Laila turned her head sharply towards the direction of the sound. In a place where there was no one just moments ago, someone’s silhouette appeared.

She—Laila thought it was a woman based on the outline of the dress—looked like a completely black shadow even under the bright and soft light emanating from the palace.

Perhaps it’s because the light is behind her.

Laila tried to entertain a hopeful thought, but the more she couldn’t take her eyes off her, the more she realized that hope was nothing more than an idle fantasy. It was darkness. Something like darkness itself in human form.

It spoke.

“Come here, child. I’ll show you something good.”

No. Laila said strongly in her mind. Even though there was no way her voice would reach that thing, she raised her voice in her mind as if it would. No, I won’t go!

“You’re already here.”

In an instant, things around her field of vision stretched out like taffy left in the sun. Not just the surroundings. Laila’s body was the same. As if being sucked into somewhere. Laila screamed as she saw her fingers stretching like thread.

When the scream stopped, Laila found herself back in the corridor with the bust.

She looked around with a bewildered expression. “It can’t be.” A groan-like mutter flowed out of her mouth involuntarily. Despite clearly standing on her own feet just moments ago, when she came to her senses, she was sitting on the floor.

“It can’t be.”

It was when Laila muttered once again.

“What can’t be, child?”

Its voice was heard right next to her ear. Laila shrieked and retreated to the opposite side, but there was nothing where the sound had come from.

“Here.”

Suddenly, a cold breath touched the nape of Laila’s neck. It was like a breath of finely crushed ice from its coldest part.

Goosebumps rose and her hair stood on end. Laila didn’t turn her head, but she could tell that someone’s head was approaching close above her shoulder.

“I’ll show you something interesting.”

“No.”

When Laila answered immediately, the eerie voice unexpectedly burst into laughter. It wasn’t an unpleasant metallic sound, but it wasn’t pleasant either. No one would like to hear the sound of a ghost laughing. Even if it was a witch.

“You will see. If I want to show you, you can see. You have eyes. Yes… I have waited for someone like you for a very long time. I waited for someone with eyes to see me.”

“I don’t want to see. Are you Eustar’s grandmother?”

“That poor thing is indeed my grandson. Yes. Although I was no longer in this world when he was born, I watched him being born. I was right there between his mother’s legs.”

Creepy. Laila thought. This was especially why she hated knowing about the existence of ghosts.

She could see ghosts, but others couldn’t. They commit shameful acts without hesitation, unaware that someone is watching them.

Once, when she saw a man eating with another man’s wife —he had lost his wife long ago— Laila was more disgusted by the ghost of the wife standing quietly beside him than by the adultery itself.

Staring intently at her husband’s face, every time he grunted and exerted force, she opened her mouth wide as if to laugh out loud. A silent laugh.

“I don’t want to see whatever you want to show me. Please send me back to where I was.”

“If you see my thing, I’ll send you back.”

Laila squeezed her eyes shut.

“I don’t make promises with ghosts.”

“Oh my, then there’s nothing to be done. Without promise or appointment, you are simply helpless. Come, open your eyes. And see this. Hurry. It’s safe here. You just need to open your eyes…”

No. Laila shouted inwardly. But these things tended to unfold regardless of her will.

She already knew that physically closing her eyes didn’t make ‘overlaying’ impossible. Moreover, this ghost wanted Laila to see its ‘core’. It was forcing her to see.

An image appeared before Laila’s eyes as if covered in dust. She tried not to look, but it became clearer and clearer. The palace came into view, and a woman walking with a haughty attitude, followed by several women, appeared.

Laila knew that she was the protagonist of the bust, Eustar’s grandmother. She looked too young to have a grandson, but that wasn’t how Laila knew.

She was the queen of Sierow but had no children. The king tried for many years with the queen to see an heir, but when all efforts proved futile, he took in a concubine. First one, then two.

The concubines were luxurious and flamboyant. They had no choice but to be so to survive. The queen didn’t blame them much for that. But no children were born from the concubines either. As the king aged, he became more hysterical. The absence of an heir meant internal war within the royal family.

Then it happened that the queen and one concubine became pregnant simultaneously.

‘Both are boys.’

Looking at the two women with very swollen bellies in the vision, Laila suddenly realized this. There was a humming noise, and the scene before her eyes changed.

Two boys about three or four years old appeared. One was the queen’s child, one was the concubine’s. By that time, the king had all but driven out all the concubines except for that one. And he loved the concubine more than the queen.

