Chapter 69
Chapter 69. Experienced Kidnapping Victim (1)
Came back after searching for peppers at the market and having a drink, and Serena had prepared a magic show.
It was a magic trick where Serena went poof and disappeared.
She wasn't visible in the bedroom, bathroom or toilet, backyard, or even the dimly lit private beach.
"Where did she go now?"
"She must have woken up midway and went out to play."
It was unexpected that weak-stamina Serena, who he'd expected to be knocked out until at least morning, woke up alone and went toddling around, but if it was Serena who was thoroughly excited about her first overseas trip, non-existent stamina might have surged forth.
"I'll go look around the resort."
"Why bother? Just wait until she comes back."
"Won't Miss Serena feel hurt otherwise?"
"...You seem to particularly look after Serena, I'm saying..."
Serena would have been bored staying cooped up alone in the lodging.
Right about now, she might be feeling hurt saying 'They left me alone and went out to play together!'
Perhaps Penelope agreed on that point as she didn't add any further words.
"Do you have anywhere in mind?"
"The beach bar operates until 5 o'clock. I plan to check there."
Considering the possibility that Serena, left alone, would wander around the resort like a lonely stray cat.
He looked around the beach bar operating until late at night but couldn't find even a single strand of pink hair.
He asked the bartender shaking a shaker, 'Haven't you seen a rather short, pinkish young lady?' but only received the answer 'Haven't seen her' before returning to the lodging.
Penelope, who had been waiting at the lodging so their paths with Serena wouldn't cross, asked.
"Did you find her?"
"The bartender also said he's never seen her. Just in case, I also looked around the walking path, but she wasn't there."
"Did she run away again this time? Or was she kidnapped or something."
At Penelope's joking self-talk, along with a chilling sensation, the intoxication descended.
Perhaps...
Was it not simply their paths crossing?
This wasn't the product of rational reasoning.
It was an unrefined, hazy intuition.
But being able to survive in this world until now was possible because he hadn't ignored vague intuitions.
If it was an intuition that couldn't be explained with clear logic, he could raise its resolution from now on by combining clues.
Even if it turned out to be groundless worry and wasted effort, there was nothing particularly to lose.
Penelope would just give Serena a hard time.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm going to examine Miss Serena's bedroom."
"I checked everything inside here though? I checked Serena's room too."
At Jurgen's stubborn attitude, Penelope sat up as if realizing something.
"...It was a joke, but you don't really think it's kidnapping, do you?"
As Jurgen swooshed up the stairs heading toward Serena's room, Penelope urgently followed.
"Serena's also a woman, so she'd hate a man rummaging through her room, right? Should I check again instead?"
"I'll ask for her understanding about that part separately later."
"Aren't you overreacting? This is a resort."
Viewed from common sense, Penelope's words weren't wrong.
Soltera, where large and small cartels ran rampant over interests, had accordingly unstable security.
However, tourist zones were exceptions, and moreover, this was 'Del Alba Resort.'
Not some random resort, but when you think of 'Costa Bay,' the first that comes to mind, a luxury resort where even the most standard room required preparing for bleeding out a minimum of 2 Crowns per night.
The very fact of considering the possibility of 'kidnapping' within it could seem like an overreaction.
"If you discover anything that seems strange, tell me."
"Haah, I don't know. I definitely warned you."
Opening the door and turning on the switch on the wall.
As the gas lamp decorated with gold leaf lit up, the appearance of the luxurious bedroom became visible.
Though called a bedroom, it could be called a suite room complete with a living room, terrace, and even a private bathroom.
Jurgen picked up clues with his senses on high alert.
"...There doesn't seem to be anything particularly suspicious."
While Jurgen looked around the room with a serious expression, Penelope also peeked around investigating the room.
But from what she saw... it was just a neatly organized room.
Well-arranged bedding, undisturbed carpet.
The window was locked and the middle door leading to the external terrace was also properly locked.
Even if she tried playing detective, there wasn't a single suspicious point anywhere.
She thought that while Jurgen being capable was true, this time he'd barked up the wrong tree but...
"Penelope."
Jurgen, who had checked the bathroom, calmly declared.
"It seems Miss Serena is in trouble."
"...Why?"
"I deduced it by combining various clues."
Before Penelope, who was too bewildered to be shocked and had no particular sentiment, Jurgen calmly began explaining.
"First, Miss Serena collapsed within 5 minutes of arriving at the lodging. She didn't have time to wash and didn't change clothes either."
"Right?"
"If Miss Serena had woken up midway and gone out, she would have groomed herself before going out. Wouldn't she?"
"...That's true."
Serena always devoted much attention to grooming.
She kept an eye on trending fashion trends and made small changes to even her hairstyle, changed yet seemingly unchanged.
Though she'd never stated detailed reasons, probably being a 'Viscount Young Lady,' she'd likely developed the habit of dressing with full spirit to avoid being looked down upon.
"That Miss Serena went out without washing or changing clothes."
"How did you know that?"
"There wasn't a single drop of water in the bathroom. Also, I opened all the luggage but the dress Miss Serena was wearing today wasn't there."
In other words, if Serena had gone out on her own feet...
It meant she went out for a stroll unwashed and grimy while wearing a dress all wrinkled from rolling around in bed, without even washing her hair.
If it were just a brief nearby walk that would be one thing, but Serena had been away from the lodging for at least an hour.
Considering Serena's usual behavior patterns, it was clearly unnatural.
"...It is strange. Did she fall into the ocean or something?"
"Given Miss Serena's personality, she wouldn't go anywhere near the night ocean."
"What about the possibility she went entirely outside the resort grounds?"
