I Became a Fortune Teller in the Game My Little Sister Made – Chapter 123

Adorned with a blood-red crown, she smiled regally.

The black ceremonial attire shimmered darkly under the faint light, and a cloak made not of fabric but a liquid resembling blood billowed around her.

Without bothering to wipe away the blood tears flowing from one eye, Kim Eun-ha reached out her hand toward me.

“Why so glum? Fortuneteller Oppa. No… Namgoong Min.”

“…Are you truly the Crown Princess?”

“Of course. I’m Kim Eun-ha, the one who met you during the private exam, shared the first semester with you, and became friends. You even helped me fend off assassination threats, remember?”

“………….”

“Shall we walk for now? This corridor has an end. Follow me.”

She was bewitching yet laid-back.

Though it was certainly Kim Eun-ha standing before me, something about her seemed different.

With blood tears dripping down, she led the way down the dark passage.

“Where is this place…?”

“Oh, it’s a Lucid Dream. Ah, you probably wanted a different answer, huh? This is the Underground Prison of the Crown Princess Palace.”

“…An underground prison?”

“Yes, a dungeon beneath the palace where my younger self used to run around. A hell where only the most depraved of the depraved are sent, never to escape again.”

Why on earth would such a place be located beneath the Crown Princess Palace?

…But I already knew the reason.

And it seemed Kim Eun-ha knew it too.

“You really aren’t going to ask, are you?”

“……….”

“You knew everything, didn’t you? Things you shouldn’t know, secrets nobody should be aware of, all those hidden truths. Maybe that’s why you can confess even my most secretive secrets.”

“………….”

“Are you being silent? That’s a good posture to take. Though, there’s nothing more embarrassing than explaining to someone who already knows… Just bear with me. It’s been a while since I felt this sense of relief.”

“…Is that so.”

“Yes. This is the Underground Prison, the hell of prisoners, a place filled with my childhood memories… and where offerings gather for me.”

Clink.

The prison bars on either side of the corridor.

With the faint light not reaching inside the pitch-black prison, Kim Eun-ha picked up a chain linking to the darkness and tugged lightly.

Of course, it was a light action only for her.

BANG!!

“Cough!!!”

“Oh, Uncle Park Hwang-cheol. I remember you. You were special among the prisoners gathered here.”

“…Special?”

“Of course! When you first arrived here, you talked about assaulting me, didn’t you? Imagine how scared I was as a child!”

“……….”

“And now, look at you.”

Park Hwang-cheol.

A prisoner bound in chains, groaning in pain, devoid of any self-awareness.

If my memory served me right… that was the name of the doll that used to be in the room of the young princess.

Was it because this was a Lucid Dream, or was the young princess really the same as the Kim Eun-ha before me?

Before I could unravel my doubts, Kim Eun-ha grabbed Park Hwang-cheol by the neck through the bars and grinned.

“Why so down? You’re a child sex offender, aren’t you? So you received a death sentence and ended up here, right?”

“Ugh, ughhh….”

“But you were special. You were the only prisoner who lasted four days. It was like my beloved doll had been damaged.”

With the strength of her frail arms, Kim Eun-ha made a sinister sound from Park Hwang-cheol’s neck and then threw him into the darkness.

After wiping her hands on the bars as if disgusted by the filth, she turned back to me.

“Don’t worry, he’s not dead. I can’t kill anyone right now.”

“Is it the Innocent Kill curse?”

“More accurately, it’s a contract. Since that day, the Mediator has shackled me. Thanks to that, I can wound others, but I cannot kill.”

The sounds of Park Hwang-cheol groaning in the darkness served as proof of that.

Though the sounds were horrifying, Kim Eun-ha moved about as if accustomed to it and continued walking.

“Is my current appearance unfamiliar to you?”

“Indeed.”

“How definitive! To be shunned by a trusting fortuneteller, how tragic.”

“…May I ask just one thing?”

“Oh? What would an all-knowing fortuneteller like to inquire about? I’m all ears.”

“Have you been released from the Desire to Kill?”

“…Well, that’s something you would be curious about.”

Thud.

