Evan’s expression darkened, and his eyes turned bloodshot.
He felt conflicted and was at a loss. On one hand, he wanted to get close to Nicole, but on the other, he was worried about Nicole getting confused and falling for Levant.
Evan clenched his fist. In a fit of frustration, he slammed his fist into the wall.
That slam hit something in the dark, and a secret passageway revealed itself some distance away. A bright light illuminated the space, and the two adults simultaneously turned towards the source.
What is a door doing there? Is that the exit?
Nicole hurried over, and Evan followed closely behind.
The place wasn’t spacious, but it contained several weird containers. Nicole and Evan checked the place out curiously.
Nicole reached out to one of the containers. As soon as she picked it up, the entrance through which they came from closed slowly.
What is going on?
They were both surprised.
“Why did the door suddenly closed by itself? How do we get out now?”
Evan scanned their surroundings and hypothesized that there had to be a secret lever or button somewhere.
“For now, let’s open the box and see what’s inside.”
Nicole nodded and opened the container only to find a medical book placed inside.
The book looked old, and it was almost as if it was an antique.
Nicole started flipping through it and soon saw the medicine used to make someone lose their memories. That got her to recall how she once lost her memories while being in the Wicked Palace.
She turned to “Levant” and growled, “So this is how you gave me amnesia.”
Evan fell silent for he did not know what to reply. The real Levant was the one that gave Nicole amnesia, and Evan had nothing to do with that. Besides, Evan wasn’t even sure if her amnesia had anything to do with the book in her hand.
“The book also mentions hypnotism and ways to turn others crazy, and…”
Nicole started mumbling as she read the book, she noticed that most of its content was linked to hurting others. The more she read, the angrier she got. In the end, she tossed the book into the box and exclaimed, “This book is basically designed to bring chaos. We might as well just set it on fire.”
“There has to be a reason it was kept safe and passed down for generations, so let’s put it back for now.”
Nicole gave it some thought. She assumed that “Levant” was simply reluctant to destroy an antique that had been in the Wicked Palace for ages, so she sighed. She later put the book back in its place before checking out the other boxes in there.
They opened every single box before Nicole finally massaged her shoulders and sighed. “These are all random paintings and doesn’t look like it’s worth much. Should we get a few out of storage and sell them? Let’s see if they’ll fetch a good price.”
Evan was surprised as well.
The paintings they found weren’t created by famous artists, but it didn’t look like it was painted by amateurs either. Some of the paintings were just strange symbols, so it was likely that a secret was hidden within them.
That being said, those were the Wicked Palace’s secret, so he wasn’t interested in deciphering them. The most important thing to do right now is to get out of here.
Nicole and Evan searched everywhere for the mechanism that would get them out of there but to no avail.
Nicole couldn’t help but sigh. We will starve if we can’t find a way out of this place. We don’t even know if the people in the Wicked Palace and the kids are aware of us being in trouble. Will they come to rescue us?
Meanwhile, the Hidden Masters started worrying upon noticing how Nicole and Evan had been inside the cave for a while.
“They went in this morning, but they haven’t gotten out even though the sun is about to set. Aren’t they hungry?” said Jensen as he stared suspiciously.
“You’re right. Should we go check the situation out?” suggested Jeremy.
John replied, “You guys obviously know nothing about Mr. Seet. He’s probably enjoying his time alone with his wife and forgot all about his hunger.”
The Hidden Masters turned to one another. We’ll let Mr. Seet and Mrs. Seet spend some more time together then.
The quadruplets discussed the matter on their own as well. They later decided to go with John’s words. It’s not like there are monsters in there, anyway. We’ll just give Daddy and Mommy some more time to interact with one another. If they are still trapped when night falls, we’ll go in with our torches to search for them.
It was nearly dusk when Nicole’s stomach started to grumble in hunger. She was so tired that she didn’t even want to move a muscle.
Evan went over and sat by her side so she could lean on him.
Nicole, however, thought that it was a little inappropriate for her to lean on “Levant”. She moved away awkwardly. The image of the domineering kiss they shared earlier flashed across her mind and she felt uncomfortable.
