It was because of Karshu. Laila listened to Yerka’s words with a puzzled feeling. What had he done to Wells? Or…

Yerka continued speaking.

“Wells tried to help me escape. We set a meeting place and agreed to meet at dawn. But Wells couldn’t come. Instead, Karshu appeared before me.”

Her voice became slightly agitated. Yet her expression remained so clear as to seem indifferent, creating a strange and discordant feeling.

Yerka looked at the two of them alternately, like an actor performing a monologue.

“I was only able to meet Wells the next day, locked up in an old warehouse. He looked at me covered in blood and said this…”

‘Young lady, I… I only wanted to help you. But…’

Yerka’s large eyes blinked slowly. Frowning slightly, she tilted her head and said.

“After that, I couldn’t see Wells anymore. Neither Father nor Karshu said anything about him.”

Eustar, who had been deep in thought while touching his lips, said.

“So in your opinion, the one who killed the young man Wells was either your father Count Haliwell, or your elder brother Karshu Haliwell, one of the two?”

Yerka looked at Eustar with round eyes and a challenging gaze.

“Isn’t it obvious?”

Eustar gave a hollow laugh. Meanwhile, Laila watched Yerka with curiosity, marveling at how she maintained such a bold attitude even in front of him, let alone herself.

Yerka tilted her head to the side and said.

“If Wells really appears in this house, I’d like to see him once. I’m curious what he would say.”

Just as Laila was about to say something…

“Ahhh…!”

A scream that seemed to shake the entire mansion rang out nearby.

“What was that sound?”

By the time Yerka cried out sharply, Eustar and Laila had already run outside.

In front of a room that used to be a nursery but was now used to store old furniture, a servant had collapsed.

Whitish foam covered his gaping mouth, and his face had turned blue with convulsions.

“Bring hot water with vinegar and salt!”

The gathered employees scattered like bees at Eustar’s shout. As he pushed a small crystal fragment into the fallen man’s mouth, Laila rushed into the slightly open door without hesitation.

‘Show me.’

Laila’s eyes widened. Very faintly, against the background of eerie patterned wallpaper and floorboards, she saw a pair of bloody feet and strangely distorted hands slowly disappearing…

“Laila!”

Eustar, who had left the fallen man’s treatment to others, entered a step behind Laila.

Taking a shaky breath, Laila slowly looked around the room.

“He was here.”

Eustar looked at her with a furrowed brow.

“Was here? You mean Wells?”

Laila nodded.

“He was here. It was very faint, but for a moment… I could see it with my own eyes. And even now…”

“Even now?”

Laila curled her fingertips, crouched down, and placed her palm on the floor. The moment her bare hand, even her glove removed, touched the cold floorboards, a chilling sensation that made her hair stand on end pierced through her entire body.

It was the exact same feeling she could have when in contact with a soul, when it brushed past her or touched her with malice.

“He hasn’t completely disappeared.”

Laila whispered, removing her hand from the floorboard. It was a hurried, anxious movement, as if she wanted to run away. Eustar gripped her shoulders and felt the delicate trembling of fear.

“Laila.”

Eustar called her name, but Laila didn’t seem to hear. Eustar only tightly gripped her shoulders when he saw her fingers curled strangely as she lowered her hand.

“Laila, snap out of it!”

Laila took a breath and raised her head. The strength left her strangely curled fingers, and her stiff shoulders slowly relaxed. Eustar’s frowning face, filled with concern, came into focus in her vision.

“Laila.”

Laila stood there blankly as if in a daze, then fumbled to grasp Eustar’s wrist. The warm touch on her skin calmed her and slowly unwound her tense, rigid nerves one by one.

Laila said.

“He touched me, Eustar.”

Eustar narrowed his brows and looked Laila up and down, examining her.

“Are you saying Wells’s soul tried to invade you?”

Laila shook her head vigorously from side to side.

“No, no. That’s not it. He… didn’t have such active will. I could just feel it. He instinctively… even as just a soul, tried to reach out to me. To ask for help.”

“Ask for help? What do you mean?”

Laila slowly chose her words. She listed one by one the unorganized words rolling around on her tongue. It was this:

“He was trembling with fear.”

Eustar looked at her with a serious expression.