The corridor was lit only by faint lanterns and bars.

Just as before, the princess led the way, with me following behind.

The difference was that she wasn’t holding my hand to lead me.

Was it trust that I would follow her, or was it a certainty that I had no choice but to?

One thing was certain.

Right now, she was feeling very good.

“How much do you know about the Desire to Kill?”

“I know enough.”

“As you know, the Desire to Kill has been a skill I’ve possessed since my birth. It enhances my health and physical abilities.”

“But it must have side effects.”

“Pretty minor. I just regularly wanted to kill someone.”

Royalty, Desire to Kill, Bloodsucker.

The ones that Kim Eun-ha had possessed since birth, her skills.

Usually, general skills gained only through artifacts or special circumstances, but the young princess was born with both.

That was indeed a blessing.

But the content of the skills was the problem.

‘Desire to Kill is also known as the Celestial Killing Star. To quell the urge, one must kill regularly; and Bloodsucker grows stronger the more it is soaked in blood, but one loses reasoning.’

If it became known that the princess of the Daehan Empire was born with such skills, it was clear chaos would ensue.

Thus, the Emperor almost imprisoned Kim Eun-ha within the Crown Princess Palace and called upon the Mediator to enforce secrecy among the high officials regarding her secret.

And finally, an underground prison exclusively for death row inmates was built beneath the palace.

To regularly satiate her Desire to Kill.

This grotesque routine progressed quite smoothly.

Until the princess grew up, all the way to her seventh birthday.

“It was a happy time.”

“…Is that so?”

“After all, the prisoners brought here are those who have already received death sentences and ceased to exist in this world. If I’m using them to resolve my Desire to Kill, isn’t that a useful application?”

“………….”

“Just like Uncle Park Hwang-cheol, there are child sex offenders, serial killers, economic criminals, and terrorists. They weren’t people; they were just objects that kept me stable.”

“……….”

“My Desire to Kill was well resolved, and my mother would often come to visit. My father… well, he almost never came. Nevertheless, even if I was trapped in this palace, I could have whatever I wanted.”

…Ahead.

At the end of the corridor where the princess walked.

A door stood before us.

As Kim Eun-ha reached the door, she opened it naturally.

“Of course… only until that day.”

“………This is.”

“It’s the scar left from that day. A wound engraved within me.”

Beyond the door was a small room.

Unlike the dark and cold prison, this room was cozy and warm.

A bookshelf, a table, and a bed all well-maintained, glowing with a soft and warm light at its center.

A person was slumped over in a chair, lifeless.

…She had the same hair color as Kim Eun-ha.

“It’s my mother.”

“………….”

“It was just like any other day. This is where I would take a nap or rest after resolving my Desire to Kill.”

Kim Eun-ha stroked the bookshelf and table as if reminiscing, circling the room around the corpse at its center.

Though I, who was entirely unfamiliar with this place, could also feel warmth and affection, the corpse at the center radiated a chilling aura.

“Originally, my mother would come to my room in the Crown Princess Palace to play with me. She would read me storybooks, engage in doll games, and often play house.”

“……….”

The room where the young princess would fall asleep together with her.

“But that day, my mother came in just like this. It must have been my birthday. She probably intended to surprise me.”

“………….”

“And so, my mother visited this room for the first time… and it became her last visit.”

And the room in the underground prison where the corpse lay.

Both rooms were Kim Eun-ha’s, and both were her memories.

“…When I came to my senses, my mother was cold, lying on the ground like this.”

“Was your Desire to Kill not resolved?”

“Honestly, I don’t think it would have mattered. After all, it doesn’t change the fact that I killed my mother.”

The day her happy childhood turned upside down.

That night, three magistrates visited her.

“The Mediator has a contract, the Oppressor has a duty, and the Dictator has restrictions.”

“……….”

“And so my Desire to Kill was sealed, and I was able to leave the Crown Princess Palace.”

That was Kim Eun-ha’s past. A past distorted from what I knew.

But if that were the case, a question arose.

Why hadn’t they sealed her Desire to Kill from the beginning?

“Namgoong Min, do you know?”

