At the morgue, Alfur and the others puked and fainted, all thunderstruck by the mere sight of such an abominable creation. The body had somehow been changed, it's face muscles forcefully twisted into an unsettling smile, as if the killer was an experienced sort of barber or doctor.
Erik did his standard procedure around the body only to find that although the lethal blow was much smaller this time, most of its guts were messed up, as if the killer had somehow mutilated her from the inside.
It was clear the murderer was mad, it wanted to spread a clear message because not far from the place the body was found, all of the insides were displayed in a strangely vandalized manner wcith the message above the wall:
"I am no prey."
The others backed away at the intestinal message as they were too terrified to even imagine how the killer managed to nail it to the brick wall. Some loudly said their prayers, some simply ran away from the scene of the crime.
He rushed to his colleague. "Gerda, we need more data on the victim's connections…holy shit, that is brutal." Said Erik while taking a somewhat horrified glimpse at the poorly emptied rib cage that became the "i".
Gerda rolled her eyes but she went to the scene anyway. She arrived and she can already smell the horrific stench, the sight isn't what scares her, she's seen them enough around the island.
She looked at the message and the body with morbid awe, fascinated by the brutality of the scene. She hasn't had this case before since she first tried her job back in London.
Seeing that she's just looking at the scene, Erik placed his hard hand on her shoulder. "Well what are you waiting for? Got anything from this?"
Feeling hurt from the harsh hand, she pushed it off her shoulder. "Yes sir, one background check coming up" said Gerda while taking a couple notes and ripping it out to give it to him.
As they got over the body, they found out even weirder stuff all around. Scraps of notes that had images of human anatomy that seem to have fallen in the enamels and tongues, loose rudimentary scalpels around the and even a small bag of coins with a letter inside saying:
"For the funeral of the poore."
Intrigued of what the killer left behind, the two crouched to the ground to examine what else there is with the body, using their handy lantern to light up the scene with ease.
As they moved the items dropped into their pockets for further examination, Gerda notices a shadow from behind.
She immediately gets up, turns around and unsheaths her knife only to find out that it's just one of the redcoats.
"Alfur? You're still here?"
Meanwhile Hilda was at her home, holding a quire of bloody papers and a pen. She was carefully revising her own anatomy diagrams as she realized that most of them are women's bodies with a few lumps of muscle.
On the table was Dagger's empty food bowl, as he had just finished it a while ago.
As she redraw the diagram to create a more masculine feature as she prepared for her planned murder, she heard creaking of metal at the kitchen.
Noticing that she forgot to finish it off, she dropped the papers at the table and went over.
"Please…" That's all the man could muster up right now.
She scoffed at the man, who she remembered well. It's the man who her mum invited in her old home and the man who tried to hold another marriage against her will.
"Look, Hilda, I know I did shit to you but please spare me!"
She grabbed a butcher knife and dangled the blade over his neck. "Shut the fuck up. Please, shut the fuck up."
Before he could muster a word, she started to cut the muscle and remaining organs into even portions as he watched.
The knife would cut silently through the muscle, with very little resistance and a few squirts of blood, and grind against the table with a low thud, before Hilda pulled it out with a very low sliding sound and repeated.
As this was going on, a woman who glanced into her home, whimpered and cried murder to the neighborhood as she watched the insides of one of her partners being butchered up by such a maniac.
She smiled gently, noticing the glimpse from the window as she interrupted her butchering on him to focus on the woman outside.
She opened it brute-forced, her hand covering the woman's as she cried out in desperation but as Hilda pulled her in an alleyway and pulled a knife out of her pocket and threatened mutilation.
The woman cried. "Have mercy, please. Oh god, joining the marras was a bad idea after all!" The muffled screams made her feel like she caught a good catch and proceeded to silence her.
She stabbed the voice box and blood spurred out like a broken sewer pipe under the street and Hilda twisted the knife to enlarge the wound.
Then Hilda lowered her head in a horrifying way, only now the marra on the ground noticed how much of a behemoth her opponent was.
She looked over at the body and regretted that she's not any closer to Jared at any point.
