10

Bang bang bang.

“Come out!”

Morning began with the sound of knocking on the door, just like every other day. Mel rubbed her eyes that wouldn’t open properly as she got up. Her eyelids felt heavy.

“Why are you dawdling like this! Come out now!”

“Yes!”

Mel answered energetically and then looked at her mother who hadn’t yet awakened from sleep.

Since being sold to this place, her mother had suffered from inexplicable anxiety. Recently, her mother discovered that Mel was secretly meeting a boy by climbing through the window. Perhaps worried about her becoming involved with Genoa, a nobleman, her mother had fallen seriously ill.

“I’ll be back.”

Mel quietly kissed the cheek of her mother, who was breathing heavily with a fever. After pulling the blanket up to cover her neck, she changed her clothes and opened the door to go out. A servant of the ducal family was waiting in front of the door.

“Hello, I look forward to working with you today too!”

“Ahem.”

When Mel greeted him energetically, the ducal family servant cleared his throat and avoided her gaze. Without saying anything else, he led her to where the other slaves had gathered.

‘Let’s work hard.’

Mel slapped both her cheeks with her palms to drive away the remaining drowsiness. Now her mindset about going to work was different from others. The only thing Genoa had shown interest in was Mel’s work.

“I don’t know what kind of family the Ivanstein ducal family is, but you need to be careful. Hmm? I have a bad feeling.”

Her mother seemed to prefer that Mel not tell Genoa the details about her current work, but Mel wanted to repay Genoa’s kindness.

Growing up as a slave, Mel had experienced various people. Men and women, young and old, each with different status and personalities, but they all said the same things.

“You ungrateful, filthy slave.”

“After all the care I’ve given you, you don’t even know how to be grateful because you’re a slave!”

“Getting thanks from a slave just makes me feel disgusted. How vulgar, trying to imitate a human.”

People who demanded gratitude just for allowing her to breathe, who expected her to consider it an honor when they merely glanced at her in passing, and who would vomit at the sight of even her small expressions of joy, saying she was acting like a human.

Mel had to exist like air. She couldn’t make anyone feel her necessity, nor could she become such an existence.

“I’m curious about you too. So let’s exchange what we each need. This is what we call a deal.”

For the first time, Mel was given a chance to give and receive something. Genoa gave her medicinal herbs to nourish her mother’s weak body and even sacred objects said to have the blessing of the high priest. All for simply telling him about her day, what she did, and what happened.

Moreover, he treated Mel with a caring attitude unlike a nobleman, and at those times, Mel often forgot that she was a slave.

‘I can repay his kindness with just a few words, Mother.’

Something was happening here that Genoa, presumed to be the son of the Duke of Ivanstein, didn’t know about. Whether it would be beneficial or harmful for Mel to leak this information to Genoa was uncertain.

He helped me, so I will help him too. Thinking like this made her heart flutter and her fingers and toes tingle.

“If everyone’s gathered, put on your blindfolds!”

They arrived at an open space where slaves scattered in different lodgings gathered. The ducal family servant busily moved around distributing blindfolds. Mel looked around before habitually taking one, and tilted her head in confusion.

The number of slaves had noticeably decreased. Since coming here, familiar faces had gradually disappeared and new faces had filled their places, but the total number had always remained constant.

“Hmm, there are fewer people……”

There had never been a case like today where the number was so visibly reduced. Mel’s face slightly hardened as she felt something strange was happening.

“Once you’ve put on your blindfold, hold out both hands and stand in place!”

Mel jumped at the servant’s shout and put on her blindfold. They must have arrived a bit late, or left early. Mel tried to comfort herself against the strange anxiety rising within her. But the moment she became certain that something was wrong came a little later.

Mel was sent to the iron room again. To Mel, who still hadn’t removed her blindfold, the guide whispered in the same voice:

“When you take off your blindfold, crawl inside and place the items from the box one by one in the gaps.”

The guide’s instructions were always the same. But today, for some reason, there was a different precaution.

“If there’s a window instead of a gap inside, I recommend not opening it.”

Mel pondered this precaution before removing her blindfold.

This time too, it was an iron room not much different from where she had worked before. However, it was slightly smaller and unlike previous rooms, it had a door made of iron bars. Curious, she approached and saw that across the door was a room of the same size as where Mel was standing.

