I Don’t Believe in Ghosts, But I Make a Living by Exorcising Them! - Chapter 2

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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I Don’t Believe in Ghosts, But I Make a Living Through Exorcism! Episode 002

Father was momentarily speechless.

He muttered my words and chewed them over several times.

Then he suddenly stood up and pointed straight at me.

His wide eyes caused three lines of wrinkles to form on his forehead.

“What did you just, just say…”

“Well then, farewell!”

I bowed my head briefly and strode out of the reception room with vigor, leaving behind Father whose pointing finger was trembling from shock.

As I confidently threw open the door and emerged, the servants looked at me like wax figures fixed to the floor, only rolling their eyes.

It was quite insolent for looking at someone who had been a baron’s daughter until just moments ago, though not anymore.

Well, it didn’t particularly bother me.

They were just servants who had been serving Father, who was a baron, after all.

My ally in this place was…

“Lady Siena!”

At perfect timing, Bella came running over in a hurry.

Since I had been suddenly called away and couldn’t explain anything, she seemed to have rushed over after seeing the mess in my room.

As expected, my only ally—

“My lady, are you really going to leave like this?”

…Or not?

Bella grabbed my arm as if she would never let go. She had an expression of contemplating whether to persuade me or not.

“Yes, Bella. He said he’d sell me off to that womanizing Count.”

“That’s…”

Bella began to hesitate. I glanced at her sideways and let out a hollow laugh.

“But isn’t it funny? If I marry the Count anyway, I’ll go live at the Count’s Estate. So why threaten to kick me out of the manor?”

“…”

Bella’s smile, which had been awkward at best, completely disappeared.

She seemed to realize that I had firmly made up my mind to leave the family house.

Someone might say wouldn’t it be better than throwing away all status, even if you’re just a Count’s wife in name only.

But that damn Count, in the original story, fell for another woman not long after marrying Siena and chased after her like crazy.

In the end, Siena was caught between the Count and her father, getting pushed around from both sides until she died of heartbreak.

Wasn’t that really a terrible and disgusting ending?

Rather than see that happen, I’ll just cut ties with the family house!

“My lady, wait a moment!”

I was striding out of the manor when I briefly turned my body to the side.

“Then where will we live?”

I could feel a slight trembling in Bella’s touch as she still hadn’t let go of my collar.

Right, the immediate concern is housing.

I confidently lifted the corners of my mouth.

“There’s a manor with good conditions.”

Perfect for us to live in.

I lightly tapped the pocket full of paper money.

“A top-class grand mansion much bigger than here.”

“What? A grand mansion?”

Bella counted the amount by folding her fingers one by one. Then she grabbed her hair.

Instead of answering, I smiled and wrinkled my nose.

* * *

“Bella, here it is!”

I pointed at the manor while holding a bag with barely any luggage in one hand.

The top-class manor where we’ll live from now on!

Thud.

Bella dropped her luggage bag as soon as she saw the main gate.

She opened her mouth wide, seemingly forgetting that she was breathing heavily from climbing the hill.

Amazing, right? Incredible, right?

I looked at the manor with a proud feeling.

“M-Miss. Is this really the right place?”

“Yes, of course.”

“….”

Bella’s eyes shook violently.

The manor was so enormously large that it wouldn’t be out of place to call it a grand mansion, and it even came with a garden and fountain.

It looked a bit desolate, but that could be fixed with some care.

I gently brushed off the dust that had settled on the wall, then lightly knocked on the slightly rusted main gate.

“It’s like this because no one has lived here for a while, but the interior is completely top-class, you know?”

Then I crossed my legs and leaned against the main gate.

“How could we buy such a manor at this price… Ah!”

What if it suddenly opens!

I flailed my arms trying to find my balance, then finally regained my center by grabbing onto Bella’s shoulder as she rushed over.

I didn’t know it was this worn out. I should repair it quickly.

“Thanks Bella. Let’s go in quickly. The inside is still decent!”

But for some reason, Bella set me upright and then stepped back two paces.

