The Fortune Teller's Fee

What was the most important thing when running a fortune-telling business full of mysteries? The type of shop? Location? Sales strategy? Of course all those things mattered if you wanted to become ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a successful self-employed operator. But in the end, the most important thing is capital.

After all, you need money to pick a good line of work, secure a prime spot, and craft a solid plan, right? Yet here I was—Namgung Min—completely broke, without a single won to my name, not even enough for dinner. In a situation like this, what did I need? Simple: a kind person willing to hand over money to someone in need without hesitation.

“So, could you give me some money?”

“……What?”

Yeah. Give it. Hand over the cash.

“…………Namgung Min, I think I may have misunderstood something.”

“Oh dear, what sort of misunderstanding?”

“You asked for money so naturally that I actually thought I must have borrowed some from you.”

Liu Yen—the very kind person who had just been hit with a sudden “hand over the money” demand from an intruder—muttered under her breath.

Inside Romance Academy, in the private office she had already scouted out, Liu Yen found herself greeting an uninvited guest. Somehow he had learned exactly where to find her. Namgung Min strolled in with that bright, effortless smile, demanding money as casually as if he were simply collecting a deposit he had left with her.

To Liu Yen, the sheer audacity was enough to make her faint.

“Asking me? For money?”

“Of course.”

“…Ha. Haha.”

Maybe it was because of the way I kept smiling so cheerfully. Liu Yen smiled back, sweeping her long black hair behind her ear as she spoke.

“Name: Namgung Min. Age twenty. Birthday July seventeenth. Born into a middle-class family in Seoul, capital of the Unified Korean Empire. Occupation: Fortune Teller. After his father’s business failure the family collapsed. Parents committed suicide when he was around twelve. Placed in a facility and raised there until eighteen. Passed the equivalency exam at nineteen and enrolled in Romania Academy this year.”

“………….”

“Anything else you’d like to say?”

She finished with a crooked, venomous little smirk. Well, it must have felt refreshing to finish digging up dirt on a suspicious person and then shove it in his face. Her doubts probably hadn’t vanished completely, but at least she now knew I wasn’t some hidden academy instructor or a spy planted by her enemies. That alone should have eased her paranoia a little.

Uh… yeah. If I had to respond to all that…

“Hmm. As expected, you’re fast.”

“………What?”

But that was actually a bit inconvenient.

Liu Yen’s paranoia was a problem when it went too far, but her suspicion dropping was an even bigger problem. She only suspected people who could cause her loss. If my suspicion level decreased here, the odds were high she would simply label me as “just a lucky idiot who can tell fortunes.”

I’ve thought this many times while playing the game, but… she really is a pain in the ass.

Despite that beautiful exterior, she was an incredibly troublesome woman. She would suspect someone without question or evidence, then treat them like an idiot the moment they proved harmless. If there was anything off, she would suspect them even harder. The root cause was simple: she divided every human being into exactly two categories—idiot or suspicious bastard—with no middle ground allowed.

Even Lucas Arthur, her childhood friend, still got the suspicious treatment, though slightly less than others. Honestly, the character event where her paranoia finally gets cured is nothing short of a miracle.

Still, raising her suspicion again wasn’t particularly difficult.

“Then you must also know that I’m an only child, yes?”

“Ha! Obviously.”

“Then we’re good.”

“………….”

Just act like there’s more to the story. She had done a background check and proudly thrown it in my face, yet I simply shrugged and said “I see.” Her suspicion circuit would flare up again, burning hotter than ever.

She was probably already considering the possibility that the investigation had been flawed, that it was planted misinformation, or that crucial details had been deliberately hidden.

Honestly, I didn’t expect her to run a background check this quickly.

In the game, once her “suspicion meter” toward the player reached a certain threshold, an event would trigger where Liu Yen investigated the player. But that was the game. In reality, we had known each other for less than two hours and she had already dug up my entire life story? Of course it was chilling. The fact that the life story was almost identical to my real one only made it worse.

The cultist bastard isn’t mentioned.

Liu Yen had only said my parents committed suicide after the business failure. There was zero mention of the despicable fortune teller who had manipulated them. Since my own class was Fortune Teller, if she had known another fortune teller drove my parents to suicide, her personality guaranteed she would have used it to provoke me. The fact that she didn’t meant even she hadn’t uncovered that information.

The great tycoon Liu Yen investigated and still didn’t know? That probably means the cultist never approached this world’s version of me.

In other words, no matter how deeply she dug, all she would find was a life story similar to mine. Even I hadn’t known my own past, so shouldn’t I be grateful she had kindly filled in the blanks?

Above all, she thinks I’m an only child?

I have a younger sister—Namgung Ji-soo. She may be a complaining, difficult, manipulative pain in the ass, but she’s still my blood. If a sister existed here too it might have been slightly alarming… but since she’s the developer of this game, there’s no way she would be inside it.

There’s nothing to fear from a background check.

Go ahead and investigate all you want. You won’t find anything else.

The more she dug, the deeper her suspicion would grow.

“More importantly, could you give me some money?”

“……You keep babbling about money, money, money. Why the hell should I give money to a bastard like you?”

“Because you received a reading from me, didn’t you?”

“So what.”

“Then you should pay the fortune fee.”

Liu Yen stared at me blankly as I continued smiling and made a money-counting gesture with one hand. Honestly, up close like this, she really was stunning. It was just a shame her massive paranoia overshadowed everything else.

“Fortune… fee?”

“Of course. You’re Chinese—you can’t possibly be unfamiliar with the term.”

Bokchae. The payment given to a fortune teller or diviner after receiving a reading. In the East, the birthplace of fortune telling is generally considered China. Eastern divination fundamentally stems from concepts such as yin and yang, the five elements, the eight trigrams, and the heavenly stems—all theories that originated in China. Even Confucius, one of the Four Sages, studied the I Ching, and from that foundation came the famous Four Pillars of Destiny.

