Episode 24 of the 24-Hour Regression, Possession, and Reincarnation Consultation Office
The second reincarnator client recorded in the Lien family archives was documented as the worst case among all clients.
She had been born a descendant of her previous life’s enemy house.
A descendant from a full two hundred years later.
[In her early teens, when the memories of her previous life surfaced, the client recognized that life as ‘me.’]
[She became excessively assimilated into those memories.]
[As a result, drawing upon the knowledge of her previous life, she manufactured poison and murdered her entire family at a young age.]
The client, imprisoned in jail, had searched everywhere for the ‘Lien family,’ and the current head of the family, who had been searching for her, met her in that prison.
[Only in her early teens, the client was overwhelmed by decades of previous life memories, in a state of being consumed by them.]
[The client fell into deep regret.]
[She said that every night, the family of her current life, killed by her own hands, came to her.]
According to the counselor’s records, although they were an enemy house, it was not because of that house that her previous life’s clan had been destroyed.
It was simply that the reincarnator had harbored a severe inferiority complex toward that commercially inferior enemy house all her life, and had hated them enough to want to kill them.
[I dare offer advice to the descendants.]
[Please, do not let the reincarnator client lose sight of their current life.]
God sometimes bestowed blessings upon the clients, sometimes trials, and sometimes delivered nightmares.
[Carrying on the will of one’s previous life cannot be said to be entirely bad.]
[However, it must be a choice made while the client is in a state capable of sound judgment.]
“I will help you, Mr. Cross, so that you can live wholly as yourself.”
Recalling Cross, who was surely looking at her, Laura showed a bright smile.
“Because that is my job.”
As if asking him to trust her.
“…….”
Silence fell.
She calmly waited for Cross to speak.
Then, Cross withdrew his hand from between Laura’s two hands.
‘Did something go wrong?’
Worry bloomed in Laura’s heart, but she did not show it.
“…….”
Just a few seconds. During that truly brief stillness, various thoughts flitted through Laura’s mind.
“……Countess.”
Finally, Cross answered.
Laura flinched slightly. Cross had approached her while she had been looking away.
Without looking at her, he stood before her with his gaze fixed on the ground. And after catching his breath for a moment, he slightly bowed his head.
“I look forward to working with you.”
“As do I, Mr. Customer.”
Cross took the hand extended before him.
And so the two exchanged their first handshake. Though it was brief, as Cross quickly let go.
“More importantly, Mr. Customer.”
“Countess, please speak casually.”
Cross showed a troubled expression, as though finding it difficult to be addressed as ‘customer’ by Laura, who was a countess.
“Very well. Then, Mr. Cross. Just as when you held my gaze for a moment longer, could you tell me about the moments when Kalien’s manner of speaking or thoughts burst forth?”
“Ah.”
Cross fell into thought for a moment. Laura watched him and thought:
‘This is a problem.’
Whether this world had gone mad, or whether Lady Lirien had gone a bit strange.
The clients who had appeared after five hundred years numbered a whopping three.
‘And not one of them is ordinary.’
A person from the Republic of Korea possessing the body of the Empire’s Crown Prince.
The mad prince who had tried to destroy the Empire.
An administrative official whose previous life was the greatest mage and rival of the first emperor.
‘And they all have their difficulties.’
She had to resolve them one by one.
“Countess.”
Cross’s deliberation was brief.
“It just so happens that I have a document recording my current condition.”
“Really?”
Laura was surprised but also a little pleased. Seeing that record would certainly help in understanding Cross’s condition.
“Yes. However, it is a somewhat lacking document, so I will write up a new one and deliver it by tomorrow.”
Huh?
Laura felt something was a bit strange.
“……Mr. Cross, you can simply give it to me as it is.”
“No. It is a jumble of disjointed sentences that will only dizzy your eyes, Countess. I have no intention of falsifying the content, so please wait just one day.”
…Laura had not thought for a moment that he would falsify anything.
“Document work, writing papers—these are all my main fields and hobbies, so you need not worry. I will finish it quickly.”
Laura saw Cross’s eyes sparkling. To anyone, he looked as though his heart was fluttering at the thought of doing paperwork.