Which meant she moved from inside the main gate to outside.

“Bella?”

No answer.

I looked at her puzzled and saw Bella’s shoulders trembling.

With her head hung low and her center of gravity slightly shifted backward…

She’s not trying to run away, is she?

The five years of bond we’ve built isn’t that shallow, right?

“Miss, this place is…”

“Yeah, it’s a bit rusty from lack of human touch, a bit dirty, well, just a little eerie, but still perfectly—”

“This is a haunted manor!”

Bella’s voice cut through the chilly air and echoed throughout. This is a haunted manor— haunted— the voice that echoed several times quickly disappeared into silence.

But the silence was brief.

“Yeah. That’s right?”

I quickly nodded my head.

That was correct. This was a place that came out at a very cheap price, called a haunted manor.

The world I possessed into was from the romance novel I read in my previous life, 【I Just Wanted to Become a Building Owner】.

As the title suggested, it was about the Female Lead’s growth process of becoming a building owner.

The slightly unique aspect was that ‘haunted manors’ appeared in it…

The manor I purchased was one of them.

* * *

“Oh, Miss. The, the electric light! The electric light suddenly went out!”

Bella clung to my arm and whimpered.

‘At this rate, we’ll end up staying awake all night here.’

I looked up at the extinguished electric light and clicked the button-type magic device attached to the wall.

The electric light repeatedly turned on and off on its own, regardless of whether I pressed the button or not.

Since curtains hung over every window within sight, the manor was dyed in complete darkness whenever the electric light went out.

This…

“The electric light must be too old. Just looking at the amount of light coming in, doesn’t it seem broken?”

If I listened carefully, I could hear crackling sounds from inside the electric light.

It meant it had lost its function long ago.

Since I was planning to replace everything old and broken anyway, it didn’t particularly bother me.

More than that, the ceiling was incredibly high. The high ceiling height made me feel proud.

But Bella’s hand gripping me trembled despite my explanation.

‘No wonder it feels cold.’

Her touch made my sleeves flutter constantly. Every time they fluttered, the wind entering my sleeves was cold.

Since the rumors were so ominous, I couldn’t blame her for being scared… I grumbled with a sigh.

“There’s nothing to be scared of.”

Right, there was absolutely nothing to be scared of.

These strange phenomena were just things that happened because the manor was too old!

In fact, in the original story, the Female Lead bought and sold haunted manors. Then she rented them out, but nothing happened.

It was thanks to tearing down and repairing all the old and corroded parts.

So, being haunted was just a rumor, and everything was just things that happened because the manor was old.

‘If there had been ghosts, they would have at least grabbed the Female Lead’s hair.’

There’s no way they would have stayed quiet when she half-demolished the manor.

But unfortunately, Bella had no knowledge of these facts.

“The, the carpet. Miss, there are footprints on the carpet.”

“Oh my. The previous owner must not have cleaned them off.”

“Strange sounds are coming from that room. Someone sob, sobbing… Kyaah! Miss, if you open the door!”

Bella let out another terrified scream and squeezed her eyes shut.

Good grief, it’s just an ordinary room, what could possibly be so scary about it.

“The window was half open. It’s the sound of wind seeping in from outside.”

I went into the room myself and closed the window. Then the eerie sound that had been faintly audible stopped completely.

At this point, it should be obvious that this happened because the manor is old.

Bella was still trembling with her eyes tightly shut.

I leaned against the creaking door and let out a deep sigh.

Now it was time to tell her the truth clearly.

“Bella, there’s no such thing as ghosts in this world. If there were, I would-”

“M, Miss!”

Awkwardly, my carefully weighted words were cut off mid-sentence.

Bella’s frantically shaking hand was pointing at something.

“There’s a gh, ghost next to you, Miss!”

Her face was pale as she stared at the right side of the room, which was the empty space right next to me.

“Next to me?”

I turned my head without hesitation.

Eek! With Bella’s horrified voice as background music, the space I looked at was…

Still completely empty.

“…”

What should I do, our Bella.

Now she’s even seeing hallucinations.

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