OKHS 10

Chapter 10

Her heart pounded, and cold sweat pooled in her palms.

Her intuition was screaming.

The circumstances unfolding were anything but ordinary.

Just as Mona was about to ask Benny for more specific information, Jake spoke up first.

“The noble hero causing a commotion over a single woman. What a rare sight.”

“I know, right. Richard Kronel is famous for never having had a single scandal involving women.”

“But why is he searching for her? Women would line up to rush to the battlefield if the war hero called. Don’t tell me he got swindled out of money?”

“Senior! Would the great hero of the realm be so petty over money? That’s insulting.”

“Then what’s the reason?”

“Well, I don’t know the exact reason, but apparently the woman was wearing a mask and hiding her identity.”

“A mask?”

“Yes. They say he met her in the Luna district, and the clues are a mask and white hair.”

“Hic!”

Mona, who had been listening intently to Benny’s words, was so startled she even hiccuped.

White hair.

White mask.

They matched exactly what she had looked like that night.

She was doomed.

“Mona, what’s wrong with you? All of a sudden.”

Benny looked at the hiccuping Mona with a puzzled expression.

Mona clamped her hand over her mouth to stop the hiccups and shook her head vigorously.

“Mona, you, don’t tell me…”

Jake narrowed his eyes.

“Are you a Richard Kronel fangirl too?”

“…Pardon?”

“Your reaction just now was exactly that. You were shocked to hear he’s chasing after some woman, weren’t you.”

“Mona. Live in reality. Would that magnificent man ever spare you a glance? Beautiful women are lining up for him.”

Jake clicked his tongue and continued nagging.

“Sigh, so distracted by fangirling that your research falls by the wayside. Cool your head with cold water and go write up your backlogged research journal right now. Understood?”

Nodding while suppressing her hiccups, Mona staggered toward the lab.

She had no idea how she’d managed to finish her research and return to the dormitory today.

‘…He’s definitely going to kill me.’

She had witnessed the war hero and member of the imperial family turning into a monster—there was no way he would leave her be.

The image of her neck being sliced clean off by his sharp sword kept flickering in her mind.

“Urk…! Hehe— ugh. Prince Richard, please… please…”

At the same time, the desperate scream she had heard in the dark alley came back to her.

It was truly a scene she should never have seen or heard.

“Ugh…”

Mona pulled the blanket over her head and her teeth chattered.

Having witnessed something she absolutely shouldn’t have was problem enough, but it was also a problem that the incomplete perfume she had created had unintentionally caused an aphrodisiac effect.

To think she had intoxicated a member of the imperial family with a drug.

It hadn’t been intentional, and she herself had been affected by the drug too—but such excuses would never fly.

Surely she wouldn’t be arrested for illegal possession of a fragrance and left to rot in prison for life?

As Mona spiraled through all sorts of terrible imaginings at the news that Richard Kronel was searching for her, she ultimately couldn’t sleep a wink that night.

“Your Excellency, among the inn employees in the Luna district, we have found a young woman matching the appearance you described.”

“…Bring her.”

Shortly after, a woman entered the office with a tense expression.

The moment Richard saw the woman his subordinate had brought, his lips pressed into a hard line.

He remembered vividly the hair white as snow.

She had even left a single strand of white hair on the bed like evidence.

But that—anyone could see it was silver hair.

‘And the woman in my arms was smaller in build.’

Richard shook his head immediately.

“Commander, this one isn’t her either!?”

The moment the woman withdrew, Dominic, a member of the Black Knight Order waiting behind, asked with a weary expression.

Dominic, a young man with fresh green hair and a neat impression, had been reduced to a wilted spinach-like state from the intense search operations of the past few days.

“One look and I can tell she’s not.”

“Are you sure you weren’t seeing things? No matter how thoroughly we combed the Luna district, not a single person claimed to have seen a woman with hair white as snow like you described.”

In the process of turning everything upside down looking for the woman, they had instead netted a whole string of illegal cigarette distributors and drug users.

As a result, rumors were circulating that Richard’s true objective was to cut off the funding lines of the Luna district’s underworld, and that the woman was merely a pretext.

“Would I be unable to distinguish between a hallucination and reality?”

“B-but it could be a side effect of the Chaos…”

Dominic lowered his voice as much as possible and whispered.

Dominic and the four elite members of the Black Knight Order knew that Richard, who had been swept into the massive, unidentified chaos, was suffering from side effects.

They couldn’t not know.

Dominic hadn’t even been swept into the massive chaos—he had only briefly brushed its edge.

Even he suffered from aftereffects, so Richard, who had gone all the way in and come out, needed no further explanation.

“…It can’t be a side effect.”

Richard recalled the hot, sweet body temperature in his arms that had subdued the monster, and spoke in a cold tone.

Swallowing the impatience that had begun seething in his belly.

In truth, he had assumed he would find the woman quickly.

