Hotel Selten

Unusual Discoveries

Ophelia woke up early again this day, not because she has a schedule for training with Thilda, it’s because a lot of things are bugging her mind. She didn’t make her sleep well, making her pissed off. She rose up on her bed, tucking her knees and resting her arms on it. She is still lazy to go up. She looks at the window, it’s still dark. She buries her face to her crossed arm. Last night, she knew a bit about Thilda.

“Who is speaking my stupid father’s name?” A familiar feminine voice speaks behind them. Both Miss Eve and Ophelia turn on their back, it was Thilda with her arms crossed and a pissed face. “Sorry for my attitude miss, but I don’t like hearing my father’s ill name.” The lady realized something, she forgot about how Thilda hates her father. The lady just smiled, “It’s fine. Excuse us.” The lady turns around as Ophelia follows.

“Why is she angry with her father?” She asked, the lady turned to her as they stopped and she holds a doorknob. “Well, he’s the reason why her mother died.” Ophelia’s face sympathizes and she became sad with Thilda’s reason. “Ophiuchus was the one who evacuated some people of Martin Mansion here, that’s why I know that place. In his stay, Bellatrix, Thilda’s mom, fell in love with Ophiuchus. I already hearing rumors that he has someone back in the Martin Mansion, but love made Bella blind. Months later, someone came and was searching for him, after that he never came back.” They entered and went to the dining room.

“That’s just… Rude.” She looks at her. “Well… He knows that Bella was pregnant, yet, he never went back to the hotel to at least check on her. After she gave birth to Thilda, she starts to become sadder and sadder each and every day. Until one day, she just took her life out and left her daughter to us. Thilda was even crying that time, what a poor thing to experience such at a young age.” They reached the dining room, wherein some of the residents are eating. They both took their seats and they both eat their dinner.

After that, Miss Eve bid her goodbye to Ophelia, since she still needs to do something. The teenager went to bed and had a series of thoughts and what-ifs.

Back to the present, Ophelia is having a headache from thinking too much. She can’t sleep anymore anyway. She looks around and she gets off her bed. Her room is tidy since she ignores some stuff here anyway, the only thing that she uses is the bed. Since she will live here, at least her whole entire life, she needs to organize her room as her own. She looked at the worktable and became curious about what’s inside its drawers. She took a seat and pulls one of the drawers and look inside it.

There were pins and paper clips, but one thing she noticed was a necklace with a blue-colored amulet that must be a Sapphire. She pulled the silver lace and takes the necklace. She examines it, “There must be someone who stayed here.” She placed the necklace on the table as she opens the other drawer, there was a booklet covered in leather. It has some dust on it, she takes it off the drawer and wipes the dust away. It made her sneeze, “That was a bad idea.” She placed the booklet gently so it won’t puff some dust off.

The cover doesn’t bear any title nor even a single clue what’s inside. Ophelia opens the booklet, it has those beige sheets and a smooth surface. On the cover, there is a folded piece of paper stuck inside of it. She pulled it out, she unfolded it and there was a message written on it.

‘Gonna head back.’

There were some scribbles under it, under the scribbles there were words, the writer must have hesitating to write those words. Since Ophelia’s mind was still a little dozing off, she sets it back to its place earlier. She scans the booklet, it was all empty. The owner must forget about this. She thought of something and looked around the room. She was happy when she found a fountain pen in the cupboard and went back to the worktable. She starts to write on the first page.

‘09-06-20

Here at Hotel Selten, this is already my 3rd day.

I found this book in a drawer.

This will be my companion.’

She smiled at what she had written, she moved her hand again as she drew a smile beside the paragraph. She looks at the room and clears everything in the drawer. She found more specks of dust and some other stuff, even buttons. She cleared the boxes and small chests under her bed, one of them is full of shells. Which made Ophelia smile, she have another idea. She set the chest aside as she piles the garbage she will throw soon. She saw a hair tie and uses it to tie her hair for her work. She exits her room to find something to place the trash with.

In the hallway, she saw Miss Eve who seems from the upper floors. “Good morning, Miss Eve!” She greeted with her smile still on her face. The lady smiled back. “Good morning, you seem doing something.” The teenage nods, “Where do you put trash and old pieces of stuff here?” “Well, you can just throw the trash in the garbage bin outside, in the back of the second building. If you just want to pile up some old stuff you think that will get used soon, you can put it in the basement.”

The teenage girl nods, “Why?” The lady peeks at her room and giggles, “Are you cleaning?” Ophelia fixes her ponytail, “Well, yeah, because I will live here for… I guess my entire life. So I will fix my room as it if it’s my own.” “I am glad to hear that.” The teenage girl looks around, “Well, I belong here… I might bring more chaos in the outside world if I stayed there.” She got some flashbacks of some incident she encountered accidentally using her magic, mostly exploding water.

