Chapter 89

89. The Golden Ring Around the Iris (1)

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Back in my undergrad days, there was this old professor with white hair who taught a med class I half-listened to while playing on my phone…

It was about neurotoxins.

In 1692, Salem, USA – the infamous Witch Trials.

Often treated as a textbook case of pre-modern barbarism and mass hysteria in both academia and pop culture.

But some theories suggest it might’ve been… ergot poisoning.

The new theory went like this: A complex explanation involving medicine and geography, not just mass psychology.

When rye gets infected by ergot fungus, black spores grow on the grains—looking like horns, hence the name “ergot.”

Ergot contains various toxins—one being ergotamine, which causes blood vessel constriction. In large doses, it can lead to numbness or even gangrene.

But would the duchess’ people have eaten so much rye? Probably not.

Maybe they ate a bit here and there. No signs of gangrene were reported, after all. Anyway, ergotamine isn’t the only toxin in ergot…

There are also several neurotoxins, including one well-known even to laypeople…

Lysergic acid diethylamide—better known as LSD.

So, hallucinations from the ergot made people think they were cursed by witches, and the vasoconstriction effects caused fingers to fall off…

And thus began the witch hunts.

This explains everything—the original Salem trials and the recent curse on the Serulis duchy family.

The symptoms primarily affected young women—relatively small in stature, weaker immune systems, and more prone to fear.

This explains why only the maids and three daughters showed symptoms, along with hallucinations and seizures.

Mass hysteria might’ve played a role too.

“Ergot poisoning.”

“What’s that?”

Istina’s eyes widened.

“When grain is infected by ergot, it grows these horn-like structures. Eating it can cause hallucinations and convulsions.”

Might be mentioned in some herbology textbook somewhere. Or not.

“It could really be that!”

The hallucinations and symptoms from ergot poisoning led to the string of fake illnesses and ghost sightings. Since it’s autumn now…

The contaminated rye and direct effects of ergot toxins likely disappeared already. All we need to do is explain this to the mansion folks.

No physiological diseases remain now. The root cause of the hallucinations, seizures, and confusion was likely ergot-contaminated rye harvested in spring.

Combined with stress and other factors inside the mansion, it led to this unusual chain of psychosomatic illnesses.

That was quite a long and confusing deduction.

“But, can we prove it?”

“Don’t know. We might find the contaminated rye, or we might not.”

Since the rye was harvested in spring, it’s probably all eaten or thrown away by now. Still, let’s try looking.

****

The deduction is done; now we just need to find the contaminated rye to wrap things up. So, we headed back to see Butler Anderson.

“Mr. Anderson.”

“Oh, dinner time?”

“No, not for that. Is there any rye left from the spring harvest in the mansion?”

Anderson looked puzzled but thought for a moment before answering.

“Hmm, maybe?”

“Can we take a look?”

“At the rye?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright then.”

But what does ergot even look like?

I only know it has toxins; never seen it in real life.

Since it’s called “horns,” maybe it’ll stand out if we look closely. A few minutes later, Anderson returned with a sack of rye from the kitchen storage.

“Mostly eaten. Not much left.”

Still, lucky there’s some remaining.

“We need to check if there’s any ergot in the rye. It might’ve caused the illness.”

“Huh, the disease came from the rye?”

“For now, that’s our working theory.”

We still don’t know for sure.

Me, Istina, and the butler sat down to examine the pile of rye. There should be some horn-shaped structures…

“What does it look like?”

“Black horns.”

“I’ll let you know if I find it.”

After a while…

“Ah!”

Istina exclaimed.

“What did you find?”

“This looks like it.”

She showed me a tiny black granule about the size of a fingernail. This must be it.

It was larger than the other rye grains, with a longer, horn-like shape.

Apparently, people back then didn’t realize this wasn’t part of the grain—they probably thought it was just oddly shaped rye.

“We found it.”

The culprit behind this incident.

Istina and I were amazed, but the butler standing beside us just looked thoroughly confused.

Right, we haven’t explained anything to Anderson yet. Guess I should fill him in.

****

We moved back to the living room. Istina carefully held onto the ergot sample while I faced Mr. Anderson again.

“So, this ergot stuff can cause hallucinations and seizures, meaning the young ladies seeing ghosts and having fits were all because of this?”

I nodded.

“Yes.”

“Will they be very sick?”

Probably not.

“No, they should be fine if they receive counseling and avoid contaminated rye going forward.”

“That’s good news. But what exactly do you mean by ‘counseling’?”

Tricky to explain without mentioning the psychosomatic aspect.

“Basically, psychological stress can worsen symptoms like seizures, headaches, etc. Hallucinations were reported too.”

“Ah, that makes sense.”

Somehow managed to avoid bringing up the psychosomatic part. Butler Anderson might be simpler than expected.

“But, should we worry about ergot every year?”

“Unlikely for next year.”

Ergot grows under specific conditions. It’s not something that happens annually.

If it were easy to cultivate, criminals would be setting up LSD farms everywhere. Never heard of anyone secretly growing ergot, unlike opium or marijuana.

Must be difficult.

Even though the mystery was solved, the butler still looked troubled. Why?

“Understood…”

“What’s worrying you?”

“Feels selfish, but I feel somewhat responsible.”

Come on, most of their symptoms now are psychosomatic. How can he take responsibility for an unpredictable disaster?

“I’ll explain things properly to His Grace.”

“Thank you.”

Rather, how much should I mention about the psychosomatic aspect? Should I clearly tell the mansion folks it’s mostly psychosomatic?

Or better to gloss over it? Patients would definitely prefer the latter.

Could just say something vague about harmful substances in the body and ergot causing illness.

“In short, the young members of the ducal family should recover soon if we remove a few harmful things from the house.”

The butler nodded.

Anyway, I continued.

“One more thing…”

“What is it?”

“The ergot poisoning doesn’t seem limited to the three daughters. The servants might’ve been affected worse.”

The butler hesitated to respond. Definitely worth considering further.

“Bring any sick people to me later. Let’s check on the third daughter first.”

****

Took a while, but mostly resolved. Now we’re here to see the third daughter of the duchy.

The first two turned out to be psychosomatic, so the third is probably the same, right?

“This is the third miss’ room we couldn’t visit earlier. She’s been sick the longest.”

“Let’s check. Where does it hurt?”

“Not sure exactly. Ask her.”

The previous two had clear complaints, but something seems different here. The third daughter’s door was tightly shut.

The nameplate read “Erzabet.”

Knock knock knock. I started with a polite knock.

“May we come i-”

Whoa, strange. The door opened by itself, revealing the third daughter, Erzabet.

Unlike the first two, she opened the door herself. And Erzabet…

Her appearance… With those big eyes, she almost looked like a cat hanyou. A golden ring surrounded her light blue irises.

Wait, what? A golden ring?

“Shit, you scared me.”

Impossible. Everything deduced until now couldn’t possibly be wrong… Yet something feels off.

“Is something the matter?”

“Can we talk?”

The golden ring around the iris. Any doctor would immediately recognize the condition. Now it’s clear—everyone in this mansion has been trying to deceive me completely.

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