A Monodrama for Carolyn August - Chapter 2

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 101.
Of course, since the one who performed the act said so, it must be true.
‘I don’t believe it.’
Caroline compared the pitiful Mechanical Human before her eyes with the Ifros from their earlier conversation. Could those innocent eyes really conceal such intentions?
The one who did everything Isaha told him to do, who obediently watched from the stairs the day she discovered Aiden’s secret? The one who came running like a young animal whenever she offered him the simplest touch, happy as a child?
‘I should be careful.’
“Who… are you?”
“What?”
“The person who wants to meet me while I’m asleep.”
She recalled the day she’d found his diary, when he’d stumbled badly.
His doll-like face had shown resentment and jealousy, and the atmosphere had grown so cold it made Caroline tense for a moment.
‘But it cleared up so quickly once I did what he asked.’
Thinking about it that way, there seemed no great need for caution. She would learn what she could while they spent time together, and if suspicion seemed likely to arise, she’d simply go along with whatever Ifros suggested.
With that resolve, Caroline took the slender hand he offered.
“Where… is the hideout?”
Ifros led Caroline out of the Mansion, still holding her hand. They passed servants on the first floor and in the Garden, but they all apologized for interrupting the acting and promptly vanished out of sight.
“We’ll get there soon. But before that, would you mind taking a walk with me? It feels like it’s been so long since we’ve had time alone like this.”
“All right.”
She planned to use this opportunity to walk with Ifros and glean some hints about where his key might be.
Caroline walked at his pace, holding his hand. The two of them made their way past the Garden toward the Lakeside behind the Mansion.
“Didn’t Isaha want to see me?”
“You saw me yesterday, the day before that too. You’ll see me tomorrow. We’re never apart—what’s there to miss?”
She spoke in Isaha’s blunt manner while leaving him no room for worry. At her words, Ifros smiled happily, his cheeks flushing.
“That’s true.”
The Lakeside they walked along was very quiet and cool. As night fell, the wind grew a little rougher, brushing past them both.
Ifros’s brilliant caramel-colored hair became tousled like that of a puppy fresh from a bath. At the same moment, his shirt collar flipped inward, and Caroline stopped walking.
“Bow your head for me.”
Beside them came the sound of the Lake’s water lapping against the stones. Two figures, clinging like lovers, were reflected on the dark surface.
Ifros tilted his lush crown toward Caroline, and she gently combed through his hair with delicate fingers.
She swept one side back, untangled the knotted strands, and gently ruffled his entire head until he returned from his disheveled state to his original self.
“It feels nice when you touch me. I wish Wednesday would hurry and come.”
“Now lift your head.”
The hair was done, and now she meant to flip his inturned collar back out.
The moment Caroline grasped his collar, she discovered the Silver String hidden within it. She knew instinctively what it was.
‘The key.’
After flipping his collar straight, Caroline grasped the string around Ifros’s neck and pulled it out from his shirt. Or she tried to.
If he had not caught her hand.
Her heart felt as though it dropped. Ifros stared at Caroline with an expressionless face. Gone were the playful glimmer in his eyes from before, the happy smile.
“What is this?”
“I don’t know either. Something I found at the hideout. Does Isaha know about this?”
Caroline’s hand flinched, but Ifros remained unruffled. He kept his hand pressed over hers, preventing her from pulling the key free.
“Pull it out first. Since it’s been inside me, I don’t even know what it looks like.”
“But it seems like you recognized it the moment you saw the string.”
“I didn’t know you wore such jewelry.”
“I’ve been wearing it for quite some time now. You must not have been paying me any attention.”
Ifros’s expression grew somewhat melancholy, and he lowered his head. Yet the hand gripping Caroline never loosened.
“I’m interested in your face, not what you have on.”
“That’s right. Isaha loves my body.”
He answered calmly to her deflection attempt. Caroline squeezed her eyes shut. His words struck like a thunderbolt, but denying them here would be unlike Isaha.
“Just… just take it out and show me. I won’t touch.”
“Really?”
“I’ll let go of you. Just take it off and show me.”
“Understood.”
Ifros still bore a slightly cool expression, looking taken aback as he withdrew his hand.
‘Does he really know he’s a machine?’
He’d pressed down so hard—just to prevent movement—yet red marks appeared on her skin. While Caroline rubbed her hand to restore circulation, Ifros lifted the Silver String from around his neck.
From within his chest emerged a key, set with a yellow flower-shaped jewel.
!
Caroline’s eyes widened, and the keen mechanical doll did not miss that reaction.
“The look of someone who recognizes the object.”
“…….…”
“What is this? What exactly is it?”
Caroline’s mouth fell slightly open.
What was she supposed to say? She couldn’t tell him it was the key to the diary you’d written. Ifros didn’t keep a diary.
But if she said it belonged to someone else, he would be consumed by jealousy. Who was it that made her want to open it? Who was she interested enough in to read their diary?
“……Being treated like a fool again. You won’t tell me anything, will you?”
Ifros’s face clouded over with resentment and resignation. It was Isaha who treated him thoroughly as a machine for physical relations, a machine for manual labor—someone she rarely shared important truths with.
Caroline, who had despised Isaha’s behavior in the script, hastened to deny it.
“No, it’s not like that.”
“Then what is it? Tell me. Whose is it, why are you curious about it? It seems important—why do you need it?”
Ifros knew how to read people’s expressions.
Though born a machine, Silvia had trained him to function like a human through Social Psychology. He’d just read the expression on Caroline’s face when she recognized something, so half-hearted lies wouldn’t work.
She decided to be honest instead.
“I need to open this.”
Caroline pulled a diary with a yellow velvet cover from her bag.
“I think this key might open it. I wanted to check.”
“Whose diary is it?”
“…….…”
Her breath caught in her throat.
Aiden’s. How could she explain someone like Aiden to Ifros?
“Is it someone Isaha likes?”
Of course.
Someone she didn’t just like but loved—loved so deeply she was willing to stake her own life on it, throwing herself into the game.
Caroline should have denied it immediately, but her thoughts betrayed her.
“Someone she loves. I know that look in her eyes.”
And terribly, Ifros read her expression.
“……No.”
“It wasn’t the look you give me. Who is this person, exactly?”
“Ifros. Wait.”
Caroline felt the chill creep down the back of her neck. The red triangle didn’t appear, but she sensed the danger.
Every hair on her body stood on end.
“Do I know this person? Have I seen them before?”
Ifros’s words came faster. Now his eyes were wide, his mouth corners curved upward as he asked—a face like a doll cursed by malice.
As he questioned her, he began stepping backward, one step at a time. The yellowed key dangled from his graceful fingers.
The silver string swayed in the breeze. There was something unsettling about it, and Caroline began to feel uneasy.
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
“So you don’t intend to tell me.”
“No!”
“Someone I don’t know that you love? Is it a man?”
In that moment of silence, Caroline felt as if lightning had struck. Ifros had finally read her expression completely.
In speaking with him, in walking beside him, she’d been thinking of someone else. She’d admitted it.
That she loved this person deeply, and that he was a man.
She realized she’d committed an act that would leave a terrible scar. And at that very moment, Ifros smiled brightly.
“That won’t do, Isaha. Forget that person.”
Then he threw the key he was holding backward.
Into the dark, deep lake.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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