I slowly opened my eyes.

It was like waking up from a very deep sleep. An indistinct rustle tickled my ears. Someone was crying and whispering behind the screen.

My mind was still not clear, I heard only fragments of phrases.

“Okay… your move.”

“Ah, this child’s face… Oh, I so want to go home.”

“Whom will he choose… I don’t know… Let’s no offense.”

“Please, you shuld wake up…”

What is this sound?

My head was buzzing. The eyelids were heavy. It took me some effort to open my eyes.

My vision was hazy, and the first thing that caught my eye was the transparent curtain around the bed.

There were people behind the curtain.

Where I am?

‘That’s right, I saved Collen. An arrow came flying at me.’

I gradually remembered the situation before I lost consciousness. Am I still in this world? Am I dead again?

My heart sank into my heels.

‘I can’t hear my own voice.’

My throat was terribly dry. I tried to say something, but only a cough came out.

Whoa, I’m going to die?

Then I felt someone next to me. I turned my head slowly.

Ah, this is Jade. Jade fell asleep with his cheek against the bed. Jade’s presence means I’m alive. It’s safe here.

‘But why are you sleeping here?’

I wanted to ask.

“Ah…”

A strange sound came out of my throat.

Jade’s bright red eyes slowly opened and aimed at me.

“Hello, Princess. Your eyes are open.”

Jade leaned on his chin and whispered languidly.

“I waited so long.”

I couldn’t say anything, so I just laughed.

‘I was alive. I don’t know how I got so lucky. In the book, Collen also survived the poison arrow, but was on the brink.’

I would ask this if I had a voice. Jade smiled at me.

Why is he looking at me like that?

“It’s okay. Slow down.”

Jade gave me water. I sipped a little, and as if I was breathing, my voice came out.

“Where I am?”

“In the hospital.”

I opened my eyes wide. Then what about Collen?

“Um, the Duke…?”

“You’re safe. You’ve been unconscious for a week.”

“Yes…?”

Jay got up and opened the screen.

“The girl woke up.”

People in white robes stood behind the curtain. There were seven of them.

I screamed.

And I was not the only one surprised. They looked at me and screamed in surprise.

“You opened your eyes!”

“Oh my gosh. Is it real?”

“We will live now!”

They held hands and wept.

What do these words mean? Have you specially gathered here to wait for my awakening?

“When did they come here?”

“I don’t know anymore.”

Jade said bluntly.

…Jade, were you lying in my bed with strangers around? It’s a little creepy.

I tried to sit up with Jade’s help.

‘My shoulder…’

Breath choked with pain. But the wound wasn’t as serious as I thought. I looked at my shoulder. The bandage was wrapped under thin pajamas.

“Who are these people?”

“Ah. Doctors.”

I closed my eyes and waited for him to continue his story.

“They said your life is safe and you will soon wake up. No poison was found on the arrow.”

“Okay.”

“But it turned out that on the arrow had an anesthetic. You are so small that you passed out from a small dose. At one time, that’s why you became addicted to this drug, because it was difficult to detect.”

My mouth opened involuntarily at what I heard.

“I am so glad.”

“What good is it that an arrow hit you?”

Jade’s gaze turned strange.

“I’m glad, because a large dose of anesthesia could just kill me. But I was lucky… Positive thinking.”

I said something strange to him.

I caught myself thinking that I almost told too much about my past life.

“Yes. I was lucky.”

Predictably, Jade found this odd.

But why did the doctors say they would live?

Meanwhile, the doctors’ celebration continued.

They reached out to me and jumped for joy. I didn’t know what to say here. Jade, for his part, didn’t even thank them.

“They said you’d wake up soon. As a result, you lay there for a week.”

“We were very upset with the doctors’ lies.”

“Oh, you know my dad is a little weird? He told the doctors: she sacrificed herself for me. If something happens to her, I will go crazy and punish you all.”

“You say that he was worried about me?”

This was a positive interpretation.

“Well, you can say so. After my father and I discussed this, I put forward the following proposal: if you don’t wake up, I choose one of these incompetent doctors and arrange a demonstrative execution.”

What does it mean?

‘Did you want to kill the doctor because of me?’

