episode_0259

Although I confidently stated as if all the riddles had been solved, the truth is, I wasn’t the only one who had figured it out.

To be honest, the circumstantial evidence was just too obvious. When I made a face as if I had “figured it out” and looked back at Edan with a smug expression, Edan was already wearing a face that indicated he had roughly come to a conclusion in his mind.

“Do you also understand, Ed?”

“In my opinion, this child’s grandmother seems to be a werewolf. There are some werewolf species that can take on the form of a human and a werewolf. She must have been hiding it until she was caught the night before last.”

“…You knew?”

“The torn clothes were probably due to the influence of her body growing when she transformed into a werewolf. She said she would be back in two days, but since she hasn’t returned yet, something must have happened that prevented her from coming back.”

“….”

“She probably left the house once a month to avoid the full moon cycle. Even if she can transform into a human-like werewolf, she would have no choice but to become a werewolf forcibly on the night of the full moon. She said she left the house around the time of the full moon, so the timing seems to match.”

“…I see.”

I hadn’t really thought about the full moon cycle until then. Well, since the night before last was the full moon, it made sense that it was before the full moon.

I admired Edan’s insight, but to be honest, even if it had been someone else instead of Edan, they would have probably figured it out just as easily. It was such a shallow deduction problem that even I could solve it.

The way I played “Luminor Academy” in my past life was basically just grinding under the guise of a strategy guide, not really using my sharp mind to play.

So, the level of deduction I can do in my head is just this much. Feeling a sense of emptiness, I quietly felt Kate looking at me with her sparkling eyes.

“I figured it out, unnie?! Does that mean we can find grandma?!”

“…Probably.”

“Where is she?! Where is our grandma?!”

“Um, I think we need to investigate further for now….”

For now, the one thing that was certain was that Kate’s only blood relative was alive, so that was a relief. In fact, I was a bit skeptical whether Kate was really her blood relative, considering she was a werewolf.

But since it wasn’t a case of the wolf biting her, but rather a situation where her grandmother was a werewolf, it was actually safer than anything else. Even if we were to actually encounter a wolf, I could easily subdue it as werewolves were a superior species.

However, the heavy truth that needed to be told to Kate still remained unchanged until the end.

“Although the difficulty of conveying that she was taken by a wolf has been lowered….”

Still, it was a bit difficult to tell her directly. It could lead to issues like the secret of her birth.

And there must have been a reason why that woman, her grandmother, didn’t tell Kate the truth. It felt odd for me and Edan to just butt in and say, “Your grandmother is a werewolf.”

In the end, unable to come to a proper conclusion, I had no choice but to postpone giving her an answer.

“She will probably come back tomorrow morning. If Kate waits patiently at home.”

“What… if she doesn’t come back?”

“…Well, I think she will come back. I mean, it doesn’t seem like she returned because she was bitten by a wolf….”

“How would you know that, unnie? Huh?”

“….”

“Unnie, how do you know if our grandmother will come back tomorrow morning? What did you find out? Please tell me, unnie.”

…Sigh, how should I answer this?

This is why kids are so annoying. They have so much curiosity, but they can’t handle straightforward answers, always making things awkward.

Not knowing how to react, I was feeling awkward, and then the clueless Ethan butted into Kate’s conversation.

“If your grandmother doesn’t come back by tomorrow morning, I’ll use the Blackwood family’s power to search for where she went.”

“Really?”

“Wait, Ed. Is that okay…?”

“…Maybe.”

Maybe? I’ve never seen Ethan struggle to make a decision like this before. Maybe it’s because it’s a family-related issue that’s making him emotionally weak.

But even if I say something about using the Blackwood family’s name for a search, will this kid really understand? Anyway, speaking like this, kids might not even understand what I’m talking about…

“Okay, Oppa.”

“Huh?”

“If grandmother doesn’t come back tomorrow morning, Oppa will find her, right?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Since it’s the handsome Oppa saying it, I’ll wait patiently.”

…Look at this girl.

When I speak, she answers reluctantly, but when Ethan speaks, what? Because it’s the handsome Oppa saying it, she believes it?

I was seriously worried about Kate’s future, learning how to flatter nobles from a young age.