“…What do you mean?”

“My Desire to Kill has been a part of me since I was born. When it was tightly bound and disappeared… I ceased to be ‘me.'”

Imagine someone who was born without arms or legs.

Someone who has normal limbs will consider it a disability; however, for someone who has never had limbs, that’s the norm.

As they grow and mature, it becomes familiar to not have limbs.

Even if they were to artificially attach limbs, they would be confused with the disparity of sensations they’ve had since birth.

‘So, Kim Eun-ha without her Desire to Kill…’

Would naturally face a dissonance of the mind.

Of course, the royal family, who was aware of this, was the one who arranged for her Desire to Kill to be resolved in a distorted manner.

But after Kim Eun-ha killed her mother, that came undone.

In the end, the royal family made a decision.

It was better that she live in an incomplete state.

“Do you remember what I said earlier?”

“Yes, I remember everything.”

“Impressive. As I mentioned, right now… I’m feeling a sense of liberation.”

In the center of a room with her mother’s corpse.

With a wide smile that was filled with madness, Kim Eun-ha spread her arms wide.

The blood that had dripped from her eyes, her blood-red crown, and her cloak began to soak the room.

“I was incomplete because my Desire to Kill had been sealed. I was always suffocated, forgetting something and feeling uncomfortable somewhere. But how about now?”

“…You’re smiling.”

“All thanks to you, Namgoong Min.”

…Me?

My… thanks?

What does that mean──

“As I extended my interactions with you, I realized.”

“What exactly….”

“My Desire to Kill trembled each time I looked at you.”

“………….”

“But the incomplete me didn’t know. Since my Desire to Kill had been sealed, I didn’t know what that feeling meant. That racing heart, I might have mistakenly thought it was love.”

“……….”

“But right now… in this brief liberation within this Lucid Dream, I fully realized.”

──I want to kill you.

──And I want to soak myself in your blood.

“……….”

An overwhelming craziness and ecstasy.

With blood tears, Kim Eun-ha slowly approached me.

Soaking her entire body in blood, splashing through the pool of blood on the floor.

Carefully, she placed a hand over my heart.

“So… Namgoong Min.”

“…Yes, Crown Princess.”

“Would it be okay for me to kill you?”

That was── the smile I saw earlier.

The pure smile of the young princess.

The only thing that had changed was her appearance and the words she spoke.

So,

“No.”

“…Is that so?”

“If you were to ask me in reality, my answer might be different.”

“Ah, haha, hahaha… I see.”

With a smooth motion, she retracted her hand that had been on my chest and stepped back.

In accordance with her movement, the blood swayed.

The overflowing crimson liquid came to a halt, and the blood that had been pooling on the floor gradually receded.

As if it had merely been a casual inquiry, Kim Eun-ha gazed at me with a pure smile while clasping her hands behind her back.

“Indeed, those who can reach this point… they are different. Your one word resonates with my heart.”

“…Is this related to the Hero being banished first?”

“Well, yes. The Abel Legion is a dream within a dream… they cannot enter my deep heart, nor are they worthy of it. So I simply allowed the ones who couldn’t even enter to leave first.”

“They were allowed…?”

“…It’s time. Even in a dream within a dream, I cannot endure it any longer.”

“………What?”

Grugugugu.

A sound echoed from somewhere.

A sound reminiscent of what I heard in the young princess’s room.

Like the noise made when the hero scratched the fabric of space──

“—Huh?”

The door to the small room opened.

And what emerged was… a rift.

A massive, torn rift that began sucking me in violently.

“Ugh…!?”

“Remember this, Namgoong Min. This is merely a Lucid Dream, and when you wake, I will become incomplete again.”

“Crown Princess…!”

“That I am the same person you know, and that this is my childhood self.”

Kim Eun-ha spoke.

The one adorned with a blood-red crown.

Now she had regressed and donned a white dress.

“And please remember my deepest truth within my heart.”

“………!!”

Just as I could no longer endure, being cruelly pulled into the rift.

With a smile, the young version of her said.

“──I genuinely want to kill you.”

That was her farewell.