Chapter 9
Chapter 9
Chapter 9
“But how did you know that there is poison in here?”
He glanced at me when Noah caught him off-guard.
“Intuition.”
‘You’re talking about gut feeling now, huh.’ This time, since I am able to move my body freely, I really wanted to hit him in the back of the neck.
“Intuition? Is that possible?”
Noah stared at him as if he was saying something absurd.
“Don’t say anything useless again, do your research.”
“….Yes. I’m glad you didn’t eat it anyway. Shall we check other foods?”
When Noah asked, Declan looked at me. “All right. Just in case, it would be better to look at other foods as well.”
“That is true. There is nothing bad about being cautious.”
As he was pondering over something thoughtfully, Declan caught Noah, who was trying to leave the room.
“Is there anything else you want me to do?’’
“Noah, is there anything else you see here?” He said as he pointed to where I was standing. Noah replied, puzzled but calmly.
“What are you talking about, Your Majesty?”
It certainly seemed to Noah that I was invisible. ‘Is Declan really the only person who can see me?’ As the situation was incomprehensible, Declan was confused and at a loss.
“No, that’s fine.”
Finally, Declan beckoned to him and gave an order. Noah and the servants cleaned up the food and went out quietly.
“Your Majesty, is there a mirror here?”
Remembering Noah’s reaction, I thought I had to check my condition properly.
“Hm?”
After gazing at me for a moment, Declan raised his eyebrows and swiftly pointed to a place. There was a large full-length mirror standing there.
When I stood in front of the mirror, nervousness erupted, and I tried to calm my breath.
“I’m not in the mirror…”
As he approached, Declan muttered as he looked into the mirror, reflecting only himself.
“I know, right.”
Even though I had been predicting it to some extent, I couldn’t help but feel disappointed.
“Then, how can Your Majesty see me?”
“I’m not sure. Is it magic?”
“Isn’t it bad if it’s magic? I’m telling you in advance, but I’m not an evil spirit.” I replied right away as I waved at the word magic.
“I don’t think of you as an evil spirit.”
At my words, Declan peered and laughed at me.
“That’s a good thing, then.”
If it were normal, I would have been annoyed by that laughter, but now, I feel relieved as it is a problem related to my survival.
“It’s been several years since I’ve had that doll. If you were really an evil spirit, whatever happened, it would have happened since the beginning already.”
He was talking bluntly, but his eyes narrowed as if he suddenly thought of something.
“By any chance, you struck my chest…”
“No.”
Embarrassed, I cut off the start of his words and replied coldly. ‘Was it so impressive that I satisfied your perverted taste?’
With my words, Declan cleared his throat and spoke again. “First, I have to look for the doll company.”
“The doll company?”
“Yes. There are magicians among the doll companies. Do you remember anything about the doll company that made you?”
I adjusted my expressions so as not to show any embarrassment. Well, I didn’t think about it until then. Still, in my defense, nothing about the history of dolls doesn’t appear in the original story, so how would I know?
‘What should I do? But it’s also strange to say that I’ve only seen and heard it from a few days ago as well…’ I rolled my head quickly but couldn’t think of an answer, so I decided to mix the truth and the lie.
“I don’t have any memories of the doll’s history. Just, Chloe, no, I have been able to see and hear since I was with Her Highness the Princess.’’
Worrying that he would doubt my existence, I shrunk, wondering if Declan would take out his sword and lift it up.
“Usually, I would have doubted if…”
However, he paused before he could finish his sentence.
So, although I was curious about what he was going to say, I didn’t pry, afraid Declan might think I’m being suspicious.
“Once I meet the doll company, I should know more.”
“Please. I’m also curious why I am in this state.” To be precise, I want to know how I came to possess a doll like this. He nodded, saying he understood.
“By the way…”
As he saw my hesitation, Declan gestured that it was all right to go on.
“How are you going to call me in the future?”
“You’re Chl…”
He tried to answer inadvertently, but paused. His eyes shook momentarily.
“Yes, you are not Chloe.”
He spoke again though his voice was repressed. It was as if he was forced to admit the facts that he did not want to.
“I am just a friend who shares memories with Her Highness.”
Because I could feel a sense of rejection from him when I said that I was a doll earlier, I decided to change it to a friend instead.
“So, please call my name from now on.”
“If it’s your name, are you referring to Erica?”