What sins were behind these doctors? Jade has kindly added an additional explanation:

“These are the seven best doctors in the capital, and the day after you were wounded, we immediately invited them…”

‘Why does the word ‘invited’ sound like ‘kidnapped’?’

Is this a hallucination?

“…Does the royal family tolerate such a thing?”

Is this whole country in Duke’s pocket? What will happen to this country in the future? I had different thoughts.

“Uh.”

Finally, one of the doctors mustered up the courage to open his mouth. He was the oldest of the doctors.

“Can I examine the patient?”

“Oh, yes.”

Jade looked displeased. My body is mine, but why is Jade giving permission? I pursed my lips in silence.

The doctors looked at me and examined my eyes and mouth. The doctor who examined me breathed a sigh of relief.

“You will be fine now. Be careful with your shoulder. We will check your condition again this afternoon.”

“Really?”

“Yes. In fact, the lady was very seriously lucky. What would happen if something went wrong…”

And the doctors looked at Jade with burning eyes.

“Then we….”

Jade nodded to them.

“You are all lucky too. I already had plans for you, but this time let’s just go our separate ways.”

“Thank you! Many thanks!”

“You can go out for a walk. Stay here a little, and you can return home. If the father permits.”

With that, Jade and the doctors walked out at the same time.

“Please tell me what happened. What happened after I fell? And why am I so lucky.”

I tugged at Jade’s hem. Jade looked into my eyes.

“Do you remember the fortune teller’s house we entered?”

“Yes.”

“There were several traps in the house. For example, crossbows.”

I nodded.

“There were two crossbow traps. Crossbow near the door and on the side wall.”

“Ah…”

I understood everything.

Initially, the arrow that was supposed to hit Collen was from a trap near the door. If so, the arrow I caught was another…

“The mechanism was manipulated by the ring worn by that crazy fortune-teller. It worked as soon as her father strangled her. If you turned the ring to the right, an arrow would fly out of the doorway and you would die. There was a poisoned arrow there. But the ring turned the other way, and you were hit by an arrow other not a poisonous one.”

“Ah…”

I understood everything.

The arrow that was supposed to hit Collen originally, was poisonous. Then, the arrow that hit me…

“The crossbow on the side wall was loaded with an anesthetic arrow. It was a really shitty thing. The poison on this arrow has been called’a drug for women’.”

The horror was growing. For women? Jade’s story continued.

“Dealing with heart attacks in red-haired women. The killer poisoned women who came to find out the future. It was a colorless, odorless poison.”

Oh, I hate it. My stomach feels weird.

“There was one arrow for the women that was supposed to kill her slowly. A man could have been instantly killed with another arrow, but giving a woman a quick death was ‘unnecessary pity’.”

“A poison that has no taste or smell?”

“Right. The poison was effective after a few days.”

“Why did he do this?”

Jade explained the culprit’s motive to me. It was like what I knew.

‘The common thing among the murdered women is red hair. It was the same hair color as the murderer’s mother.’

A killer obsessed with his mother. …It was a pervert.

He grew up with an intense attraction to his mother. He loved his mother, but at the same time he hated her.

In the midst of such mixed emotions, he suddenly thought that he wanted to become like his mother himself.

So he disguised himself as a woman and put on a red wig. Then he introduced himself as a fortune-teller and lured women.

This was the essence of the killer.

It was scary to know and listen to such things. What other criminals live in this world?

“Scary…”

“Now everything is okay. My father punished him enough.”

I didn’t want to know the details.

“Doesn’t it hurt?”

“Yes. But not that much. At first I thought I was going to die. But it looks like the wound is insignificant.”

Jade laughed.

“No, the flesh on your shoulder was badly torn. Bones were visible. And those were broken. You could have died from heavy bleeding.”

“Yes?”

I opened my eyes wide. How then… was I cured?

“The priests have been pouring magic into your body for a whole week.”

The priests were worth their weight in gold in this world?

“Are you saying they were sent here just for me?”

“Ah, I want to go take a nap. Don’t worry about them.”

“It’s too wasteful.”

“You can repay them with donations.”

Is this how problems are solved in the world of the rich?

I wanted to laugh.

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