[Episode 16]
Had I been too conscious of my own existence? I had occasionally felt people whispering or casting unpleasant glances my way, but it wasn’t anything worth worrying about. Without deviating from the original story’s flow, the days passed one by one without any major uproar at the Academy.
Feeling rather proud that I seemed to be settling into this world much better than before, it was a day when I was preparing for my first outing since entering the Academy.
I’d had a few chances to briefly look around the capital before enrolling, but each time I was pressed for time and had to return quickly. Using the excuse of going out to buy stationery to send to Baron and Lady Degott, this time I truly wanted to properly tour the capital.
And more than anything, I wanted to get away from the Academy and get some fresh air. Having encountered a few crazy people, I didn’t want to remain at the Academy through the weekend and needlessly run into them. I didn’t want to deliberately ruin the stable daily life I was savoring after so long.
I took one of the carriages lined up in front of the Academy and rode to the center of the capital, where numerous large and sophisticated buildings caught my eye—certainly unlike Heilem. After slowly sightseeing, I entered a general store that caught my eye, bought some stationery and ink, and came out, only to find my next destination unclear.
With the thought of at least stopping by a café, I was looking around when merchants selling small items at street stalls suddenly caught my attention.
I approached one of them, where an old woman with eyes as milky-white as hair was selling small pins. From hairpins to cufflinks, the intricate items were quite delicately made for goods sold on the street.
With the sudden thought of buying one to send along with my letter, I crouched down in front of her. The old woman selling the goods took her eyes off the pin she was handling and stared at me fixedly. Feeling slightly embarrassed, I was holding a hairpin and examining it this way and that.
“Fake.”
The old woman selling the items quietly opened her mouth. It was an abrupt thing to hear from a seller.
‘What an honest person…’
Feeling even more embarrassed at the word “fake,” I set down the pin I had been holding and picked up a cufflink. It was a blue-gray cufflink, similar to Dietrich’s eye color.
“Then what about this?”
Considering Dietrich’s status, I shouldn’t be using honorifics with someone selling goods on the street… but honestly, speaking casually to an elderly person still pricked my conscience. Besides, I doubted anyone here would know Dietrich’s status.
So it was with relief that I was showing off my manners as someone from the Land of Eastern Etiquette, speaking formally to my heart’s content without any pangs of conscience after a long time. The old woman stared at me fixedly for a while again and opened her mouth.
“Fake.”
This time, too, the item I had picked up seemed to be a counterfeit. Thinking that perhaps I simply had no eye for goods, and that with this level of discernment it would be faster to ask the honest seller what was real, I spoke.
“Grandmother… no, Madam. Then is there nothing real here?”
Honestly, would real jewels be at a street stall like this… but I couldn’t ignore the good faith of the old woman who was answering honestly. I figured there must be at least one item she believed was real.
“No, not the items.”
At the unexpected answer, I turned my gaze from the items to look at the old woman.
“I’m saying you’re the fake.”
The focus of the old woman’s whitened eyes was now sharply directed at me.
Remarkable.
Feeling the sharply piercing gaze of the old woman, I recalled a fortune-teller who had once guessed my past with almost shamanistic precision. But… perhaps those words were a tactic to gain the upper hand.
‘After all, shamans start by shouting at the people who come to them.’
I looked at the old woman with wide eyes. Then I cautiously asked.
“Why am I… a fake?”
The old woman clicked her tongue and gestured as if telling me to come closer. When I leaned in, she lowered her voice and spoke.
“You’ve entered someone else’s body and are acting as the owner. That makes you a fake.”
“Gasp.”
It seemed I had come to the right place after all. The intuition that the old woman before my eyes knew what my true identity was flashed through my mind. Not wanting to miss this opportunity, I abruptly grabbed the old woman’s hand.
“Grandmother, no, Madam, no, Teacher! That’s right. I am a fake.”
How did you know? I whispered, clutching the old woman’s hand tightly. Perhaps because it was an unexpected admission, the old woman seemed slightly flustered. But I couldn’t miss this unexpected stroke of luck. A clue as to how I had come to this world had come by chance—something that wouldn’t appear even if I searched the library books a hundred times.
“I really want to return this body to its owner too. I didn’t come here because I wanted to.”
Speaking as if pleading even more, I practically clung to the old woman’s hand. Hoping my earnestness would reach her, I looked at her with the most pitiful eyes I could muster.
Clinging pitifully while using the highest honorifics, she spoke in a tone where the initial sharpness had softened slightly.
“The gap between the body and soul is patched together in the sloppiest way. It’s because the soul remaining in that body is forcibly holding onto something that doesn’t fit.”