‘……’
Count Violet, who had expressed expectations for Cross while saying, ‘He’s painting a big picture,’ suddenly came to mind once more.
‘To think writing papers is his hobby.’
She wondered whether Cross could truly continue a quiet life in administration, but for now, she swallowed those words.
“Then, Countess, let us conduct the consultation after I deliver the documents. For now, I shall provide guidance regarding the temporary tutor position.”
Cross pushed up his glasses and mentioned the work.
At his much calmer demeanor, Laura followed him and sat on the sofa.
“Countess, are you aware of the authority granted by the temporary tutor position? The main duties?”
“I only know the general outline.”
At Laura’s answer, Cross took out a token from inside his coat.
“This is a token indicating your position and your permission to enter and exit the Imperial Palace. With this, you may freely enter and exit the Crown Prince’s palace, the Imperial Palace library, and the Imperial Palace gardens.”
“I see.”
Laura listened attentively to Cross’s unwavering explanation.
“However, Countess.”
She waited for his continuing explanation while looking at Cross reflected in the window.
Cross stared at Laura, then pushed his glasses up once more and opened his mouth.
“Is His Highness the Crown Prince also a reincarnator?”
Huh?
Laura’s heart dropped.
Her outward appearance remained calm, but Laura’s eyes were focused on Cross’s mouth reflected in the window.
The perennial top student of the Imperial Palace Academy. His eyes were shining with cold composure.
‘Surely my pupils aren’t shaking right now?’
Had Cross not been right in front of her, Laura would have been touching her ears, wondering if she had heard correctly.
‘Stay calm! Stay calm!’
She wanted to immediately take out a dagger and fiddle with it to calm her mind, but she held back.
And spoke.
As naturally as possible.
“What do you mean?”
Meanwhile, Cross flinched briefly at the voice devoid of emotion.
To Laura, it was a voice she had produced by trying to strip away emotion and respond calmly, but to the listener, it sounded severely detached.
“Mr. Cross?”
When there was no reaction from Cross, Laura called out to him with an anxious heart.
But when Laura called his name in a low voice still devoid of emotion, Cross could not easily open his mouth.
‘So this is what it means to be the head of a family of meritorious retainers?’
He had momentarily mistaken her gentle and kind demeanor, but Laura Lien was someone who had protected the county alone at the age of twenty.
And to think she was from a family that counseled regressors, possessors, and reincarnators.
Cross only believed this fact readily because he was the party involved; had he been an outsider, he would have asked if it was a novel and refused to believe it.
Come to think of it, Kalien, Cross’s previous life—that crazed bastard had thrown fits whenever he saw Countess Laura.
‘The implication was that without the Countess’s ancestor, the first emperor Ren would not have been able to accomplish as much.’
Perhaps the County of Lien had played a far greater role in the founding of the nation than was known to the public.
Then, Laura called Cross again, who was lost in thought.
“Mr. Cross?”
Cross suddenly came to his senses.
Meanwhile, Laura was on pins and needles.
‘He seems incredibly intelligent! What is he thinking? Could he have figured everything out?’
However, without catching Laura’s trembling gaze, Cross opened his mouth.
“His Highness the Crown Prince hovered between life and death and then suddenly awoke. And in a considerably healthy state, at that.”
Cross continued speaking while looking somewhere other than Laura’s face, so as not to awaken the demon-like Kalien sleeping inside him.
“And as soon as he woke, he displayed a course of action considerably different from before.”
He was different from the Crown Prince known to be frail.
“Of course, I heard that he has not yet recovered his health.”
The incident in which the Crown Prince had suddenly collapsed had already become a rumor spread among those who ought to know.
“……Why do you ask?”
Cross looked at Laura, who had suddenly flinched.
“It’s nothing. Please continue.”
Laura knew that the Crown Prince’s collapse was not due to health reasons, but she pretended not to.
“For such a person to suddenly take the next step of taking the Countess as a temporary tutor.”
To Cross, it was a trivial guess.
“Everyone was in an uproar, saying they could not find a single thread of contact between the County of Lien and His Highness. But I knew the secret of the County of Lien.”
Thinking based on that secret, only one guess came to mind.
“That something had occurred within His Highness the Crown Prince, and therefore he needed a teacher who could counsel and inform him of this.”