Hilda sighed and forced the marra to stay alive and she accomplished that by stealing her neighbor's fabric across the fence and tying it around to keep her breathing.
Then she dragged her inside, with much resistance, and then had her sit at the table overlooking the golden utensils and her old plates, all of them belonging to her partner.
"Why? Why are you doing this to us?!" The woman cried, muffled by the fabric around her mouth.
She scoffed at the woman's cry. "Well you guys tried to kill me first… isn't it nice when someone ELSE is plotting against you, huh?"
The serious yet somehow playful vibe Hilda is playing off isn't making both of them comfortable and one of them wants to get out, he'd been battered since yesterday and he wishes to not be the first victim.
Seeing their faces, she chuckled at the sight and decides to intentionally leave a knife on the table to see if any of them would even dare.
Then as she leaves the kitchen, she pulled out her own knife just in case they actually get out, then after hearing rope snapping inside, she returns back to see that the knife is about to get out of his chair, untied and with a knife.
As the man got up and tried to charge at her, Hilda got her hands on her trusty golden knife that she always got in her pocket, and then struck his hands and then charged towards him, hitting him between the eyes and after he screamed in agony.
He fell to the sink as the blood bled into the floor, only making the marra cry harder seeing she was alone.
"Huh, usually my aim isn't this good." Hilda commented. "But it's an improvement, at least."
Overhearing her comment, the marra started shaking her shoulders trying to break out of the deadlock but it isn't enough and without the knife on the table anymore, her fate is sealed.
Looking at her trying to break out, Hilda then pressed the marra's back against the bloody lump of meat whilst still tied at the chair, grabbing on the butcher knife again, like a farmer about to neck a chicken for the family dinner.
But as the blade was about to meet her throat… she stopped… the marra opened her eyes to find Hilda's grin widening, her face tampered with blood and sweat from all the tension she had while dismantling the body.
Then as Hilda is about to land the killing blow… an idea clicked… she could make her job so much easier… and better yet, they had no choice!
She was so much stronger and taller at least to the victim… maybe she could let one go… just for connections… for her mum's will.
Thinking of what she could do for the poor woman, she calmly put the knife aside and kneeled to match her height.
"Now, I will let you in on a deal." She opined, bringing an uncomfortably relieving moment to the woman. "You will have to work under me for now and I will let you live. Of course, if you disobey, you're doomed."
The marra nodded out of desperation before Hilda lifted the entire chair with both of her hands and then threw her outside, luckily, no one bothered.
"Now go get your pals! I have some cleaning to do."
Then as the woman ran away, Hilda went back inside, the blood dripping down her sink all the way to the floor, making the whole place smell like a slaughterhouse.
She could barely start to plan how she would do the same to Jared, seeing how this mess has hampered any progress.
Immediately going to work, she then threw out all the meat into the street and then hid the body inside a locker, closing it off and barricading it behind a shelf.
She then grabs multiple rags to clean up the blood on the floor, sink and table, which took about 10 minutes.
Back in the morgue with Gerda, she was equally disturbed while going to the main files together with Alfur, who was the only one available to check through them.
Weirdly enough, between the three victims they didn't share anything related to each other. Not an atom of relation involved.
He looks at the pinned files on the wall. "Madam, do you think he just picks them at random?" He asked, "Honestly no… why would someone go through the effort of emptying an entire body if it was a random person?"
Greta sighed and decided to take action quick. Both she and Alfur went over to the most reliable doctor they could find in town.
Which was somewhat coincidentally, the same one to check up on the Foulkestones years before.
Alfur was somewhat concerned with these interconnected backstories.
But as they knocked, they were met with a thin but tall lady, with white and grey messy hair in the doctor's place.
"I heard you guys must be looking for the doctor…"
Gerda nodded. "Yeah actually…"
Then as Gerda looked up from her notepad, her gaze shifted into a sad grin. "Well he- he's not… available for now or… ever again… I'm his student actually. if you guys wish to, I can check in any issues you might have…"
Both nodded. "Will do."
They both went inside, everything seemed just like where the doctor left it when he "left". The woman got everything set and got a block of notes, starting off her registry.
