Time Healer Ceres - Chapter 3

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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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“…! Good heavens, what a sight!”
Those who noticed her eyes open all gasped in unison.
“Ceres!”
A middle-aged woman who had hurried in first approached with tears glistening in her eyes.
Crash!
“Ceres, you! What on earth were you thinking? Do you have any idea how frightened I was?”
…Aunt?
The woman who held the bewildered Ceres spoke rapidly through trembling breaths.
“No matter how difficult things were, to attempt to end your own life like that!”
…I tried to end my own life?
What in the world is this nonsense?
“That’s enough, that’s enough. Ceres, the fact that you’ve awakened is all that matters.”
The woman, wiping at her eyes, smiled brightly and gently patted her shoulder.
Ceres, watching that hand intently, asked with a hint of irritation.
“And who are you?”
“…What?”
“Who are you?”
“Oh, my! Ceres?”
“Ceres… That name’s been grating on me since before. Why do you and that child keep calling me that?”
“Oh my, oh my…”
Oh my this and oh my that.
Ceres clicked her tongue lightly as she watched the middle-aged woman cover her mouth with both hands in haste.
‘What on earth is this situation…’
Could someone please explain this properly?
* * *
“Ha… ha ha.”
Laughter was all that would come.
“So then…”
I died, but came back to life?
“And in the body of a woman I’ve never even seen before?”
It took precisely one day to grasp the situation, however poorly.
“What happened? How?”
She had spent the entire day wrestling with it, but could find no proper answer.
I was definitely dead—so why am I inhabiting someone else’s body?
‘I do recognize this face, though.’
Though I never saw her while alive, there was one being I encountered after death.
That woman I saw in the deep darkness.
The woman with platinum blonde hair and pale violet eyes—the image had been striking enough—and there she stood in the mirror before me, which left me utterly astounded.
‘And she backstabs me with that innocent face of hers.’
No matter how I think about it, taking her hand was what set all this in motion.
If I’d known this disaster would happen, I would never have taken it, no matter how pitifully she looked at me!
‘Why resurrect someone who died peacefully, and cause all this chaos?’
She let out a sigh, twisting the platinum blonde hair that fell across her shoulder.
Ceres Drow.
A woman who had taken her own life, for reasons unknown.
I’d heard she was seventeen this year, and the child I’d seen yesterday was apparently this body’s actual brother.
“Ha ha…”
Seventeen years old, you say?
“…I’ve regained my youth?”
Whether to be pleased or to weep at this.
Ceres—or rather, Grace—could only let out hollow laughter again and again.
Knock knock.
Just then came a soft knock at the door, and the child from yesterday slipped inside.
A maid-like woman followed after him, carrying light food in her hands.
“…”
The boy drew near and stared intently at Ceres. His expression suggested he had much he wanted to say.
“Well, do you have something to tell me? Go ahead.”
“…Antonion.”
“Antonion?”
“Right. So don’t call me little.”
Watching the boy grimace at being called by that name, Ceres broke into a quiet laugh.
There was something about him that brought back a memory of someone from long ago.
‘Artia was exactly like that when we were younger.’
Artia.
A childhood friend, much like Kainel—someone she’d grown up alongside.
Back then, she’d been smaller and prettier-faced, so Ceres had treated her like a younger sister; Artia had thrown tantrums about it just like this.
‘And yet that little thing became the youngest Magic Tower Head. How could anyone have known?’
As Ceres lingered a moment longer in those old memories, she turned her gaze toward the maid who had been watching her carefully since she entered the room.
“Excuse me, Miss Ceres. Are you feeling all right?”
“Nothing hurts, really.”
“That’s a relief.”
A long breath of relief escaped the maid’s lips.
“While you were unconscious, Lord Antonion worried terribly. He came by every day to check on your condition….”
“Jae, that’s enough of that.”
“Oh! I-I’m so sorry.”
At Antonion’s irritated reproach, Jae quickly offered an apology and bowed respectfully toward Ceres.
“My name is Jae.”
