The people’s wishes would be granted. In the middle of the night on a Sunday, no less, an announcement was made — one that was advertised to the whole world, a campaign funded by the Jiyo family. Dante Searcher’s testimony would be released three days from now in a dramatic reading at the mystery conference. Noone knew why the infamously uncooperative princess changed her mind, but regardless, excitement brewed.
Finally, they’d be free from the uncertainty that came with the reliance on material whose canon was dubious at best. Now, they’d get the real thing — the last and final breath the long overstayed mystery would let out. Finally, the story could be laid to rest and the three years of mystery and illusions could reach its dramatic conclusion.
Everyone was shocked by the announcement and the conference center, which had already been cleaned up after the third year of debate, had scrambled to prepare for a massive influx of guests.
Beatrice stood at the helm of this event, and under lock and key, she made sure none of the material would be leaked before the release date. She prepared everything — from diagrams and blueprints of rooms to a dramatic, thunderous reading of a gruesome string of serial murders.
She stayed home at the castle where those murders were committed, and with pen and keyboard, she prepared every slide, every page and every corner of her script.
It was up to her to make it as impactful as she could — to leave behind a proper, satisfying conclusion, one that would immortalize its creator. It wasn’t for her own sake, but his. It was her final thank you to the only boy who knew how to make her smile.
At least, that’s what she told herself.
A single question crept into her mind. What was the point of it all if he wasn’t there to see how the world reacted to his greatest murder mystery? After all, he had no intent of sharing it with the world. It was her selfish desire and decision to spread the preexisting rumors of murders online — the action that started it all.
This whole time, Beatrice did nothing but follow his script, answering questions people asked through the testimony. From the very beginning, she followed it under the belief that it was him who wrote it.
But now that she thought about it, she looked at the testimony which sat next to her laptop. The more she thought, the sooner she realized a possibility.
Perhaps this testimony really was written by ‘Dante Searcher’. To go ahead and spread that rumor online, lead people on for three years, then release it would be a massive violation of ‘Dante’ and the other victims’ privacy.
To build a legacy off the backs of people who were mercilessly slaughtered in some cruel game — the thought filled her with disgust, and for what? To satiate the curiosity of strangers online?
Could she truly and honestly stand up and allow that to happen?
Looking online, she saw it again. Some people argued over who really died and who didn’t. Some people went around, harassing people who they believed were tied to the murders that took place. Some people treated these real people like characters, toying with their lives in their own twisted versions of the mystery and others paired them together romantically, like children playing with dolls.
The people cared more about solving the case more than they sympathized with the victims of said case. How did she know that? Because that’s how she felt when she was first introduced to the case by Sen himself.
Everyone treated the victims like chess pieces to play with, to disgrace after their gruesome, bloody deaths. Realizing that, Beatrice’s eyes wandered from the testimony and to the fireplace that gently lit her room with an orange, sunset glow.
It was immoral of her to spread this story in the first place, and the only person who definitively knew the legitimacy of the story had drifted away from her three years ago. Now, she truly realized how it felt to be alone, like Dante wandering through the castle after being left as the final survivor.
Spreading it online — she realized it was a mistake. It had done nothing but drag the victims’ corpses out of their graves and onto the autopsy table for wannabe detectives to dissect and disembowel. They had already died and the police had already dismissed the case. Either way, there was no way the victims would get justice.
For whose sake was this all for?
It wasn’t for Sen, who could neither take credit or enjoy the show.
It wasn’t for the victims, who could never get justice for their killer who was long gone at this point.
And it surely wasn’t for herself who grew tired of the entire debacle, silently regretting ever publicizing the mystery.
That’s when her phone rang, and picking up, she heard the doctor on the other end.
“Sen’s parents, I tried contacting them but I’m getting sent to voicemail,” the old lady said. “Have you seen them recently? Have you contacted them and told them about the procedure?”
She hadn’t. In fact, she hadn’t seen them in two years. They stuck around for a year, watching over their son, but in the blink of an eye they had vanished. Ever since, she was the only one who ever paid Sen any attention. Though, she did remember the air — how it was charged with the strong emotions that came with every stage of grief.
