I am the Entertainment Tycoon-Chapter 954: The Shadowed Doors

The hum of focused work from the first and second groups filled the air, a steady counterpoint to the excited buzz emanating from the central table. Here, the third group – Samantha, Sayuri, June, Kumiko, Max, Kin, and Gwen – were deeply immersed in their own investigation. Their table was a battlefield of intellect, strewn with a chaotic yet organized array of notes, hastily sketched diagrams, and the enigmatic optical illusion, a baffling discovery from Woodwright's quarters.

"Okay, so we've got this recurring motif of rabbits and flowers," June began, tapping a finger against a cluster of floral drawings. "And not just any flowers, but these really abundant, overflowing petals. It feels like a deliberate choice, not just random decoration."

Sayuri nodded, tracing a line across a sketch of a treasure chest. "Exactly. And then there's this treasure chest. It's prominent in several of our findings. All the other pictures and patterns we found before were of flowers, but this one depicts petals. Why the change? What if these abundant petals aren't just a random change, but about something being *revealed* or *unveiled* through them?"

"Think about the poems too," Max chimed in, his brow furrowed in concentration. "Some of the verses are quite cryptic, but they keep mentioning the words 'seek', 'Flower', and 'hare'. Could there be more on this than merely pointing to the Flower Bunny Inn?"

Gwen, her eyes fixed on the optical illusion, gestured animatedly. "And this illusion! It's so disorienting, like it's playing with our perception. I'm starting to think it wasn't random that Woodwright placed the pattern on this optical illusion. What if he wanted to show us something? Something that might appear in that direction during the Bloom Week."

Samantha, or Sam as her group often called her, leaned forward, her mind clearly connecting different threads. "That's a brilliant thought, Gwen. And it makes sense with the astrological findings we unearthed. We noted specific constellations and planetary positions, and we can try to find what the common sights are in the northern sky during spring. But how does that connect to the practicalities? Like, what about the poems that hint at *roping* a treasure chest?" She looked around the table, her gaze seeking input. "Could the 'roping' be a metaphor for securing something valuable, something that's been revealed through these blooming petals and celestial influences?"

Kin, who had been quietly piecing together fragments of the architectural blueprint, finally spoke up. "The blueprint, when considering the original layout, is almost a perfect symmetry of triangles. It seemed that Woodwright did a great job hiding the secret room where he placed his treasure."

Their conversation was a vibrant tapestry, ideas weaving in and out, building upon each other. They were actively brainstorming, a dynamic exchange of theories and hypotheses. Each new connection, each tentative hypothesis, felt like another piece of a monumental puzzle clicking into place, as they relentlessly sought the overarching narrative that bound all these disparate clues together. They were determined to understand the *why* behind the *what*, striving to uncover the story that Woodwright had so carefully, and so cryptically, left behind.

"Guys, what if the words 'to see through' in the second poem have more than one meaning?" June suddenly asked.

"How so?" someone asked.

"We have been wondering how the moonlight from the moon on the last day of Bloom Week might fit into all of this intricate puzzle that Woodwright built, right?" June said with shining eyes, "I was wondering if during the vital moment where the moonlight shines upon the inn, the light might pass through some inn's wooden details showing us the right path to follow."

"You mean these wooden details?" Max showed a picture of a balcony's ceiling carving depicting a vine, and here and there, crevices could be seen on the vine's extension.

"Yes!" June exclaimed, "The moonlight passing through these crevices might be the right way to use this night's moon!"

Everyone's eyes started shining with excitement as they found that June's speculation was almost right.

"Great idea, June!"

"So, this is the way to use the moonlight."

"Finally, we know how to use it!"

"..." The crowd started talking excitedly.

"But there is one problem," Sam suddenly said, "There are several of this type of ornament throughout the inn, which one is the right one? There has to be at least one where our treasure hunt starts."

The crowd looked at the hundreds of pictures depicting the same type of ornaments where the moonlight could pass through, and heaved a collective sigh.

"It seems we discovered something important, but we ain't have the right location to apply it," Kin commented.

"Hmm, guys, what if Woodwright might have already told us?" Sayuri suddenly asked.

Everyone looked at her and waited for her to continue.

"Remember the two poems we found?" She asked.

"Of course!" Everyone replied.

"When moonlight crowns the blossoms' last breath,

The rabbit stirs where petals rest.

Seek the house of flower and hare,

Where shadowed doors unlock the air."

"'To see through and know where to find,

The inn of old keeps what fate designed,

Seek the flowered hare where secrets bind."

These were the poems (clues) they found during their journey to solve the mystery.

"Of the seven verses that make up these two poems, during our adventure, we found connections between verses and other clues in six of these verses. Which verse do we haven't even one clue connected to it?" Sayuri asked with narrowed eyes.

"Where shadowed doors unlock the air." Everyone said at the same time with pensive expressions.

"It is indeed weird that only this verse has no connection with other clues," Max commented.

"Sayuri, are you saying that this verse might be the breaking point?" Gwen asked.

"Yes!" She exclaimed, "There were no connections to other clues because there was no need to! The verse is directly telling us where to look!"

"But what is 'shadowed doors'?" June asked.

The group was silent for a while as each one of them tried to figure out the meaning of these words. Suddenly, Max started to search avidly through the pictures they printed from the inn.

"What are you doing, Max?" someone asked.

"Hmm, I thought of something, but I'm not sure." He replied.

Suddenly, he stopped and stared intently at a picture with shining eyes.

"Guys, I think I found something." He said with enthusiasm, "Look at the pictures of this room on the ground floor's northern wing."

The group looked at the picture that showed a room in the format of a triangle. Which meant that this was the most extreme room of the triangle-shaped inn. The two walls that formed the tip of the triangle were traditional yamatese (Japanese) paper walls.

Yamatese Paper Walls refers to Shoji, which are sliding panels in traditional Japanese architecture made of a wooden lattice frame covered with translucent Washi paper. They are used as room dividers, windows, or doors to softly diffuse light, creating a soft, atmospheric, and shadowy effect rather than direct illumination.

But on the picture that Max was showing to them, it seemed like the light inside the room was stronger, so they couldn't see light coming from the paper. Plus, these paper walls were extremely common throughout the inn, so they couldn't see why these two were different.

"What about it?" Kin asked with a confused expression.

"I ain't seen nothing either." Gwen chimed in.

The rest nodded as well in agreement with them.

"I know that they might seem like the other paper walls throughout the inn," Max simply replied, "But what if I show you this picture?" He said as he showed them another picture.

This picture seemed to be taken outside the inn, and it was the picture showing the other side of the paper walls of that room. And on the picture, they could see that on the other side of the paper walls, Woodwright carved all kinds of flowering details on the wood.

"This..."

"Yes," Max said with a certain voice, "Imagine the moonlight passing through these paper walls and these wooden flower details! This must be the room where our hunt starts!"

"Wow!"

"How did you find out, Max?" 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

"You did great, Max!"

"..."

"Haha," Max laughed, "I just felt something was odd, and when I went outside that room, I saw those wooden details. I didn't think much of it, and it was only with June's idea that I remembered this room."

"Okay, we have to thoroughly analyze this room! Our hunt tonight probably will start there!" Sam suddenly called.

Everyone responded with enthusiasm and started analyzing the room with a more rigorous method.