‘I suppose the doll’s name will have to do for now.’
He continued, “Yeah, I should call you like that… You’re not Chloe.” Even so, it felt as though it was difficult for Declan to say those words.
I know he could barely endure his feelings, remembering Chloe through the doll and being comforted by that. For him, it must have been difficult to think of Chloe and the doll as separate because it meant that he didn’t need to keep living alone.
Nonetheless, it doesn’t heal the wound, but rather, it makes it more festering.
So, for him and for myself, I had to properly heal his wounds.
“Okay. I’ll call you by your name… Erica.”
He spat out ‘Erica’ difficulty. For a moment, the silence seemed to flow, then I heard a knock on the door.
“Come in.”
With Declan’s permission, Noah came in with a stiff face.
“It seems to be poisonous. The silver couldn’t detect it at all, but when I fed it to a mouse, it died immediately within a few minutes.”
The word poison caused serious tension inside the room.
“What about other foods?”
“There was no poison in other foods.”
“All right, good work.”
“I will investigate all the people who work in the kitchen and the attendants.”
“If they know that I’m fine, the criminals will be embarrassed. You know what you need to do before you proceed with that, don’t you?” Declan twisted his mouth.
“Understood.”
“Can you identify the culprit?”
He turned to ask me, but just as I was about to answer, Noah replied first. “We’ll have to investigate that, won’t we?”
“I didn’t ask you.”
Declan reacted bluntly to his words, embarrassed.
“Ah, did you ask Her Highness the Princess?” Noah asked, tilting his head. Hearing his words, Declan frowned lightly.
“Aren’t you all done? Get out.”
“You’re a little weird today. You talk nonsense about intuition, and you ask what I see in places where there’s nothing… Were you poisoned?”
“Are you not leaving?”
Noah flinched as he spat out grimly.
“I’ll investigate right away, Your Majesty.” Saying so, Noah, who hurriedly greeted him, went out quickly.
“Is it all right to let him think that you’re acting weird?”
The thought made me worried that this would be something that would happen frequently in the future. However, unlike me, Declan looked calm.
“It can’t be helped. There is no way I could explain it to Noah because he couldn’t see you.”
“That’s true, but…”
“Let’s figure out what we should do later.”
I nodded quietly since I couldn’t think of any other solution right now either. Thinking about the next urgent thing, Declan spoke again.
“So, is it possible to find the culprit or not?”
“It’s not that I can see through people’s thoughts, Your Majesty.”
“Is that so. I thought you could find anything because you talked confidently.”
At that moment, my temperature jumped from his disregarding tone. ‘Huh, a mind reader? Who does he think I am? Finding the culprit with a cough?*’
As I glanced at Declan, huffing inside, he stared back as if asking why I did so. Ah, this man was denser than his appearance.
‘Be patient. Patient, patient, patient.’
Frustrated, I tried to calm my mind, thinking of the future where I would be burned. Though my mouth already started moving.
“You can’t ignore me.” He reacted profoundly to my provocative remarks.
“There is no guarantee that the same thing today will not ever happen again.”
Declan couldn’t immediately refute it even when he looked at me with a ridiculous expression.
“Even if you ponder about it a hundred times, you still need my ability, don’t you?”
With my words, dissatisfaction was painted on his face. I continued, “So, be good to me in the future.”
He laughed as I crossed my arms and made a proud look.
“Yes. It is true that you played a big part today.”
Although it was a reluctant recognition, I was satisfied with it. However, for a while, Declan just smiled as he held the doll at the table.
“But who really needs to be good, now?”
I was stunned by the threats to remember who the doll’s owner was. Even if I wanted to refute, I had no choice but to harden.
“Huh?”
The doll I saw for the first time was very familiar.
“Iris?”
I couldn’t speak.
The doll, about 50centimeters in size, had shiny, gold hair twisting down to its waist. The purple eyes shone so brightly that it was unbelievable that they were glass balls. In addition, the skin color was similar to that of humans, so I felt as though it was going to move any second.
In a word, it was the same as the doll I had in my life, Iris.
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Notes:
* Okay, this doesn’t make sense to non-Koreans, I guess. There was a long-running old historical drama that spurred memes as the King killed someone just because they coughed. The meme was (roughly translated) ‘Who was it? Who made the coughing sound?!’. Yes, I know it doesn’t make sense, hahaha.
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