Mel’s knowledge was limited to survival skills necessary for living.

Mel tried to imagine the birds living inside that tree. Somehow, her heart started pounding.

“Then can I give the leftover bread crumbs to the birds?”

“Of course, my child.”

Her mother happily placed bread crumbs in her hand.

Mel had never shared anything that came into her hands before. Especially not food. In the harsh life of a slave where she had to somehow eat well and survive well, there was no room in her heart to share anything.

But seeing Mel show a young and pure heart for the first time, her mother was visibly excited.

“……”

Seeing her mother’s happy face, Mel tried hard to put on an even brighter expression. With her mother’s help, Mel threw bread crumbs into the hole in the tree.

“If we wait, we might be able to see the birds come out and eat the bread.”

“No. It’ll be hard for you, Mother, so I’ll stop now.”

Mel bravely came down from her mother’s arms. Her mother was massaging her sore arms, but still looked regretful. It had been a peaceful moment for once. She wanted to prolong this moment just a little more, just a little longer. But such peace was not allowed for the mother and daughter.

Bang.

“It’s time to work!”

Without any warning, the door of the cabin burst open.

They were told that their employer was the Ivanstein ducal family. Last night, they heard that someone from the duke’s household would manage them from now on. The duke’s servant was a middle-aged man, with a sharp and fierce demeanor.

“Your mother is not needed. Just you come out.”

“Yes.”

Mel obediently answered and stepped forward. Her mother grabbed Mel’s hand with trembling eyes, but she patted her mother’s hand to reassure her.

“I’ll be back. The bed was warm, and the food was delicious. This seems like a good place.”

“But child, there’s no kindness without a price. Especially for people in our situation.”

“I know, I’ll be careful.”

Mel smiled bravely, showing her teeth. Whenever Mel smiled like this, her mother looked into the distance as if remembering someone dear. Her mother gently stroked her black hair, kissed her, and pushed her back as if to say go.

Mel bowed to the person from the duke’s household who had patiently waited while she said goodbye to her mother.

“Thank you for waiting. Next time you call for me, I won’t be this slow!”

“…Alright.”

The person from the duke’s household looked at Mel with quite uneasy eyes.

In the Kingdom of Raon, buying and selling slaves was illegal. He, who had lived in the kingdom all his life, had learned about the existence of slaves from books.

Vulgar and dirty beasts. Subhuman mongrels who don’t know how to learn shame and honor. That’s how the books he read defined slaves. But it wasn’t written that a young girl who looked to be just about eight years old could also be a slave.

Worrying about her sick mother, and reassuring her mother even though she might be dragged away to face who knows what… And yet, greeting without a shred of doubt, purely… The child seemed… not like a beast, but like a person. No, she was a person.

“Follow me.”

The person from the duke’s household, unable to hide his complicated feelings while looking at the bright-looking Mel, eventually said with a sigh.

“In a little while, I’ll put a blindfold on your eyes. This is for security, so don’t worry. When you take off the blindfold, do the work they tell you to do there, and when you put the blindfold back on, I’ll take you back to your lodging. Understand?”

“Yes! Thank you for telling me.”

Mel smiled and thanked him, and the face of the person from the duke’s household twisted even more.

A moment later, as the duke’s person had said, when she put on the blindfold, someone presumed to be another person picked Mel up and went somewhere.

The air suddenly turned cold and damp. And the sound of footsteps echoing. It was as if they were entering a cave. After going down for a while, listening to the sound of footsteps and the occasional crackling of candles burning, Mel was able to put her feet on the ground.

“When you take off the blindfold, crawl inside and place the things in the box one by one in the gaps. When you’re done, come back here and hit the wall hard three times.”

A voice different from the servant who had brought Mel whispered in her ear.

“Can you count?”

“Yes, my mother taught me.”

“Then count to 50 and open your eyes.”

As soon as Mel answered, the blindfold was removed. She closed her eyes tightly and started counting as instructed. During that time, the presence of the person who had been talking to her gradually disappeared.

…48, 49, 50. Mel had finished counting, but she couldn’t easily open her eyes.

She didn’t know much about high-ranking noble families, so she didn’t know how great the Ivanstein ducal family was. She just couldn’t understand why such an important person would borrow the hands of a slave for such an important and private task.

‘Shouldn’t important tasks be entrusted to important people?’

She had an uneasy feeling. Mel was good at sensing things related to survival, so she felt this even more strongly. Could she survive if she didn’t open her eyes here now, and knocked on the wall without doing the assigned task?

Mel pondered for a moment but soon shook her head. If you become useless in any way, you die. So she had to prove her usefulness right away.

“Hoo……”

Mel took a deep breath and opened her eyes. Then a space surrounded by iron walls unfolded. There was a box on the floor as the guide had mentioned, and a small passage in one corner was the only feature of this room.

Mel picked up the box and crawled into the passage as instructed. There were several small gaps inside the passage. Mel took out the items from the box and pushed them into these gaps. The types of items were very diverse. There were things necessary for sustaining life like towels, bandages, jerky, and water bottles, and tools with unknown uses like daggers, wires, axes, saws, and iron hammers.

The size of each gap matched exactly with the size of each item. As if it had been designed from the beginning to hold these things. Mel felt an inexplicable chill as she fitted them one by one into their places.

“Is this really all?”

It was a really simple and straightforward task. It was embarrassingly simple for a job that required such thorough security.

The inside of this passage was so narrow that Mel had to walk crouched down. She realized why a young slave like her was deployed here when she saw the size of this passage. But a ducal household would have young maids or servants, so they could have used them, yet they bought a slave to do this kind of work, which she couldn’t understand at all.

“I shouldn’t think about the circumstances of those who have…”

Mel shook her head hard and ignored the goosebumps that kept rising. While focusing on the work again and filling in the items, it happened.

“Huh?”

Something out of place had fallen in this bizarrely clean space. It was bread crumbs and fragments.

“This looks like what I put in the tree hole this morning?”

Mel looked up. There was a small crevice in the ceiling. She stuck her nose to that crevice and sniffed. There was a faint smell of grass, and the air was a bit cooler only at the top.

“Could this be an air hole?”

She remembered overhearing a few words from her former master that enclosed spaces always need a place for air to pass through. Mel looked alternately at the fallen bread crumbs and the crevice.

If these bread crumbs were indeed what she had thrown into the tree hole, this place was underground. And it was located right under the cabin.

“What on earth are they trying to do here……”

Mel stared at the air hole above her head for a while.

If there’s a rule for slaves, the first one is that you should never harbor personal curiosity about what your master does. But Mel, who had grown up on edge to survive until now, instinctively knew.

This place is somehow dangerous. She shouldn’t be here.

‘Should I… run away?’

A word not allowed for slaves filled Mel’s mind. No matter how unfair the treatment, no matter who tormented young Mel and her mother, Mel had never once thought of the word ‘escape’. But from this place, from the master who made such a place, it seemed like she should run away.

“There must be, there must be a way……”

Mel bit her lip hard and started hurriedly filling in the items from the box. While thinking that she should somehow persuade her mother and think of a way to escape.