Like a burr seed. Saying so, the old woman made gestures with her hands as if pressing something together and pulling it apart.
If it was a burr seed… she seemed to be talking about Velcro. If the soul remaining in this body was Dietrich’s soul. But why on earth? When I looked at her with eyes saying I didn’t understand, the old woman opened her mouth again.
“Regrets cling to it thickly. As it is now, even if you say you’ll go, it won’t let you.”
Regret about what? I slowly pondered after hearing the old woman’s words.
I had possessed this body after Dietrich slipped on the stairs and broke his leg. Before breaking his leg, the only thing I could think of that Dietrich might have lingering regrets about was being kicked out of the Duke’s household.
‘Could it be that he regrets not being able to be filial to Baron and Lady Degott?’
Wrapping my head, which could only produce answers steeped in Confucian thought, I decided to ask another question I had long been curious about.
“Teacher, then what about the owner of this body… the original soul. Do you know where it went?”
“Eh, I don’t know that.”
Why? I asked, springing up like a coil. When I looked at her with an expression of ‘but someone so remarkable…’ the old woman added nonchalantly.
“If your next-door neighbor runs away in the middle of the night, you might wonder where they went, but how would you know exactly where they went?”
Hmm. That was true. But actually, there was something else I was really curious about.
“Teacher, perhaps… my body. My real body in another world. Is it still alive?”
“Don’t know that either.”
“Why?”
This time I truly jumped up and asked. No, that’s the most important thing…
The old woman, now seeming somewhat annoyed, answered without even looking at me, her attitude becoming more nonchalant.
“I might know the affairs of our own neighborhood, but how would I know the affairs of someone else’s neighborhood too? For that, you’d have to go over there, to the Temple.”
The whereabouts of Dietrich’s soul, and whether my body was still alive in that world—it seemed I would have to go to the Temple and meet a priest to get answers to the things I was curious about. The problem was that meeting priests like the High Priest at the Temple required paying a large sum in the name of donations.
‘Of course, ordinary people would live well enough without necessarily meeting a priest, and nobles who truly had something to ask a priest would pay that large sum easily but…’
My head throbbed at the thought that I would eventually have to go to the Temple.
“Um… thank you, Grandmother. Sorry for being a bother.”
The old woman merely glanced at me without saying a word. Pressing my lips tightly out of embarrassment, I added a few more words.
“And… it felt nice, like seeing my own grandmother after a long time. I’ll hurry and try hard to return to where I belong.”
“Earlier you called me teacher, and now it’s grandmother again.”
Though she was grumbling, her tone had completely softened. The old woman seemed to focus on the cufflink she was making, but after glancing at me, she spoke.
“Empty, so empty.”
Gasp, was she finally giving me some new information? I quickly asked back.
“Is that written on my soul too?”
“No, you just look like that.”
“Ah, yes.”
At the old woman’s cynical answer, I replied, feeling embarrassed. This time, the old woman, who had been staring at me fixedly, clicked her tongue, saying I would have a hard time ahead.
Gasp, could she see the future too?
“Can you see my future?”
“No. Empty-headed kids like you have always gone around asking for trouble.”
“Ah, yes.”
At the series of cynical answers, I truly became embarrassed. The old woman clicked her tongue again when I couldn’t hide my expression, then pressed the pin and cufflink I had been fiddling with earlier into my hand. I was just rummaging through my wallet, thinking that having heard this much, it would be acceptable to be pressured into buying one or two items.
“No need for money. Just take them.”
Saying something unexpected, the old woman began putting away the items on her stall.
“Still… I’ve already received your help, and it’s too much to receive gifts like this as well….”
I moved my head this way and that, trying to meet the gaze of the old woman, who was cleaning up her stall without looking my way. When I continued lingering without leaving, she gruffly said that I should come by again later and buy a few things. “That’s right,” I answered in a bright voice.
“Of course. Before I return to my original place, I’ll definitely stop by and buy a lot.”
At my words, the old woman finally met my eyes again and replied, “Do that.” For the first time since our conversation began, a slight smile seemed to brush past the old woman’s lips.
***
“…500 gold?”
“Yes. You said you wanted an audience with the High Priest.”
But as expected, this world was not going to let things slide so easily. At the temple I had come to following the old woman’s advice, I encountered yet another obstacle.
“And it’s not something you can have an audience for immediately. You must put your name on the waiting list and wait approximately six months.”
“Six months?”
“And that is the minimum estimate.”
‘What the heck, meeting the High Priest is like making a hospital appointment at a university hospital….’