To have their brilliantly bright son fall terminally ill so young — it’d drive any parent crazy, and the last time she saw them, she remembered it distinctly.
They were no longer sad or upset. At that point, they had brought a pair of Higanbana flowers, which they left by his bedside. Looking back on it now, it seemed like they had come to accept that it was over and laid their son to rest.
“Beatrice?”
“They’ve said their goodbyes,” Beatrice said. “The only one clinging on is me, now. I’m the last person who still cares for him.”
Beatrice heard the beeping of machinery on the other end of the phone. The doctor was clearly beginning the procedure.
“Is there anything you’d like for me to do before I go through with this?” she asked, and Beatrice sucked in a breath, then picked up the testimony.
“I want you to abort the procedure.”
“You want me to give up?”
She took that testimony, turned to the fireplace, and stared as the flames flickered. Staring at the book, she held it tight.
“There’s no point holding on anymore. I’ve done nothing but desecrate his image, forcing him to stay alive for my sake,” she answered. “It’s time for me to say goodbye, to lay him to rest.”
“Beatrice…”
She took that testimony and read it over once more.
“There’s no more reason to hold onto hope,” she whispered. “It’s about time I finally let him go to his final resting place.”
Tears stained those pages, but it was all over now. She took the testimony, then let it rest — being absorbed by the scarlet petals of the fireplace. Each leaf of paper turned to embers and the souls of so, so many were freed all at once.
To all the victims, innocent or not, may they rest in peace.
There were only two days left before the reveal, but after having burned the true testimony, Beatrice sat outside that cafe, staring off to nowhere in particular. It was about time she shut this chapter of her life and laid the one she loved to rest.
Of course, being out in the public only elicited excitement in the form of both fans, haters and the paparazzi media who wanted to slice up the story and profits among themselves and their constituents. While she sat, tea by her side, she was hounded by a swarm of people who wielded their own theories, notebooks and microphones like swords.
A thousand questions flew like arrows, but the killer’s advocate, Beatrice, sat firm — her lips sealed. She grew accustomed to being in the limelight and gained an uncanny ability to stare off at noone in particular and drown out all the noise.
Questions, rumors, mysteries, theories, accusations, fanfiction — she had heard it all. A more humble person would’ve been flattered and open to answering their questions, but that just wasn’t her.
The crowd grew so noisy that nearby police officers had to break them up. Beatrice had grown secluded, making herself impossible to reach online. Their only way of speaking to her was in person and that had its own caveats. The crowd was broken up, all until a single person stepped in.
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They had hair as gray as the clouds above, wore the suit and tie of a foreigner and over their eye was a black eyepatch. She saw them, froze in place, and silently watched as they parted the sea of people. The figure stood before her, looking her up and down with a tired eye before bowing.
“Princess Higanbana, I’ve heard all about you,” they said. “It is my pleasure to finally meet you in person.”
“You —”
“Before you even ask, allow me to answer your question,” he said, and he placed a gloved hand over his heart to say, “I am Virgil — your humble servant.”
Beatrice sat in shock. A figure from a murder that took place thirty years ago stood in front of her. Even the surrounding people stood, shocked, unable to fully grasp the idea that a victim — or perpetrator — had come to say hello. Whispers filled the air, and Beatrice took it upon herself to realize the most likely outcome.
She stood up, then smiled.
“Why, that is quite the cosplay you have, old man,” she said, and she slowly clapped her hands, saying, “Well done. You’ve fooled me. For a second there I thought I saw a ghost.”
“Perhaps a ghost is the most correct descriptor,” Virgil said, and he reached into his suit shirt to pull out a cup of bubble tea, a drink he pushed towards her alongside a sealed straw. It was a bribe.
“Princess, I must ask, is it true you had renamed all of the victims to hide their real identities?”
She normally gave vague answers to questions like those, but for some reason, the answer spilled out of her.
