A Monodrama for Carolyn August - Chapter 35

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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 35.
Caroline woke with a dull ache settling into her muscles.
Last night’s memory of being chased by the servant had bled into her dreams, leaving her groaning through the early hours before she finally stirred awake.
‘That was truly terrifying.’
It was an experience she had no desire to repeat.
“Miss Caroline, breakfast will be served shortly.”
Moving stiffly, Caroline washed and made her way downstairs to the dining room.
Aiden sat waiting, his face drawn with exhaustion as always.
He wouldn’t remember meeting the servant last night, nor introducing Caroline to animals that didn’t exist.
It pained her to think he’d wandered all through the night while believing he’d slept.
‘All night long?’
Did he really remain in this Role-play State from dusk until dawn without interruption?
‘If that were true, he should have collapsed by now.’
Though she couldn’t be certain of the exact mechanics, yesterday’s experience had revealed something definitive to Caroline.
‘Aiden enters the Role-play State in the evening.’
He transitioned into that state after sunset.
With one exception: the dinner hour.
It seemed breakfast, teatime, and dinner were occasions when he provided her with information.
‘And the role he takes on…….’
Yesterday, when they’d discussed what happened at the Campbell Mansion and Will had appeared, Caroline’s suspicion was confirmed.
‘Now I’ll be able to predict things better.’
Having discovered the pattern, she could anticipate what might come.
With a lighter heart, Caroline worked her spoon with renewed focus.
“Um, Aiden.”
Today she wanted to ask about Aiden’s mother.
“I’m curious about something regarding your mother.”
She framed it without revealing she’d entered his room, tying it instead to what she’d seen yesterday.
“What is it?”
“Did your mother have a fondness for luxurious and precious things?”
[▲]
In an instant, a red triangle signaling danger flickered across her mind.
Caroline quickly added to her question.
“While organizing things yesterday, I noticed there were quite a lot of expensive-looking items. There are so many of these things in the mansion, and you mentioned they couldn’t be discarded…….”
“Ah, so that’s what caught your attention.”
Her smooth deflection seemed to work—Aiden’s briefly stiffened expression relaxed.
A faint smile crossed his face as he nodded.
“My mother…… Yes. She had a fondness for beautiful, luxurious, precious things.”
He set down his fork and knife, his mind drifting elsewhere.
That distant gaze she’d glimpsed during previous meals—the look of someone gazing into the far distance.
“Luxurious things draw the eye and enchant everyone who beholds them. She believed that by surrounding herself with such things, she too could possess that power.”
Caroline nodded in understanding.
Wasn’t it the same logic as people buying luxury goods?
With a celebrated actor for a son, she certainly had the means for such consumption.
“She believed that even relationships long severed, even people with whom she’d fallen out of favor—all of them would look upon her again. That’s why she kept purchasing new and varied jewels.”
His eyebrows twitched and his expression grew weary. He picked up his fork and knife again.
“There are truly so many things in her room that need to be disposed of…… Mm.”
He shook his head slightly and resumed cutting his food.
“But I haven’t been able to bring myself to enter that room.”
“I…… see.”
Caroline could find no words and simply nodded.
She’d asked out of curiosity, but now guilt crept in.
Game character or not, he was genuinely suffering from his mother’s absence, wasn’t he?
For that reason, Caroline made a silent decision: she would not use her remaining questions to extract information.
Instead, she would shift to a different topic and lighten the mood.
“But when I was looking through the box you gave me, I found some fun things.”
“You did?”
“There was a mint candy box that came out as Oyster Man merchandise. It still had candies inside with an unexpired date, so I kept them. They’re really delicious. Have you tried them?”
“Yes, I recall receiving an entire case directly from the production company. They were so tasty that I ate them often, though eventually I tired of them because there were so many.”
As he spoke, Aiden laughed like a mischievous child.
‘Good.’
Watching him, Caroline felt a wave of relief wash over her.
