She picked up the phone again and repeated to Annabelle what Laurence had first requested from the beginning. 

"Please get Bence and yourselves up to the attic, as quickly as you can." 

The illusions did finally stop after Vernon had completely cleared the largest window of the house of ivy and the rest of the house of the roots and plants clinging to the walls, like caging around it, the others were also able to safely explore the other rooms, opening up the curtains. The young woman kept her hand on the crank to prevent it from playing again.

Some more natural sounds climbed up the ladders to the attic as the detective appeared, taking careful steps towards her slouched and tired form. 

"How do you feel?" He gently asked her, kneeling to sit beside her. 

"She's a skeleton, how long do you think she's been here? Never found?"

"For as long as the house was abandoned. These old houses are just now being noticed, after the past owners, died and their descendants are now inheriting them."

Dove stayed silent, looking at the skeleton across the room, not much meat for even the bugs to pick on anymore. 

The music box in her hand didn't put up much of a fuss anymore. She passed it to him to inspect.

"It wasn't the mentally ill or even the old family members haunting the house, it was the nanny. The rooms we saw belonged to the kids she took care of, her spirit was confused, thought we were the children, tried to herd us into the rooms."

"Do you think she was a good nurse?"

She thought for a moment, looking around the room. 

There were locks on the outside of the doors, and then a lock for the inside of her room. 

"Well, the locks were certainly questionable, but maybe she was just paranoid or afraid, or maybe judgmental."

Laurence then stood up, holding out a hand for her, and she took it, still using her legs, refusing to let him put much effort into pulling her up. The window behind them was becoming more lit up, some of the greeneries were now just falling off. 

She sighed, subtly basking in the warmth of the setting sun. 

"However she treated them, I just know that when she died here, she must've been thoroughly confused, maybe following a routine that she did when she was alive until living visitors came... So, what's next?"

"Closing inspection, one more attempt to patrol around this place." The detective put a hand in his pocket as he rotated the music box in his hand.

"But that's just something Bence and I will be doing, you and the others will be resting."

He offered to escort her out, but she shook her head and decided to fully explore the rest of the house, now that nothing crazy will happen, so he let her follow him and Bence after the two men had the other interns sit aside, to which they also rejected. 

Joon was intrigued by the mannequins, specifically their mobilities, and was begging for permission to take them, to which Bence reluctantly allowed since these mannequins were the main part of the strange movements and figures that some passerby would see either as silhouettes in the windows or the ones making movement in the gardens at night. Due to all of this, they would need to be studied, much to Joon's triumph. 

Bence watched Joon bounce on his one flesh ankle as he yammered to the alchemist, that he was shadowing, to schedule when to pick up all the mannequins for study. The corner of his mouth nearly twitched upward at the boy's cheeky enthusiasm.

Dove ushered Annabelle and Vernon to follow her so as to keep them on a leash, looking to Laurence who smiled quickly and nodded his head at her, before then helping Bence to inspect the house, starting from the outside.

Having a calmer look around, we were able to breathe better, and Annabelle was happy about not having any safety rules as we went from room to room. All the bedrooms had a toy, or more like an enrichment item of some sort, but we could tell which were for the children and which belonged to the older family members. The kids' rooms were upstairs, I assumed a good 5-6 kids based on the number of beds, one room had two separate beds, another had a singles bed on one side and a bunk bed on the other. 

Surprisingly not as many bedrooms in reality. That hallucination was insane. It was just two and what was considered a good size for a master's bedroom in the 1900s, late or mid, I don't know when this house was built. Hell, it could've already been old by the time the family with their nanny moved in, and they installed the bathroom and stuff. Grandma's room was downstairs, with her knitting needles that she used for making little stuffies for the kiddies still there, with her yarn. Every room save for the master's had a shower built in, all different but for the same purpose. 

The children's bedrooms did have locks, and with some pictures left behind, I saw how big some of the kids actually were. Maybe the nanny really was afraid? Who knows what happened, it's not my business and no one asked me.

"Didn't think I'd ever see an old house with pink walls." Annabelle commented as the three explored each room, but she looked at the picture frames left behind. "Always thought it'd be too frivolous for the people of the 1900s

"It was likely a choice made by owners from the 1800s then, they had more frivolous interior designs, and a safer one too." Dove replied, observing some cracks. 

"I read that back then, something about green paint having arsenic, so pink was safer."

"And then, the newer 1900 homes ended up using asbestos!" Joon suddenly popped in and responded. 

Dove nearly jolted in surprise as she looked over her shoulder at him, smiling at the pink walls while thinking of the irony. 

Joon had finished his call and decided to join them as Laurence and Bence were still busy, and they were also still waiting for someone to come and retrieve the body in the attic. Bence told them to not go near or touch her. 

