Miss Witch, please don't leave your fragrance everywhere

Chapter 19 Miss Witch and Destiny

　　In the forest outside Leo Village, Miss Witch easily found Samuel. With the help of magic, it was not difficult to locate a person at a close distance.
　　"Hello, Samuel, we meet again."
　　"…It's you. Why can't I move?"

　　"Because you are already dead."
　　Angelica smiled as she told the cruel truth. Samuel was lying in the forest far outside Leo Village. He fell under a tree with bloody wounds on his abdomen and chest. Before Angelica arrived, Samuel had actually died from his injuries. What Angelica did was to use magic to keep the soul in the dead body. The soul of a person after death would not go to the underworld immediately, but would continue to wander in the world.
　　Caelum Sequence 6: Soul Shackles, which allows the soul to continue to stay in the dead body, but cannot move, and is not a true resurrection. The purpose of doing this is to explain the last words, or to ask who the murderer is, or to let the deceased take one last look at the world. However, if the death time is too long or the body is too severely damaged, the soul shackles will not work.

　　"I used magic to keep your soul here for a while. Do you know what terminal lucidity is? It's similar to that."
　　“…I see.”
　　"The villagers in Leo Village are talking about you killing your father."

　　"Um."
　　"With the magic I gave you, your father will never be your opponent. So it must have been the guards of the Lord of Leo Village who did it, right?"
　　Magic in the other world is not extremely rare. Although Leo Village is an inconspicuous little village and its lord is just a small baron, his guards are still elite knights who master magic and can use it in combat.

　　"...After my father came home that day, he lost a lot of money again and got drunk. He started beating my sister, saying that she looked like my mother and that if I didn't stop him, my sister would be beaten to death by my father. Perhaps because of the long-standing conflicts, I accidentally beat my father to death."
　　There was no unnecessary emotion in Samuel's words. This was the drawback of soul shackles. The dead who were regaining consciousness could not express their emotions well and could only passively state the facts.
　　"Even so, you should have been arrested and publicly executed, not just beaten to death."

　　Although Samuel committed the heinous crime of parricide, procedural justice is still necessary. He must first be arrested and sent to a judge for trial. Even if Samuel had a reason, he would most likely be sentenced to death. However, it is illogical that Samuel was seriously injured and died by the guards.
　　"I didn't try to resist. I was taken to the prison, but the guard suddenly asked me if it was my sister who was seducing my father."
　　"Ha?"

　　"My father beat my sister and tore her clothes... The guards told me that people in the village were saying that she seduced my father. She was also a victim, so why would anyone spread such rumors? I couldn't let the rumors spread. If I let the rumors continue to spread, the monastery would refuse to adopt my sister... Although it's probably too late now. I chose to escape from prison. If I must die within seven days, at least I want to silence those who spread the rumors."
　　Later, because the prisoner escaped from prison, the guards chose to attack Samuel in a way that was fatal. The prisoner who escaped from prison and took someone's life would be judged as an extremely vicious criminal, and the law allowed the guards to fight back in self-defense.
　　The protection that Angelica gave to Samuel only gave him strength, not a body of steel. Samuel, who was a mortal, escaped from prison with serious injuries, but before he could find out who spread the rumors, he bled to death in the forest outside the village.
　　"I suddenly felt very sad... Our family was poor, my sister and I were often abused by our father, and no one was willing to stop him... Why did he spare no effort in spreading unrealistic rumors in the end?"

　　“It’s probably a cost issue.”
　　"Cost?"
　　"Your father was an alcoholic. People avoid alcoholics for fear of getting into trouble. You killed your father, and were taken away by the guards and thrown into prison. Your sister lost all protection... For them, it was nothing more than gossip. There was no cost and no price to pay."

　　Angelica finally understood why the people of Leo Village panicked. It was not because Samuel killed his father. After Samuel was arrested voluntarily, someone in the village speculated about Samuel's ragged sister. At first, it was just speculation out of curiosity, ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) but it eventually turned into a pure rumor that Samuel's sister seduced her father. The rumor reached the guards, who were interested and decided to ask one of the parties directly.
　　The villagers of Leo Village were in panic because of Samuel's escape from prison. At this moment, they didn't know that Samuel had been seriously injured and had died.
　　"People are always curious, and curious, otherwise there is no way to explain why ghost stories can be sung from place to place. They may not hate you or your sister, but they are just interested in the possibility and discuss it."

　　"But this... damages my sister's reputation. The monastery will no longer adopt her..."
　　After a brief hesitation, Samuel knew that he didn't have much time left and there was no reason to remain reserved.
　　"Can you please look after my sister?"

　　"I have somewhere else to be."
　　"Then please take her to a place where she can be properly accommodated... She can't continue to live in Leo Village."
　　"Do you mind if I take her somewhere far away?"

　　"The farther away the better... This place will only bring sadness to my sister..."
　　The only person Samuel could trust was Angelica; they had no other relatives here.
　　But in the end, Samuel still had a question.

　　“By the way… if you had given me a stronger protection, would I have been able to survive…?”
　　"No way."
　　Angelica rejected Samuel's little hope. If the witch hadn't given Samuel magic, Samuel's fate might have been to be beaten to death by his over-alcoholic father. But Angelica gave Samuel magic, which made it impossible for ordinary people to compete with it. So fate arranged for Samuel to have a conflict with the guards who also mastered magic, and eventually died of serious injuries.

　　If Angelica gave Samuel more protection, the situation would still develop in a worse direction, and it might even turn out that the witch would kill him herself.
　　"You may find it hard to believe, but I used to actively resist fate. But I won't do that anymore. Just accept your damn fate. Maybe your sister is destined to drift far away."