A Fortune-telling Princess - Chapter 16

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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“What’s so impressive about a divine beast anyway… tsk!”
Yet Duke Sorpel’s hand remained careful as it touched the pendant. The pendant was essential to finding and awakening the divine beast.
“Sigh.”
Another long breath escaped his lips.
* * *
I think I’ve got indigestion.
Camilla, who had been sprawled across the bed, sat up.
I’d collapsed onto the mattress the moment I returned to my room, exhausted from the uncomfortable meal, but my stomach felt terribly unsettled. I really needed to go outside and take a walk through the Garden.
[Miss Camilla.]
As I headed outside, wondering which part of the Garden to visit, I stopped at the sound of my name. It was Derin, the butler ghost.
“Yes?”
Camilla’s expression grew puzzled at Derin’s unusual demeanor.
The gentle smile he always wore was nowhere to be seen. Instead, he appeared somewhat tense.
“Is something wrong?”
[There is someone I would like to introduce you to.]
At Derin’s words, Camilla said nothing for a moment. She simply stared at him.
[That person is-]
“A ghost, I assume.”
[Pardon? Ah, yes.]
If a ghost is introducing them, they’re obviously a ghost.
“Then I’ll have to decline.”
[I beg your pardon?]
“I don’t necessarily have to meet them, do I?”
[Ah, no… I!]
This was a request from Derin himself, of all people. I wanted to grant it if I could, but…
‘His expression is far too grave.’
If he was broaching the subject with such a serious face, this was certainly no ordinary being.
From experience, meeting ghosts like that never led to anything good.
I could bet my entire fortune that I’d end up saddled with an incredibly, incredibly troublesome task.
I’m sorry, but I must respectfully decline.
[Miss, that person is-]
“I’m not feeling well, you see.”
[Ah, Miss….]
“My apologies.”
Leaving Derin behind as he called out in flustered tones, Camilla hastily exited the room. Fortunately, Derin did not follow her.
‘I do feel a bit guilty, though.’
I was in a situation where I was receiving help from Derin and Perol.
I’d even told them to speak up about whatever they wanted, saying I’d grant most any request.
‘But they said they didn’t need anything.’
Derin had said he had no wishes, that he was simply happy to be able to help the Sorpel Household again.
I felt a twinge of guilt, but I absolutely refused to form another connection with a different spirit.
‘Once spirits start gathering, there’s truly no end to it.’
Perol and Derin were more than enough for now. I had no desire to be formally introduced and bind myself to yet another ghost.
‘Still, he gave up surprisingly easily.’
Camilla moved forward with a somewhat lighter heart.
But then….
[Miss Camilla.]
[I apologize for disturbing your sleep.]
[Forgive me for interrupting your meal, but….]
[That person truly wishes to see you….]
[Would you be willing to meet them just once?]
[Miss.]
[Miss Camilla.]
I had been mistaken.
‘Damn it….’
Was the butler always this persistent?
From the next day onward, Derin circled around me day and night, repeating the same words endlessly, and I grew increasingly exhausted.
If it were truly a selfish wretch—no, a spirit—who only cared about themselves harassing me like this, I would have simply ignored them.
But….
‘That expression is far too sorrowful!’
Following me around with such earnest, pleading eyes, speaking those words with a face full of apology for even making such a request—it was far harder to ignore.
“Fine.”
In the end, I threw up my hands in surrender.
“I’ll meet them.”
[Thank you! Thank you so much!]
“You’re a bound spirit, aren’t you?”
[Pardon? A bound spirit? What is that?]
“A ghost tied to one place. Someone who cannot leave that location, correct?”
If he’s been chasing after me for days begging me to meet them, it would be simple enough to just bring that spirit here myself.
After all, they’re not the type of beings that a locked door can keep out.
Yet the fact that only Derin keeps coming to find me day and night means there’s only one answer: that spirit cannot move.
In other words, I would have to go find them myself.
[That’s correct.]
Derin nodded vigorously.
[That person cannot move freely like we do.]
Derin marveled repeatedly, amazed that I had grasped the situation so accurately with only a few clues.
“So where is this place?”
* * *
‘I don’t like this.’
[Sob… sob.]
I really hate this.
[Argh! Why do I have to die!]
I genuinely hate this!
Why is this place like this?
When people think of places where ghosts are likely to congregate, they typically mention the Funeral Hall, the Columbarium, or gravesites.
‘Wrong!’
They’re all mistaken. Surprisingly, ghosts don’t actually linger in such places.
The moment they realize they’re dead, they either ascend or seek out unfinished business and people they left behind in life.
Ironically, the very places where the living mourn the dead rarely contain the spirits of those being mourned.
Instead, most ghosts avoid the vicinity of funeral halls and columbariums altogether, unwilling to witness their own lifeless forms.
‘And yet…’
Why were there so many ghosts swarming this place?