"Similarly unlikely."
To summarize, didn't it mean Serena, who couldn't have gone outside the resort, wasn't visible within the resort grounds, and had even disappeared without grooming herself?
"Kidnapping seems going too far but... there is a problem."
Only then did Penelope also realize this wasn't something to pass over lightly.
***
Del Alba Resort's lobby and check-in counter.
"You're saying your companion has disappeared?"
"That's right."
The senior manager wearing a full suit set even in the sweltering heat showed a trained smile.
He smiled so politely his eyes remained slitted throughout.
"I see. I'll ask a few questions to confirm the situation. Are there any items missing from inside the room?"
"Not particularly."
"What about traces of outsiders coming and going?"
"There weren't any."
"Could you tell me the time you last saw your companion and their appearance?"
"I last confirmed about 8 hours ago. Pink hair and pink eyes, height around 150cm so on the shorter side. And..."
As they advertised as a high-end luxury resort, the social status of guests was often high.
Del Alba Resort's management philosophy was to at least pretend to comply no matter what unreasonable demands guests made.
"Ahem. Yes, I understand. First, I apologize for causing worry on what should have been a comfortable trip. I'll arrange for resort staff to contact us if they spot your companion. I'll instruct security staff to search the coast."
The smile the manager was making now was exactly the smile of 'pretending to comply no matter what unreasonable demands guests make.'
Adding somewhat malicious imagination, should it be called a response where the moment he turns around he'd say 'Making a fuss over everything, damn troublemakers'?
"Please don't worry too much. Perhaps your companion just got lost momentarily since it's the first day of your stay. If you entrust it to us and wait at your lodging, we'll contact you."
As the manager headed somewhere, Penelope, who had been sitting on the lobby sofa with legs crossed, vented her dissatisfaction.
"Feels like coddling a whiny child, doesn't it?"
"Can't be helped. Our claim was based on intuition after all."
It was hard to say the manager made an entirely wrong response.
Actually, even Jurgen wasn't certain how things were turning, let alone from the manager's position as a complete outsider.
Should he have brought Vic...
Then like last time, it would have been something simply resolved by tracking the scent.
He'd left Vic behind because summer Vic became as lethargic as Penelope, but he hadn't known he'd need Vic's help in this way.
"The atmosphere clearly wasn't one where they'd handle it properly. How about filing a missing person report with the police?"
At Penelope's words, an old man who had been sipping alcohol in a corner of the lobby suddenly interjected.
"Meaningless, you two."
While his appearance with neatly combed grayish hair was unmistakably a Britannian gentleman, the deeply carved wrinkles and tanned skin suggested the years the old man had spent in Soltera.
"Meaningless, you say. What do you mean?"
"You just talked with that employee. You said a friend disappeared?"
The old man clicked his tongue.
"It's not in the Costa Bay promotional booklets. How many greenhorn travelers like you do you think go missing in Soltera per year? At least several hundred."
His attitude had a peculiar mix of the weariness of watching a child's obvious mistake and the subtle superiority complex like a teacher just before revealing the answer.
It was certain he wasn't a good-natured person.
"Could you explain in more detail?"
Jurgen calmly asked while gesturing with his eyes to stop Penelope, who looked clearly heated.
Right now, even a single piece of information was precious.
"I'm saying the local police are all in it together anyway. That young lady, she's probably already been dragged off by slave traders by now?"
Local police and in it together, slave traders.
Combining those with the clue of Soltera, what the old man was trying to say became visible.
"Are you saying our companion got caught up in human trafficking?"
"The slave trade has a lot to profit from. If it's a young woman, all the better."
"But our colleague never left outside the resort. How could they have kidnapped her?"
Penelope interjected.
Perhaps viewing the old man's attitude unfavorably, he was anxious, but fortunately it was a polite tone.
"This is why outsiders who know nothing about local circumstances become targets. Is a resort some kind of military facility? From the cartel bastards' perspective, buying off a few employees is nothing."
"Isn't Del Alba a high-class resort? If disappearance cases were frequent in such a place, wouldn't it be bad for the establishment's reputation?"
"That's why they target easy marks like you. Nouveau riche who have no backing and are naive but got lucky touching some petty cash."
The old man, who looked Jurgen up and down, stood up as if he'd said all he had to say.
"Do pray your friend is just passed out drunk in some corner of the resort. Or go check the Empire's slave market right now."
At the condescending tone until the very end, Penelope's patience also ran out.
"Wait."
The way that old man who looked about to die spoke was very irritating.
"How dare you call anyone a commoner?"
Soltera was a protectorate that had delegated diplomatic and defense rights to Britannia.
Mainland kingdom nobles and Soltera local nobles differed like heaven and earth from treatment to status.
According to Penelope's social circles skill 'sidelong glance,' that old man was precisely a nouveau riche acting noble with money in Soltera.
She'd heard there were many such fellows in protectorates, and he was exactly that specimen.
Perhaps his eyes had gone bad from excessive ultraviolet exposure, but if he tried to play such pathetic hierarchy games even seeing this nobility, Penelope had no choice but to show the dignity of Rosemore.
Since he wasn't even from the mainland anyway, would he know Nortaris circumstances?
The moment she resolved to make him obediently spit out information while at it.
"..."
Jurgen, who met her eyes, placed his index finger on his lips and lightly shook his head.
The context made his action's meaning clear.
It meant 'Don't reveal you're Rosemore.'
"Do you have something to say?"
Penelope Rosemore.
Her temper had really mellowed a lot.
"...Nothing at all."
The old man who had stopped briefly clicked mockingly at Penelope chewing her lips and moved away.
Forget everything and just sell Cola