The women who frequented the Luna district were limited, and her hair was so distinctive.

But even after raiding everything from salons to drinking establishments to gambling dens, not a single person knew of a white-haired woman—not even one who claimed to have seen her.

‘…I’m starting to get invested.’

Just as he was running his tongue along the inside of his cheek, his eyes glinting coldly—

“Lord Richard!”

Bang—!

With the sound of the door flying open, Hugo, the vice-commander of the Black Knight Order, rushed urgently into the office.

Richard’s neat eyebrows rose slightly.

“What is it?”

“Monsters are running wild at the western border, sir.”

“Monsters, rampaging again?”

“Yes.”

How long had it been since they subjugated the Black Dragon that fell into chaos, and now monsters were running wild at the border again.

Richard’s lips hardened coldly.

Mona spent about three days trembling in fear.

Whenever there was a knock on the door, her heart dropped, and she held her breath at the sound of footsteps in the corridor.

But as nearly half a month passed without incident, the fear dulled, and she was gradually able to regain her composure.

‘If he hasn’t found me by now, he probably never will…’

When you thought about it, Richard must have been out of his right mind that night too, due to the perfume’s side effects—just like her.

So there was no way he could clearly remember her appearance, especially since she’d been wearing a mask.

Moreover, the salon Professor Thomas frequented was a pleasure district that Mona had never once set foot in in her entire life.

No matter how thoroughly they searched that area, they would never find any clue about her.

Calmly listing the reasonable grounds for why he wouldn’t be able to find her, Mona headed to the dye shop.

‘It was lucky that all the dye washed out that day.’

She always dyed her hair ash-gray, and everyone knew the woman he was looking for had white hair.

The reason the dye had faded was simple, now that she thought about it.

Because the man’s presence had reversed the flow of mana, the cheap dye made with low-grade alchemy couldn’t cling to her hair and had fallen out in dust-like particles.

‘I should switch to the expensive stuff.’

This time, something that won’t dust off.

It’s a bit of a waste of money, but it’s not more precious than my life…

That was when Mona, holding her emergency savings and seriously examining the premium dye display—

“Is the young lady here to buy white too?”

The shopkeeper sidled up and asked.

“…Pardon?”

“But what a shame. White, silver, platinum, even light blue—they’re all sold out. If you came looking for something to make your hair white, you’ve wasted your trip.”

“Why would people buy that…?”

“Why else? White hair is all the rage these days. Because the war hero said white hair is his type…”

Mona was momentarily speechless.

Absurdly, everyone seemed to be mistaking a serious incident for a romance novel.

‘It must be because of that man’s unreal appearance.’

He didn’t exactly give off the image of someone who would hunt down a woman to destroy evidence.

Tsk, clicking her tongue, Mona bought an ash-gray dye with plenty of stock and left the shop.

Looking around again, young ladies with white hair were beginning to enter her field of vision one by one.

‘Even if someone catches a glimpse of my white hair, at worst I’ll just be mocked for dyeing it with whatever trend-following drug is popular.’

It was absurd, but not particularly bad for her—Mona scratched her head and headed to the lab.

But now that she had set aside her fear of Richard, the reality before her eyes was a horror story in itself.

“…There’s no substitute professor for the time being either?”

“Yeees. Professor Thomas isn’t dismissed, just suspended. And there’s no one available to take over for that short period.”

The Department of Monster Studies clerk answered half-heartedly.

“Then when exactly will Professor Thomas be reinstated…?”

“Well, if it’s short, about three months.”

“Three months!?”

“It could be longer.”

She needed to get her first thesis approved within the year to attempt early graduation next year, and now there was no professor to approve it.

‘What do I do?’

Mona was passing the time writing a research journal she couldn’t even focus on when—

Around the afternoon, the department clerk suddenly called for Mona.

“Miss Mona.”

“…Yes?”

“The Dean of Academic Affairs is looking for you.”

“Me?”

“Yes.”

The Dean of Academic Affairs was quite a high-ranking figure within the Academy.

With a puzzled feeling, Mona headed to the flashy, ornate main building where the Dean was.

And there, she received an unexpected proposal from the Dean.

“Join a project team?”

“Yes. It’s a top-secret project currently known to only a few within the Academy.”

The Dean continued in a serious voice.

“But that team needs a researcher knowledgeable about monsters. The former professor, Emil, strongly recommended you.”

“Thank you for thinking highly of me, but I need to write my graduation thesis, so I don’t have the leisure to participate in outside work.”

It sounded like a hassle at first listen, so she refused immediately—but the Dean dangled bait.

Bait she absolutely could not resist biting on.

“Ah, if that’s the reason, there’s no need to worry.”

“If you simply produce meaningful results on that team, you won’t need to write a separate thesis for your degree. Naturally, early graduation would also be possible.”

Early graduation.

At that word, Mona answered as if bewitched.

Without knowing that it was digging her own grave.

“I’ll do it.”