By the constabulary uniform hanging on a hook next to the old desk, Gerda already presumed that she was after a case.
As Alfur and Gerda checked the room, Victoria sat down on a chair with her legs crossed. "So, what do you need from me?"
"Ms. Van Gale, do you know anything about autopsy and…"
Before she could make a statement on the case, she glanced an eye at the corner to see hoards of skin piling up in a tray.
"My dear Christ… tissue removal?"
Victoria noticed her gaze. "Oh yeah, actually," she answered calmly, "it's an old tactic some soldiers could use to disgust their enemies on the field for tactica-"
"Look, we are not interested in the story, what we want to know is, how HARD it is to make one?"
Then as Gerda quickly quieted herself, Victoria's tone switched to a more worried one. "w-well it can be made by amateurs but that would require some knowledge of the human body… heheh" She nervously laughed, hoping they'd dismiss it.
"Then what about rearranging face muscles? Surgically?"
"Look, if this was all found on one corpse, you guys are after a decently talented maniac."
Victoria concluded with a seriously concerned face…
Like she was hiding something.
"I guess that helps...well thn, okay, thank you for your help." Then she jotted it down in her notes before leaving the premises.
Alfur on the other hand stayed. "Might I ask from you something... did your teacher ever do anything on the Foulkestones? Like...anything at all?"
Victoria raised an eyebrow. "Not that I recall unfortunately… I mean he knew about them, even had their contacts and cheques but after a while he resented himself… the last time I saw him mention that was with a very… very tall woman he made a checkup on, then all the files were gone."
Intrigued, Alfur pulled out his own notepad. "Might I have the description of this tall woman?"
"If I recall, she had short black hair, likely artificial but that's unheard of, tall as Heaven, somehow wide shoulders, flat-chested and a scar on the left eye… or would it be on the right one?"
Alfur drew a very remarkable sketch, so remarkable he even surprised himself. Then as he drew all of the details into one person, he shivered in realisation.
He then rushed out of the room without even saying goodbye, making a run back to Gerda for a Eureka moment.
Hilda meanwhile was going to a meeting, to an address she received via a poorly delivered letter. The damned postal services.
However she wasn't expecting anything but a trap. Under her coat there was a fully fueled lantern, one of the bags of powder she had from the cemetery, a knife and a small garden spade.
Arriving at the barn, all of the others had their own weapons ready, ranging from knives to crudely removed sewer pipes. She didn't seem surprised at all, in fact she was actually quite surprised at the fact they didn't try to attack her on sight.
She took off her beret and placed it on a dusty misplaced night table.
"Okay, what do you want from us?" one of the marras asked, having a broken bottle in hand as they arranged themselves around the table accordingly.
"Nothing, miladies. You guys are just getting in my way. So all I ask of you all is to...well, to get out of my way."
"Look, you don't seem very trustworthy… we fight on the same si-"
"I take no sides. Woman, man, slave…well actually not the slaves, that would be fucked up… point is, there are no sides to my war. My war, my way."
The marra negotiating with her facepalmed."Then why should we help.. or even AGREE to you then?!"
Hilda scoffed. "Because you're neither my ally nor my foe, my main target for the moment is that fucker Jared… and second.." she explained while taking off the gunpowder bag. "I can fucking blow you all up in a quick harrying."
Seeing the bag, they felt like they lost the high ground. "o-okay fine…. we can… maybe help-"
Suddenly, Hilda dropped the bag at the ground, leaving a wet thump, showing to them that the bag is a dud.
"I'll give you a deal." Hilda opens. "Just give me a better killing weapon. Make sure it HAS to be a shovel or a spade, I don't care how stupid it sounds to the vendors… and you guys don't spill shit about me, or I will get back at you all…get it?"
They nodded out of feeling threatened by her.
Meanwhile at Kaisa's, she was starting to get sick. Something about that new letter was worrying…
Apparently someone had started to randomly dump arsenic in the mail, resulting in her having terrible reactions and having her table tainted green.