Although she became no different from a living widow, the queen still had to remain dignified. Sometimes there was unbearable hatred welling up, but she endured it skillfully.

She was always haughty and expressionless, and because of that, she received both fear and respect from people. After all, no matter how great a concubine might be, she was still just a concubine, and could never surpass the queen, who was like the bedrock of the royal family. Never.

Favoring a concubine was like keeping a pretty bird in a cage and doting on it for a while. When the bird grows old, loses its feathers, and its voice becomes hoarse, it will be quickly disposed of. The queen cultivated her patience, waiting only for that day.

However, when the king’s favor turned into love, the situation reversed.

The king came to love the concubine, who embraced him with soft coquetry, more than the queen, who was always stiff and spoke righteously.

Her pillow talk whispers sounded like loyal advice, while the queen’s counsel sounded like nothing but boring nonsense. The concubine’s influence grew stronger day by day.

Insolent rumors even began to circulate that her son might become the crown prince, surpassing the queen’s legitimate heir.

That was unbearable.

“So I got rid of it. I tried to kill it by destroying its most precious thing.”

As the ghost whispered, Laila felt a stinging pain and chill as if stung by a bee again. Something terrible was bound to happen… She wanted to close her eyes. She didn’t want to see.

But she couldn’t. Laila had to keep watching.

It was much easier to deal with the young illegitimate child than with the concubine who was attached to the king’s side all day.

The queen sent a snack to her son through several hands. Children naturally love sweet cookies. There was no need to use dangerous poison.

It was enough to just twist in a tiny bit of her magic.

The child, who was said to be very intelligent for a four-year-old and widely regarded as too good to be born a bastard, stopped breathing less than two hours after eating the cookies she sent.

“How could you do such a thing…”

“It’s too early to say that, child.”

She tried to turn her head towards where the voice came from, but Laila’s head couldn’t budge as if it was fixed in a tight frame.

I’ll do anything if I can be freed from here. Laila thought. But neither liberation nor restraint was under her control.

“That cunning wench must have noticed… Someone might have leaked the information. It’s all in the past now. But it’s an unforgettable event. Now, watch. See clearly what that wench does.”

Laila saw the king’s concubine, who had lost her son, rushing at the queen. She tried to stop the concubine using her weak magic, which was effective but not perfect.

The concubine tried to throw what she was holding onto the queen’s face but failed, merely soaking the front of her dress.

Yet the queen collapsed, clutching her chest in agony. Her skin seemed to turn red as if burning, and rashes and blisters began to form instantly. The concubine was arrested on the spot, and the queen fainted.

“What that wench sprayed on me was a very poisonous and strong toxic liquid. A tincture so strong it could peel skin and melt bones just by touching… I don’t know where she got it from. Or from which witch.”

Laila, who flinched, moved her eyeball to one side. Since she couldn’t turn her head, that was all she could do.

Laila said,

“I’m the only witch left in this land. Before me, there was only my mother, and before her, only my grandmother. Are you saying my grandmother killed you?”

Then the ghost made a laughing sound again. This time it was a grating sound like metal being scratched.

“So that’s how the story goes. Yes… Anyway, I became weak because of that incident. But fortunately, I was able to see that wench die.”

“Did you kill that woman? Did you kill her?”

“To be precise, His Majesty killed her. After hearing my last request. Despite not loving me, he wore such a desperate expression then. How ridiculous. So I told him to put her alive into the toxic liquid that wench had sprayed on me. And I watched it. I watched with great pleasure as it screamed, wailed, spat blood, and died. And then I died peacefully.”

Laila’s body shuddered. This woman was not human. Not because she was a ghost, but because she was too wicked to be called human.

Laila said,

“You hurt that woman’s son first.”

“That wench seduced my husband first.”

“So you kill a child? Even beasts wouldn’t do such a thing! After doing something worse than a beast, were you resentful for receiving your own wrongdoing back? Is that why you killed that woman so miserably?”

“Resentful? Not at all.”

The vision had already disappeared. Laila’s vision went pitch black and then brightened with a pop as if a light had been turned on.

A woman was standing in front of her. It was a hideous sight with clothes burned and stuck from the shoulder to the chest and stomach, and skin peeled off. She was smiling.

“I didn’t kill that wench because I was resentful. I just wanted to kill her from before. And…”

Moving her eyes as if twitching, with pupils that couldn’t be seen, she said,

“Now I want to kill you.”