Our groups were the same as before.
Maid came over to me and Queen to King. Prince went to Princess and although very hesitant, she silently went along with it, albeit frowning.
I kind of felt sorry for her though. Not that I have anything against him, it's just that... this feeling kind of came to me almost naturally. As for Maid, I felt oddly comfortable around her.
Maybe we were friends? I can't really say though, with the gap in my memories and everything.
Actually, make that the entirety of my memories.
Now, a while back, Prince asked me what I thought about Queen. And yes, she really does feel like an older sister to me. And King... I don't know, honestly. Just this feeling of tension.
As for Prince. Well nothing negative really. Nothing positive either. Just this feeling of uneasiness.
But enough about that. Maid and I went around again.
We somehow ended up in the infirmary first and searched there.
When I went through the cabinets, I found a weighing scale, that thing for blood-pressure, more tools I don't know the use of, and flashlights.
When you think about it, they weren't much. But something irked me.
“Hey, do you think these will work outside?” I asked Maid.
When I turned around I saw her going through the documents found on the desk.
She turned to me. “What will?”
To her question I showed her a total of six flashlights.
Seeing this, she looked happy for a moment.
“But... do they have batteries?”
Hmmm. I opened one of them and found... nothing.
“Aww.”
I opened each and every one of them and they all turned out the same.
“Too bad.” Maid said a bit sadly as she came over and played around with one of the flashlights.
Click-
““Oh.”” Both of us said at the same time.
It turned on.
“That's... strange.” I said. “But somehow I don't feel surprised. Even though I sort of want to.”
Maid nodded. “Oh. But hey! We could try them out!”
Thinking about it a little, I asked her a question.
“Should we get the others?”
She frowned a bit and thought. “I guess? I mean if you want them to.”
Shrugging, we just decided to call everyone.
We navigated our way until we got to the lounge. Going up the stairs, we tried to look for King and Queen. So, we checked their rooms first.
Facing the room of King, I hesitated before knocking.
No response.
I knocked again. Still nothing.
Exchanging looks with Maid, we went to the opposite room and knocked. Having no response as well, we knocked on the other two rooms and entered ours.
Well, they aren't here, so that leaves us with only one place. Which was the library.
We walked towards the library and passed the three locked doors.
Making a right turn, we went and opened the door to the right. Making a creaking sound, we entered looked around.
There, on one of the chairs, Queen was sitted and was reading a rather thick book.
King on the other hand was looking at the books in one of the shelves.
Noticing us, Queen greeted us.
“Hello there, Jester, Maid. What brings you here? Found something?”
Nodding, we both brought out three flashlights each.
“Oh my. Do they have batteries?”
Maid shook her head and Queen was visibly disappointed.
“But look.” I said as I switched on one of the flashlights.
Queen raised her eyebrows. “I thought you said they didn't have any batteries?”
“Well yeah. They don't. But they turn on anyways sooo...” I said as I handed them to her.
She inspected them as she tried turning them on. She opened the lid and found that there really was no battery and, without closing it, repeatedly switched it on and off.
“Huh. Interesting.” She said. “Hey King, check this out.” She threw one of them to him and he nimbly catched it.
Tilting his head as he inspected it as well, he turned to me.
“Where'd you find this?” He asked.
“Uhh. The, infirmary. I guess.”
Saying nothing, he continued inspecting the flashlight.
“Well anyways.” Queen grabbed our attention. “What do you plan on doing with these?”
“You see, we thought that maybe we could use this outside, or something.” Maid said.
“Ohh. Didn't think of that.” She said. “Alright. Call the other two and let's try to explore a little bit.”
Doing as she said, we went up to the third floor.
“This place is really beautiful huh?” A familiar voice reached us. “Say, do you know how to dance? You know, the formal one? No? Well, how about singing?” Just like the blonde haired boy we know, he just kept talking and talking.
“How about hobbie- Oh heeey! Jester! Did you find something?”
“Hey. And yeah, we found this.” I gave him two flashlights.
“.......Um, they're kind of empty?”
I took a flashlight from Maid and turned it on.
“Apparently for some reason, they don't need battery.”
“What? Really? Hey Princess! Come check this out!”
Even without his calling for, Princess was already heading this way and stood beside Maid.
Maid showed her the flashlight and gave her one. Surprised, she inspected the strange flashlight.
Seeing that, I just continued talking to Prince.