She stumbled out of her office once again, vomiting out into the hallway as she's carrying a massive green box and as she walked down the stairs, the arsenic took its toll on her legs.
Falling down on the wide stairs, the box fell out of her hands and it rolled down towards the latter end of the stairs before landing crudely on the banister, getting stuck in the process.
A few workers rushed by and saw their secretary fallen flat to the ground floor. One of them ran towards David's room while two of them tried to bring her back up.
Her swollen skin and the hot touch of the worker's hand thanks to their job ached Kaisa to the bone, trying to scream in agony but her pain prevented her from fully feeling in agony.
As they just arrived upstairs, David rushed to the hallway just to see two miners carrying a red rashed Kaisa. "Kaisa! What 's wrong? What happened to you?!"
His concerns took over her ears and it made her feel safe with her.
She pointed towards the stairs. "That….box." She said even with the struggle of speaking due to the rash.
Looking at the box stuck at the banister, David politely ordered it dumped it on the trash outside with all safety precautions.
Deciding to act now, he decided to try and argue with Stephen again, who had catched a cold for some reason.
As David went back to the fortress home of his workshop, he was alone in the train again, finally making notes on the inner workings and making a pretty decent blueprint rundown.
Despite the watery eyes and noticeable fatigue, he was still going from the multiple beers and now sickness.
David knocked on the wood, startling Stephen from his work bench. "Dad… someone's been sending toxic stuff in the mail… we better get that checked. Kaisa just fell ill to it."
After looking at him with an annoyed look, Stephen scoffed at it. "Yes, David I know. I was gonna go pay some guards to hunt and beat the motherfuckers, but with this new 'Erik' dude, I just fucking can't."
Holding in his frustrations for now, David asks. "You don't know Erik? Him and his family ar-"
"Famed war generals in a battle somewhere 'round the globe? don't fucking tell me. Me and him have a score."
"...At your house?"
"At the Pearsons, the house that we all have in our names but for the sake of forming our own, none of us use that. Erik and their old men were prominent against us, so we made a generation-lasting pact of shutting their fuckery down…"
He continued. "Erik seems to be the last one, but frankly I can't risk necking the guy, so I'm waiting for someone else… that was usually the foulkstone's part but you know what happened to Hilda and her mom well…"
"You guys are just weird… but… now honestly, can I PLEASE not marry Kaisa? I don't dislike her but… you know…"
Stephen sighed. "To be completely honest, I don't really wanna pressure you that far. But, you're so… naive and you're scared of marrying someone since Hilda and I think Kaisa seems so comfortable around you… I'd never forgive myself if you get hurt again…"
"Look, I understand but… we… we need to stop this before Kaisa starts to resent us both-"
Just as he finished his sentence, the locomotive sent out a puff of steam and slowly started to gain speed.
"Hallelujah! I did it! I forgot that I left the coal on the furnace!" He exclaimed, immediately going back to his job and poured it in a tube with some gallons of water, making the train pick up speed even with the engine exposed.
He looked at the workings and gears as the thing made a spin around the trail system.
And soon Stephen and Frida joined to watch it go around the small circuit round and round.
Even David, who was finally letting out his frustrations a few minutes ago, was somewhat excited as well… but also somewhat worried… he too had received arsenic poisoning without warning.
Whatever was happening around them...he knew it was very harmful.
Meanwhile, Hilda was on her way to the funerary, about to get some more burials done as scheduled.
But this time she was actually quite scared… as she walked to see who was to be put to rest, she saw no other than one of her victims, specifically the marra at the cemetery.
Turns out her family wanted an actual burial, and well, she didn't mind. More money for her pockets, she thought.
Her boss approached her once more. This time with a more serious tone.
"Hilbert." He approaches with a serious tone.
"Sir." She said, trying to keep her masculine voice she trained over the years.
"I don't like to point fingers at my employees but… are you sure you didn't see anything strange…?"
As her boss stared at her seriously, Hilda started to dig the burial hole as the procession kept going. "Sir, I said everything I remember to the Constabulary and that's all there is."
He sighed, placing his heavy hand on her shoulder. "Just… come to my office, okay?"