"Yeah, but I guess how else would people learn about the chemical without a couple deaths I guess." Dove tried to match what she guessed was his humor, although she could not make her tone sound uplifting. 

Joon snickered at this, Annabelle did too. 

"How else would they learn?"

"They won't pay attention unless something scary happens."

We stopped exploring the second floor and went down, where the more odd rooms that are no longer built today were. Or, even if they were, it's very little because most modern people have the interior design skills of someone designing uncomfortable airport lobbies and waiting rooms. All because of 'efficient' designs and 'different materials'.

Vernon went to a certain room and the others followed. The study room, he found the little flower box that hung outside the window of the study, still hanging in there despite the rusted hooks and the dented wood. There were still flowers growing from the small bed of soil, albeit wilting just a bit. 

Dove followed him and gingerly looked over his shoulder, to which he scooted a bit to the side for her to have room to peak over his shoulder. A con to being similar in height.

As soon as Vernon opened the window and leaned over, looking at them from above, the wilting flowers seemed to lift up their heads to him, like sunflowers raising their heads up to the sun. 

"This used to have lavenders in it." He said to her. 

"Oh, but they look different now." 

"But still alive too." 

He didn't even will them to move for him, it seemed like they were just waiting for him to notice them. 

"I'm too tired to coerce any of them into moving right now, but they still like looking at me." He said when Dove asked him if he had moved them like the other plants before.

Although his hair covered his eyes, nothing could cover his blissful smile...

Some people arrived later, in a hearse, a couple others in different cars. I think one was the real estate agent and a coworker of his, I just asked Laurence if we could all go back to the cars while he talked to them. He regretfully said we couldn't, since there were questions that we had to answer. 

Of course. I have to interact with people, and of course, they were going to ask me questions that are perfectly normal for the situation but their tones are gonna make it sound deathly serious and then I'll get too nervous and lose all the confidence in my voice as I try to answer back and it's not like I can ask them to speak a bit more gently because people don't work that way-

The young woman unknowingly stoic and tired expression on as the people who arrived in the hearse came up to ask her about the body of the nanny. Laurence stayed next to her, but he chose not to say anything, still studying her in a way.

I mean, yeah considering how Laurence was there, I had a weird wanting to at least be composed, stay mature, I don't plan on sounding eagerly friendly, but I know I'm not a professional, so I didn't try to talk like that either. The same way I used to act to hope my teachers would always have a good impression of me, I just wanted to act,,, 'mature'? No, upright/well-behaved/impressionable- No none of that exactly! I just, wanted to act like someone, confident and composed, I guess. He's nice and professional, I want to give off the same vibes that he does.

"Attic, down the second-floor hall. I can show you there if need be." She said in a low toned, fast paced voice. 

I didn't mean for it to come out like that! I was just afraid I'd mess up if I said too much! I sounded just like my mother.

It seemed to make the two almost flinch a little as they shook their heads. 

"No, no, that's alright. We can find it." One said as they hurried into the house, and Dove quirked an eyebrow, head jerking as she watched them rush past and into the house, carrying an empty body bag folded over. 

She looked towards Laurence with a concerned look.

"Did,,, Was I too mean there? "

He simply gave her a light chuckle and a smile, shaking his head lightly as Bence walked up to him, asking for the music box, to which he handed over. 

The necromancer would have to inspect it along with another coworker. Since there was only one skeleton in the house causing all the mess, he didn't have as much work as expected, save for tracking down the families of each of the poor souls who fell victim of becoming unwilling 'dolls' acting as the house occupants for the nanny.

"You're fine, you did good today, I think they just noticed how tired you are. Your eyes are strained." 

He could tell even with how dark it was getting from the sun going down.

Yeah, that whole black and white, chalky filter sure did a number on me, even if it was fake, or whatever paranormal illusions are considered.

More questions came from the few people that arrived. 

"What happened to the over grove?"

Vernon just told them he moved it somewhere better. The holes he dug would've been uneven after the morticians removed the other skeletons there, so he put the pieces of greenery and roots that once climbed the house, into each of them before burying them back up after. 

"Is the house still alright?"

Annabelle said it was still in shape, while Dove said nothing but kept a straight face as she showed the pictures of some damaged parts to him. Nothing that would require any big construction, but mildly annoying to have so many.

A van drove up to the house, the driver came out looking for Joon. He recognized the man as he bounced on his living heel again, eagerly going back in while the driver followed him. Two other people came out to help get the mannequins.

Now that I actually saw them, turns out they weren't the mannequins I was thinking, more like life-sized, ball joint smooth wooden dolls. Where the heck would the family have even gotten those? No wonder Joon was so eager.