A Monodrama for Carolyn August - Chapter 93

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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 93.
“What?”
Caroline pushed herself up slowly, feeling her way across the floor.
At the same time, the acrid smell of blood filled her nostrils.
She was crumpled inside the Cargo Elevator—the kind that opens when you strike the wall, its shaft so narrow you’d have to fold your body almost in half to fit.
‘No way.’
Caroline scrambled to her feet and examined the elevator’s interior.
“Where does this thing go?”
The metal Cargo Elevator bore no obvious stains, yet the faint metallic stench of blood clung to it. What if the Circus Master had been shot here, then transported up to the Deck through this very shaft?
‘When I hit the wall, it opened.’
Caroline felt along the metal surface, and now she understood. Her head hadn’t rammed it open by force. There was a small protruding button, barely visible on the wall.
Press it, and the doors open. Press it again, and they close.
So then.
‘I should go inside.’
Summoning courage from nowhere, Caroline stepped into the elevator.
The Cargo Elevator was just wide enough for her to fit comfortably if she curled up—meaning the Circus Master would have had to squeeze in quite tightly.
She reached out, pressed the button, and quickly folded her arms.
Then.
“Ahhh!”
The elevator shot upward in an instant.
It was faster than anything she’d ever experienced. Even sledding down a snowy hill with friends had never felt like this.
Caroline clenched her teeth, terrified she was about to be hurled overboard into the open sea.
Thunk!
And just like that, she arrived.
Fortunately, the doors opened automatically without her touching anything. Now Caroline could confirm her suspicion was right.
The Deck, battered by the churning waves, bore deep bloodstains that hadn’t washed away despite the salt spray.
Caroline was about to step out of the elevator.
[Warning! This area is not accessible.]
“Ah.”
She remembered the instructions: during the Mission, Players could only access the basement through the Second Floor—or, in ship terms, the First through Third Floors.
The Deck was clearly significant to the narrative, but since the Third Floor was off-limits, it seemed her actual access was blocked.
‘That’s fine. I saw what I needed to.’
Caroline reached back out of the elevator.
After fumbling a few times, her hand found something like a button. She pressed it, and down she plummeted.
“Aaahhh!”
Heart pounding, Caroline gripped the sides as the elevator doors slammed shut above her.
Damn this mechanical death trap. Damn this elevator. At least now she could piece together how Will had killed him.
‘He shot an arrow from the Engine Room—not at a vital point, but somewhere that wouldn’t kill him immediately. Then he transported the body up to the Deck via this elevator.’
After hastily cleaning up the Engine Room, he’d retrieved the prepared Ice Bucket and Syrup and returned to his post.
Then, watching for his moment, he’d hurried to the Deck and bound the Circus Master with Rope he’d stashed there—waiting for him to wake in agony and face the waves.
‘And then he came back with several bottles of Wine to establish his alibi.’
Will’s story did feature him shooting someone he hated with an arrow, but not like this. What made this version shocking was how deliberately he hunted his final victim—that was the whole point of the script.
Still trembling, Caroline closed the elevator doors.
She jotted down what she’d discovered, then climbed back up to continue gathering evidence.
“This is absolutely chilling, what I’ve figured out.”
Caroline shook her head in disbelief.
Like most of the murders in “The Campbell Cruise Incident,” Will’s killing was brutal. He didn’t end it cleanly—not when his victim was someone he’d hated his entire life.
With the Circus Master, he could have simply killed him in the Engine Room.
Instead, he shot him, let him wake, and made him suffer until death came.
He gagged the man’s mouth with a Napkin and got everyone else so drunk they couldn’t help even if they wanted to.
‘It’s revolting.’
Of course, all of this was a fictional scenario—something she’d only gotten to see by accepting Will’s Key.
Caroline finally understood why Aiden insisted Will could never love Jane. He was too cruel.
‘But I also understand why Will did it this way.’
The Circus Master was the person Will hated most.
He despised the nobles who mocked him and made him their jest, but above all, he despised the Circus Master—the architect of his ruin, the man who’d cast him into the pit of circus and clowning.
The Circus Master had put Will’s Mother on display like an exhibit and raised Will to be a clown, whipping him countless times in the process. The script showed Will’s bare back scarred with ugly welts because of it.
The Circus Master had worked Will’s Mother to death without any care or healing, denied Will even a funeral, and afterward—once Will had achieved success as a Performer and a Clown—the man had clung to him, leveraging their connection to court the nobility and strengthen his own standing.
‘If I were him, I’d want to kill him that way too.’
Could brutal murder truly prove Will lacked human feeling? Or was it the opposite—that he felt too deeply, and that’s precisely why he could do something like this?
Caroline moved forward with that thought, taking another step.
If she could find only those objects that proved her theory—the rope, the arrow, and the like—she would be able to explain the Circus Master’s murder perfectly.
And finding them proved not difficult at all.
‘Finally.’
Caroline discovered the coiled rope and the arrow with its bloodstains wiped clean in a trash bin inside the Cocktail Bar. The rope was unremarkable, but the fact that the arrow had been restored suggested Will had meant to return it to its proper place before the others woke.
[Remaining Time: 1 hour 2 minutes 41 seconds]
“I’ve figured it out.”
The victim was the Circus Master—shot with an arrow in the Engine Room to incapacitate him first, then bound on the Deck and left to die.
If one simply asked who was killed, where, and with what, the answer would be easy to provide. But the Deck wasn’t on the map, and yet the location of death was the Deck. That was the cruelty of it.
‘This game is despicable, truly.’
Caroline shook her head and recounted what she had discovered. And then…….
[Miss Caroline August, you have succeeded in your mission. As a reward, the location of Will’s Key has been revealed.]
[Will’s Key Location: Inside the pocket of Will’s Light Blue Tailcoat.]
“Oh?”
The location was simpler than expected. Caroline remembered seeing the light blue tailcoat hanging in the wardrobe when she’d organized the clothes.
‘Then I just need to go to the Third Floor and fetch it.’
By now the sky had grown dim. Midnight was not far away.
Caroline climbed the stairs to the Third Floor at a quick pace and entered the room with red wallpaper. The moment she opened the wardrobe door, she realized her own foolishness.
Today they’d had tea while discussing Will.
So Will would be wearing the tailcoat. It wouldn’t be hanging here.
And as if to punish her stupidity, danger arrived at once. From behind her.
“I was certain I warned you last time, Miss Detective.”
Caroline had been caught going through his belongings again.

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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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