Hilda tensed up and nodded as she completed digging. As they both went into the office, a very familiar face was already there.
The Doctor.
"Hilda?" The doctor said, surprised but unfazed. "Ahem. So, I see you met my brother."
"Well sir, I would be lying if I said I didn't notice the similarities between you and him."
As they exchanged small talk about each other, the boss locked the door. "Okay, back to the point. You see, although the Constabulary isn't trying to sue, their legal wing surely is. My brother already solved that, and now it's time we do too."
Hilda tensed up from this concerning opening, putting her hand in her pocket and preparing the knife just in case this came to a head.
"Look, we have to sell this place before they start inspecting. We can't afford getting ourselves in prison if we do." The boss said with a cough. "Same as how my brother sold his clinic to his medical student."
"Wait, what do you mean? Why would you sell the funerary home? The Constabulary wouldn't suspect us just because we store bodies."
Her boss sighed as the doctor walked up to her. "And now this is where you enter." Said the Doctor in a serious tone Hilda wasn't used to hear from him. "You must disappear from the map, and so will we."
Surprised at this baffling proposal, she backed away from the doctor and prepared to pull the knife.
"But we will be close friends… each with our… fair share of endeavors…" the boss said while giving away a cheque to the frightened Hilda. "It's better if we have people to trust."
The paper had two addresses aside from Hilda's, with pseudonyms and postal codes.
Hilda looked up to them out of indecision. "So….are you moving to London and… the neighboring city?" She asked, letting her voice change to normal.
"Wait, you're a woman?" Both react in surprise from her voice change. "Well anyways. Yes, we do. And this is Farewell, I'll drop what would be the pay for the next two years, a recommendation letter, a list of jobs, and a bonus for you and Alfur." Both him and the doctor left the room, not a single extra word.
They needed to hurry if they wanted to outrun the layers.
Hilda gave a smile and mentally wished Farwell to her old friend, the doctor.
She spent the rest of the day locking doors; collecting spare keys and some personal stuff she left in the closet.
As she left the place by noon, she couldn't help but feel some premature nostalgia to the place… it served well while it lasted.
As the last funeral took place in their cemetery, she looked back at the mourning family of that marra with pity and remorse for having to kick the bucket for their relative.
At least for now… she could focus on something else… the body in the wardrobe could need some proper treatment after all...
Meanwhile, David and Frida were outside in a small commemoration Stephen was having, and Kaisa was just sitting on a chair, seemingly conflicted… she also wasn't feeling well after that bucket was "gifted" to her.
But regardless, she was much more worried about the news she was quietly reading on the newspaper… a gruesome dismemberment of that women….somehow this little piece of news marked the place on the map.
And now it was seemingly going regional as more general newspapers also started to report. Liverpool, Birmingham, Tyne, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester, Doncaster and even royal family members took notice of the first cases as they were remarkably brutal, even for London's standards.
She was still feeling guilty…about the girl.
The night went by with feasts, drinks, and just Stephen riding around his still-a-prototype locomotive.
But the morning was much more… trivial… especially for Jared.
As he walked by the fields his family still owned, he noticed that his multiple slaves… or employees as he says they are and what they legally are, grouping around a strawman in the field.
He got closer to shout at them for ignoring their work but as he can finally see it, it dawned on him that the strawman wasn't a strawman, it was a corpse.
Its eyes were gouged out, the lips were slit into a dead smile and the tall wooden stake kept it hanging via impalement. The chest were slashed crudely from corner to corner, leaving a gaping wound in the form of a giant X in its torso.
The organs were clearly taken out once again. but what was actually scary was the swollen, dreaded expression the corpse had.
Jared actually fell down to the wheat in terror of this sight. "Wha– What the– No way, what the fu–" He's at a loss of words.
A few minutes later, the constabulary was already called by his slaves and there, as Gerda and Erik were equally frightend by the scene as well. It was clear this was one of THOSE killers, who might not even have a meaning, but he definitely likes doing their modus operandi.
As they approached the stake, Gerda excused herself among the slaves politely while Erik was too busy spending his shots on the ground, seemingly to terrify them.
