A Monodrama for Carolyn August - Chapter 98

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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 98.
Having exhausted what could be said about Ipros, Caroline found herself chatting with Aiden about her experience watching .
The man listened intently, as though he had never heard his own performance discussed so candidly before. Watching him, a thought crossed Caroline’s mind.
‘Will he remember even the smallest things now—my impressions of the play, what I enjoyed—the trivial details?’
At first, he hadn’t remembered at all.
Later, he had recalled her words only very faintly.
Then came the moment he repeated back to her, word for word, the advice she had once given him. Now that stories about her were surfacing clearly in his memory—even those that didn’t center on him—could he eventually remember everything?
Caroline found herself wondering if Aiden himself was aware of this shift, this growing ability to retain her words.
“I’ll end our tea time here. We’ll see each other at dinner, Caroline.”
“Aiden, there’s something I wanted to ask you……”
Just as Aiden rose to clear away the teacups, Caroline prepared to ask her question—when the Labyrinth stretching beyond the garden, visible past his broad frame, caught her eye.
The Labyrinth.
The day she’d first laid eyes on the jester Will, she’d ventured into those passages seeking answers about what lay within. After the sun had set halfway through and the thread had swung loose, forcing her retreat, she’d never bothered to explore again.
‘I’ll go in today.’
A key or something else might be hidden inside. The servants weren’t permitted entry, which gave the place an air of significance. Having resolved this, Caroline continued speaking.
“Yes, Caroline.”
“When I first arrived at the Mansion, it seemed you didn’t remember much about me. But now I feel like you retain so many things—my habits, the things I’ve said. It’s comforting, somehow. I’m glad.”
“Ah, yes. I’ve sensed the same. I suspect it’s because as I welcomed you as a guest, I grew more familiar with you, and through our conversations, I’ve come to know much about you. I, too, have grown very comfortable and intimate with your presence, Caroline.”
Aiden’s Affinity level toward Caroline was rising markedly.
Caroline gazed at the small squares hovering above his head—the visual representation of his Intimacy with her.
[□□□]
What happens if those squares become five? Will I receive a reward?
“I’m grateful that you’re spending this time at the Mansion, Caroline. Though I wish I could have welcomed you when I was healthier and the Mansion was more prosperous……”
As he spoke, his already weary face grew even more drawn.
He seemed to genuinely harbor gratitude and affection toward her. Yet though she couldn’t quite perceive his multiple personality disorder, it was clear he carried a quiet bitterness about his unstable mental state.
‘It’s not your fault. I’m grateful that you think well of me, but I wish you wouldn’t torment yourself over it.’
Watching him, a sharp ache bloomed in her chest. Caroline quickly shook her head.
“How could it be more beautiful than this? A perfect day, an exquisite garden, an elegant tea—what more could one ask for? Of course, I’d be happier if you slept better, ate better, and found peace of mind. But that’s something you need to do for yourself, not for me.”
“…Thank you.”
“I love every version of you, so please don’t worry. This summer break we’re spending together is so precious to me.”
Aiden smiled gently, then crossed the garden and entered the Mansion. From meeting him again at three in the morning last night, it was clear he hadn’t slept nearly enough.
‘He’s probably going to take a nap.’
Thinking this, Caroline tilted her head at how much he’d changed.
When she’d first arrived at the Mansion, he had seemed almost inhuman. So colorless, so devoid of life that it was easy to understand why he might be nothing more than a game’s target character.
‘A blank expression, that eerie composure, that smile. He was like a machine, answering any question asked of him without hesitation.’
But now he had learned to express the pain and conflict he felt. And remembering her words was merely a bonus.
“If my parents had mental defects and were people I despised, and as I grew I found myself resembling them despite my intentions…what would you do, Caroline? Do you think I could ever become truly different from such parents?”
Caroline recalled that conversation when they flew the kite. Then came his words from when they’d ridden in the boat on the Lake.
“Back then, I was absorbed in Ipros. I wish I had understood that I only needed to never lose the awareness that my life was my own.”
“Even while living similarly, if one doesn’t lose the awareness that it’s one’s own life, wouldn’t that make one fundamentally different…? That’s what I meant.”
He was no longer a character—he was becoming genuinely human.
‘Human?’
Rather, human like Caroline. In other words…
‘Like someone with a self.’
Caroline had found the answer to what she was feeling. He was behaving as though he’d developed a self. From a being who merely fulfilled his role as a conquest target, he had become one who remembered, who felt emotion.
‘Just like the three-in-the-morning Aiden.’
Of course, he still had far to go before reaching that level.
The fact that Aiden at three in the morning came to mind the moment she thought of memory and emotion—Caroline wondered if she’d fallen into a chronic habit. Was it because she relied so heavily on him?
“All right, enough brooding. Let’s head to the Labyrinth.”
Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Caroline gathered the Notebook where she’d sketched the path on her previous exploration, a pen, and the ball of thread Anna had given her, then made her way toward the Labyrinth.
“…Aiden was right.”
Holding the thread, Caroline peered down at the crooked lines she’d drawn.
The map she’d made of the Labyrinth’s passages on her last visit didn’t match at all. She was certain she’d drawn it correctly then, yet somewhere the paths had shifted.
“I tried to create a map of the Labyrinth by remembering the entrance route. I gathered information over two or three days and relied on it when I entered, but for some reason it matched nothing.”
“Damned game.”
Memory didn’t seem to be the key to navigating the Labyrinth. What mattered was finding the way forward each time you entered, pressing deeper into its depths.
“Today I’m going to push through to the end.”
There were still hours before sunset. Within that window, she planned to conquer the first area that young Aiden had mentioned.
“The Labyrinth is essentially composed of two spaces. Like a one-stroke drawing, there’s a path that runs in a single direction, and a space you cannot escape without someone else’s help.”
As she’d seen before, the Labyrinth’s first space offered only a single path forward, yet it revealed countless dead ends along the way.
From that dead end, she had to turn back and find another path forward—moving as if drawing with a single continuous stroke.
‘I didn’t fully explore it then. Even if I make it all the way through today, the layout will have changed by next time, but I want to see what’s inside.’
And so Caroline began her solitary journey.
How much time had passed, she couldn’t say.
The sun hung low on the horizon, and a cool breeze swept across the beads of perspiration on her skin.
Caroline realized she had wandered deep into the heart of the Labyrinth. It seemed she’d encountered more than a hundred dead ends by now.
And the moment she turned a corner along the wall before her,
[Settings bar]
The countless Labyrinth walls vanished, and in the center of a vast circular earthen floor, a window bearing familiar script appeared above a fountain shaped like a weeping boy seated in a chair.

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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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