7. Trial of the Rose Windmill Cabaret (19)
7. Trial of the Rose Windmill Cabaret (19)
Back in my room, I rummaged through the vanity.
It was packed with an assortment of bottles and jars.
Air fresheners, cosmetics, bath salts.
All gifts from Anais.
I picked up one of the vials. She'd told me it was a restorative potion for recovering one's energy.
On my way back to Ella's room, I pulled out the message again and reread it.
But no matter how many times I scanned the words, they offered nothing beyond the obvious.
A few ideas surfaced, but for now they were nothing more than vague conjectures.
I simply didn't have enough clues to draw a conclusion.
Maybe if I pressed Ella about what exactly happened between her and Wonderstein, something more would come to light.
But I couldn't bring myself to do it.
It would mean digging into a wound that girl carried.
There was another reason I found it so difficult to ask.
I was the one who had done it.
Asking her "what happened back then" would come across as bizarre.
From her perspective, it would look like the demon was simply playing another one of his games.
I dismissed the notification window.
I needed to stop jumping to conclusions and prioritize examining the clues I actually had.
Devolut Immunity.
How was I supposed to interpret that?
I'd tried using Devolut on other troupe members before.
Their longing for "normal bodies" was something I understood better than anyone.
If it were possible, I wanted to make them whole.
With that hope, I'd run a diagnosis.
The Evolution Lab had returned the following response:
[Innate Traits cannot be altered.]
A notification identical to the one I'd seen when I tried to remove 'The Smiling Man.'
Like this grin carved into my face, altering their natural forms with Devolut was impossible.
Because of the classification: Innate Trait.
Wonderstein hadn't simply been gathering people with unusual appearances.
There was something more beneath the surface.
My thoughts had sorted themselves out by the time I stood before Ella's door.
Inside, a middle-aged man I didn't recognize was holding Ella's wrist, taking her pulse.
A doctor had already arrived?
Yurakne approached me with a look of palpable relief.
"One of the hotel's other guests happens to be a physician."
With all the tourists flooding in for the Circus Grand Prix, Rouge was currently suffering a severe lodging shortage.
People with money to burn were sleeping in their wagons because no rooms existed.
When Anais and the people from the Bergson Trading Company had left Rouge temporarily over the "aftermath" situation, they'd offered their empty rooms to guests with ties to the company.
Even if they'd rented out the entire hotel, leaving over a dozen rooms vacant in a situation like this would have invited ill will.
It was better to offer them to acquaintances.
And to think a physician was among them.
That was a stroke of tremendous luck.
"How is she?"
At my question, the doctor leveled a reassuring smile at me, the kind he'd probably deployed for patients' families thousands of times before.
"Nothing to worry about. Orthostatic hypotension. She'd been squatting and then stood up suddenly while stretching, yes? Her blood pressure dropped, and her brain was momentarily starved of oxygen. That's what caused her to collapse."
Had Ella's constitution always been this frail?
As if reading my expression, the doctor nodded.
"A combination of stress, fatigue, lack of sleep, and irregular routines is likely at play. Rest and a nutritional potion, and she'll recover swiftly."
In the end, she'd collapsed from pushing herself too hard.
A relief that it wasn't something more serious.
I could guess why she'd been so needlessly stubborn about it.
The circus was her sanctuary.
Minimizing how much she relied on Wonderstein's help must have been a point of pride for her.
Having done everything within his power, the doctor rose from his seat.
"You should be able to find a nutritional potion at the Alchemy Guild once the sun is up."
"Would this potion serve the purpose?"
I held out the vial I'd brought from my room.
The doctor examined the label, his eyes going wide.
"Oho, this is the one that's notoriously difficult to come by! Though... using this on a young lady might be a bit..."
"That's irrelevant."
Judging by the doctor's reaction, it was a fairly rare and expensive item.
Too valuable, he was probably thinking, to waste on mere exhaustion.
But her health was the only priority right now.
I wanted to do everything I could for her.
I extended the potion toward the doctor once more.
He waved his hands, refusing it.
"Er, well, the thing is, this..."
"Use as much as needed. If it gets Miss Ella back on her feet, I don't care."
"No. That's not... you see, this is... a tonic for men's vitality."
"......"
"You see it, right? The name? It's called Wife's Tears."
A hot wave of embarrassment washed over me.
Without The Smiling Man, my face would have been burning red.
Why on earth had Anais gifted me this?
Given that it was packaged alongside cosmetics and bath salts, was it part of some gift set the Alchemy Guild put together?
I glanced around. Everyone was struggling to suppress laughter.
But, of course, none of them would dare openly mock Wonderstein.
Only Sven, his Clown Temperament acting up, was rattling his jaw as if his lips itched to speak.
At that moment, a laugh slipped from the bed.
"Heh... heh..."
Ella was watching me through half-lidded eyes.
A wan, trembling smile played on her lips as she spoke.
"Y-you... not so great after all, huh?"
"Pardon?"
Seeing my bewilderment, she kept laughing.
"Heh heh... I s-saw everything, you know...? That day... the two of you, in the bedroom..."
Maya abruptly inserted herself between us.
The movement was almost urgent.
She pulled Ella's blanket all the way up to her chin.
"Her fever's high. She's been rambling deliriously for a while now."
"Heh heh... Maya, you... saw it too..."