She persuaded him to stop but just as always, he ignored her.
He proceeded first to the body. "Tsk tsk tsk well well well, this time there's nothing inside again…" He said descriptively while taking his hand out from the wide wound.
Gerda took note. "We already have a group looking around the field." She said as she wrote down the situation at hand.
Erik took a deep breath being relatively shocked by the constant brutality they were encountering all day and with a bit of help, he managed to get the body out of the stack and into the morgue for an autopsy.
They then placed it on the ground before one of them went off to the barn to fetch a cart. After a minute of waiting which involved five shots fired from Erik out of impatience, they brought the cart and now they were carrying it to the nearest cemetery around like a bubonic plague body collector.
Having arrived at the now desolate cemetery, both Erik and Gerda decided that this will be their autopsy lab for now.
As he and Gerda opened the fresh cut atop a closed empty coffin, they found that contrary to Erik's previous judgement, there were actually still pieces of paper among the remaining tissue.
"Jeez….That's one lazy maniac" Erik remarks as he pulled out a sealed envelope inside the blood and guts.
He opened the letter and Gerda went around the coffin to see it too. There they both found a pamphlet or more specifically...a wedding invitation, and a small note saying:
"After a couple years, I finally managed to get one of these."
The wedding appears to be between Jared Haustad and someone that had their name scribbled over in ink, ending with the house name "Foulkstone", a name that made Erik's face shift from bored to anger.
"Well, them bastards always had some real issues huh." Gerda said while also taking note of the name.
"I feel like we just need to find one of the damn stones to end the hunt…"
"Well I talked with alfur… the files guy, and he says that well, really there isn't anyone else with the name here."
"And we have a wedding letter and a house name now, all we need is a connexion between them."
Meanwhile at the marra's barn, they all were quietly in reunion as Hilda had just brought in a pile of guts with a bag. On the box there was a special shovel that the Scots tried to use as weapons.
She then laid the bag, mush with blood. And with just her hands, she snapped the old box open, without a second thought.
She then picked up the shovel and analysed it for any rusts before finally leaving the place again with some of the marras still cowering on the corners.
As she left the barn, they all let out a sigh of relief, mainly the one with a cloth around her neck, her voice box permanently damaged, making her barely able to vocalize.
She picked up the bag and slowly opened it with disgust, recognizing the distinct looks of the fleshy human meat she bought for them to dispose of.
At the estate, David and Frida were finally taking their breaks once again as the medics were on the scene trying to cure her… and just about as Frida was starting to lay down the helltaker hunt for now, her observant eyes spotted the newspapers again in the midst of the medics, excusing herself from the medics and rushing to the table and grabbing them.
She gave a somewhat curious look at the headline before she rushed to the cabin to add that to the pile of snippets to the detriment of her medics.
"Frida! Where are you going?"
As they chased her all the way to the shed, Frida arrived there quickly but as she entered her, she only to find the shack empty and a pile of shredded paper on the side.
Furious, she rushed to David and Kaisa, who were playing golf again.
As she was stomping loudly towards their way, she could overhear their peaceful chatting.
"Say, how do the Scots find this enjoyable?"
David replies. "I don't know, I heard it's like hitting a ball with a club and then you somehow need to reach the hole in one hit."
She scoffed. "There's no way someone can get it in on one try, or see this as fun."
David giggled lightly. "And this is why Scots and Englishmen are different, Kaisa."
Frida was able to catch up, panting from rushing herself all the way from the shed to the golf course, which was around a few yards big. Tired, she decided to rest for a moment before going ahead.
"Frida!" He shouts, rushing towards her, concerned. "Are you fine? You're very tired and your skin is prickly red for some reason."
After panting for the final time, she finally begins. "David, what in the everloving HELL DID YOU DO!?"
He looked confused and worried, raising and eyebrow before making a step back from her. "Wh– Wha– What do you mean, Frida?"
She pointed at the shed with such stifling anger at the tip of her finger. "My investigations, what in our Almighty God did you do!?"
"Didn't you said yourself, you are worrying too much about it." He responded while focusing on his posture on the ball.