Without being asked, she’d already given her name—which made it clear she’d heard that Ceres had lost her memory when she came back from the dead.
“If there’s anything you need, please don’t hesitate to tell me.”
Ceres nodded lightly and rose from her seat.
‘But then again….’
Creeak.
Squeeeeak—
Creeak.
Squeeeeeak—
….
As she moved toward the table where the meal lay, Ceres clicked her tongue at the strange, jarring sounds that assaulted her ears.
Creeak.
Craaaack—
…Is this place falling apart?
Even the bed where she’d tried to sleep last night had been dreadful. The moment she shifted even slightly, it emitted such bizarre sounds that proper sleep was nearly impossible.
But the bed wasn’t the only problem. With every step she took, the floorboards answered with an unpleasant cacophony.
Looking closer, she could see that the furniture and everything else in the room was so old and worn that it seemed as though it would crumble to dust the moment she touched it.
“Is this what they call the room of a noble young lady who’s scorned by her own household?”
“What nonsense are you talking?”
“Why is the room in such a state?”
Though the place was shabby, the size of the Mansion and the presence of a maid suggested this was indeed a noble household.
Hadn’t the woman called Aunt, whom she’d met yesterday, been wearing quite elaborate clothes?
‘And yet….’
Look at the clothes she was wearing right now.
The fabric quality was decent enough, and it looked clean enough—but that was all.
The color had faded from washing, and the sleeves and hem were so threadbare they looked ready to come undone at any moment.
‘They’re not doing much better, are they?’
Looking carefully, even Antonion’s clothes were scarcely different.
And Jae’s maid’s uniform was hardly worth mentioning.
“The family’s in ruins.”
“In ruins?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
Antonion clamped his mouth shut as if unwilling to say more, then hurriedly fled the room like a fugitive.
When Ceres turned a questioning look toward Jae, the maid too wore an awkward expression before hastily moving toward the door, saying she’d return once the meal was finished.
“Hmm.”
Watching the two of them disappear, Ceres looked at the food on the table and clicked her tongue lightly.
Some hard-looking bread and a bowl of stew that was nearly devoid of any real ingredients.
Was this really the best meal to offer someone who’d just been brought back from the dead?
“A ruined family, he said.”
Following Antonion’s meaning didn’t require much thought.
* * *
“What absolutely rotten weather.”
An unkempt Garden, wild with weeds and overgrowth.
It must have been beautiful and resplendent once, but now it was merely a desolate space.
Ceres, seated in one corner of that garden, stared blankly up at the sky.
The cloudless, clear sky today felt unusually grating to her eyes.
“Three hundred years.”
A hollow laugh escaped Ceres’s lips.
And with reason—the fragile hold she’d maintained on her sanity had slipped away entirely once she learned this new fact.
‘What?’
‘Pardon?’
‘What year is it now?’
‘It is 1513, ma’am.’
‘…This is insane.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Good gods, I’ve lost my mind.’
‘Um, um… Ceres?’
After learning from her maid Jae—who had entered the room to clean—what year it currently was, Ceres found herself utterly stunned for a long while.
‘If I died in 1213…’
That meant exactly three hundred years had passed.
The sheer absurdity of realizing this fact.
What on earth had I been doing for three hundred years?
‘It did feel like I’d slept deeply.’
When she first opened her eyes in the darkness, there had indeed been a sensation of waking from an extraordinarily long sleep.
But who could have guessed that such time would amount to three hundred years?
“Sigh.”
The first thing that came to mind after gaining this new life was, of course, the Elrcian Countdom she had once led.
She had planned to slip away and visit once she grew somewhat accustomed to this new existence.
Of course, she had no intention whatsoever of marching in declaring ‘I am Grace Elrcian!’ and demanding the seat of Family Head back.
Who would believe such an incredible story, one she herself could hardly accept?
But still…….
‘I’m curious whether Enoch is doing well.’
She worried that the foolish boy had been taken advantage of by others.
‘Yet three hundred years?’
All such thoughts were pointless. So much time had passed that even the ashes of her disciple would have turned to dust.

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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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