RESIDENT EVIL VILLAGE - The House of Dimitrescu

Chapter 8 - Bela

It was three days before Y/N next had an opportunity to retrieve the second mask. After his encounter with the three youngest Dimitrescu's, they had been roaming the halls almost without rest. It was only through the constant use of the secret passageways that Y/N had been able to avoid detection thus far.

Lady Dimitrescu herself had entered a towering fury upon learning of the attempt on her daughter's life, and though she spent much time cloistered in either her chambers or her study, attending to matters of business and the like, the few hours in which she joined her daughters in the search were some of the most traumatic of Y/N's life. 

They had long ago discovered the bell room, and Y/N had been forced to watch in horror from a crack in the wall as Lady Dimitrescu had laid waste to the many elegant desks and chairs within, searching for him in a roaring fury through showers of rent glass and shattered bookshelves. 

However, his attic room remained undiscovered, and Y/N sometimes wondered if they even knew it was there, or if they had simply accepted that it was beyond their reach. Perhaps it might have been possible for them to send one of their many maids or servants up there to check on him, but it appeared from his round-the-clock observation of the family that they had no plans to do so yet.

In fact, Y/N felt slightly bad for the many maids and servants who worked in the castle during this time, as when one of their frequent rages took the Countess or her daughters, more often than not a serving girl would lose her life to claw or sickle, before the others were left to mop up the poor girl's blood into buckets with mops and rags. 

Oddly, Y/N had not seen any males other than himself and the Duke since he entered the castle, though he often heard their screams when roaming the lower levels of the castle. The dungeons seemed to be crammed full with male victims, as apparently these were the preferred type of prey for the daughters, and Y/N couldn't help but wince when he imagined what they must be going through. 

He had not yet had a chance to enter the dungeons, as he was intent on searching the rest of the castle first, and finally, after days of waiting, Y/N's heart leapt with joy as he heard the loud calling of Lady Dimitrescu's voice from her study, and the two daughters who he had been watching through the cracks in the walls quickly swarmed away towards her voice.

Quickly, Y/N fumbled with the ring of keys in his belt and opened the nearest hidden doorway in the wall, stepping out onto the landing above the main hall and closing it quietly. With one hand on his chain to keep it from rattling, he quickly and quietly ran around the carpeted floor, circled the gallery, then slipped through the doorway into the hall of the masked statue. 

Wasting no time, Y/N quickly retrieved the second mask, stashing it under the wreckage of a shattered bookcase in the bell room to retrieve later, then began to continue the search.

After a few moments careful listening, Y/N stepped back out into the hallway and crept across the landing towards the South wing of the castle. The crackling fire below him made his skin crawl as it popped and crackled, the loud noises seemingly unnaturally loud in the otherwise tense silence of the gallery.

Quietly, Y/N approached the one-eyed face carved into the South wing's doorway and fished the maroon eye from his pocket. He had taken to carrying it around with him as he patrolled the castle, so he could be ready to seize his opportunity at any moment. 

With shaking hands, Y/N pressed the maroon eye into the scratched socket, and his heart leapt as the door clicked loudly before swinging laboriously open. Y/N hunched reflexively, peering around the doorway into the gold-laced corridor beyond, before proceeding into the South wing of the castle. 

He had seen Cassandra and Daniela fly off to their mother, but while he hoped Bela had done the same, Y/N knew better than to take chances by now. Paranoia and anxiety were keeping him alive... there was never a worse time to become overconfident than now.