“So, what about these flashlights?” Prince asked.
“Well, you know about how it's really dark outside right? Maybe these'll work.”
“Ohhh.” Understanding, he nodded. “What are we waiting for then? Let's go!” He said as he went towards Princess saying 'C'mon, c'mon. Let's go!'
Going back down, we met up with King and Queen and went down one more time.
Maid and I lead the group and got to one of the doors leading outside. The transparent one.
“Okay, here goes nothing.” Queen said.
She put a hand on the door knob and turned it. She pushed it open and pointed her flashlight outside.
When she turned it on...
It cut through the darkness almost perfectly.
Phew. “At least it worked.” Queen said.
With that, each of us stepped outside, each with our own flashlight.
Walking further with Queen in the lead, the order went on with King next, then Princess, Prince, and Maid and me in the back.
Smiling, we both nodded and I said in a voice just enough for everybody to hear.
“Hey guys? You might wanna turn around.”
Hearing me, they turned around. And widened their eyes. Well, except for King.
“Woah!” Prince exclaimed.
Woah was right. Even if this was the second time I saw this, it felt really refreshing.
A mansion. And everything else is darkness. Because of that, the mansion was even more eye-catching.
“Oh my.” Queen looked at it as if trying to burn it into her memory.
After a while, we snapped back and got back on track.
Queen lead us as she pointed her flashlight here and there. Doing this for a while, one thing was for sure. That this place was a garden. There were many flowers, bushes, and a few tiles acting like stepping stones.
And there, we even found tall walls made of leaves and vines. It started from one corner of the mansion and rounded off towards the other. But in the center of that wall, was an entrance of some sort.
When we entered, more walls were there. We walked through the corridors the walls made and concluded that this area was a labyrinth of some sort.
We even tried making Prince going behind one of the walls to see if it would impede our view of each other. Which it did. We tried having one of us go as far as possible but with nothing in between to obstruct our view. We found that no matter how far we go, we could see each other. Unless something is blocking us.
Queen told us not to go to the maze saying that we may get lost.
And with that, we got back and ate lunch.
This time we had fish and rice.
For breakfast we had an American kind of meal and now we're having an Asian style meal.
What next? Spaghetti? I hope so. Or maybe lasagna. That would be good too.
After our meal. We went to the supposed front door.
Queen puts her hands on the handles and opens the double-doors.
Like last time, she lead us around.
When we walked around enough, this is what the place looked like.
The cement floor apparently was a road and beside it were grassy lawns. Unlike the garden this place wasn't surrounded. We circled the mansion and found the leafy walls and circled it as well. We went around until we made full circle.
This time we tried to go as far from the mansion as possible.
When we walked about 25 meters, we came to a full stop.
In front of us, was a steep cliff that shot straight down. Not even the light could reach the bottom.
We walked along it and found that it was like that all around.
As if the mansion was isolated from the world.
“Say, how deep do you think this is?” Prince asked.
“Oh? You want to know? Here, give me your flashlight.” Queen said.
“...?”
Curious, he gave her the flashlight.
There, Queen walked towards the cliff aaand... dropped the flashlight.
“Hey!!” Prince shouted.
But what's done is done.
We watched the flashlight fall as it disappeared into the void.
“Well that's deep.”
“YOU BITCH!!!”
“Well anyways, let's go back. I think it's nearing dinner already.” Queen said as she turned towards the mansion.
The rest of us followed leaving Prince loudly complaining and quickly followed soon after.
When we entered, we immediately noticed that it was visibly darker.
Unfortunately, there aren't any light bulbs or lamps. So we made use of our flashlights instead.
… I hope these don't run out soon.
When we got to the dining room, the girls went and made our food again.
As expected it was pasta. Yay! For some reason I feel really happy.
We ate our meal and when we finished, Queen told us to meet up in the lounge again once we wake up.
Getting darker and darker, as if saying that the sun is going down we went to our rooms.
“Good night.” Maid said to me.
Smiling, I replied. “Good night.”
The rest of us respectively said that in turn and closed our doors. But as for King and Princess, they quickly got in their rooms without doing so.
“Geez it's been a tiring day.” I said as I removed my shoes and jumped into bed.
I may be in formal attire, but strangely enough, it didn't feel uncomfortable even when I was lying down. Rather, it feels like I've gotten used to this.