Clunk. When she grabbed and pulled the iron bars, the door opened easily. The box containing the items was beyond the door.

“……”

There was a keyhole in the iron bars. Though the door opened easily now, it meant it could also be locked. Mel stood holding the iron door for a while.

“I should wedge my shoe in there.”

Mel took off her shoe and wedged it in the door gap. She felt a little more at ease.

She checked the box on the other side. The items in the box weren’t much different from before. Daggers, axes, jerky, medicine, bandages, water, and so on. Among them, one particularly sharp dagger caught her attention.

“……”

As she handled the dagger, Genoa’s face came to mind. Was this what he was curious about? Would telling him about these things truly be the answer he wanted?

Genoa always listened attentively to Mel’s same stories as if hearing them for the first time. So it should be fine. Mel must still be necessary to Genoa.

She shook her head to disperse her increasingly complicated thoughts.

This time too, the passage was prepared in one corner of the room. She dragged the box to the corner. This box was particularly larger and heavier.

“Ugh, the box won’t fit.”

The passages in previous rooms were large enough to drag the box in with her. But this box seemed to contain more items, making it impossible to take it along.

“……Why are they hiding all these things here?”

Mel decided to take out as many items as she could carry. She spread out towels and blankets, placed as many items as would fit, and tied them into a bundle. A fairly decent package was completed.

“Whew.”

Mel took a deep breath and then crawled into the passage with the bundle. Indeed, this passage was as long and complex as the quantity of items suggested.

After making about three bundles and going back and forth, it became worrisome. Mel looked at the passage that seemed endless and thought.

‘I might get lost in this passage.’

After pondering briefly, Mel tore a bandage with her teeth. She tore it into small pieces and placed them at points where the path diverged, marking the way she had come. This way, she could clearly see where she had been and which places she hadn’t visited yet.

“I hope I don’t get scolded for using the items on my own……”

Mel worried briefly but soon shook her head.

The passage was too narrow for an adult to squeeze through. Only a child around ten or twelve might manage it. Could Genoa fit through here? Would he ever need to? Her thoughts continued to link together, each one tugging at the next.

“……me out!”

“Like this……, no!”

At that moment, she heard human voices from a passage she had never been to before. Mel, who had been working alone in silence until now, immediately recognized the faint sound.

“Are those other slaves?”

She had thought there would be other slaves somewhere here. Sometimes while crawling through passages, she discovered routes leading to other rooms.

Among those numerous rooms, occasionally there were signs that people had been there. A bed, straw, blankets, and so on spread out. Since Mel’s room had been empty, those things must have been carried by someone like her.

‘What kind of work do the others do?’

Curious, Mel eagerly crawled toward the sound. The more she knew about this place, the more she could tell Genoa. An expectant smile spread across Mel’s face.

But,

“……open, open it!”

“Uugh, huaaah!”

As the sound grew closer, Mel’s smile slowly faded. And then…

“I don’t want to die like this! Ugh, uwaaaaah!”

“Save me!”

Mel discovered a window instead of the gap the guide had mentioned. The screams were coming from there.

Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, the sound of something being pounded. Terrible screams. And the sound of something breaking with a crunch.

The small window, about the size of Mel’s two palms put together, had a thin iron plate attached to it. There was a small groove at the end where you could insert your finger and slide it sideways to open the window.

The guide had said:

“If there’s a window instead of a gap inside, I recommend not opening it.”

She knew she should listen to that advice. Opening this window would mean seeing something she shouldn’t see. But Mel’s trembling hands were already inserting her fingers into the window gap.

Swoosh, the window opened easily with just a little force.

“……!”

What was visible beyond the window could hardly be called a room. Water was flowing through a waterway, with weeds growing around it. The waterway was quite wide and crossed the middle of the room. And at the corner furthest from the waterway, a male slave was frantically pounding on a door.

“Please, please open it! Please! Uugh, uwaaah, aaaah! I don’t want to die like this, I don’t want to die…… Uhuhuhu!”

Pleas and screams alternated ceaselessly from his mouth. Red blood was splattered on the male slave’s body. It wasn’t his own. It belonged to someone else.