CH 11

(Eve’s POV)

Remorse reflected on my face as I speak.

“I know that it’s really late, but I sincerely regret all the rude things that I’ve done to the Grand Duke.”

The Duchess nodded quietly. She still looked shocked and all, but fortunately she didn’t seem to doubt what I was saying.

And the way she looked at me changed a bit.

‘It seems that Eve is trying to get the Grand Duke’s favor, as the wedding is approaching.’

This is what I think that she was thinking.

“But, Your Highness, if you remain here like this, you may get frostbite. If you don’t mind ….”

The Duchess pulled out her handkerchief with worried eyes. It was a handkerchief embroidered with wisteria flowers in an ivory-colored fabric.

“It is a handkerchief with thermal insulation magic on it.”

“Magic?”

I didn’t need a handkerchief, but it would be amazing if it had magic.

Come to think of it, there were several practical magics like this in this world.

“If you put this in your hand, it will warm you up quickly.”

The face of the Duchess, who held out her handkerchief, was full of sincere concern.

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Unlike before when she tried to please me just because of her daughter, now I can see that she’s starting to have a genuine interest in me.

Perhaps because I sincerely offered to give the hard-earned flowers in memory of her deceased sister, the late Grand Duchess.

Still, being so kind to Eve….. This lady seemed to have a kind and gentle personality that suited her generous appearance.

It is unbelievable that such a gentle lady is the Grand Duke’s aunt.

“Thank you.”

I reached out to get the handkerchief.

The Duchess’s hand lightly brushed the tip of my finger as I received the handkerchief from her.

At that moment, the field of my vision suddenly became distorted and a completely different space appeared before my eyes.

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‘Wait, what is this?’

The icy air had completely disappeared and a warm surroundings pervaded my skin.

The garden of the temple where I was standing a while ago suddenly vanished.

Now, I was standing in a splendidly designed and elegant hallway.

As if I was dreaming, my vision is a bit hazy, but the warm air is vividly felt.

‘Where am I?’

Then, at the end of the hallway, a maid with a tray appeared.

I stepped back unconsciously, startled by the stranger’s appearance.

But the maid passed by me and opened the door next to me before going inside.

I followed her as if possessed.

When I opened the door, there was a small side room that seemed to be a sitting area.

After passing there, I opened another door and this time a luxurious room appeared that looked like a reception room.

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Inside was another maid who seemed to be a middle-aged woman.

“I brought the medicine.”

“Okay.”

The young maid, who brought in a tray, put the bowl down on the table and went outside.

‘Did she just say medicine?’

The maid who remained in the room took out a small medicine bottle from her sleeve and poured some white powder into the medicine bowl.

Then she turned to the other side.

There was another door there.

“My lady, you need to take your medicine before you go to sleep.”

Then a brunette-haired girl opened the side door and came out.

It was a young girl with a pale face that looked about 16 or 17 years old.

She was wearing a white nightgown that wrapped around her skinny body.

The girl approached the table and took the medicine bowl.

I reached out my hand in surprise.

Wait, there was something in there just now….’

This maid put something on it.

But my hand passed through the girl’s body.

‘What, what?’

Without letting me stop her, the girl completely drank her medicine from the bowl in just one go.

And then I went back to where I initially appeared.

I saw the girl in the hallway, and I unconsciously followed her.

The girl entered a cozy and luxurious bedroom.

She laid on the bed as if she was about to sleep.

At this point, I finally understood what’s happening.

‘I don’t know exactly what to call this, but it’s clear that this isn’t reality.’

Whenever I touch an object, my hand will always pass through as if I was touching air.

As the surroundings became hazy again like a dream, time and space were being distorted little by little.

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I could see the clock hanging on the wall moving very quickly.

Dozens of minutes passed in an instant.

The girl, who had been sleeping on the bed, suddenly grabbed her heart and bent over.

A moan of pain erupted from between her parched lips.

“Ugh… Cough! Cough!”

Blood dripped from her mouth after she coughed dryly.

Perhaps another person heard her cough, a maid from the outside immediately opened the door and went inside.

“My lady!”

The girl fainted and collapsed, covered in blood that she spilled.

“Call the madam now!”

The girl tossed and turned, frowning as if she was in deep pain.

‘What the hell is this?’

I couldn’t get my mind off this horrific scene unfolding right before my eyes.