China, the origin of Eastern fortune telling, naturally developed the practice to a high degree and therefore has a deep understanding of fortune fees. Of course, even in today’s Unified Korean Empire it is standard to pay a fee whether the reading uses tarot, physiognomy, or Four Pillars. But the concept I’m referring to carries a slightly different weight.

“You’re not planning to refuse, are you?”

A reading is essentially a question and answer. The client asks, the fortune teller answers. But if that were all, the client would receive their answer while the fortune teller received nothing. Therefore the fortune teller warns the client: If you do not pay a fair price, I will take your fortune away.

In the East, fortune tellers were seen as proxies serving gods or ancestors. They could demand payment by invoking that authority.

So refusing to pay the fortune fee after receiving a reading is basically saying ‘I don’t care if disaster befalls me~’.

The Western concept is slightly different, but since Liu Yen is Chinese, she would find it difficult ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to escape this cultural framework.

If she refused anyway? Since I hadn’t actually performed a real reading and there were no gods or ancestors involved, there would be no real consequence. My plan would collapse completely.

But I wasn’t particularly worried.

“……No. I’ll pay.”

“Thank you.”

A severe paranoia patient like Liu Yen would most likely conclude that it was better to just pay the trivial fee and be done with it. Paying would make it a normal transaction between client and fortune teller. Refusing would force her to wonder what the fortune teller might do in retaliation, adding yet another item to her ever-growing list of suspicions. She wasn’t foolish ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠enough to choose the option that increased her paranoia.

“How much? Ten thousand yuan? Twenty thousand?”

“Don’t worry, it’s not much.”

As expected of a tycoon. Watching her casually toss out sums like ten thousand yuan (roughly 1.8 million won) or twenty thousand yuan (roughly 3.6 million won) was fascinating.

Of course, I wasn’t asking for either of those amounts. The proper price for the fortune fee had already been decided.

“Right, just how much does this pig have to devour before he’s satisfi—”

“One million yuan.”

“——What?”

“Neither more nor less. One million yuan will suffice.”

I answered lightly and shrugged. One million yuan—roughly 180 million won. That was the appropriate price I had calculated for the fortune fee I intended to collect from Liu Yen. It was a hefty sum, but to her it wasn’t particularly large.

So if I just took the money and headed straight to the shop—

“Are you out of your mind?”

“……Hmm? I’m not sure what you mean.”

Contrary to my expectation that she would casually pull out 180 million won and toss it over, Liu Yen’s face flushed crimson with rage as she glared at me.

Huh. She’s putting up more resistance than I thought.

“One million yuan for a cheap little trick that just guesses what’s inside objects?”

“If it had ended as a mere trick, one million yuan would be a joke and even one hundred yuan would be plenty.”

“Then that settles it.”

“But it didn’t end as a trick, did it? You used me.”

“………”

“You didn’t seriously think I wouldn’t know, did you?”

…Did she actually believe I wouldn’t find out? If so, I was a little disappointed.

With a faintly disappointed expression, I turned toward Liu Yen’s frozen left hand. The ring that normally adorned her ring finger was missing.

“You showed me the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ring you normally wear on that finger… and I told you it contained several small gemstones.”

“………”

“You removed every last one of those gems and sold them, didn’t you? On top of that, you showed me a magically sealed box whose contents were unknown, a pendant that wouldn’t open because it was broken, and similar items. You verified their value and disposed of them, correct?”

“……”

“All told, that comes to roughly three million yuan. Out of conscience I was only asking for one million… yet you’re deceiving me far too much.”

Thanks to my reading (or rather, my fake reading), she had earned approximately three million yuan—roughly six hundred million won. Wasn’t it only basic decency to share a portion of that profit? Still, since I had also deceived her using game knowledge rather than genuine ability, I had conscientiously asked for only one-third instead of half.

“For a supposed tycoon, you’re surprisingly stingy.”

Grind. Grit.

I was a bit disappointed by Liu Yen’s miserly attitude, but… everyone deserves a chance at redemption, don’t they? I smiled at her with the most innocent expression I could muster while she continued making those strange grinding noises with her teeth.

“Could you give me some money?”

Grind. Gnash. Grit. Gnash. Grind.

*

“……Come out.”

The sun had already set. Only faint moonlight filtered into the office. In the middle of the devastated room—furniture broken and scattered everywhere—Liu Yen stood with bloodshot eyes, breathing heavily, and whispered.

Creak.

The moment she spoke, the tightly closed door to the adjacent room opened.

“……You called?”

“Find out.”

“…Yes?”

“That fortune teller bastard. Namgung Min. Learn everything about him.”

“……You want me to run another background check?”

“No.”

Liu Yen tilted her head toward the person beyond the door. Her crimson, bloodshot eyes gleamed in the dark office. They overflowed with venom, madness, and suspicion.

“Approach that bastard. Whether by coincidence, friendship, romance, as a sex partner—whatever works. Get close to him and learn everything. His past, personality, speech patterns, history, occupation, habits—every last detail.”

“………”

Habits and history aside, why ask to relearn his past, occupation, and personality when the previous investigation had already covered them? But the person beyond the door wisely chose not to ask and remained silent.

“Do that, and I’ll erase all your debts. You’re a student at Romance Academy too, so you can manage it, can’t you?”

“…Understood.”

Click.

After that short reply the door closed again, leaving only a skin-crawling silence in the office.

With nothing but faint moonlight and silence for company, Liu Yen focused her red eyes on a single spot.

“………….”

Liu Yen was the same as always.

She began to suspect, and suspect, and suspect again.