Magic Manor 4

"Butler," Lu Mi finally asked, unable to hold back any longer, "did you put something on your face?"

The butler paused without raising his head. "This? A kind of mud for skin care. Would you like to try it?"

Lu Mi hastily said that wouldn't be necessary.

The manor covered a vast area, and the broad stretch of grass beneath their feet was where they would teach horseback riding.

Lu Mi took the opportunity to ask about the war, but the butler smiled. "What are you talking about? Isn't everything fine here?"

"Everything is fine" again.

Watching the butler walk away, Roman said, "Liar."

Lu Mi tentatively stroked the horse's head. "He heard the coachmen say with his own ears yesterday that Bart had been killed by soldiers. Noel, though, doesn't seem to be acting. I suspect her days and nights have been split apart."

He looked toward the western tower again. "However you look at it, this manor has been ravaged by war. Those soldiers probably stayed here, which is why the whole place is such a mess that we can't find a single room fit to sleep in."

By the time the morning was over, both of them were exhausted and drenched in sweat.

Whether the butler had done it deliberately or not, both horses he had brought out were fiercely spirited, and taming them had taken considerable effort.

The sky remained overcast. After tethering the horses, the two sat side by side on the withered grass to rest.

Lu Mi gulped down a good deal of water, then noticed Roman watching him out of the corner of his eye. "Want some?"

Roman said nothing. Only after a while did he utter a name. "Jin Bi."

"What about her?"

"Nothing." Roman turned away, looking down at the woods several hundred meters below the grassy slope. "I just wanted to say that she and Ning Zhuangzhuang are two completely different people."

Lu Mi silently tightened his grip on the water bottle.

This guy seemed to understand him better than he understood himself.

If Roman hadn't pointed it out, he probably still wouldn't have realized that he had been unconsciously searching for traces of Ning Zhuangzhuang in Jin Bi.

It was already half past twelve when they returned to the castle.

They had barely stepped through the entrance when Jin Bi and several other players came stumbling out, nearly crashing straight into them. "That Noel girl has gone completely berserk!"

"What happened? Tell us properly."

The other players kept fleeing outside without a second thought. Only Jin Bi stayed, panting hard. "Go look in the dining room and you'll see. God, now I finally know why the butler said little girls get hungry so easily. What an appetite!"

Lu Mi and Roman exchanged a glance and headed inside.

But the castle's corridors and secret passages formed a tangled maze, and one careless turn could leave them lost.

Roman grabbed a passing maid and told her to lead the way.

The dining room was also exceptionally spacious, with a high ceiling and a long dining table stretching from one end of the room to the other.

"Noel?" Lu Mi called softly as he walked farther inside.

The sounds of ravenous eating reached them. As they rounded the dining table, Noel's skirt came into view.

The little girl was crouched beside the table with her back to the entrance, her head lowered as she chewed on something.

Only when she heard someone call her did her bulging cheeks stop working.

The maid stepped forward. "Miss Noel, your clothes are dragging on the floor and getting dirty. Please come with me for a bath, or the butler will be unhappy."

Noel slowly turned her head, revealing a pair of hollow eyes-the two butterflies were gone.

She licked her greasy lips, then suddenly sprang onto the maid, tearing a large chunk of flesh straight from her arm!

Lu Mi shouted and pulled them apart. Noel continued frantically chewing the raw flesh in her mouth, her eyes still fixed on the maid.

Roman pried Noel's mouth open, snatched out the meat, and threw it away. Her sharp teeth snagged a long, thin thread from his glove.

It took them considerable effort to calm Noel down.

Only when two butterflies flew in through the window and settled back into place over her eyes did she rub her stomach in bewilderment. "I'm so full. It hurts."

Despite the injury to her arm, the maid acted as if nothing had happened. "Come along, miss."

Noel nodded and stood, revealing a large bowl of whitish meat soup on the floor. Bits of meat and broth had splattered all around it.

"What is this?" Lu Mi asked the maid.

The maid seemed entirely accustomed to it. "Dog meat. The tutors cooked it for the young lady's lunch."

Lu Mi watched the tall maid and the little girl leave hand in hand, as though that fit of madness had never happened. "Those butterflies seem to act as a switch for Noel's emotions. If that's true, what makes them turn on and off?"

Roman picked up the bowl of meat soup. "Let's watch her during this afternoon's lesson. As for what's in this bowl, it really is dog meat."

The two silently exchanged a glance, each understanding what the other was thinking.

The butler's words couldn't be trusted.

At two o'clock, Lu Mi and Roman each held one of Noel's hands as they headed through the side entrance toward the field.

Some players dared neither enter the building nor rashly try opening the manor's great iron gates, so they hid in out-of-the-way corners.

They all found the sight unbelievable. "They must have seen that little girl devouring meat like a maniac. Aren't they scared?"

"Actually, what I want to know is how they've survived this long..."

"Could it be that the little girl only goes berserk at night, and no matter how strange she acts during the day, she won't hurt anyone?"

"I think that's very likely. I taught her the second arithmetic lesson. I was so scared that I did a terrible job, but she didn't eat me."

"Then whoever stays with the little girl tonight will be in real danger..."

When they reached the field, Noel's face glowed with a happy smile. "Gentlemen, what a beautiful day."

Lu Mi was fitting a bridle onto a brown pony and seized the opportunity to ask, "What's beautiful about it?"

"Look," Noel said, pointing. "The blue sky, the brilliant sunshine. These lovely butterflies, and the lush grass. I'm sure it must be covered in exquisite dewdrops in the early morning-the manor in spring is my favorite sight!"

Spring?

Lu Mi remembered waking up freezing last night even beneath a down duvet. Then he looked at the gray sky and the withered grass before him and fell silent.

Clearly, the players and Noel saw entirely different worlds.

His gaze shifted to the fluttering butterflies over the little girl's eyes, and a bold theory formed in his mind.

But the butler was already standing nearby with pen and paper, taking notes and silently urging them to begin the lesson.

Noel was indeed clever and learned quickly. But they soon discovered that she also held herself to extremely high standards.

"Noel, you don't have to put so much pressure on yourself." Remembering that his own riding skills were still mediocre, Lu Mi privately broke into a nervous sweat.

Sitting on the horse, Noel frowned deeply. "No, I have to do my very best."

An hour later, the lesson ended. The butler came over, offered a few comments, then took Noel away to her next class.

Lu Mi voiced his theory. "When the butterflies are there, Noel sees a beautiful world through those butterfly eyes. When they fly away, she starts behaving abnormally, sometimes mildly, sometimes severely."

Roman nodded. "Noel is very good-tempered under normal circumstances. That couple probably wasn't eaten because they angered her, and the idea that it happened because they left her alone instead of playing with her makes even less sense."

The players doing the cooking would probably also have followed the instructions and made sure Noel finished all her food.

The rules were so easy to follow, yet things still went wrong.

In that case, they had to question whether those rules really needed to be followed at all.