She had one incident at her school wherein all of the cups containing water suddenly just spills, which made other pissed off since some of them are hot coffee or even cold teas. The thing which really bugs her off is the incident in the shop. Since it’s just recently and the time she really killed someone. The incident which pushed her to this hotel, the sanctuary of non-normal people, the ones who can understand her and she can live with without worrying.

Her thoughts trailed off as Miss Eve speaks, “Ophelia, my dear, are you okay? You seem to doze out quite a lot.” Ophelia looks at her and smiles, “Don’t worry Miss, just organizing what to do this day.” The lady just shrugged and accepted her excuse. “Come with me and eat breakfast before doing your work. Working with an empty stomach will just harm you.” The brunette girl nods as they went on their way to the dining table and Ophelia ate her breakfast.

After that, she went back to her room and started to throw away the trash and clean the whole room itself. It was hard for her to carry heavy things, but she chose to do it herself to gain some strength. She designed her room with the seashells and she was happy with the results. She noticed some of the box and small chests which she didn’t choose to dump but to set it aside. She carried them all, batch by batch, as long as she can carry it all the way down the basement, which is just underground. She chose the easy path to it which is in the lobby. She placed it in a vacant place.

She looked around the basement, surprisingly, it has some double-decked beds on it. It seems someone is using it judging on how it is not tidy and organized. She approached the beds, the pillows even have that evidence that someone had slept here. Who could it be?

“Who are you?”

She turns around and saw a woman, she is wearing a blue dress and her hair is in a ponytail. There was nothing unusual about her physical appearance. She just has dull eyes and a flat face. “I am… Ophelia… Do you live here?” The woman nods. “Uhm… Are you sure?” The woman nods again, “Yes… I have been living here for… Uh… I don’t know… I don’t really sense time anymore… I just work… And work…” 

She seems out of her mind, but her speaking is normal. “Work? Are you one of those servers or even a cook? You aren’t a resident of this hotel?” Ophelia asked once again, “Hotel? This is a hotel?” The teenage girl confirmed that the woman is out of her mind. “Are you even okay—”

“She is okay.” A familiar male voice emerges in the room, she saw Hugo holding the shoulder of the woman. The latter bowed at Hugo, “Sir Hugo… I apologize, I need to sleep now.” He looks at her, “You may now sleep.” “Thank you, sir Hugo.” She went to her bed which is on the top of the third bed. Hugo looks at her, he seems not happy about this.

“Why are you here?” He said it made her shiver. “I was gonna store some things here… I am done, can I go now?” He sighs, “Since you know it now and I wish I did a better impression on you, you may go out with us and let’s buy you some clothes.” She has almost forgotten about it, “Sure.” Hugo leaves as she follows, she quietly closes the door to avoid disturbing the sleeping woman.

They went out of the hotel premises with the other “helpers” as Hugo calls it. “Aren’t we gonna get seen by the enemies and get tackled down?” Ophelia got worried. “No, since the lady’s barrier is in its full-blown, anyone who exits inside the barrier will not be seen for quite a while, so we should get going.” They started to walk away from the hotel.

Ophelia looks around, it’s like years that she didn’t witness the scenery of the outside that can’t be seen from the hotel, yet, she has been there for almost 4 days. With them, it was a teenager who seems just like their ages. She was looking normal, unlike the other one.

“So… They are normal people?” Hugo nods, “They were the ones who caught one of us or been stuck in the hotel because of the breaches. With my ability, we can put them to good use instead of just killing them. Since then, we are free to communicate in the outside world and maybe find another place for us. Some of them work at the hotel like this one and some act as the breadwinner for us. We can’t just stay stealing foods and stuff.” There are more to unveil for Ophelia, one of them is this.

They arrived on a road, Ophelia was suddenly hyped since she only sees trees for 3 days. They crossed it to go to a clothing shop, wherein the girl with them goes in as the two just hid.

“Tell me what you want Ophelia.” The brunette girl with Hugo thinks, “I just want some shirts that are sized small and some medium leggings… And uhm…” Hugo looks at her, “What?” Ophelia blushes, “Well, I guess I need to say this since I really need it.” She whispers to Hugo which he just responded ‘okay’ like it was nothing. He then draws a box and pulled a string of hair and whispering all of the things she said. 

After a while, the girl paid and went out of the shop. “Let’s go.” Ophelia nods, “Sure—”

“Ophelia, is that you?”