Chapter 262 Catch the Thief
Alton watched as Seraphina returned the crest ring to Isabella, frowning.
What's going on?
Could it be that the crest ring Isabella had wasn't actually the one Seraphina lost?
Apart from the phoenix-patterned crest ring found on Isabella, Rose hadn't found anything else.
Isabella looked at Seraphina, "Ms. Seraphina Waverly, can you now prove that the theft of your crest ring has nothing to do with me?"
Seraphina's face looked rather unpleasant.
She still didn't quite believe that her crest ring wasn't stolen by Isabella, but she had no evidence.
"However, last night, I did go toward the main hall," Isabella said. "Because I heard some strange sounds in the middle of the night."
At these words, Seraphina suddenly looked at her, "What did you hear?"
Isabella narrowed her eyes slightly, "I heard... it seemed like someone was chanting a prayer. The sound was distant and drawn out, lasting for quite a while, probably half a minute. It sounded very uncomfortable."
Only then did Seraphina remember, "I heard that sound yesterday too!"
"Really?" Isabella lifted her chin, looking at her. "The sound I heard came from the direction of your bedroom, which is why I went to check things out. More importantly..."
"When I went there, I smelled roses in the hallway."
Isabella's gaze fell meaningfully on the maid Rose, "Exactly the same as the scent on her."
At these words, Rose's face turned deathly pale.
Seraphina's expression darkened even more, and her cold gaze went straight to Rose, "You came to my room last night?"
"No... no..." Rose looked at Seraphina in terror, "Ms. Seraphina Waverly! I didn't... I really didn't..."
Seraphina stared intently at Rose, as if trying to determine whether she was telling the truth.
Elijah, standing to the side, spoke up, "Ms. Seraphina Waverly, whether it's her or not, we'll know after searching."
"Elijah, search her!" Seraphina ordered coldly.
Rose tried to back away.
Elijah directly pulled Rose over, had several guards hold her down, and forcibly searched her.
Sure enough, they found Seraphina's crest ring on Rose.
Looking at the crest ring found on Rose, Seraphina's face instantly became extremely ugly.
She walked over and slapped Rose across the face, "You're asking for death! How dare you hypnotize me and steal my crest ring!"
Rose knelt on the ground, "I'm... I'm sorry, Ms. Seraphina Waverly, I was wrong..."
Hearing Seraphina mention hypnosis, Isabella frowned, "The sound I heard last night was hypnotic?"
Seraphina glanced at her, "That's right. I usually don't sleep well, so Rose isn't just a maid I hired, she's also a hypnotist who can help with sleep."
"I just never expected that she would dare to put me under deep hypnosis without my permission!"
At this point, Seraphina glared at Rose with disgust.
"What's deep hypnosis?" Tyrell asked curiously.
"Deep hypnosis means putting someone into a deep sleep state, but not just any deep sleep state - it puts the hypnotized person in a state where their senses are completely shut off, so the hypnotized person can't hear sounds around them or notice anything unusual."
As an ancient martial arts professional, Seraphina's senses were already different from ordinary people. If an ordinary person tried to steal something from her, they would probably be detected before they even got close.
But yesterday, her crest ring that she carried with her was stolen without her noticing at all, precisely because she had been hypnotized.
Seraphina continued, "Someone, drag her out and give her ten lashes, then throw her out of the castle!"
A mere maid daring to be so reckless.
She was really asking for death.
The guards immediately dragged Rose out of the hall. Rose kept crying and begging for mercy, but Seraphina ignored her completely.
Rose was held firmly by two guards gripping her arms.
Another guard held a whip and lashed it hard across Rose's back.
Rose was in so much pain that tears fell from her eyes.
Another lash.
Rose bit her teeth tightly. She clenched her fists, her nails digging deep into her palms, her face becoming gloomy, her eyes full of malice.
It was all because of that Lumaria girl.
If it weren't for her, how would she have been discovered?
Another lash struck her flesh.
Rose was in so much pain she almost passed out.
She gripped her palms tightly to keep herself from using her hypnotic powers.
If she could, she really wanted to kill all these people right now.
But she couldn't yet!
This was the Waverly family's castle.
Even though her hypnosis could knock down a dozen people in an instant, not only was Seraphina here, but Rosalind was too, and there were armed guards upstairs. She simply couldn't escape.
Rose could only endure while gritting her teeth.
With each lash that fell, the hatred in her eyes deepened.
Once she left the Waverly family's territory, she would definitely kill Isabella!
——
With the matter of the stolen crest ring resolved, Isabella and William left the Waverly family's castle.
Seraphina stood in the second-floor living room, watching Isabella's figure disappear from view, when she suddenly thought of something strange.
"Earlier, Isabella said she heard Rose's hypnotic sound?"
Elijah nodded, "Yes, she said she heard the sound, which is why she came to the main hall."
"Did you hear any sound?" Seraphina asked.
Elijah shook his head, "No."
Seraphina furrowed her brow, "Your room is less than fifty meters from mine. You didn't hear the hypnotic sound, but Isabella's room is a full hundred meters from mine, yet she heard it?"
This didn't make logical sense.
Hypnotists in Novaria were different from hypnotists in the general sense. They didn't hypnotize by producing music - their hypnosis was strictly speaking a kind of mental attack.
In other words, although the hypnotized person felt they heard a sound, this sound didn't actually exist!
It was just imagined by the hypnotized person due to the mental attack.
Elijah's expression changed too.
Clearly he had also realized how strange this was.
If Rose had performed area hypnosis, and if this area covered Isabella, then everyone else within that range would also be within the hypnosis range.
But Elijah hadn't been hypnotized.
This meant that, ruling out area hypnosis, Rose had performed targeted hypnosis - this mental attack was only aimed at Seraphina.
So only Seraphina should have been affected by the mental attack and imagined the hypnotic sound.
But why would Isabella also be affected by this mental attack?
Seraphina narrowed her eyes, a cold look in them, "And why, after being affected by the mental attack, could she still maintain conscious awareness to leave her room and check things out?"
If Isabella had also been affected by the mental attack, she should have entered a deep sleep state like Seraphina did. How could she have become more alert instead?