Ella clutched the blanket and murmured.
She clearly wasn't yet in her right mind.
Lying out there in that freezing rain for an hour, it made sense.
"Troupe Leader, it's time to head to the theater."
Maya pulled the blanket over Ella's head entirely and pointed at the clock.
I hadn't even noticed it had already struck six.
By now, the Ratmen would be unloading and unpacking the equipment they'd hauled over.
"Is it that late already?"
"We need to go and get ready for the performance."
"Hold on. Should everyone really be leaving?"
"Ha ha, she's right. Wouldn't it be better if one or two of us stayed behind to take turns looking after the Deputy Leader..."
"No. Today's the last day of rehearsal. Everyone has to be there for the run-through."
"Right."
"That's what I think, too."
"But Ella..."
The room erupted into a clamor.
At the same time, a scatter of Member Quests popped up.
The troupe's opinions were evenly divided.
I read each quest carefully, then dismissed every last one of them.
I couldn't afford to be tugged along by their individual wishes right now.
I moved to the center of the room.
The troupe members, who'd been talking over each other, fell silent and looked at me.
I met each of their gazes, smiling.
"The performance is tomorrow. No one misses today's rehearsal."
"Then what about Ella...?"
"We can ask the hotel staff. Honestly, when it comes to caring for someone, they're better at it than we are. You know that from the massage service alone."
Sighs rippled through the group at my words.
"All of you, go to your rooms and fetch your gear. We'll gather in the lobby."
The troupe members dispersed to their respective rooms, leaving only Ella and me behind.
Several minutes passed in the quiet.
"Mmm..."
From beneath the blanket, her eyes peeked out cautiously.
When her gaze met mine, she flinched and instantly stared elsewhere.
What was this about?
I walked over and positioned myself right where she was looking. Her eyes darted away again.
Not to be outdone, I moved into her new line of sight. She shifted her gaze a third time.
We repeated this little game of sight tag several times.
Finally, abandoning all hope of escape, she glared at me and muttered.
"What..."
"Heh heh, do you surrender?"
"Shit... why are you bothering me... I'm exhausted as it is..."
"Perhaps because you keep avoiding my eyes."
I paused to gather my breath, then said what I'd meant to say all along.
"Is there nothing you'd like to say to me about what happened?"
I wanted her to be angry with me.
What had happened to her was largely my fault.
If I could just hear her vent her frustration, I felt like my own conscience might rest a little easier.
That was why I'd deliberately provoked her.
But the words that came out of her mouth were the last thing I'd expected.
"Sorry..."
I stared at her, blank.
An apology? From her?
Why?
"...Why are you apologizing, Miss Ella?"
"Taking care of yourself is part of the job. Look. I failed at that, and now I've become a burden to the team."
What on earth.
Earnest as she was, this was too much.
"No one thinks that. Everyone knows how hard you've been working, Miss Ella. Wasn't all of that hard work for the sake of everyone here?"
She hesitated, chewing on her next words before answering.
"No. That's not it. Listen... I went out of my way to suffer. Suffering I didn't even need to take on."
"That can't be."
"It's true. I kept inventing work that didn't need doing, things I could have just let slide. You know why?"
She let out a small sigh, then revealed a truth she'd kept hidden deep inside.
Hearing it, I sighed inwardly with a pang of heartache.
When had this girl's heart turned into such a battlefield?
"Considering everything that happened between us, Miss Ella, it's perfectly understandable to me why you might have acted that way."
"No."
She shook her head, side to side.
"A performance is a promise... No matter how much you despise your partner, if you're cast as lovers, you play the part of lovers on stage. Even if you're sworn enemies... if you're assigned the role that catches them on the trapeze... you have to reach out your hand. That's the principle. Whatever grudge might exist between us... I can't let it ruin the show. The audience's trust, the theater's, the rest of the troupe's — it's all bound up in that. And I let my personal feelings wreck it. So Kirkeus punishes me. Just like what happened to the Ghost... Yeah. This is my punishment..."
Strength gradually seeped back into her voice as she spoke.
She grabbed the edge of the bed and pushed herself upright.
"Stay lying down."
"I have to go... I have to do my job..."
"You're a patient, Miss Ella. You need to rest."
"The show must go on. I can't ruin it... ugh."
Her posture crumbled the moment she tried to rise.
Propping herself up with elbows and fists, she strained to lift her eyes to me.
"W-without me... who's going to be the emcee...?"
"I will."
Her brow furrowed.
"Y-you...?"
"I wrote the script. Have you forgotten?"
My words threw her breathing off its rhythm.
"B-but standing on stage is an entirely different matter. You..."
"I already told you. I've performed in front of thirty thousand people before."
Even if it was from the other side of a monitor.
I crafted my most confident smile to reassure her.
"Trust us, and rest, Miss Ella. Do you understand? Recovering your health comes first."
I was about to walk out the door when I stopped.
I hadn't said the most important thing.
It was the very reason I'd stayed behind in the room.
"Miss Ella."
"...Hm?"
I paused to gather my breath, then turned back to her with a smile.
"I'm sorry for having left all the hardest work to you."
"What...?"
Leaving Ella staring blankly at me, I hurried down to the lobby.
The troupe members were already assembled, each with their equipment in hand.
"Let's go."
Our three loaded wagons plunged into the torrential rain and sped toward the cabaret.