Shaking away my thoughts, I just focused on sleeping. And sleep, I did.
…
Waking up the next morning, I found myself in the same room as before.
Well, obviously.
Getting up, I took in my surroundings. I wore my shoes and left the room.
When I opened the door, I found that the opposite room did so as well.
“Oh, good morning.” Maid said to me.
“Good morning.” I said back. “Just woke up?”
“Uh-huh. You?”
I nod.
“Shall we get going?”
She nodded as well and we went down the corridor...
Which led straight into the hallway.
“What?”
In front of us, instead of a right turn, was the hallway as well as the other corridor.
All in a straight line.
Maid and I looked at each other then hurried to knock on the other doors. Receiving no response, we hurried downstairs.
“Queen!” I called as I entered the lounge.
“Yeah, I know.” Queen immediately answered. “Hurry, the others already went outside.” She tossed us our flashlights.
Nodding, Queen then lead us outside.
While walking around, we noticed that the entire first floor was completely different. The kitchen and dining room were somewhere deeper instead of closer to the lounge, hallways branch off somewhere else, and the path to the exit has changed.
It felt as if we were in a completely different building than before.
Arriving at one of the exits, the double-doors, we stepped outside and found three others, each with their own flashlight.
Well, except for Prince.
“Alright so...” Queen said as our group merged with theirs and turned around. “...” Once she did, she fell silent and narrowed her eyes as if thinking.
Seeing her like that, I turned around as well.
There, a mansion stood with all it's glory. A building so beautiful, it looked as if it needed each and every detail to complete it. Because of that, it looked frail but extremely sturdy at the same time. It looked powerful as it proudly stood there. It was like this, but still...
It's still the same building. Nothing has changed.
“More questions but no answers...” Queen muttered. “I wonder if we should explore again.”
“Hmm, I think we should. Just to know where everything is again.” Maid.
“True. But what if it changes again tomorrow? And the next day?”
“Then we continue searching.”
“...” Queen sighed as if saying it couldn't be helped. “I don't know why but, it feels like you've always been like this.”
“Ehehe.” Maid.
“Well it's not like we can do anything about it. If it happens again tomorrow, then it happens again. But if it doesn't...” Queen paused. “Then the better.”
Looking around I saw Prince looking as if he wasn't interested. Same for King and Princess.
Especially King.
Princess looked as if she just wanted to go back to sleep.
“Meh.” Prince. “Well anyways, hey Princess! I found a chess set! Wanna play?”
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King just quickly walked back and Princess followed suite.
“H-Hey! Don't leave me!” Prince said running after them.
After the three entered the building, Queen sighed yet again.
“Geez, they don't have a sense of danger. Can't they be a bit more worried about this? Well I understand how they feel but...” Queen complained softly as she walked back as well.
Smiling wryly at this, I felt someone tugging my sleeve.
“Looks like we can explore more?” Maid said beaming.
With this, we spent our day exploring the first floor. Our meals that day were assorted as well. I was surprised to see Queen coming in with a dish holding a lobster. We had other foods I was surprised to see as well. Well, surprised not because of the food but because they knew how to cook them.
After lunch, we continued searching and found the initial rooms, which were the kitchen, dining room, infirmary, comfort rooms, and the one with the piano.
What we found different, other than the corridors and stuff, was that there were only 5 locked rooms.
Which was , obviously, much fewer than yesterday.
When we finished and ate dinner, just like yesterday, the place became darker and darker signalling night time. We turned in and agreed to meet in the lounge again.
After saying good night to the others, I entered my room and once again jumped into bed.
I thought about today. And of course, the following days.
Will we continue living like this? I wonder if we'll be able to find a clue, a clue to get out of here... but, I feel like we can't leave this place. Well, it's just a feeling. I hope it's just a feeling.
'Cause I sort of want to leave but, at the same time... I don't.
Guh. I feel like I'm not getting anywhere. And I feel even more confused than before.
Piles and piles of questions raided my head and I thought about each and every one of them.
Where are we?
Why are we here?
In the first place, who are we?
These were the root of all the other questions bombarding me.
It was painful thinking about it. Literally. Every time I feel like I am close enough to answer one of these, a phantom pain will assault me. But I did so anyway. Just to get even the smallest hint as why we're here.
Getting tired, I my eyelids became heavy. And before I knew it, I was asleep.
…
Waking up again, I repeated the same routine as yesterday.