After a while, someone from outside ran into the room screaming.

“Diane!”

The person running was a middle-aged woman in a light blue evening dress.

‘The Duchess?’

She looks much paler and weaker than before, but it was clearly the Duchess with whom that I was talking a while ago.

The Duchess wept and hugged the girl tightly.

The skirt of her dress was wrinkled, and the platinum blonde hair that was painstakingly twisted was a mess.

“Diane! Why…. Why is this happening?!”

The Duchess wiped the blood from the girl’s face with her trembling hands.

‘Does that mean that this girl is Lady Diane?’

‘Diane, the only daughter of the Duchess and my bridesmaid?’

“Hurry up! Go…. Call the doctor right now!”

The Duchess, who had been continuously crying, looked around and shouted.

Only then did I see the people around me.

Several people were standing in front of the door, looking worried.

They were all dressed up in fancy evening dresses and ball robes.

When I saw it, something immediately came to mind.

‘Is there a ball?’ 

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My thoughts didn’t go any further.

At the end of that scene, my vision went dark and everything disappeared in an instant.

I was startled and hurriedly removed my hand.

The surrounding area was back to the winter garden where the sun was setting again.

A cool breeze permeated my skin with the warm glow of the sunset.

The illusion that had appeared so suddenly, vanished without a trace.

In front of me was the Duchess, dressed in a navy blue dress and neatly tucked in platinum hair.

The moment I saw her, a flash of realization hit my mind.

‘This can’t be….’

Seeing my strange reaction, the Duchess was astonished and asked:

“Princess? What’s wrong?”

“…… No, it’s nothing.”

I took the handkerchief and smiled as if it wasn’t a big deal.

As soon as I touched the soft handkerchief, the warmth was felt through my skin.

It felt like holding a hot pack with frozen hands.

However, unlike the warm feeling that I felt in my hands, my mind started to wander. 

‘Did I just have a precognition right now?’

(T/N:Precognition, also called prescience, future vision or future sight, is a claimed psychic ability to see events in the future.)

It was just a brief vision, but the illusion was so vivid that it all felt real.

Foresight was Eve’s divine ability.

It was clear that it was a fragment of the future that I had glimpsed through that ability.

It’s been four days since I woke up here, but this was the first time I’d ever seen the future.

I looked at my hand that was holding the handkerchief.

Thin, white fingers wrapped around a soft handkerchief.

A wisteria flower embroidery was visible between the fingers.

‘This was the key to the secret.’

Eve’s foresight was triggered through touch.

To simply put it, when my hand touches someone else’s body parts, foresight appears.

And Eve didn’t know about it until she was killed.

Her ability to see the future just appeared anytime when she was still a child.

However, around the age of 10, the medium of foresight suddenly changed.

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If she doesn’t touch the other person with her bare hands, her ability wouldn’t be activated.

That’s where the problem comes from.

‘Because Eve…… had a severe case of (*)mysophobia.’

(T/N:(*) Extreme or irrational fear of dirt or contamination.)

Eve, who hates dirty things, always wore gloves on her hands.

Thanks to this, she never had a chance to touch other people with her bare hands.

Moreover, since Eve’s divine power was so weak, her foresight wouldn’t come out that easily even if she touched another person with her bare hands.

Only when I touch the other person while thinking about the future that I’ve wanted to see in particular, will the foresight come.

However, since the appearance of foresight was very rare, that’s why most of them did not appear even after holding the other person’s hand for a long time.

So, even if Eve had a chance to touch another person with her bare hands, she would not have known it because her foresight ability would not appear.

‘But what appeared in the vision is very clear…..’

The brown-haired girl in my vision was the Duchess’s daughter, Diane.

In fact, I understood why Diane’s future vision came out.

Maybe it was because I kept thinking that Diane couldn’t attend the wedding because she was sick.

I also thought it would be nice if Diane could attend the wedding.

‘The maid definitely put something suspicious on her medicine. The one that Lady Diane had drunk obediently, and then woke up from her sleep and vomited blood.

It won’t be a poison.

Because it was never mentioned that Diane died that way.

In the original story, nothing was mentioned about a maid feeding Diane with some suspicious drug.

That means that the maid’s actions were not detected and simply had something passed to Diane to worsen her current state.

Perhaps the powder is not poison, but it was a kind of drug that aggravates her disease.