“Indeed. I wanted to protect their identities, and in turn, their families and relatives. I didn’t want them to be hounded by readers.”
“How kind of you, princess,” Virgil said, “but I must ask — why did you change every victim’s name except mine?”
Beatrice found herself shuddering at his words and her fingers curling up — her nails digging into her palms. Just who was this person? From the way they spoke, it was as if they were really Virgil. From the look of him, he fit the image of an old butler serving a cruel, sadistic princess — a butler who had grown in the thirty years that had passed since then.
Virgil scanned her expression-filled face and simply smiled.
“It looks like my hunch was correct. You are not the writer of this story. After all, you lack the cruel, sadistic nature required to be a serial killer.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’m saying that you’re far too kind to create this sort of story,” Virgil claimed. “If I had to guess, you align more with the detective.”
Virgil systematically broke apart the image she built around herself — the mysterious noblewoman who may or may not have sadistically murdered nine victims in her castle and gotten away with it. She built the image of a serial killer who got away with murder and gloated, spreading the story all over the internet for strangers to try and solve.
To have someone deny that and say she aligned more with the detective — the one who was meant to solve said mystery — was both revealing and insulting.
“What? Are you calling me a fraud?” Beatrice asked, and she scoffed, saying, “You come here, claiming you are Virgil, when in reality I already have a Virgil of my own. If anything, you are the fraudulent one here.”
“Princess Higanbana, have you earnestly not considered the possibility that there could be two Virgils?”
Two Virgils? Why, her Virgil was in the withdrawn hospital hidden in the middle of the forest. What sort of claim was that, to say there were two?
“What sort of proof do you have to support your claim?” Beatrice asked, her face growing red — flushed with blood.
“I believe this will do,” Virgil said, and he pulled out a tape recorder. With a single finger, he pressed down on play.
“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I’m sure you had a lovely, lovely rest. Please, allow me to welcome you all in.”
It was the voice of a woman — of Princess Higanbana. That woman, clearly, wasn’t Beatrice.
“Impossible,” Beatrice whispered. “How did you get your hands on that tape? I had locked it away in my vault for years.”
“You locked your copy of the tape in your vault, all while I held onto mine.”
It was impossible. How could he have his own copy?
That’s when a single realization popped into her head. The set of murders wasn’t a story written up by Sen. Rather, they were events that truly did occur — a string of murders so perfectly impossible that the culprit managed to completely evade punishment.
Now, thirty years later, that murder mystery reemerged long after the statute of limitations had passed on the case and here he was. The culprit. And he stood before her with a gentle smile — gloating over a string of murders he could never be prosecuted for.
But, there was no real evidence towards it. The most that existed was the tape he carried and the claims he made which were of information only those involved could know.
The castle’s age was unknown, all while it was made clear that the murders took place thirty years ago. In that time, there’s a chance someone could’ve cracked the safe and entered before Beatrice or Sen ever did.
If that person did exist, it had to be the man standing before her.
The crowd suddenly dispersed, being pushed off the street by a limousine. Virgil, like the gentleman he was, stepped aside, granting her access to her vehicle.
“It seems like your ride has come,” Virgil said, and he bowed as if he were one of her servants, saying, “Go on ahead. Don’t let us common folk slow you down.”
Beatrice stood, but before she could enter the car, Virgil shook her cup of bubble tea — catching her attention with the jingle of the ice inside.
“Princess,” he asked. “Before you go, I must tell you one thing.”
“And what is that?”
“When the day the truth is finally revealed, I want the true author to be our orator.”
She paused, then gave in.
“I will,” she answered — her voice soft as whispers. “When the day comes, he will be there.”
Her usual calm demeanor had been blown away. She sat in the back seat of the limousine, unable to look the crowd in the eye before vanishing down the road.
She had already completed everything that went towards the finale. All she had left to do was give her final goodbyes. She got off the limousine early, just to spend a few precious minutes walking through the gentle, silent forest.
The world stood still that day, like time had paused. The moment she saw the hospital, she took her time. She admired the wooden walls of the house’s exterior, the slightly rusted handle of the front door and the smell of fragrant tea escaping out the windows. She took her time, so that his life may be that bit longer.
