The Cowardly Baby Saint Sees Ghosts - Chapter 23

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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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# Chapter 23
So the ghost had seemed willing to do anything to achieve its purpose, yet now that I’d opened the door, it hesitated.
I picked up the Name Tablet and rose slowly, walking toward the doorway.
Demian followed behind me without a word.
A woman stood in the frame.
She couldn’t cross the threshold, only gripped it, her hollow eye sockets fixed on the Name Tablet.
“It’s here.”
I spoke.
“This is what you were looking for.”
Water streamed between her wet locks of hair—whether tears or mere water, I couldn’t tell.
Her bloodless, pallid hands trembled visibly, shaking so hard the eye could see it.
Within reach, yet as if unable to touch, the hand she’d extended drew back.
“Ah, ahh…….”
A crackling, spine-chilling voice fractured.
“Baby…….”
I bit down hard on my lip. Afraid she might step closer toward me, I squeezed my eyes shut and endured it.
“Baby……. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, my baby.”
I clenched my teeth.
“I couldn’t protect you. I failed to keep you safe. You loved me so much.”
How much must that three-year-old have cried, locked alone in that narrow room.
“Amara.”
Demian spoke.
“She must have gone to a better place. The fact that she’s enshrined here at all means she received the remembrance of countless people.”
The woman’s hand slowly descended onto the Name Tablet.
As her transparent hand covered the tablet, the endless sound of falling water ceased.
[Enlightenment Condition achieved.]
Light flared.
Quiet, small light.
Only the soaked floor remained.
“……Is it over?”
He asked quietly.
“Yes.”
I said, sliding the Name Tablet back into place.
“Anticlimactic, honestly.”
It was almost funny, watching someone who’d been trembling and weeping say something like that.
I let out a sharp laugh through my nose and brushed off my hands.
‘I really hate ghosts.’
I could usually stay composed about most things, but when it came to ghosts alone, my immunity crumbled—I reacted like a child.
[Quest completed.]
[Good Deed Gauge increased by 5.]
[Current value: 34 / 1000]
That’s when it appeared.
[Additional Information]
An interesting point has been discovered regarding this incident!
What now.
I read through the status window with the most miserable expression on my face.
[The Nursemaid ghost ultimately could not enter the Sacred Relic Storage on her own.]
Right.
[But what if she were to possess the Crown Prince’s body?]
I blinked hard. What was this supposed to mean.
[With a body carrying imperial blood, she could open the door herself and achieve Enlightenment.]
‘Wait.’
Dread crept up my spine.
[(Announcement) A new method has been discovered! (Congratulations)]
Route opened: Achieving Enlightenment for ghosts using the Crown Prince’s body!
Detailed information will be revealed after route registration.
Would you like to register?
[Yes / Yes]
I stared at the status window.
‘Am I supposed to die here?’
Ask someone who’s suffered under ghosts their entire life to be possessed by one again? You want me to say something that cruel?
‘That’s too heartless.’
Why is there no reject button?
I was beginning to think this cursed status window didn’t exist to save my life at all—it just grabbed me by the collar and dragged me wherever it wanted.
“I won’t do it.”
I closed the status window and walked past Demian, who was staring at me oddly.
* * *
As we left the Imperial Palace, the sky was already brightening. Inside the carriage, I nearly collapsed.
But though my eyes were closed, my mind was spinning furiously.
‘Use Demian to achieve Enlightenment,’ it said.
In short: temporarily possess him so the ghost could do things it couldn’t do on its own.
Open a door. Meet someone in person. Go somewhere it couldn’t reach.
‘If I proposed that directly to Demian?’
He’d refuse. That much was certain.
I let out a hollow laugh.
Of course. I’d have refused too.
‘But then again, if you think about it differently… it’s not a bad method.’
With Camilla, I’d rushed to possess a doll according to the status window’s mission.
But if Demian were to help—
‘It would be so much easier.’
Ghosts who couldn’t communicate were difficult to lead to Enlightenment.
If they couldn’t speak, I couldn’t learn their story. Without knowing their story, I couldn’t meet their Enlightenment Condition. Then the quest wouldn’t clear, the Good Deed Gauge wouldn’t fill—
‘I’d die.’
—And I’d be dead.
So strictly speaking, having a method wasn’t a bad thing.
The problem was that Demian would never agree to it.
“Holy Maiden.”
Liam called to me quietly.
“I’m sleeping.”
“I know you’re not.”
He sighed deeply and brushed the sweat-dampened hair from my forehead back behind my ear.
“Why do you insist on struggling so hard to survive? You could be content with what you’re given.”
It would have sounded quite rude if it had come from anyone but Liam. From someone else, I might have felt hurt.
But…
“You’ve already lived through so much hardship.”
Right. From Liam’s perspective, a child barely five years old was trembling and pushing herself just to save the Crown Prince—it must look excessive.
When really, I was just running around trying to save my own life.
“It’s all right.”
“You’ll learn to say ‘it’s all right’ even when it isn’t, once you’re grown.”
I’d never reached adulthood in my past life, but “it’s all right” had already become a habit.
“This may be selfish of me, Holy Maiden.”
…….
“But I only wish you could truly enjoy having finally found your place in this world.”
His trembling hands and lips showed how much courage it took him to speak.
I tried to argue back, but my resolve crumbled.
“Eat plenty. Play and run around—like the child you are.”
Like a true child.
“But I’m a Holy Maiden.”
“Still, Holy Maiden.”
“No matter how young, a Holy Maiden is a Holy Maiden. I already understand how difficult this world is.”
“I only worry that it might be too hard for you…”
I knew. Liam saw me as his own daughter.
But that wasn’t what I was.
I was a Holy Maiden, a being burdened with the duty to save this world.
“It’s all right.”
…….
So that was all I could say.
“Really.”
I offered him the brightest smile I could manage.
Liam looked as though he had much more to say, but mercifully, he held his tongue.
She simply lay with her head on my lap, patting my shoulder gently.
* * *
Ordinarily, Demian would have come to the Temple to replenish his Holy Power.
But on days when his condition was particularly poor, there were exceptions.
‘It’s not as if his Holy Power has drained again so soon.’
There was a reason I could hazard a guess.
The truth was, ever since that incident, I hadn’t wanted to go to the Imperial Palace.
Inside the Temple, malevolent spirits couldn’t enter, so that was fine—but the Imperial Palace was another matter.
Large, ancient, and full of the dead, it was, in short,
‘a five-star restaurant for ghosts.’
I pressed my throbbing brow repeatedly while sitting in the carriage.
Cheese’s tail swished across my lap.
“You’ve got it easy.”
A ghost who isn’t afraid of ghosts.
Cheese tilted her head back and forth inquisitively.
Come to think of it, she’s a ghost too. Here I am, a ghost lamenting to another ghost how frightened I am of ghosts. My life really is….

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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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