Chapter 91
Chapter 91
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 91
Chapter Title: There Were Ghosts, Too
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“Out it comes!”
“It’s out!”
“I can feel it!”
“It’s real!”
Rowdy cheers echoed through the deeply excavated circular mine shaft.
Seeing the knights rush toward the miners who had just emerged, Rachel clenched her fist.
‘My guess was right!’
It had been a fortnight since their arrival in Fern, and the pink diamonds had finally been discovered.
The knights had expected diamonds to pop out the moment they arrived at the diamond mine, but reality didn’t work that way.
These were diamonds that hadn’t appeared until the coal mine was depleted. They only began to surface after the mine was dug so deep it was nearly abandoned, and then a heavy rain eroded the surface.
The diamonds lay even deeper, and extracting them would take more time.
‘The first raw stone really was a miracle.’
As Rachel lost herself in thought, a loud exclamation erupted beside her.
“This one’s gotta be the pink!”
As always, the chatty Mikeli spoke up first.
There were five newly mined raw diamond stones. If you had the eye for it, you could distinguish fancy diamonds by their color differences.
Even so, what he emphasized was that divine power emanated from the pink diamond.
“Have you confirmed how the divine power is infused?”
“Yes!”
When they first arrived at the mine, Enoch and his squad had circled the area to check if any divine power could be felt from underground. But they hadn’t sensed a thing.
However, divine power was detectable from the pink diamonds mined by the workers, so they waited, and waited some more.
And this was the result.
“The divine power only became detectable once the raw stones were exposed to light.”
“It’s not like they’re photosynthesizing plants or anything.”
“Yes?”
“No, just talking to myself. This confirms it. The pink diamond has become the symbolic stone of the Lux Church.”
Enoch nodded.
“Shall I inform the temple?”
Rachel grinned.
“Yes. We’ll need the temple’s help going forward.”
“If there’s anything I can do to help, I will.”
“Thank you. But having you here is already a huge help. We offered the first stone to the Lord, but I’ll gift the second one to you, Enoch.”
At Rachel’s words, the corners of Enoch’s mouth curved softly. Sola, who was standing beside him, poked her head forward.
“What about us? You wouldn’t abandon your comrades who suffered through this freezing winter with you, right?”
Her golden hair wasn’t as bright as Rachel’s but carried a reddish tint, and she winked at Rachel.
“Of course not. I owe you all, so I’ll get gifts for you too.”
“Woo-hoo! As expected from the captain’s girlfriend—such generosity!”
At Sola’s words, Rachel blinked. Enoch seemed flustered and froze up.
“Um, Lady Sola. I don’t know what misunderstanding you have, but Enoch and I aren’t like that.”
“Yes?”
The question came from Dona’s mouth. Rachel had been speaking to Sola, so she had no idea why Dona was reacting.
“You two aren’t dating? We thought you were keeping it secret, so we pretended not to know.”
“Exactly. Brother’s gaze softens whenever he looks at Lady Rachel, so we all figured...”
‘You guys... Back then, I thought Enoch was into me because he was so kind, but he never confessed. It’s not like that.’
From the atmosphere, it seemed all five besides Enoch thought the same.
Enoch waved his hands in panic.
“It’s really not like that. Rachel and I are just friends.”
She’d known that, but seeing Enoch deny it still soured Rachel’s mood.
The tactless Mikeli added a few more words.
“Come on, what kind of friends act like you two?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“If you’re hiding it for political reasons, don’t worry. We won’t tell a soul.”
Even after they denied it, no one seemed to believe them.
When neither Enoch nor Rachel affirmed it, Sola looked shocked.
“You’re really saying you’re just normal friends? You expect us to believe that?”
“That’s right.”
At Rachel’s curt reply, Mikeli slapped his forehead with a ‘thwack.’
Dona belatedly tried to smooth things over in an awkward tone.
“I see. You two can be friends, sure. We misunderstood. Ha, ha, ha.”
Dona laughed awkwardly like that and then dragged the squad members away.
“It’s strange. Why would they think that? To me, Rachel is a very precious friend.”
Enoch was unaware that his behavior had led those around him to misunderstand.
‘If I weren’t involved, I’d have assumed the same.’
Was it okay for his eyes to be so tender toward a mere friend? Rachel couldn’t imagine how affectionate Enoch would be with a lover if he was like this with friends.
“Yeah. You’re too kind, Enoch, so they got the wrong idea.”
Even after everyone left, Rachel kept chattering away without pause, and Enoch gauged her mood.
“Is that so? I thought I treated everyone equally, but it seems I unconsciously favor Rachel.”
“Because we’re friends.”
“Yes. Very precious ones.”
Enoch emphasized the adjective. Rachel snickered.
‘Does Enoch know he’s incredibly handsome?’
He probably didn’t. Otherwise, he wouldn’t smile like that so freely.
“Our business here is done now.”
“I’m not sure if we’ll make it before the civil war breaks out.”
Time was tight to reach the royal palace before the king passed.
Being summoned to the temple and coming all the way to Fern territory were unplanned, so their schedule had gone awry.
‘This is all because Carion won’t approve my vacation!’
Her affiliation was with the administrative branch, and her position was administrative officer, but her direct superior was Carion.
