In the darkness, Wade heard his own heart pounding wildly, each beat seeming ready to leap out of his throat.
The pajamas on his back were already soaked with sweat, and when he sat up, he felt a chill.
Wade pressed a hand to his forehead and sat on the bed for a while before asking, "Is this what you saw?"
In the bedroom, which had originally contained only him, a pearl-white figure stood silently.
Mrs. Gray stood before the window with her back to the room, her body giving off a faint, cold glow in the night. Her long hair fell smoothly down her back.
Hearing Wade's voice, she did not turn around. She merely continued gazing at the Black Lake in the night, then nodded gently.
"That eye in the darkness... what was it?"
"I don't know."
"And the force that pulled you back—had you known anything about it before?"
Mrs. Gray's shoulders trembled slightly. She turned around, her hesitant eyes falling on Wade's face.
"This is the first time I've known it too," she said. "This castle... seems to be conscious."
She paused, and her gaze shifted back outside, settling on the distant Tower.
Only then did Wade realize that Mrs. Gray was not looking outside to admire the scenery or simply daydream. She was searching for something.
Her gaze drifted as she slowly said, "But... this is actually quite normal."
"In the era when I was still alive, it was said that some Ancient Things could indeed give rise to extraordinary power."
"The castle must be the same... Over a thousand years, countless children have lived here. Every brick in its walls has been steeped in the children's Magic Power."
"So of course it would remember... It remembers the laughter that once drifted through this place,