I was currently walking through the National Cemetery—specifically, the section reserved for those who had rendered great service to the nation.
Every noble in the empire, or anyone who had lived off the state’s generosity, desired to be buried here after death.
Being interred in this place alone was a mark of family honor.
“But it’s still just a cemetery, after all.”
What good did it do to serve the nation and be buried here? The place was teeming with spirits who harbored such deep resentment they couldn’t leave this world, wandering endlessly around their own graves.
Weren’t they the ones who couldn’t accept their deaths more than any other ghost—precisely because they hadn’t wielded enough power, hadn’t accomplished enough?
I paid no attention to the wailing of the ghosts echoing around me. If I did, they’d immediately cling to me, thrilled to have found someone who could perceive them, and refuse to let go.
So I simply followed behind Derin, who walked ahead of me.
[This way.]
The place the butler ghost Derin led me to wasn’t an ordinary cemetery.
It was a more elegantly appointed space—clearly where those of higher rank were buried.
As we climbed the stairs toward higher ground, the number of graves decreased rapidly.
‘The weather is disgustingly beautiful.’
The sunlight illuminating the graves was particularly warm. Here I was, wandering through this place on such a perfect day.
[Miss Camilla.]
After a moment, Derin stopped and quietly called out to me.
When I looked up, I could see a middle-aged man sitting in a relaxed posture beside one of the graves.
[Sir.]
Derin quickly approached him and spoke carefully.
The middle-aged ghost, who had been sitting with his eyes closed, slowly opened them and looked at me.
[Is this the child?]
[Yes, sir.]
I still hadn’t properly learned who I was supposed to meet. Derin had only kept repeating that I absolutely had to meet this person, so I had reluctantly been dragged along.
[….]
The middle-aged ghost stared intently at me. In turn, I gazed blankly back at him.
[So I really am visible to you.]
“I can hear you too.”
[Heh… heh….]
His laughter was hollow—a strange blend of joy and sorrow, multiple emotions tangled together in a single breath.
[Finally… I’m finally seeing the end.]
The end. So he did have something to ask of me after all.
[I should introduce myself first.]
“Hersel Sorpel.”
[…!]
“The previous Duke who once led the Sorpel Family, I see.”
[…How did you know? Did Derin tell you?]
The bewildered middle-aged ghost—no, Hersel—posed his question, and I exhaled softly before pointing to the space behind where he sat.
“I can read letters, at least.”
[Ah….]
His name was carved plainly into the tombstone he was sitting on.
39th Patriarch of the Sorpel Family, Hersel
Rests here.
‘The 39th… that was a very long time ago.’
The current Duke of Sorpel was the 42nd patriarch of the Sorpel Family, after all.
[The reason I called you here was-]
“Before that, may I ask you one thing?”
[…? Ask whatever you wish.]
With Hersel’s permission, my gaze drifted toward his head.
“Is it hereditary, perhaps?”
[Hereditary?]
“Your hair.”
His scalp was truly beautiful.
‘So lustrous.’
His bare head gleamed in the sunlight, and I found myself drawn to it again and again.
* * *
‘A divine beast?’
My mind churned as I turned away from Hersel. I knew the basics about divine beasts.
Divine beasts owned by the Empire’s three greatest families. And the divine beast of the Sorpel Family, lost long ago.
I knew well what divine beast symbolized the Sorpel Family.
‘The White Tiger.’
A white tiger.
‘It suits Ludvil perfectly.’
Thinking of Ludvil’s pure white hair, untainted by any other color, I sighed quietly.
‘So that’s it….’
He’s asking me to find it.
The middle-aged ghost I’d just met—Hersel—was the one who had caused the divine beast to vanish from the Sorpel Household.
‘Though, strictly speaking, it wasn’t his fault.’
He hadn’t wanted to be poisoned, after all.
Unable to properly tell his descendants where the newly born divine beast would be reborn, he became a ghost unable to leave this world, bound by that singular regret.
He needed to convey that location somehow, yet even after all these centuries, he hadn’t found a way—a frustration that must have gnawed at him endlessly.
For such a profound regret to bind him as a earthbound spirit to his own grave, unable even to leave that place, his death must have been an anguish beyond measure.
‘It’s unfortunate, but…’
What exactly am I supposed to do about it?
Hersel had told me where the Sorpel Family’s divine beast was located.
But the matter was far from simple. If I suddenly appeared with the divine beast’s egg that they’d failed to find for all these centuries, what would everyone say?
‘Absolutely creepy.’
Just imagining the barrage of questions the family would hurl at me gave me a headache already.
‘Why do I have to play the shaman here too?’
The thought that I might have to do divination and read fortunes here as well drew an involuntary sigh from Camilla’s lips.
‘And what? It’s in the water?’
I’d be the perfect target for ridicule.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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