Their ranks were mismatched, but there was no helping it. Back then, that was the only way to protect Rachel. Thanks to it, she was called the witch who ensnared the prince, but it didn’t faze her one bit.
The only annoyance was Carion rejecting her vacation requests.
‘Carion wouldn’t give me time off, so I had to pull this stunt to get here.’
Enoch was busy with knight squad duties too, so opportunities to leverage “Enoch chance” were rare.
If they hadn’t come straight to Fern territory out of concern for the December rebellion, pink diamond distribution would have been pushed to next year’s end.
‘Can’t have that. I need to make pink diamonds trend fast before Damien can scheme anything.’
As Rachel desperately plotted ahead, the silent Enoch finally spoke up beside her.
“Rachel, I thought about that story you told me before, and I don’t think the rebellion will happen in December.”
“Why?”
Looking at Rachel’s blinking eyes, Enoch explained slowly.
“His Majesty’s chronic illness has recently been cured.”
“Is that true?”
“Yes. My brother hid it to test the crown prince and the third prince.”
“I feel bad for Rkeia and Abyss all of a sudden.”
“Still better than a rebellion breaking out.”
“Yeah. But if the illness is cured... it was a curse?”
It was a guess based on the common belief that diseases couldn’t be healed with divine power, but it turned out correct.
Enoch nodded. At that response, Rachel’s brow furrowed.
“A curse medium was found in His Majesty’s bedroom.”
“And you removed it to cure his chronic illness?”
“Yes.”
There was something nagging at Rachel. Propping her chin, she voiced one question.
“There’s a great black magic defense formation in the royal palace, right?”
What puzzled Rachel was how a curse could activate inside a defensive formation that blocked black magic.
“I think the black sorcerer created a loophole.”
“Was that even possible?”
“Judging by the results. They’ve blocked priests from entering the palace for over fifteen years, so they must have found a way.”
Realizing even the royal palace wasn’t safe, Rachel squeezed her eyes shut. But Enoch reassured her.
“Don’t worry. My brothers dispatched to the capital are patrolling the city and palace now.”
Thanks to that, Rachel halted her spiraling dark thoughts. She decided to just trust Enoch.
Afterward, Rachel packed her things, spread out the map, and set the route with her companions.
“We should avoid high mountains in winter.”
“One snowfall and we’d be trapped for sure.”
Dona and Sola offered advice while studying the map. Pashi went out to buy food supplies.
“The Path of Light runs like this, so we can follow the same route as before up to here.”
Rachel and Enoch gathered everyone’s input and finalized the path to the capital.
“We’ll have no choice but to cross this mountain.”
Rachel’s finger pointed to one spot on the map.
The baronetcy of Hanie, formerly specialized in beekeeping, famous for its honey.
Before sugar imports, it had prospered greatly, but after a massive forest fire on its mountain last year, there’d been no news from the area.
Rachel remembered it because she’d overheard the finance minister complaining.
‘The fire was last spring, and I heard the crown prince visited to offer condolences. There’s a record of no taxes collected for a year.’
Having recalled that much, Rachel’s eyes lit up.
“Ah, they’re famous for honey pastries here.”
Rachel had never tried them, but she suddenly remembered Rkeia mentioning it.
‘She said it was a shame they were unavailable after the wildfire.’
She’d felt bad for suddenly canceling their meeting to go to the temple. Rachel brightened, thinking Rkeia would love honey pastries as a gift.
“Pashi would be thrilled to hear that.”
“Then we’ll definitely stop there.”
With that, the route to the capital was smoothly decided.
***
Having finished setting up camp, Rachel and her companions sat around the campfire.
For the past few days, they’d passed through villages and stayed in inns, but on the sixth day today, with no village nearby, they had no choice but to camp.
They dug into the ground, laid down dry grass, then erected wooden supports and covered them with fur hides.
After building two such simple tents for sleeping, they lit a campfire to prepare dinner.
Sitting by the campfire and chatting idly was only natural.
The conversation, started by Enoch’s cooking, soon shifted to tales of valor from the holy knights.
“There are still magical beasts in the east. The Order conducts regular subjugations.”
At Sola’s words, everyone except Rachel nodded in agreement.
“Enoch hasn’t gone yet, right?”
At Rachel’s question, Enoch tossed more firewood into the flames and replied.
“No. You can only join at twenty.”
“That’s right. Our captain has the skills but is still young.”
While Rachel regressed, Enoch had never been absent for a magical beast subjugation.
She’d wondered why, and it turned out to be simply his age.
Sola continued.
“Anyway, the far east has heavy yin energy, so undead spawn naturally. Ghosts appear too.”
“Eek, no thanks.”
To Rachel, who’d regressed from messing up a horror game, it wasn’t exactly entertaining. She asked Sola.
“Then how do you exorcise ghosts? Not all holy knights have divine power, right?”
“Oh? You know your stuff. Usually, priests scatter divine power. If that’s tough, they coat their swords in holy water.”
“It’s standard to travel in groups of one priest and two or three holy knights, so nothing to worry about.”
Dona added it to ease Rachel’s concerns. Sola quickly smacked Dona’s arm.
“Hey, you’re spoiling my story before I can tell it. No more questions from now on.”
Rachel nodded. Only then did Sola clear her throat a few times and lower her voice dramatically.
“This story is a true tale from what I experienced two years ago.”