Despite Cat’s earlier claim that the wolf didn’t take her grandmother outside, she also insisted that the wolf wasn’t still in the house. Watching her contradictory statements unfold, I couldn’t help but feel utterly bewildered.

Was this not Little Red Riding Hood, but rather the boy who cried wolf?

For a moment, I wondered if this whole thing was just a wild goose chase—if there had never been a wolf at all. Just as I was about to dismiss the idea entirely, Ethan stepped in, asking a question that made me pause.

“If the wolf didn’t take her out by mouth, did it carry her on its back or in its arms?”

"……!"

Of course! A werewolf!

I had momentarily forgotten that we were in a medieval fantasy world, where creatures like werebeasts—hybrids of humans and animals—existed. If it had been a werewolf, which looked more like a wolf than a human, it would be easy for a child like Cat to mistake it for just a large wolf.

If a werewolf had taken her grandmother, there was a chance she might still be alive.

"No."

"…Are you sure? Absolutely sure?"

"Yes, I’m sure."

"……."

So much for that theory…

I had genuinely thought a werewolf was the most likely explanation. But if Cat was so certain it wasn’t, then I couldn’t press the issue any further. She was looking at us with those wide, innocent eyes, and there was no way I could accuse her of lying.

With the possibility of a werewolf set aside, I tried to clear up the misunderstanding between us.

"Did the wolf and your grandmother leave the house holding hands?"

"No."

"Then did the wolf put your grandmother on its back and carry her out?"

"Um, no."

"…Did the wolf maybe wrap its tail around your grandmother and take her that way?"

"…What does that even mean?"

"…Never mind."

I had offered every conceivable option for how a wolf could take someone away, but Cat continued to answer with a firm "no" to each. It was almost as if she was playing a game of twenty questions, and I was starting to wonder if she was teasing me.

If the wolf didn’t carry her out in its mouth, arms, or tail, then what other options were there? A fleeting thought crossed my mind—maybe Cat’s grandmother had never existed at all and was just a figment of her imagination. But before I could dwell on that idea, Ethan asked Cat a new question.

"…So why do you think the wolf kidnapped your grandmother? Couldn’t it be that the wolf just happened to come into the house when your grandmother wasn’t there?"

"But… the wolf said so."

"…Said so?"

"Yes. It told me, ‘I’ve taken your grandmother, so if you want her back, just sleep quietly for two nights and wait.’ But it’s been two nights, and my grandmother hasn’t come back yet…."

"……."

"……."

So, it really was a werewolf, I thought.

Cat’s words also provided another piece of crucial information: she hadn’t actually seen her grandmother being taken away. She had simply believed what the wolf—or rather, the werewolf—had told her. There was a chance that her grandmother hadn’t been kidnapped at all and had simply stayed away for some other reason.

Maybe there’s still hope of finding her grandmother.

It was far better to go through the trouble of searching than to tell a child that her last remaining relative was gone. With that in mind, I entered one of the two rooms in the house, where the werewolf had supposedly been.

"Is this your grandmother’s room, Cat?"

"Yes!"

"And this is where you saw the talking wolf?"

"Yes!"

Finally, something that makes sense. For a while, Cat had only been saying "no," which had been incredibly frustrating. But now that she was confirming things, I felt like I was finally getting somewhere.

As I looked around the slightly messy room, I noticed a suspicious piece of string on the floor, mixed in with some of the scattered clothing.

…What is this thin piece of fabric?

At first, I thought it might be part of a necklace, but it didn’t seem to be. It had ties on both ends, but they didn’t seem intended to be worn around the neck. The fabric was too small to be a piece of clothing, or at least, it didn’t seem functional as one.

As I examined the thin black strip of cloth shaped like an "H," trying to figure out its purpose, Cat hesitantly asked me a question.

"Um, miss?"

"Yes?"

"Why are you holding my grandmother’s underwear?"

"Underwear? …This?"

"Yes, the thing you’re holding. That’s my grandmother’s panties…."

"…Aaaah!"

Startled by the realization that the thin strip of fabric was indeed underwear, I quickly threw it aside.

This is underwear?! This flimsy piece of fabric that doesn’t cover anything?!

The thought of wearing something that could so easily expose everything at the slightest gust of wind was mind-boggling. I couldn’t believe anyone would actually consider this "panties," let alone wear it.

Thank goodness I hadn’t met Cat’s grandmother yet—if I had, I might have pictured her in these… "underwear."

"…Lily, is that your taste?"

"N-no, Ed!"

"…Alright. If you ever need something like that, just ask the head maid. She’ll probably get you whatever you want."

"I said no!"

Who does he think I am, some kind of exhibitionist?

I felt my face grow hot at Ethan’s ridiculous suspicion that I had some strange fetish just because I’d been examining a piece of clothing.

…Now that I think about it, the other clothes on the floor seem to belong to the same person.

Setting aside the thin piece of fabric that had been mistaken for underwear, I noticed that the other clothes on the floor all had something in common: they were torn, especially around the back and waist areas.

If that H-shaped strip of fabric really was Cat’s grandmother’s underwear, then it seemed likely that the torn pajamas and nightgown with frayed seams also belonged to her. Considering the circumstances, these were probably the clothes she had been wearing the night she disappeared.

If the werewolf was going to kidnap her, it would’ve been quicker just to take her as she was. Why tear all her clothes off like this?

A troubling thought crossed my mind—what if the werewolf had some sort of perverse interest in Cat’s grandmother? What if, in the middle of the night, it had tried to assault her, only to flee when Cat appeared?

…No, that can’t be right.

The developers of Luminor Academy may not have created a pure heroine route for Lilith, but they were still skilled at crafting a "marketable" game. They knew what would appeal to the audience, which is why a game from a small country in Asia had made it onto Steam and been translated into multiple languages.

There was no way they’d create an episode featuring something as distasteful as a "grandmother-loving werewolf." They knew that kind of content would anger a significant portion of the fanbase.

If I ruled out that possibility, I needed to think of a more reasonable explanation for why the werewolf would tear off Cat’s grandmother’s clothes.

Was it trying to "unwrap" its meal before eating?

I meant this in the most literal sense, not as a sexual metaphor.

But in this world, werewolves were generally treated as beastfolk and had no reason to engage in cannibalism. If the werewolf had really done something like that, there should have been signs of a struggle or bloodstains somewhere in the house. But there were no such traces.

Even the torn clothes didn’t show signs of resistance. If the werewolf had forcibly done something, the clothes wouldn’t have been ripped so neatly.

Wait, these clothes….

Looking closely at the tears on both the top and bottom garments, I noticed a commonality: the fabric had torn along the seams.

If the clothes had been torn by an external force, they wouldn’t have ripped so neatly along the seams. Usually, the fabric itself would have torn in irregular patterns, or the clothes would have been shredded into pieces.

This kind of tearing only happens when the fabric is uniformly stretched from the inside with equal force. Like if a balloon were inside the clothes and it suddenly expanded until it burst….

"…Ah! I get it now!!"

"Eek?! M-miss?"

"Lilith?"

Cat’s testimony, the talking wolf, and the clothes torn from the inside—it all made sense now. The mystery was solved. The truth was, as always, only one!