chapter 33

She dared not linger any longer and could only leave the room quickly.

Tu Nan walked a short distance and saw the supervisor press a certain brick on the wall again. The Secret Door appeared before her.

The wall fit seamlessly, leaving no trace.

She turned her head and hurried away.

When she returned to the Front Hall, most of the crowd had already dispersed. She glanced at the time-there was still a while before Midnight.

A Maid cannot leave before finishing her work, so Tu Nan could only start cleaning the hall.

As she swept, she replayed the strange events of the day in her mind.

She had originally suspected that Cinderella might be the Mouse, but before she could test her theory, Cinderella had died mysteriously.

Everything happened in the dark, without any clues.

Could the murderer be Bella? She frowned, but felt Bella didn’t seem capable of it, and after the lights came on, Bella appeared genuinely panicked.

But she couldn’t rule out the possibility that Bella was pretending.

If she wanted to identify the Mouse, she had to do so while the Mouse was still present in the Instance. Once the Mouse left the Instance, her task would fail as well.

So, either Cinderella was never the Mouse, or Cinderella wasn’t dead at all!

After finally finishing cleaning the hall, before she could catch her breath, she suddenly heard a few loud, far-reaching chimes from the distance.

“Dong-Dong-”

It was the Royal Palace’s Midnight bell.

Tu Nan was startled, instinctively looking at the clock in the hall.

There was clearly still an hour before Midnight!

How could this be?

She had no time to think. According to the Rule, she had to find the nearest room and crouch in the northeast corner.

The nearest room she could think of was the one where Cinderella’s body had been stored.

There was no time for hesitation. Tu Nan dashed toward that room without a second thought.

The bell had already chimed twice; she had to reach the room before it finished.

Fortunately, she wasn’t far from there. She quickly arrived at the wall.

The bell chimed three more times.

The tenser the moment, the calmer her mind became. She began tapping the area where she remembered the supervisor had touched.

“Dong-Dong-”

The bricks beneath her hand gave off a dull sound, until one particular brick produced a distinctly different tone when her knuckles tapped it.

Her eyes lit up. She pressed hard on that brick.

With the familiar sound of gears turning, the Secret Door appeared before her once again.

The bell had chimed eleven times.

There was no time for hesitation. Tu Nan slipped into the room, relied on her decent sense of direction, and crouched down in the northeast corner.

She had just crouched down when the twelfth chime of Midnight rang out.

This final chime was especially deep and resonant, its echo lingering for a long time before fading away.

From the start, Tu Nan had been in a state of high tension. Only now did her heart, which had nearly leapt out of her chest, begin to calm down.

She wiped the cold sweat from her forehead and couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief.

The Royal Palace’s Midnight bell was meant to urge those lingering to leave quickly. Fifteen minutes later, there would be another chime. If she still hadn’t left by then, the Exit would close.

She needed to wait in this room until the next chime, then reach the Exit within ten minutes to leave the Royal Palace as quickly as possible.

The Castle wasn’t far from the Exit. If she ran fast enough, she could make it within ten minutes.

But the Rule stated that running was not allowed inside the Castle.

She had already run once to get here in time, and the reason she dared to do so was because, although Bella had previously broken the Rule, she hadn’t received any punishment.
It was known that Bella had violated the Rule at least twice without being punished, so this Rule was likely cumulative-two violations wouldn’t result in punishment, and she was still safe.

Tu Nan let out a sigh of relief.

As soon as she relaxed, things she had deliberately ignored earlier became obvious again.

For example, the temperature in this room was far too low, and…

Was Cinderella’s corpse still in this room?

The thought that she might be sharing a room with a corpse made the temperature around her seem even colder.

But she couldn’t move, only squat in the corner.

In darkness, people’s hearing and perception become sharper. Tu Nan closed her eyes. She wasn’t sure if it was her imagination, but she seemed to hear a faint scraping sound.

The scraping was strange-not continuous, but coming in fits and starts. If she had to describe it, it was like someone dragging their feet slowly across the floor, with long pauses in between.

Tu Nan was startled by her own description.

The scraping sound was getting closer-

So close, it felt as if it was right behind her.

Her blood seemed to freeze in her veins.

In the previously windless room, a sudden breeze seemed to blow from somewhere, brushing against the back of her neck again and again.

The scraping, which had been so close, suddenly stopped.

She could faintly smell a trace of something metallic and foul.

Something was behind her.

She squeezed her eyes shut, but the feeling was overwhelming, as if an eye had grown on the back of her head, staring intently at that thing.

She could even imagine how the thing behind her was staring at her, saying nothing, and then blowing on her neck, breath after breath.

It was waiting-

Waiting for what?

Maybe it was waiting for her to turn around, or perhaps waiting for a certain moment to pounce and devour her completely.

Her teeth chattered uncontrollably.

If there really was something behind her, hiding here would be like walking right into a trap.

Suddenly, she felt a strong urge to get up and run out of the room, no matter what.

Wouldn’t it be fine as long as she left the room? If she ran fast enough, whatever was behind her wouldn’t be able to catch up…

Tu Nan kept her eyes tightly shut, her breathing especially loud in the darkness.

Unconsciously, she stood up, about to turn and leave the room, when her wrist suddenly hurt.

The pain snapped her back to her senses.

She opened her eyes in terror, only to find that she had somehow turned around and was almost out of the corner.

Tu Nan, still shaken, lowered her head. The Bracelet on her wrist glowed faintly-it was what had reminded her and brought her back to herself.

Without this Bracelet, she might have met a terrible fate.

In the Instance, the greatest taboo was losing one’s sanity to fear.

Maybe she had stayed in this Instance for too long, and the Weird had unknowingly seeped into her body, without her realizing it until moments like this, when she sensed danger.

All those sounds, those breaths, were things she had imagined herself.

The more she imagined, the more real they became, until she was truly frightened to death by her own mind.

Tu Nan gripped the Bracelet on her wrist, which was still faintly warm, and squatted down in the corner again.

This time, she emptied her mind, waiting until the chime sounded once more.

Now!

Tu Nan opened her eyes, turned to leave without hesitation, but in her panic, her foot suddenly kicked something.