"I know but, I didn't want you to trash my every investigation! It's crucial info!"
"You need sleep too! That's crucial as well."
Frustrated by his action, she proceeded to grab him by the arm and pull him away from the golf field as he was about to make a hit. As she pulled him over to the back of the shed, she then begins to calm down.
"Look….those investigations I did….that's for our safety."
Then she walked right behind him to go back inside but to her surprise, David actually followed her to the room. Looking at the now empty wall dotted with holes like a smallpox survivor, it feels to Frida that everything she did was gone.
He placed his hand over her nape. "Hey, don't worry. We can update them whenever we get news of her."
Appreciating the supportive nature that he possesses, she placed her own hand on his nape too. As the skies started to quiet down at noon, the day had come to an end for most.
But not for Hilda.
As she stumbled down the streets, hiding in the shadows as an indifferent person to the public. but as the afternoon began to take shape and everyone went for shelter due to the heat, she smirked at this opportunity.
Reaching over one of the walls, she then throw a ball of string over, landing on a stake in his empty gardens. Then she tugged the rope to see if its on stable ground and after it rings like a guitar string, she pulled herself inside the confines of Jared's house.
She was surprised the guards didn't immediately spot her as she sprinted across the soft grass. The ideal scenario would be to lure him out, but in order to do a proper scapegoat for the people, that would be impossible.
Moving through the grass without making a noise is an impossible thing. Luckily thanks to her job as an undertaker, she knew how to walk over it without disturbing anyone.
As she got through the building, she rested her back at the pristine walls before checking one of the glass windows.
The hallways seem to be empty inside and there were no guards or even maids or servants around either. Perfect chance.
She held a piece of cloth up from her torso as she used her knife to cut the wooden locks to the windows. They're surprisingly brittle as it broke down from moderate friction.
Now with the window open and with a seemingly empty house, she then proceeded to explore the palace of a house Jared occupies in order to carry out her plan.
Preparing the piece of cloth in her pockets and knife in hand, she explored the place. She walked into the kitchen and even though afternoon tea is a must-have for someone with a house like this, nobody seems to be cooking or making tea.
She looked over at his living room and the bathrooms, the door with his painting still there but nobody seems to be in the area.
She then checked the office where she encountered an accountant of his businesses inside.
"Who is th-" The accountant said out of annoyance before looking at the door. "Bum! What are you doing in here, you stupid hobo!?"
A bum and a hobo. Those are no words that Hilda can accept. His voice probably alerted the rest of the house and she needed him to shut up. She immediately ran towards him and slashed his arm and grazed his hand with the supposedly infected knife.
The accountant groaned quietly at the pain. "The fuck did you do to me? People like you should be at a monastery at this point!"
Offended, she then dealt the killing blow, suffocating him with the cloth she intended for Jared but had to use it early for him. After struggling for about 12 minutes, the accountant finally died of asphyxiation.
She then stood up and looked at the soulless body. "Fat bastard." She muttered to his carcass before spitting at him for those insulting words.
She then hid the knife and the cloth in her pockets before sneaking out of the office. Again, nobody is around the hallways here, even with his annoyingly loud voice.
She walked over to another set of hallways with the paintings of the Haustad family all over the walls with eerily fixated eyes on her as she walked. Then a familiar room came into sight.
The bedroom. Finally, she reached her target but as she got closer, her ears once again picked up voices coming in from inside the room.
"Sir, please. I cannot do the act, I don't feel like I should be doing this." A female voice said inside.
She didn't recognize the voice but she did knew who she was. She's that bride that she glanced at the party while walking back to her home with a necklace on her hand.
"As the Lord intended, you must follow my word. Madam, get on the bed now! Or I'm repealing the contract."
A contract? What contract? Is he threatening her with the old papers of arranged marriage? Or worst…..
"Jared, please! Get away! It's not to my liking that you could wish to do upon me! Please!"
Hilda had enough. She bursted through the door and pulled out her knife, ready to face Jared and probably save this poor woman.
Inside, she saw the bride, clearly in her nightgown and Jared, still in his gentleman's outfit, about to push her into the wall with one arm already pressed against it.
