Chapter 358: Chapter 358

This was hardly the time or place to discuss a dead man's burial. Jenkins tucked the thought away and stepped into the dining room.

The Augustus family must have been quite magnificent in its day. The sheer size of the dining room, along with the slightly tarnished gold ornaments and silverware, all spoke to the family's former splendor.

Jenkins quickly saw that Miss Mikhail had been right—every young lady at the event had a male escort. And whenever young men and women gathered, a certain amount of one-upmanship and showing off was inevitable.

What surprised him, however, was that most of the guests seemed to recognize him on sight. He joined in the dinner conversations, but any aggressive remarks or probing questions were tactfully steered away from him, as if by some unspoken agreement.

His only real interaction was with the lavish spread of food before him. This was a coastal city, so once again, he found himself face-to-face with a fish staring up from its soupy grave, its eyes wide as if it had died with a grievance.

He cast a questioning glance at his companion, curious as to why the verbal jousting was so deliberately kept at a distance. In response, she simply offered him a gentle, captivatingly feminine smile.

Miss Mikhail's friends were, for the most part, the scions of high nobility. The male escorts, however, came from more varied backgrounds. Their only shared trait was their striking good looks.

Jenkins spoke with a few of them and found a mix of young nobles, the son of a marquis with a distant claim to the title, a young instructor from an art academy, and a violinist.

As he ate, stroking Chocolate in his lap, he couldn't help but wonder with a touch of malice how many of the men present were essentially "paramours in training."

The ladies were all quite taken with Jenkins's cat, but Chocolate, in his usual haughty fashion, refused to let anyone but his master touch him.

They then asked Jenkins to describe what it was like to own a cat. As he chatted amiably with the other ladies, he noticed Miss Mikhail seemed a little displeased. For once, Jenkins actually picked up on the subtle shift in mood, so he adopted a more reserved, aloof demeanor, limiting his interactions to his cat and Miss Mikhail.

After dinner, Viscount Augustus raised his glass and offered a few words of caution for the evening ahead. The guests rose to thank him for his hospitality before departing from the estate together.

"Where exactly are we going?"

Jenkins was still confused on this point, but Miss Mikhail simply smiled without answering.

Their party consisted of eight young men and eight young women, but the walk through the countryside at night was hardly terrifying. After all, they were accompanied by three times as many servants carrying paraffin lamps and driving carriages alongside them. It felt less like an adventure and more like a country stroll.

Jenkins walked beside Miss Mikhail, his cane in hand. Her dress wasn't ideal for the terrain, but thankfully, she had chosen flat shoes over high heels.

After a moment of internal debate, Jenkins slowed his pace, moved closer to her, and offered his arm for support.

She gave him a hesitant glance before graciously taking his arm.

This was exactly how Jenkins expected Miss Mikhail to react. If Hathaway had been with him, he would have undoubtedly received a lecture on proper etiquette.

The path wasn't difficult, but it was covered in snow, so servants had to scout ahead to ensure it was safe. The country wind was far more biting than in the city, and everyone walked with their shoulders hunched against the cold. It seemed that most of the party, Jenkins included, had no idea where they were going. But Miss Lindsay insisted the mystery was half the fun.

After about half an hour of walking, they finally reached their destination.

"This is the place?" Get full chapters from novelꜰire.net

Jenkins swallowed hard.

Miss Mikhail confirmed with a firm nod.

He simply couldn't fathom what possessed this group of bored young people, what sort of courage—or foolishness—led them to bring a Ouija board to a cemetery for a game on a cold winter's night.

Before them lay an abandoned cemetery. The roof of the groundskeeper's cottage had a gaping hole in it, but the fence around the burial grounds was still standing, which helped Jenkins recognize the place.

As it was in a remote, rarely visited area, the entire cemetery was blanketed in snow.

Jenkins couldn't make out the location of the individual graves under the snow, but he knew one thing for sure: this was absolutely not the place to be holding a casual seance.

A murmur of unease rippled through the group. Clearly, not everyone had been privy to their destination like Miss Mikhail.

In a world steeped in religious belief, even the most audacious youths had to carefully consider the consequences of their adventures. The desecration of the dead was an extremely grave offense.

Perhaps sensing the group's hesitation, Miss Lindsay beckoned a servant to hold a paraffin lamp higher and addressed them all.

"Please, rest assured," she announced. "This public cemetery was decommissioned twenty years ago. All the remains and coffins were exhumed and reinterred in a new burial ground. The entire process was overseen by the great Church of Death and End. It might look spooky, but I promise you, there's nothing actually buried here anymore!"

Jenkins pressed his lips into a thin line. Even if that was true, coming here in the dead of night to play with a Ouija board was still a terrible idea.

He scanned his surroundings—vast, open wilderness stretched out in every direction. He'd heard a village once stood here, but it had vanished long ago, leaving only the cemetery behind. With no local population, it had become a final resting place for those too poor to afford a proper burial elsewhere. Eventually, after much official debate, the cemetery itself had met its end.

The entourage included not only servants but also guards and bodyguards. Among them, he noted, were three Enchanters: Miss Lindsay, Miss Mikhail, and the bodyguard of another young woman named Megan. The realization helped Jenkins relax, if only slightly.

"It's not as if something is guaranteed to go wrong."

He thought with a touch of self-mockery. He'd been through so much lately that he was starting to expect trouble around every corner. It was probably becoming a complex.

He was, after all, well-prepared. He had his Spirit Striking Cane, the pistol at his hip loaded with consecrated bullets, and the protective charms he kept near Chocolate. He should be able to handle any run-of-the-mill evil spirit.

It was nearly eight o'clock, which meant he still had four hours before his appointment with Miss Miller. He hoped this little game would be over soon. While events were an opportunity to make friends and broaden one's horizons, Jenkins found himself longing for the comfort of his own fireplace.

Being winter, there were no overgrown weeds to contend with. The servants checked the groundskeeper's cottage to ensure it was safe, then swept it out and lit some candles. One by one, the dozen or so young nobles filed inside.

The twin moons slipped furtively behind a veil of dark clouds.