Oh and if you're wondering, we do take baths. In the comfort rooms, there are shower areas.
We sort of agreed that the girls go first in the morning and the boys in the afternoon.
When I opened the door, I looked towards the other end of the corridor.
Just like yesterday, it changed. Instead of either right or straight ahead, it went left.
What was completely different though, was that to my left, was the hallway.
Normally it would just be a windowed wall with red curtains.
I went left and went downstairs to enter the lounge. It felt strange though you know? Since I kind of became used to going right to go to the hallway.
When I was walking down the stairs, a voice already reached me.
“Come on! It'll be fun!! Just the two of us you know?”
Entering the lounge I found two people.
“Don't you think so too? Princess? … Hn? Oh! Jester! Didn't see you there!” Prince greeted.
“Morning to you too. The others?” I asked.
“Now why do you want to know where they are. I can understand Maid, but King and Queen...” Prince trailed off. “Well anyways, the place seems to have changed again huh?”
I nodded.
“I wonder why it happens? Say, do you?” He asked.
“No. I want to know too.” I said.
“How about you Princess?” Prince asked.
Princess just shrugged.
“Oookay. How about exploring again? Since the place has changed, we can go for another round?”
Prince said.
“...”
No response.
“C'mon~ maybe this'll help us become closer no?” Prince insisted.
Remaining quiet, she frowned a bit.
Becoming a little impatient, Prince kept pushing.
“I'm trying to be nice here see? If we go, you might think it's fun?”
“I don't want to...” Princess finally replied, albeit in a soft voice.
“You won't know until you try right?”
“I said I don't want to...”
Prince suddenly grabs her wrist.
“...?!”
“Come ooooonn~! I'm telling you it'll be fun.”
Frightened, she tried to pull away. But Prince was persistent.
Not liking where this is going I tried to intervene.
“Um, Prince?” I called.
“Hm? Oh! I forgot about you... Say, we'll continue this later.” Prince smiled and walked off looking a bit irritated.
“...”
“...”
“So tell me... has Prince been doing this to you recently? If so, we could I don't know? Tell Queen?”
“...” She turned to me. And gave a light smile. “...Thanks.”
After saying this, she walked away as well. But unlike Prince, she was sort of happier.
“...What?” Not really knowing what she thanked me for, I pondered about it for a while whilst walking away myself.
The days went on with us exploring, eating, and sleeping. And each day had a different floor layouts but still the same building. We even tried mixing the groups up a bit with me teaming up with Princess.
Prince seemed to be dissatisfied but hesitantly went along with it. Princess though, seemed to be happy about it.
As for the others, King teamed with Prince, and Queen with Maid.
We tried many thing as well, like assigning different search areas, searching on the same floor, forcing open the locked doors and fail, and more stuff even if trivial.
As long as we can find something.
This continued for about a week. And with us not really coming up with anything, slight changes were beginning to show in everyone.
King frequently yawns now and mostly goes to the library to either read or sleep.
Queen seems to be getting tired of having no results and she's starting to accompany King almost all the time.
Princess is a bit more positive though. She interacts with us more now and could make sort of decent conversations with me. But still, she's really quiet and still speaks softly.
Maid didn't really change, she enjoys exploring and keeps asking me to come along with her.
And as for Prince, it's starting to show that he doesn't really care about our situation.
The days kept going and we began to kind of settle in and quietly make our own routines.
But I noticed. That as the days go by, Prince keeps getting pushier and pushier with Princess.
“Hey Princess, wanna go to the garden?”
“Hey Princess, let me accompany you...”
“Hey Princess, are you going somewhere?”
“Hey Princess, I can show you how to do this...”
“Hey Princess, what do you think? Kind of romantic huh?”
“Hey Princess, do you think there's a reason why I'm Prince? And you're Princess?”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“Hey Princess.”
“HEY PRINCESS.”
“WOULD YOU JUST STOP ALREADY?!”
One day, Princess finally snapped.
“Why are you persisting me?! Why me?! Can't you talk to the others instead?! And also, I don't care WHY were “Prince” or “Princess”. And NO, were not soulmates or whatever you're saying okay?! Just... just leave me alone.” After her short rant, she stormed off to her room and slammed her door shut.
“...”
Worrying that Prince might be devastated, I called out to him.
“Hey um-”
“Heh.” Prince snorted.
