Working at a Haunted Mansion Chapter 117

The cult leader led Lily upstairs. As they climbed the stairs, Lily kept talking without pause.

She mentioned the clean tablecloths, the furniture with its humble beauty, the elegant window lattices…

Then suddenly, she fell silent and blinked.

Turning her head mid-step, she noticed that every window she could see had bars fixed on the outside. Black iron bars in a curved lattice pattern.

“I’m glad you like it,” the cult leader said, waiting at the top of the stairs and looking down at her.

On the second floor were bedrooms filled with luggage. Lily thought it looked a bit like an inn and carefully asked,

“S-so, there are guests here?”

“Yes.”

He admitted it easily. That in itself was terrifying—until now, she had only seen the cult leader and his knight.

“They went down to the basement first.”

The cult leader turned and descended the stairs again. Lily felt a growing chill creep over her, but she had no choice but to follow.

There were two doors on the first floor he hadn’t shown her yet. He opened one, revealing stairs leading down to a basement.

A niche in the wall held an oil lamp. With its flickering glow, they went down the steps.

The further they descended, the stronger the strange smell became. It was like smoke, yet like herbs—an odd, pungent scent.

Lamps had been placed around, so Lily could see the basement clearly.

Yes, there were the “guests.” Three of them. They sat at the points of a strange pattern drawn on the floor.

They weren’t on chairs—they sat directly on the stone floor!

Not only that, their legs were crossed into knots and their fingers twisted into bizarre shapes. Their overall postures were unnatural and strange.

Their eyes were closed, and they didn’t move at all, as if they hadn’t noticed anyone enter.

Meanwhile, the mysterious fragrance made Lily’s stomach turn.

Before she knew it, she gagged. The cult leader raised a finger to his lips. Lily clamped a hand over her mouth and nodded.

He pointed to his eyes, then at the seated people. Lily moved her gaze as directed.

After waiting a moment, he quietly turned back toward the stairs.

They left the basement. Lily gulped down fresh air, fluttering her eyes open and shut in a flurry. The fragrance had left her dazed, like smoke that clouded the mind.

The cult leader looked at her.

“Well? Their souls… do their bodies shine?”

He sounded eager, curious—and utterly confident that she could answer.

Lily didn’t bother thinking too hard and spoke honestly.

“No, Your Majesty. They looked ordinary. Just like me or anyone else.”

“I see.”

He accepted it without disappointment, despite how interested he’d seemed.

“It is a difficult thing,” he murmured with a smile before moving on.

Now only one room remained unseen. Once she saw it, she would be fully entangled in the cult’s affairs.

Sticking close to his side, Lily asked,

“Am I to serve those people? Should I prepare today’s meal for them?”

“No. They are the ones who should serve you.”

He didn’t slow down as he spoke. Lily moved in front of him, covering part of her mouth with her palm, and whispered,

“Are they perhaps… practicing astral projection?”

“Astral projection?”

He repeated the words. His Imperial tongue wasn’t yet fluent enough for such a term, apparently.

Lily placed a hand on her head and mimed pulling something invisible out into the air.

“A technique where the soul leaves the body like this.”

“Ah, so that’s the word. Yes. Correct. They are striving—to control the soul by will.”

Lily recalled the scene in the basement. The three men and women had been deeply absorbed in their training.

They weren’t restrained. They seemed to be there of their own free will. That meant the cult leader had succeeded in gaining new followers.

With a smile, he asked,

“You know much, don’t you?”

“It’s nothing of worth,” Lily answered humbly.

“You have both knowledge and ability. You remind me of myself, when I was young.”

She wished he wouldn’t compare a loyal citizen of the Empire to the youth of a cult leader.

He reached out, cupping both her cheeks in one hand. His piercing gaze stabbed into her eyes.

“These eyes… Did you train them? Or were you born this way?”

“I was born with them.”

“Ah, what a gift. A talent. Something those people downstairs could never gain, even if they trained until death…”

His other hand traced beneath her eyes. Though she was alive and warm, it felt like the touch of a corpse. She shivered.

He offered gently,

“Why not become my disciple? I’ll pass on all my knowledge—things Kashimir’s stolen books could never reveal.”

Lily blinked, then slowly declined.

“Th-thank you for your offer, but I need time to think.”

“So be it.”

He released her face and walked past.

Lily barely held back a sigh and prayed inwardly.

“Not yet, Aiden? We’re almost done with the house tour!”

The cult leader opened the last door.

The moment Lily looked inside, she froze.

“I had this prepared in advance for your arrival.”

He gestured grandly into the room.

In the center stood a simple surgical bed. On it lay a man, flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling.

Looking closer, Lily saw strange markings drawn on his forehead, the backs of his hands, and the tops of his feet.

Around the bed were small wheeled trays. Along the wall stood shelves and a workbench of wood.

While Lily stood shocked at the sight, the cult leader lit some incense. The same smell as in the basement spread through the room.

The cult leader approached the man’s head and asked a question similar to before.

“How about this one? Can you see his soul?”

“No, I can’t see it,” she replied.

The man was not in a coma. He wasn’t cursed either—he seemed to be simply sleeping.

“Hm.”

The cult leader grabbed a jar from a nearby shelf, dipped a brush into it, then pulled it out. With the brush stained red, he added a few Solomonic characters to the man’s forehead.

He returned the item to its place and, as he left the room, said, “Sit and wait.”

Lily took the chair the cult leader had pointed to.

What on earth was about to happen? She had expected to sit at the tea table and argue with him, not to witness a heretic’s experiment this quickly.

She prayed with all her might that the cult leader would collapse on the spot. But that prayer went unanswered, and he returned in one piece.

He had changed into strange clothes. Over his worker’s outfit he wore an oil-treated leather apron covering his torso and protective arm sleeves.

Without speaking to Lily, he went straight to the workbench. He picked up one of the tools—a hammer.

‘A hammer?’

Lily felt puzzled.

The cult leader wasn’t finished. He began wrapping the hammer head with a thick cloth that had been lying at the side of the bench. Crimson characters were densely written on the cloth.

When the hammer almost looked like a large mallet, he carried it back to the head of the surgical table.

He positioned it above the man’s head and measured slightly—and at that moment Lily screamed and sprang to her feet.

“Aaah!”

The cult leader looked at her. Lily realized she had acted rashly.

But she couldn’t help it. The hammer head was aimed at the man’s skull!

“Do not be alarmed.”

The cult leader said kindly.

How was she supposed not to be alarmed? He was about to crush a human skull with a hammer!

She spread her palms toward him as if to stop him.

“I—I don’t know why you suddenly want to do this, but please wait. Let’s—let’s talk. You don’t have to do it yourself. Your Majesty has the power to get what he wants without this.”

The cult leader tilted his head. He seemed not to understand, so Lily tried to make it simpler.

“Please don’t kill him.”

“Do not worry. He will not die.”

He tapped his own palm with the hammer.

“See? It’s not that hard.”

So the cloth wasn’t for blood absorption but to soften the impact. Whatever the effectiveness, she couldn’t understand why he would do this in front of her.

Holding back tears, Lily asked, “I—if you’re not trying to kill him, then why put the ha—hammer to his head?”

“Do you not know?”

‘That’s why I’m asking, you idiot!’ Lily fought the urge to shout and answered briefly, “No.” While he looked around the room, she stealthily took a step closer to him.

“You said you couldn’t see the soul.”

“That’s right… Wait a moment. Could it be—?”

The cult leader nodded.

“I’m helping his soul to come forth.”

“You’ll kill him that way!”

Lily leapt up and shouted.

“Not at all. It’s easy. Since my teacher acknowledged me, I have never failed.”