From the sight and from what she has heard alone, she already knew that he's probably about to violate her.
"The fuck? Who are you and why are you in my property!?" Jared yelled at her, not knowing this is her with the charcoal dyed hair and the clothes she stole from textile factories.
She pointed the knife at him. "The fuck? Who is this woman and why are you about to rape her!?" She shouted with her normal, feminine voice.
Both were shocked. The woman didn't expect that this haggard looking person is a woman while Jared's shock slowly dawned to a realization.
"Hi– Hil– Hilda?"
She smirked at his stutter. "You're correct." she taunted.
Ignoring his bride, he pulled his hand out of her arm and stomped his way to her. Hilda, knowing that he would probably make the first move, backs away for a few steps near to the door.
As she backed away, Jared kept talking a lot of gobbledygook on her. "Look, I don't know if this is you or not but I swear that I will beat you up so fucking much that you wish that your mother was here!"
That alone ticked the timebomb. Angered at his gobbledygook, she then charged at him with a knife. Jared didn't see this coming and his only move was to place his arms against the wall behind him. Bad move.
Hilda stabbed him in the gut and seeing his widened eyes in shock and smirking at the face of terror, she twisted the knife around his abdominal area, spilling out a buttload of blood all over the blood.
After the initial shock, he finally tries to fled towards the room, pushing Hilda away, but the flood of blood on the floor made him slip and fall to the floor, hitting his chin first against his tile floors.
As he laid down on the flood, looking up to his bride who was standing in front of him, begging for mercy. Instead, she spits at his babbling mouth, making him gag and spit out the spit.
Then Hilda walked upon his bleeding body and pulled out the piece of cloth and covered the entirety of his face. Part of this white fabric cratered around his mouth where Jared tried to scream for help and mercy but after a few minutes of tugging, he fell unconcious.
Looking at the unconscious soul, she turned it around and decided to cover up his wound so that he can survive later on for her plan. Then she looked up at the bride that looked appreciative of her actions.
"Danke. Thank you very much, he's been very perverted." Accompanied by bowing down to her, she spits on the body again and shakes Hilda's bloody hands.
Smiling back forcefully, Hilda took the time to ask something. "So….how did you end up with him anyway?"
The bride looked down at the body and sighed deeply before looking back up. "I was sold to him."
Hilda was surprised. He bought his wife!? That is absurd, even for him. She looked at Jared's unconscious body with shock and disgust, prompting her to kick his body near his wound.
Then she grabbed her by the arm and took the bride out of the house. As both of them were now at the still empty gardens, she grabbed a bucket of lantern fuel and sprinkled it all over the white walls of the mansion.
Before she even light the lantern, she also decided to pull Jared out of the house.
"Wait, where are you going?!"
She turned back to the bride. "Don't worry about it! Be free!"
She rushed back to the room and then slowly dragged him to the hallways. While hauling him through the hallways, she pondered about where the hell did anyone in the house go other than the accountant.
Nearing the door, she wondered. "Where the hell are the guards?" Then as she pulled him out of the door and into his expansive gardens, it's now at this point that she pulled out the lantern.
Slinging it towards the walls, the fires finally began to take shape and as it ate away at the doors, she then pulled Jared out of the premises.
The fire quickly gone out of control and as it finally reached the upper rooms, the guards had finally just noticed the smoke and began to call out for any citizen that has a bucket of water at their disposal.
At the street, Hilda knows that she may be caught carrying an unconscious body, and because of that, she lifted him in the manner of looking like a friend carrying his drunk pal back home.
She finally got home with Jared, with the fire from his house distracting them. and as she barred the door with her wooden chair, she also covered her windows with any fabric she still has.
Then at night, Jared finally woke up from his unconsciousness, he discovered that he was tied to a chair. He wiggled his hands, wanting to get out quick but to no avail.
As the lantern finally lit open against the darkness, he realizes that he is in the kitchen and appearing against the darkness looks like dried blood on the floor from the sink.
Then Hilda finally appears with a knife in hand. Jared knows that this will be his doom.