WHO AM I TO JUDGE?

CHAPTER 21

"Hiro! Meldy! Wake up!." I shouted while removing the red ribbon in my arm.

"What?." Hiroshi replied while still rubbing his eyes.

"Check your arm." I said to him.

"What? Why?."

"This morning I discovered a red ribbon tied up in my arm with a note in it."

"What? I don't understand come here lemme see." He said.

When I gave the note to him, he was really confused.

"Red thread ball? Hey as far as I remember, Meldy said about that red thread ball while sleep talking last night." He said.

"Yeah I'm surprised too." I replied.

"Maybe it was Meldy who attached that note to you."

"Morning, what's up." Meldy said while rubbing her arms with her eyes half closed.

"Hey, did you wrote this?." Hiroshi asked while lending her the note that I gave him.

"What's this? Red thread ball?,"

"Wait, I read about this in the store. Red scissor and red threadball." She said.

"What? I don't understand." I said.

"It was written on a paper, pasted in the left corner of the store."

"I didn't see something like that back in the store, how come we didn't notice that?." Hiroshi asked.

"Well that's because you guys are so busy playing with those dolls." She replied.

"Prepare yourselves, we will go back to that store. Let's confirm what you said and at the same time check the ceiling of the 2nd floor." Hiroshi suggested while washing his face with water.

"Ceiling?." Meldy asked.

"Yes the ceiling, the hidden exit or hole might be in the ceiling." I explained.

After eating some breakfast, we prepared ourselves with some guns and gears.

"You ready?." Hiroshi asked.

"Yeah."

************

"Here we are, come let's go inside." Meldy said while opening the main door of the doll shop.

"Where did you read that red thread ball thing?." Hiroshi asked.

"Here." Meldy said while pointing towards the corner where some puppets were hanging.

In the corner where Meldy was pointing was a big paper with something written in it.

Red scissor must cut the red thread ball of evil

The cat always hide the red thread ball, red scissor always find.

Cat is evil, cat is protecting the red thread ball. Red scissor always alone, red scissor can't cut the red thread ball.

Cat must be eliminated, but cat vanished in the thin air. Cat took the fish when cat disappeared.

"Hey, isn't this the one Meldy spoke in her sleep last night?." Hiroshi asked.

"Yeah that was it, I didn't know there was something like this here." I replied.

When I touched the paper, I noticed that it was a bit odd.

"It was written with blood." I said to them.

"What?." Hiroshi replied while touching the paper.

"Yeah the blood is a bit darker now, indicating that this paper was written years ago."

Based from what is written in the paper, it was very hard to decipher. It was so deep, so deep we could hardly understand.

"He will kill us if we will not find the red thread ball, so basically we will just find that red ball somewhere in this town right?." Hiroshi asked.

"I don't know, maybe." Meldy said.

"Hey, by the way there's something I want to check." Hiroshi said while looking at me.

Again for the 3rd time, we went upstairs to the room.

"Get the ladder." I said.

Hiroshi took the step ladder, placed it in the middle and then inspected the ceiling. He checked every detail, and every part of the ceiling just to find the hidden exit.

Then finally, in the left side of the room. While pushing the ceiling upward, Hiroshi accidentally opened the ceiling in the corner of the room.

He looked at me with a serious face and...

"You were right afterall." He said.

After the discovery, Hiroshi pushed that ceiling to make enough space of us to enter.

"I can't believe that this part of the ceiling is a trapdoor." I said to them while slowly entering.

Above the ceiling was an attic, it was filled with lot of webs and things. In the corner of the attic was a small bed enough for 1 person. The room was also filled with things covered in white blankets and drawings.

"Seems like a children bedroom for me." Meldy said while exploring.

While exploring I noticed that there was another trapdoor in  the right side of the attic. When we opened it, it was connected to the hallway.

The mannequins that we encountered was also in the attic corner.

"So that explains it." Meldy said while at the mannequins.

"That person was using these trapdoors to confuse us." I explained.

Atleast in that moment, we were able to answer the confusion about the disappearance of the mannequin and the person in the room.

"I can't believe you were right about the ceiling thing, how did you know? " Hiroshi asked.

"Nothing, I just realized that we forgot to check the ceiling, while watching the ceiling." I explained.

"Yo guys, look at this drawings here on the wall." Meldy suggested.

On the wall were a lot of drawings. Some of it were really hard to understand and some were covered with black dusts.

"Leave it, there's nothing significant about it." Hiroshi said while roamimg around the room.

I was just glazing my attention elsewhere when I accidentally discovered another hole. In the hole was a long ladder leading to the dark underground below.

"Hey guys, check this out." I suggested.

"What is it?." Hiroshi asked.

"A hole leading to the underground." I replied.

"What? Seriously."

"Are we gonna descended towards the underground?." Meldy asked.

"Yes of course."

"I'm scared."

"Hey did you bring the flashlight?." I asked.

"Yeah, It's in my bag."

"So, shall we?."