“Fear, Laila?”

Laila nodded.

“That’s right.”

Her voice was strangely low and calm, yet also seemed enveloped in fear.

“That’s right, Eustar. He was… trembling with fear, a fear he couldn’t escape even in death. That’s why he reached out to me. He was asking me for help.”

Eustar’s expression grew even more somber. A wandering soul that couldn’t depart was dangerous no matter what, but those with emotions or will were even more dangerous. Whatever the emotion, whatever the will.

Especially for a medium like Laila. Eustar thought. She, who could make contact with souls more easily than humans, could get closer to the will of ghosts and even invite them into herself. The stronger the medium, the stronger this power.

And Laila was the most powerful medium currently in Sierou… Eustar hugged her, feeling anxiety cross his chest, and said.

“Don’t approach it, Laila.”

Eustar’s voice trembled faintly.

“Don’t sympathize with that emotion.”

Laila’s faintly trembling breath slowly stabilized. His scent, his temperature, his heartbeat. It all felt like it was caressing and soothing her. Like comforting a startled child.

“I’m alright, Eustar.”

At Laila’s words, Eustar finally let her go, but his worried expression remained.

It was then. Muge appeared beyond the open door, her face pale, glaring at the two with wide eyes.

“Both of you.”

Muge’s voice was rougher than ever and seemed out of breath.

“Follow me, now. I have something to show you.”

Saying that, Muge quickly disappeared before the two could even answer, as if she had urgent business left. Eustar and Laila followed her in bewilderment, asking.

“Olga, what’s going on? What do you need to show us?”

“It’s hard to explain. No, I can’t explain it.”

Eustar frowned. It was a reflexive reaction because he had never thought he would hear the words ‘I can’t explain’ from Muge Olga’s mouth. After all, she was…

Muge said.

“There’s something in this house. It’s not a synk, but something even worse than that. I don’t know how long it’s been hiding in this house, or who it is, but…”

“What are you talking about? Are you talking about ghosts?”

A snorting sound was heard.

“Ghosts?”

Muge, who had finished descending the stairs, turned to look at the two. Her expression was terrifyingly distorted.

Muge said.

“Ghosts are not the problem. Do you think I’d be making such a fuss over a mere ghost commotion? Follow me.”

The place the three arrived at was a storage shed in a secluded part of the garden. Eustar looked down at the shattered lock and turned to Muge.

“Did you do this?”

“What, you think a rabbit gnawed through it? Get inside.”

Laila and Eustar were practically pushed into the shed by Olga. As the sound of the door closing was heard, the sunlight was completely blocked off, darkening their vision, and a bright white light from behind illuminated stairs leading underground.

“Is it a basement?”

When Laila asked, Muge sighed and nodded.

“We need to go down.”

“Olga, what on earth is…”

Eustar’s words were not completed. Muge went down the stairs first with quick steps, and Laila immediately followed.

When a small crystal imbued with magic brightly illuminated the dark and damp basement, the two, except for Muge, lost their words and even forgot to breathe.

“Ms. Olga, what is this…”

Laila’s voice trembled.

She felt a far greater fear than when she had encountered Wells’s ghost. If the trace left by Wells’s ghost was like a small, sharp blade cutting across her finger, the terror existing here was like a massive axe blade that could split her body in half in an instant.

On the black floor of the basement was a partially erased massive formation and dried bloodstains. It was old, discolored black and almost crumbling, but it was clearly identifiable as human blood.

Muge, looking alternately at the faces of Eustar and Laila who couldn’t continue speaking, said.

“This is a very ancient magic. It’s vicious and dangerous, something that even magicians who most disregard rules argued should be taboo. This is a formation that summons something ominous. It’s magic with an extremely low chance of success, but surprisingly, whoever drew this formation must have succeeded.”

Laila, who had been staring with round eyes in surprise and fear, caught her breath and asked.

“Ms. Olga. What… does this formation summon?”

Muge’s gaze turned to Laila. The light from the magical tool eerily swept across the distorted corner of the formation.

“A doppelganger.”

At those words, Laila and Eustar suddenly felt as if they had been doused with ice water.

Muge continued.

“I don’t need to explain what that is. Summoning a doppelganger is more wicked than summoning a demon.”