I didn’t feel jealous. What’s there to be jealous of a little kid who doesn’t even look ten?

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

“Lily, are you sure this is the right way?”

“…I used the power of the saint to find this path, so it should be correct.”

About 30 minutes after leaving Kate and her grandmother’s cabin, Ethan and I started searching for the traces of the werewolf that passed through the outskirts of Hwangdo by climbing a mountain.

Using the power of the saint to find a lost person wasn’t that difficult. One of the abilities the saint possessed was the ability to find the owner of a lost item, which included finding the owner of a lost item.

Of course, it couldn’t be used on just any item; it had to be a precious item that the owner had lost. It was originally an ability to return precious items to their owners.

And among the items we could get our hands on, there was only one item that we could use the ‘owner of the lost item’ ability on, so we just followed the direction ‘it’ was pointing towards up the mountain path.

“But you know, Lily.”

“Yes, Ed.”

“Do you have to carry the item around to use the saint’s power?”

“…Yes.”

“I see… Well, I guess there’s no other way, haha….”

“….”

“But, it’s a relief that it doesn’t look like anything important at first glance. If you weren’t looking closely, you wouldn’t even notice it.”

“….”

“Maybe it’s a good thing that the place she went to is in the mountains. If people saw Lily carrying ‘that’ around, they might have misunderstood…”

“….Ed.”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up. I’m feeling troubled right now too.”

“….”

I couldn’t hold back my temper this time and blurted it out.

But what can I do? Some people carry around a piece of cloth that doesn’t even look like underwear, searching for their owner, and if you make comments like that, it just seems mocking.

Feeling as if she were tracing a pulse with dowsing rods, Edan followed in the direction of Cat’s grandmother, holding a piece of underwear in her hand.

After wandering along the mountain path with Edan for about 10 minutes, they ventured deep into the mountains.

Fortunately, they were not in a very remote area, as the direction indicated by the piece of cloth began to change, and they could easily spot a cabin with clear signs of human presence.

“It seems like it’s over there.”

“…Yeah.”

The cabin was actually quite close, not far enough to say they had run away from Cat’s eyes. Perhaps, if they looked down from the mountain, Cat’s house would be clearly visible, as it was that close.

Even when they had looked up from below earlier, the cabin had been hidden by trees and bushes, making it an ideal place to hide from their granddaughter’s eyes.

“I don’t think they’re a strange person.”

“Well, considering they’re hiding the fact that they’re a werewolf from their granddaughter, they might actually be quite delicate, don’t you think?”

“Maybe….”

In truth, at an age where one could be called a grandmother, wearing ‘this kind of underwear’ was a bit odd, but to be honest, such things were close to personal freedom.

However, even the place they had chosen to hide from their granddaughter’s gaze turned out to be a place where she could still keep an eye on them, so they knocked on the cabin door, feeling a sense of presence.

-Knock, knock.

“Yes~! Just a moment~!”

‘…Huh?’

Wait, was that cheerful voice just now?

It was a rather young female voice, not Cat’s grandmother. Was there someone else here?

If not, then perhaps it was someone else’s house? But no matter how you looked at it, the piece of underwear seemed to be pointing towards the inside of this cabin.

Maybe there was a cohabitant. There was no story about a woman who didn’t want to reveal to her daughter or granddaughter that she was a werewolf, and the size of the cabin itself seemed a bit too big for someone to live alone.

Thinking this, they waited for the door to open, and the owner of the voice they had heard from inside earlier finally opened the door.

…In a body-hugging dress-like outfit, commonly known as a dungtan dress, the appearance of a female werewolf made me feel quite flustered.

“Welcome~!”

“Hello…?”

…Welcome, she said?

“The door was open, so you could have just come in~! Do you have something you’re looking for?”

“Something… I’m looking for?”

“…By any chance, is this your first time at our store?”

“…Store?”

Thinking it was just a small cabin in the mountains, a store?

Thinking this, they carefully examined the sign next to the door once again, only to realize a beat late that it wasn’t a doorplate but a signboard for the store.

『The Scent of the Wolf』

…I fervently hoped that this store was not created for some suspicious purpose.