When I woke up again, I was lying on the cold floor.
I blinked my eyes, feeling my head hurt so much it felt like it was going to burst, but my vision was still dark. I could hear murmurs around me.
"...Oh, she's awake!"
"She's awake. I guess she woke up because of you."
"Shh, be quiet."
The moment I raised my arm, I heard a metallic sound like chains clashing against each other. That sharp sound brought me back to my senses.
I closed my eyes tightly with my eyebrows furrowed, then opened them completely. It was quick to find the source of the voice.
'Children...?'
From the edge of my vision. I could see a group of children sitting in a circle, looking down at me.
"Wow, she's pretty,"
"Then what can I do? Cough, at best it will just be sold for a higher price."
"You keep your mouth shut. Here, drink some water."
I couldn't concentrate at all because all the chattering voices were overlapping at once.
I barely moistened my lips with the water in the bowl a child handed me. The bowl tasted like rust, perhaps because it was metallic.
"Where is this place?"
Suddenly, an intuition occurred to me. I thought that maybe this was the place I had been searching for.
However, the memory was interrupted in the middle, and the last thing I remembered was being beaten by Hayden in the forest and passing out.
Thinking about the reddened eyes controlled by black magic gave me goosebumps, but I was also worried about Hayden, who was still a young boy.
I wonder if he's okay. Did he just get thrown away after outliving his usefulness?
"We don't know either. We just know that this is a warehouse where goods are stored."
The dark-skinned boy answered in a gruff voice.
After hearing that, I raised my upper body and looked around.
At first glance, it looked like a prison, one of a kind in the basement of every noble mansion, used to incarcerate criminals of the estate.
But a tiny bit of sunlight came in through a very small window with iron bars.
I got up from my heavy body as if I had drunk water and walked towards him with a limp.
At first, I was surprised by how much higher it was than I had expected. I thought it might be the top floor of some tower.
Secondly, the scenery around the tower, which was so beautiful that it seemed out of place, was amazing. Purple flowers were blooming all around, so it felt like I was standing in the middle of a lavender field.
There were no other clues. My wrists and ankles were fitted with heavy restraints that blocked my magical powers.
"..."
I sighed deeply at the dire situation. Yes. I was too careless.
I went out without checking anything because I thought Sarah was in danger.
Besides, I couldn't even dream that Hayden was brainwashed by a warlock.
But rather than blaming myself, I had to find a way to overcome this situation first.
I turned my gaze away from the window and looked at the children again.
It was a very narrow space, so tight that ten people could fit inside. I and three children were trapped here.
"Are you feeling okay? You haven't opened your eyes for a whole day."
"A day has passed?"
I asked back in a surprised voice. I felt like my body was too cold.
"Are we the only ones here?"
As soon as I opened my mouth, a loud thud was heard from the wall on the other side. It was the vibration caused by someone hitting it with a fist.
"Hey, be quiet! Damn it. I can't sleep!"
The growl of the man across from me could be clearly heard through the wall. As I froze at the grim warning, the boy shrugged his shoulders.
"We're the only ones in this room. There are a lot more people outside. There must be a hundred."
"Isn't it because you can count up to 100?"
A little girl asked rashly and received a cold glare for no reason.
But the question wasn't strange because they were all children. The oldest boy looked to be only about thirteen years old.
In the meantime, I became convinced of my thoughts. This was indeed the place where people were gathered to be put up for auction.
But there was no reason why the Duke had kidnapped me and brought me here. It was something that would be discovered someday.
If it was because they realized that there was an auction going on in the forest, this was definitely the worst response they could have ever received.
'Aren't you afraid of the Grand Duke's wrath?"
I thought about it carefully, then lowered my voice and asked the children again.
"Do you all have magic powers too? Is that why you were captured?"
"Yes, I was sold to by parents, and they are from an orphanage. The director thought they were an adoption agency and sent them there."
The boy answered my questions faithfully, even though he had an annoyed look on his face.
"Were you wearing a blindfold when you came in here?"