Sen’s parents hadn’t picked up. Not once, not ever. It seems like they had long given up. Now, it was her time to follow the lead they left her. It was a clue so obvious, only a professional detective could miss it.
She walked through those quiet halls, all the way until she could hear that familiar beep. Pushing past the unlocked door, she saw the doctor for what was meant to be the last time.
“Are you really going through with this?” the doctor asked, and Beatrice nodded.
“It’s about time I let go of this childish belief — a belief that there ever was hope in the first place.”
The doctor looked a bit disappointed, hearing that, but respected her wishes — stepping out of the room to give her the privacy she needed. There, she stood over Sen who continuously drifted. He had been put under more intensive care with his mouth and nose covered with an oxygen mask, every vein pierced by a different drip bag and a variety of machines set around him.
It was a pitiful state of being. She couldn’t help but feel awful for forcing him to live so long that his body degraded to such an extent.
“Sen, can you hear me?” she asked. “I realized, after so long, that what I did was wrong. Spreading your story online without your permission has done nothing but spread my misery to others.”
She leaned in, looked down to his pierced arm, and reached for his hand.
“I’ve done nothing but lead people on. I’m nothing more than a fraud, living off the back of your work.” and she squeezed his hand tight to ask, “At least, it is your work, is it? There weren’t actual murders that took place in the castle, were there?”
Beatrice let his hand go, allowing his fingers to curl naturally, tightening as if rigor mortis was settling into his joints.
“I met a man who claimed to be Virgil today. That can’t be right, can it? This work is nothing but fiction, is it? I haven’t been allowing people to desecrate the story of the victims, have I?”
No response. Sen’s body was still. He couldn’t be classified as a body — rather, a corpse.
“That’s not what happened, was it? I haven’t been disrespecting the dead, have I? If I have, then I suppose this is an appropriate punishment.” and she lowered her head, resting on his chest which breathed in and out — assisted by a ventilator.
“This punishment. It doesn’t fit you,” she whispered, and her tears wet his frozen heart — the warmth thawing it ever so slightly.
“Please, God. Punish me in his place.” and she lifted her head up and out the window, towards the dying afternoon light.
“Howell, Baron, Aki, Iffrah, Wright, Calina, Erika and Misha,” she whispered. “To all of you and the real people behind these fake identities, I apologize for everything I’ve done to the memories of your lives.”
She reached down and squeezed his hand one last time. Tears spilled down her cheeks as she whispered to herself.
“And of course, my apologies to you, Dante Searcher.”
She looked to Sen, then to the outlet where all of the machinery was connected — the single outlet that kept him alive for so long past his logical death.
“I’ll lay the mystery to rest, and in turn, I lay you to rest as well.”
A thousand memories passed her by. From the first mystery to the last time she saw him. It all ended in the image of his smile.
“Goodbye, Sen. It’s time I let go.”
She reached out and grabbed the plug.
Then, she pulled. Millimeter by millimeter, the cord pulled out.
“Beatrice?”
Her hand froze. She felt his hand, for the first time in years, tighten in its grasp.
It came out in whispers — whispers so subtle that she couldn’t tell if his lips, obscured by the foggy oxygen mask, were moving. For the first time in three years, she heard him speak.
“Sen?” she asked, but there was no response.
She looked at every machine and piece of technology in that room. Every single one of them suggested that what just happened was nothing more than a trick of her own mind. A sort of lasting guilt, one that manifested in a fake, physical lie.
That’s when she felt something brush past her leg and fall to the floor. She didn’t know where it came from, or how, but on the floor was a familiar black feather.
Even if the feather was a fake, that didn’t rule out the possibility of a witch. That’s what he argued all those years ago, and while she used to argue against him in opposition of the witch’s existence, now she stood at a standstill.
She let go of that cord to grip the feather, then took it to the window where she let it free — free to fly away, picked up by the autumn breeze for it to get caught in the brush of the forest for someone else to stumble across.