The Fortune-Teller Saintess - Chapter 4
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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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The Fortune Teller Saint
Chapter 4
The person on the other side of the magical device gulped audibly.
But that sound was drowned out by the cheers that followed.
“Waaah! It’s the Saint!”
“Saint!”
Nine gazed at the front of the temple. His eyes widened suddenly as he spotted someone.
And a bright smile spread across his lips.
“Found her.”
-What? The person who got one over on the Tower Master?
“Yeah. And the Saint too.”
Nine waved his hand toward the Saint with a cheerful grin.
The Saint who spotted him, Ellia’s light green eyes began to tremble finely.
***
The moment I saw Nine sitting far away on the roof, only one thought came to mind.
‘I’m screwed.’
Nine didn’t have the best personality. Especially his unpredictability was one of the things I feared most about him.
What if he came to kill me for wrongly telling him that Robelina was the Saint?
‘But I didn’t know either! In the original story, Robelina was the Saint!’
I wanted to jump up and down in frustration.
But right now, we were in the middle of a consecration ceremony offering rituals to the gods. I absolutely couldn’t show any unseemly behavior.
I sighed inwardly and recited the prayer as I had been taught.
Even with so many people gathered, it was very quiet while I recited the prayer.
“…may You bestow warm peace and brilliant glory upon the Empire.”
As I finished the last verse, the priests who had been waiting around scattered flower petals.
At the same time, the people who had been silent burst into cheers.
“Long live the Saint!”
“Please protect the Empire, Saint!”
I stood there awkwardly smiling. I still couldn’t believe I was standing here instead of Robelina.
Then one of the priests brought something. It was the tarot cards, the sacred relic of this generation’s Saint.
‘Here it comes.’
I gulped.
The consecration ceremony appeared to be a ritual where the Saint paid respects to the gods, but it was actually a kind of talent show.
One performed by the Saint.
During the first consecration ceremony, the Saint would perform using the sacred relic. The performance varied depending on what that generation’s sacred relic was.
And this generation’s sacred relic was tarot cards. Perhaps my performance would be the most pathetic among all those performed throughout history.
‘But what can I do? I have to do it.’
I sighed inwardly and picked up the tarot cards. Then I looked around at the people gathered in the temple and pointed to one person.
“Could you perhaps help me with my ritual?”
“Me? You mean me?”
The person was startled and pointed at himself with his finger.
When I nodded, other priests guided that person to stand before me. The citizen who suddenly found himself facing me looked extremely honored.
I shuffled the tarot cards and asked him.
“Do you happen to have any worries?”
“Well, I do have worries, but….”
“Please tell me about them.”
The man glanced around nervously, hesitating before carefully opening his mouth.
“Actually, my mother has been very ill lately. I wanted to come see the consecration ceremony with my mother today, but….”
Perhaps thinking of his sick mother, the man’s face darkened. The surroundings became solemn at his words.
I nodded and listened to his words attentively, then stopped shuffling the cards. Then I spread the cards in the air.
The cards floated quietly in mid-air by my divine power. I spoke to the man who was looking at them with surprised eyes.
“Please draw three cards.”
“How could I dare touch the sacred relic…!”
“Don’t worry. That’s what it’s there for.”
The priests who were about to stop him hesitated at my words.
The man hesitated, but when the priests didn’t intervene, he carefully drew the cards.
I looked at the three cards the man had drawn in order.
‘Six of Swords, Seven of Pentacles, King of Pentacles.’
These were cards representing the past, present, and near future in order.
The past card showed a family on a boat heading somewhere, and the present card depicted a man looking somewhat dissatisfied at what he had built.
I gazed quietly at the two cards and then spoke to the man.
“It seems you experienced some major change as the head of your household in the past.”
“A change…?”
“For example, did you change jobs?”
“That’s right! To earn money, I recently moved to Jedo with my family.”
The man looked at me as if wondering how I knew, and the surroundings began to murmur.
I paid no attention and continued while looking at the present card.
“You succeeded in establishing yourself in Jedo, but you seem to have worries due to your mother’s condition.”
“How do you know that…?”
“But don’t worry.”
“What?”
I showed the King of Pentacles card to the man and smiled gently.
“It looks like someone who will help you is about to appear.”
The man stared at me with blank eyes.
Having finished my task in the quiet atmosphere, I moved to make my exit.
‘That was probably the most pathetic performance in history.’
Sigh, I sighed inwardly.
Then I heard someone calling out from the crowd.
“Liam, Liam!”
“Mother?”
The man I had read the tarot for exclaimed in surprise.
Meanwhile, his mother pushed through the crowd and came forward. She looked back and forth between her son and me, then spoke with tears welling up in her eyes.
“Some kind person came to help us.”
“What? Who on earth….”
“A doctor who received great help from you in the past. He came to pay his respects, and when he saw that I was ill, he said he wanted to help….”
“Ah, that person! My goodness. Oh God.”
The man clasped his hands together and offered a brief prayer to the sky, then looked at me with a face contorted as if about to cry.
“Your words were right, Saint! Someone really did appear to help us!”
“What? No, that’s….”
“The Saint foresaw the future!”
The murmuring turned into cheers in an instant.
Amidst those cheers, I looked down at the tarot cards in my hand with a bewildered face.
‘Could this really be…?’
“Long live the Saint!”
“Saint, please read my future too!”
As the atmosphere grew increasingly heated, the priests finally stepped in. They grabbed me as I stood dazed on the platform and led me inside the temple.
‘Wait, what about Nine?’
Coming to my senses, I hurriedly turned my head to look at the roof where Nine had been sitting earlier.
But that place was completely empty.
***
Ellia’s Room, where I had moved, was incredibly spacious.
And above all, it was white.
This room, said to be where past Saints had stayed, was utterly white from the wallpaper to the floor, even the furniture. The only variation was gold accents here and there.
I was sitting in the middle of a bed large enough for three people to sleep comfortably.
With tarot cards spread out on the bedspread.
As I stared seriously at the face-down cards, I remembered what had happened at the consecration ceremony earlier.
‘The Saint was right. Someone who would help us really appeared!’
My card interpretation had been correct. If this were my previous life, I might have thought ‘how strange’ and felt proud. Such coincidences did happen occasionally.
But this was a fantasy world. Moreover, these tarot cards were divine artifacts. There were too many suspicious points to dismiss it as mere coincidence.
What if these tarot cards really were divine artifacts with special powers?
‘I need to check.’
I voiced the question I had prepared in advance.
“What will be served for lunch today?”
When I drew a card, ‘The Empress’ appeared. It meant I would eat very abundantly.
Seeing that, I unconsciously let my guard down.
“Abundant, my foot. Temple food is always modest.”
So that earlier incident was just a coincidence after all.
Just as I was thinking that.
Knock knock-
“Saint, we’ve brought your meal.”
“Come in.”
The door opened and priests came flooding in. Each of them was holding a plate of food.
When they set down all the plates they had brought on the table, a feast that would put the Imperial Palace to shame was laid out.
“…”
“The High Priest said you worked hard today and ordered us to prepare an abundant meal. We’ll take our leave now.”
The priests bowed to me and left the room again.
I stared at the table of food I could never finish alone, then asked the tarot cards a second question.
“What profession suits me?”
This time ‘The High Priestess’ card appeared. No matter how I looked at it, it seemed like a card that came out considering I was a Saint.
I reflexively gulped.
“…This is my last question.”
I hesitated before the question, then carefully moved my lips.
“Is the one who gave me these tarot cards truly a god?”
I drew a card. Then I got goosebumps and dropped the card.
It was a blank card.
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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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