Free Web NovelChapter 93: Key
Victor wondered who had knocked on his bedroom door, but when he looked both ways down the corridor, he saw no one.
Immediately, Victor wondered who could have been so quick and quiet to knock on the door and disappeared before it opened. Victor then bent down to pick up the object that had been left at the foot of the door. It was a small silver key. Intrigued, Victor examined the key more closely, turning it over in his hands. There was a symbol embedded in the head of the key, a symbol that looked like a prism.
"A key..." he muttered to himself.
He knew that this was probably not a simple coincidence; someone had left this object there on purpose right after knocking on his door, and the question was who and why.
At that moment, Victor automatically remembered the warning that Gracela Selvarum had given him. "... Welcome to Selvarum Manor, Mr. Shieldman. However, I don’t advise you to explore the rooms like this, especially so close to nightfall, you may end up finding some unpleasant things."
Indeed, the mansion looked different at night, an aura of mystery whispered through the darkened corridors, so much so that it was making Victor curious.
With his mind full of thoughts, Victor decided to keep the key in the inside pocket of his jacket in the closet and think about it more the next morning. Perhaps asking someone about it at the breakfast table would be a better idea than going around looking for a lock for it.
So Victor went back inside his room, put the key in the pocket of his robe in the closet, locked it and started dinner.
Dinner was a simple meal, a meat stew well prepared by the mansion’s staff. After eating, Victor lay down on his soft bed and closed his eyes slowly, letting himself be carried away by the tiredness of the day, the comfort of the bed, and the quiet sounds, like the snow falling outside and the crackling of the fireplace.
When Victor opened his eyes again, to his surprise, he was no longer in his room. He looked around him and realized that instead of having woken up the next day after sleeping, he had gone back to the moment he arrived at the mansion in the late afternoon. He had his cloak in his hand, and his boots still had a bit of snow on them from the street.
"What’s going on?" muttered Victor to himself, trying to understand the strange turn of events. freewebnovel.cσ๓
The melody of Gracela Selvarum’s piano echoed through the house, just as Victor had witnessed a few hours ago, and it gave him goosebumps.
Victor, still perplexed by the sudden change of scenery, quickly reached into an inside pocket of his tunic in search of the silver key he had just put away. However, his fingers found only the soft fabric of the inside pocket of his tunic and the ten silver coins he had left after paying the tailor for this garment.
"It can’t be..." he muttered once again to himself as his eyes stared at the empty hallway. "Did I really go back in time without dying this time? Is that... possible?"
The memories of all his actions from hours ago mixed with the confusion of the present moment.
Determined to understand what was going on, Victor decided to literally retrace all the steps that had led him to that mysterious key, because that key was his only physical clue to finding out what was happening to this mansion.
So, just as he did the first time he experienced these moments, Victor followed the piano music to that tower with the spiral staircase and it led him to the room where Gracela Selvarum was. When he pushed the door open slightly, he could see her playing the piano keys with mastery, care and focus.
The music was about to reach its climax, but Gracela suddenly stopped playing and turned to face Victor.
"Ah... you’re the visitor who arrived last night."
Victor remembered almost perfectly what he had said, because at that moment he thought about the words he would use.
"Yes, I’m Victor Shieldman, an old friend of your cousin’s. I was curious where the music was coming from, so I followed the sound here."
The conversation between them proceeded identically to the first time, including the warning about the ’unpleasant things’.
Victor was tempted to insist that she tell him exactly what she was talking about when she said that, but he didn’t, because he had already learned in Agocester Village that every different action he took could end up directly interfering with the flow of things, altering the future.
So Victor closed the door to Gracela’s room after he left and heard the sound of piano music start up again, albeit muffled by the door this time.
He naturally went downstairs and, just like the other time, saw Elban coming out of what looked like a fencing training room. They crossed paths, ignored each other and headed in opposite directions down the corridor.
Victor went up to his room, took off his clothes and had a quick shower so that when Margaret knocked on his door, they wouldn’t have to go through that awkward moment again.
When the soft knocks echoed at the door, Victor stood up calmly, adjusted his tunic as if he were preparing for a formal meeting and opened the door.
Margaret’s brown eyes sparkled at the sight of a slightly cleaner version of Victor.
"Good evening, Mr. Shieldman. How are you? I’ve brought your dinner, I hope you like it," said Margaret in a soft voice with her head bowed.
"Thank you, Margaret. This all looks delicious," replied Victor, gratefully accepting the plate.
Margaret bowed her head in thanks and left, but as the door closed, she wondered:
’Did I tell him my name?’ Confused, she thought, ’No, not that I remember. But one of the other servants must have...’
Victor didn’t have much time now, and didn’t even bother to put the food on the table as he had done before, as that would have wasted time. Instead, he put the plate of food down and waited for the next knocks to come, and when they finally did, Victor opened it quickly and looked both ways down the corridor. His dedication to standing by the door was not in vain. Victor clearly saw a black figure turning the corner of the corridor to the right and in the same second he began to run on pure instinct.