Immediately he turned around and quickly walked away.
Seeing this, I had a gut feeling. As if I knew something was going to happen.
I went to inform Queen just because.
Maybe I felt that it would help ease me a bit but... this feeling of anxiousness wouldn't leave me and continued to grow stronger.
It felt unnatural.
It felt like a huge swarm of butterflies assaulted my chest until I really couldn't sleep.
I didn't tell anybody though. I know it's stupid, but to me it felt wrong doing so. So I just kept it to my self.
On my third almost sleepless night, I pondered. Why am I feeling like this? Why am I having these strange feelings in the first place? I've been feeling so many things, and now and...
-Thud!
A loud sound rang out.
-Thud! -Thud!
And two more.
Then more followed by fast footsteps.
Getting up from bed, I tried to make sense of the sequence of sounds until...
-Bang!
The door of my room burst open and a blonde haired girl came running in.
She was wearing a beautiful blue dress but her hair was a mess.
What I processed next was the colour red.
Blood.
“Jester!” Princess frantically called my name.
But before I could ask what happened, another voice filled the room.
“Well lookie here~ Running to your knight in shining armour I suppose? Hmmm... So you ran to Jester...” Prince mused as he brandished a knife. “Well, I did notice you two becoming closer these past few days and... you know?” Prince waked closer.
Princess stumbled away from him and I tried to move in between them. Even though it was around midnight and I was sort of sleep-deprived, I could still understand what was happening.
Prince attacked Princess.
I know how he was being forceful with Princess but... to jump straight to assaulting her? I know Princess blew him off but this is too much.
“I've been... nice, you know? Tried to become friends, you know? I did a lot of things. But... why?”
Prince continued talking. “Why Jester? What did he ever do to you to get you two to become all buddy-buddy? I mean, you could've gone to Queen 'cause you know, she's reliable. Or King, he seems strong. But Jester? You barely talked to him and he, to you.”
Prince paused.
“But.. I did notice. That you actually speak to him more than the others. I've been watching. When it comes to the others, you're all really quiet and on the receiving end of the conversations. But if it's with Jester, noooo. He's special. And that's, what I don't understand. Do you know? Jester?”
He pointed the knife that I now see as a kitchen knife.
“Say, did you ever wonder if were the last people on Earth? I mean, if this is still Earth. Or that, if this place will ever run out of food? What will happen to us?”
Remaining silent, I tried to think of a way out. It may just be a knife, but a knife weilded with the intention to kill is dangerous. My eyes darted around the room, while not leaving Prince out of my sight. Looking at my room now, this was the first time I thought it was extremely empty.
Feeling a bead of sweat slide down the side of my face, I could feel tension fill the room.
Prince frowned. Then smiled.
“No? You don't know? Well, there is something I do know... that something will happen to you.”
He leaped at me. Shooting the knife at me, I tried to move away but I got hit on the shoulder.
“Gah!” The pain screamed at me.
“Jester!!” Princess shouted.
Making a wicked grin, he launched the knife again.
Dodging this time, I moved diagonally behind him and tackled him from behind, causing him to stumble into the set of table and chairs. In the background I think I heard Princess scream.
With a loud crash, the furniture flew everywhere. Quickly getting up, his eyes burned with rage.
Gripping my shoulder, I waited for his next attack. But I immediately regretted when he ran straight for Princess.
“Tch.” I clicked my tongue as I ran and tried to tackle him again.
This time though he dodged. He brought the knife down at me but was stopped when a blue shoe went flying to his face. Taking this chance, I tried to take the knife from him. I held on to the knife causing my hand to bleed. Wincing from the pain, I wrestled him for the knife further making my hands bloodier.
Kneeing me in the stomach, I fell down and brought him down with me.
The one who got up first was Prince. But at the same time, my door blasted open again.
“Jester?!” Maid called out as she entered the room. “...!!” She fell shocked when she saw me.
I tried to warn her but Prince was fast.
He went for Maid and held her up, pointing the knife to her throat.
“Don't move.” Prince said with heavy breathing. Not saying anything more, he took a step back. And started walking ever so slowly to the door.
I got up with one knee on the floor and one arm gripping my shoulder that was searing with pain.
I glared at him.
“Bastard...” I said.
As a response, he smirked and continued to move backwards towards the door.
And when he finally stepped out, he poised his knife and...
-BANG!!