“Oh, and there was a picture book in the box that Aiden seemed to have seen when he was young. Um, Delia and Toby? Things like that.”
“Ah……!”
Aiden’s expression lit up with genuine delight, as if he’d stumbled upon something precious.
In his widened eyes, memory flickered like candlelight.
“Good heavens. Yes, there was a book like that. Ah, now it’s all coming back to me…….”
“Was it a favorite of yours?”
Granted, idle chatter about childhood books wouldn’t help uncover Aiden’s secrets.
Yet Caroline found herself drawn to learning things about him that she didn’t already know.
His mother, a book from childhood.
She loved him for more than just conquest targets.
“Yes, I remember being quite fond of a character named Toby who appeared in it.”
Toby.
As she listened, an odd feeling crept over Caroline.
‘Could it be coincidence?’
A boy unacknowledged in the mansion.
A presence that didn’t even cast a reflection in mirrors, like a ghost.
Aiden had mentioned a younger sister in passing, and given his name as Toby.
‘What exactly is this?’
“I was impressed by how he tried to care for his sister despite their poverty. He even had a taste for ginger cakes, which seemed so mature that I once tried to mimic it myself.”
‘We can’t go hungry. Not me, not my sister.’
A chill ran down the back of Caroline’s neck.
‘Could Toby be…….’
A figment of imagination?
A character from a book Aiden had loved.
What if it appeared in the game in a form only the player could see?
‘But why?’
Why would help need to come in such a form?
“I thought it was admirable how he took on the role of head of household at such a young age, without parents.”
“Ah…….”
‘Parents? He didn’t have parents?’
Yet Toby had acknowledged his mother’s existence.
Caroline remembered only that when she’d asked about her, he said they couldn’t meet.
“Mother has no interest in what I eat or what she eats. She only cares about the mansion.”
But what could it possibly mean that she only cared about the mansion?
A casual conversation had opened a labyrinth of confusion in Caroline’s mind.
She rose from the table, her questions still unresolved.
* * *
‘What role-play awaits today?’
The servants had mentioned that the weather was lovely, so they would take tea in the Garden.
She stepped out from the First Floor of the Mansion and started down the stairs toward the Garden.
But the air around her thrummed with noise.
‘What is that?’
A quarrel was taking place.
Though the voices weren’t raised, the exchange carried a stubborn resolve—neither party willing to yield.
A conflict in this quiet mansion was unthinkable.
‘Who could it be?’
Surely not the servants.
As she listened, one voice cut through with crystalline clarity—unmistakably familiar.
‘Aiden?’
The servants stood in bewildered silence, and beside them sat an automobile she’d never seen before.
‘An automobile?’
An automobile…….
‘Not the sort just anyone would be driving.’
A sleek black four-wheeled motorcar, smaller than a carriage but still imposing in size.
Caroline noted how sunlight gleamed off its polished surface, and caught glimpses of heads just beyond it.
As she drew closer, the words became clear.
“Are you truly going to leave me standing here? Is this how you treat your guests, Aiden?”
“In this household, we do not keep guests standing.”
Caroline had never heard Aiden speak in such a cold, clipped tone before.
Cold contempt dripped from his voice.
“But you were not invited, were you?”
“Ha, that’s hardly fair.”
“I’ve no intention of keeping you here any longer. Wouldn’t it be simpler if you just left?”
“And what do you think will happen if you send me away, Deverell?”
The elderly gentleman standing before him was a head shorter than Aiden.
As he laughed with a soft chuckle, he pestered Aiden’s composure with polite insistence.
‘Who is this man?’
Caroline could see her actor’s large hands clench into fists so tight the skin threatened to tear.
Tension rippled through his forearms above his shirtsleeves.
“I will come again. This matter needs to be resolved.”
“The ending came long ago—several times over. Yet it’s Count Roman who refuses to accept it, isn’t it?”
The name was familiar.
‘Count Roman?’
The Agreement Document she’d seen yesterday flickered through her mind.

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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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