"I wasn't blindfolded, but I couldn't see outside because I was being carried in a cart."
"What kind of manager is this place..."
"If you're going to ask questions I ike that, then just shut up."
But as soon as I asked a question about this place, his expression hardened.
He furrowed his brow as if he was annoyed, then continued speaking forcefully.
"If you're going to talk nonsense about escaping, think about it alone. The kids might have high hopes for you. Do you know there are more than one or two people like you?"
"..."
"Now that you're here, cough, you better worry about your situation."
The children's vigilance was more severe than expected.
I, too, am in terrible physical condition right now and have a severe headache, so I can't think of persuasive words as I usually do.
First, I took a step back and leaned against the wall. Then, the girl who had been watching me approached me stealthily.
"Don't think too badly of it. My brother is sick, that's why he's like that."
"What does that mean?"
"He went to auction a few times, but he didn't sell because it looked sick, so he came back. He was sold once, but they got their money back because he was coughing. He's probably been here the longest."
The boy clicked his tongue, thinking he was talking nonsense.
When I heard that, I looked again and saw that the boy's face was very pale. Not only was he coughing intermittently, but even his usual breathing was rough.
My heart ached. My desire to resolve the matter as quickly as possible grew stronger.
"I wasn't captured, guys."
It seemed like I had to mix in a little lie to reassure the children.
"I am the Grand Duchess of Kronhardt. I have been following this auction for a long time since I learned about it."
"Ha, now they're going to catch even liars indiscriminately."
The boy laughed and did not believe me. I continued to speak earnestly.
"The auction used to be held in a building on Montreal Street, right? But after the stage caught fire, the location changed to the middle of the forest."
"How do you know that, Sister? That's what my brother told me a while ago..."
"Shh, be quiet."
The boy opened his eyes wide and shouted without realizing it, then closed his mouth with a huff.
"Did you see the fire on stage?"
"... I had a bad cough that day, so l was tied up and waiting."
The boy answered in a voice that was still cold but had softened slightly.
"I started that fire. I saw them on stage, trying to make a boy your age fight a wild beast. He's currently staying at the Grand Duke's residence."
"Jacob? He's alive?"
"Do you know that kid?"
We exchanged surprised glances and were careful not to raise our voices.
"We can't communicate anyway."
"You could communicate with him, right? He's from a foreign island, you know."
In our haste, our voices almost overlapped.
"Somehow, that's what happened. I tried every possible dictionary, but they all failed."
The boy looked me up and down, perhaps letting his guard down a little, as he spoke.
"If that's true, why did you come only now?"
I was speechless for a moment. I quickly grabbed the boy's hand carefully.
"I'm sorry. I'm so late."
"..."
"So please help us before it's too late. So that more people won't be hurt."
The boy looked straight into my eyes and bit his lip with a confused expression.
Then he blurted it out.
"If things work out well, take them first. I'm sick anyway."
"Don't worry. We'll all go together."
"So, what are you curious about?"
The gboy who had been watching us anxiously from the side smiled brightly as if they were relieved.
***
"Do you remember how many hours it took to get from that forest to here?"
"We set off in the morning when the sun was rising, and by the time we got here the sun was setting. There was a time when the coachmen stopped for a meal in the middle."
I asked myself several questions and then looked out the window and thought.
A tall tower located in a beautiful flower garden. Where on earth is this?
'Building a new structure is too conspicuous. Buying an existing tower is also risky in many ways.'
It's not strange for a Duke to use this place, even though it was originally here.
"..."
I didn't want to believe it, but I felt like I knew where this was. I had been here several times before I turned back time.
"Are you really human...?"
I suppressed my heavy heart and muttered quietly to myself.
The Duchess, my mother, loved lavender.
After her death, the Duke planted flowers around his wife's grave and built a structure to commemorate her achievements as a sorcerer.
It looked like some kind of tower, but it was so decorative that you wouldn't imagine it was empty inside, so you couldn't tell right away.
Even back then, I thought I was doing something that didn't suit me.
The fears became reality. This was where my mother's grave was.
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