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Chapter 1
“Gasp—!”
The moment the blocked breath burst out, my eyes flew open, and I sprang upright as if bouncing off the ground.
Trying to calm my pounding heart that raced as though I had been running at full speed, I hurriedly checked my stomach, neck, and whole body with trembling hands.
‘L-Live…! No, I definitely died….’
Without thinking of anything else, I had thrown myself in front of the blade to save the original female lead, Chloe, and was stabbed in her place.
The image of Chloe crying desperately while looking at my collapsed body after I was struck by the sword still lingered vividly before my eyes.
‘And now I’m alive again? But where is this place?’
Even after looking around, all I could see were unorganized books and furniture covered in dust.
It was a place filled with silence and stillness.
‘Does no one live here…? First, I should get out of here.’
Even though I had been stabbed in Chloe’s place, I still needed to check whether she was safe and reassure my worried parents.
As I hurriedly moved toward the outside, something reflected in the window caught my attention.
A white and transparent figure shaped like a person…
‘W-What…?! What is that? A ghost?’
As I slowly approached, the blurry figure didn’t feel unfamiliar.
It tilted its head exactly the same way I did…
‘No way… it’s me? What? I’m a ghost?!!!’
In my previous life, I was Irene Snowell.
When I opened my eyes, instead of reincarnation, possession, or regression… I had become a ghost.
Had it been around thirteen hours since I woke up as a ghost? At least, that was how it felt.
While wandering through the silent and lonely castle, I discovered several things.
Compared to its size, very few people lived in the castle.
Perhaps the owner was away, because only the butler managing the castle, the servants, and a small number of knights remained.
‘Until I figure out where this place is, I guess I’ll have to stay here.’
The ghost decided on her own to rely on this ghost-like castle without an owner.
At the same time, I decided to find a room to stay in for the time being.
One advantage was that I could freely move anywhere inside or outside the castle without restriction.
As a ghost, I could pass through walls, ceilings, and floors and move wherever I wanted.
When I stretched my hand toward a door for the first time, it simply passed right through.
‘It really passed through? That’s a little scary….’
Realizing my condition again, I shivered.
True to being a ghost, no one could see my existence.
Not even me.
Even the faint shape I saw when I first woke up had disappeared.
Of course, I tried making noise and moving around, but no one could hear me.
‘Well, I don’t have to worry about other people noticing me, and no one can interfere with me. It’s actually pretty convenient. So this is how I finally achieve my dream of flying through the sky.’
Ghost Irene let out a hollow laugh.
I still didn’t know why I kept reincarnating, and now I had become a ghost.
At least one thing was certain—I had died in place of Chloe in my last life.
But the problem was…
‘Now that I’m a ghost, I can’t even die. Does that mean reincarnation is over too? Am I going to stay a ghost forever?’
I carefully thought about this ghost life that I might have to live forever.
As a ghost, I wouldn’t get hungry, wouldn’t need sleep, and wouldn’t even need clothes.
Which meant I didn’t need money either.
‘Hmm. Maybe this is actually nice. Then I really don’t have to do anything anymore? For now, this is a vacation!’
Irene decided to think positively about this unexpected new life.
As for why she had awakened here in this state, she decided she could figure that out little by little later.
After experiencing life three times, she had become surprisingly quick to accept and adapt to new lives.
‘My previous lives weren’t exactly ordinary anyway.’
In her first life, she had grown up loved by kind adoptive parents in a world with advanced science, technology, and overflowing information.
However, there was one thing that made her far from ordinary—her weak healing ability.
‘It wasn’t enough to save dying people or anything like that. But my own injuries healed very quickly….’
Her healing power for others was weak, but her own body healed exceptionally fast.
She never knew why she had such an ability, but she secretly helped people in danger while pretending to live normally.
Unfortunately, the secret she hid was eventually exposed, and while running away from kidnappers, she died in a traffic accident.
Then, when she opened her eyes again in her second life, she found herself inside a romance fantasy novel.
One of those popular stories with a cold northern duke and a bright, cheerful heroine.
The heroine had suffered abuse before adulthood, so Irene had pitied her and wished for her happiness while reading the novel.
Thankfully, she awakened as an extra who was never even mentioned in the original story.
Irene of the Snowell Marquis family, a sickly girl who could never leave her bed.
But for some reason, the healing ability from her previous life remained.
Day by day, sickly Irene became healthier.
Despite her promise to quietly watch the original story from afar as a mere extra, she could not ignore the suffering female lead and eventually helped pave a flower path for Chloe herself.
Then the original story finally began, and she thought she would simply watch Chloe happily walk her destined path.
But unfortunately, while protecting Chloe from danger without even thinking, Irene ended up dying in her place.
Floating through the air like dust while recalling her previous life, Irene realized just how dramatic her lives had been.
She was almost kidnapped, died in a traffic accident, transmigrated into another world, and finally got stabbed while saving the heroine.
And now, after all that, she had become a ghost.
Faced with such an unbelievable situation, a helpless sigh escaped from her lips.
‘Sigh… I wonder if everyone I left behind is doing okay.’
As she reflected on her past life, sadness filled her heart at the realization that she would never meet them again.
But before her depressed mood could last long, Irene suddenly flinched from a sharp pain.
‘Ahk—! What? Can ghosts feel pain too? Ugh, my head.’
The stabbing pain felt like needles piercing her head, and Irene eventually crouched down while clutching it.
Then strange memories and voices echoed loudly inside her mind, flashing past like scenes in a lantern show.
‘It’s still not enough. Draw out more. More, more!’
‘Do you think you can escape from this place? That will never happen.’
Shadow-like figures surrounded her while speaking threateningly.
‘Irene—!’
A sorrowful voice called out to her through thick smoke that suddenly spread everywhere.
‘What I can do for you right now… it’s only temporary… until I find another way….’
Along with sharp sounds like weapons clashing together, broken fragments of voices rang out.
The memories passed rapidly like damaged film reels playing chaotically.
And finally, what remained at the end were eyes—wild like a beast, yet beautiful like a round moon…
“Gasp—! Huff—!”
As if reliving the moment of death once more, the brief flashback finally ended, and Irene took a deep breath.
‘W-What was that?’
Irene was shaken by the scenes that had flashed by in an instant.
Especially those final eyes.
They felt so sorrowful that they made even her nonexistent ghost heart ache.
‘Those were definitely someone’s memories….’
Confused by the unfamiliar memories, Irene hurriedly floated toward the window and checked her reflection from every angle.
But the transparent ghost reflected nothing at all.
‘Wait… after dying, did only my soul come to this place? Don’t tell me this ghost body originally belonged to someone else? And those memories just now belonged to this body?’
Shock froze both her thoughts and movements.
Irene had believed that after dying as Irene Snowell in her second life, only her soul became a ghost and arrived here.
‘No, what in the world is going on?’
It felt as if God had suddenly changed His mind, and Irene became anxious that her newly started third life would not be easy either.
‘I don’t know anymore. No one can see me anyway. So this time, I’m going to live a life where I do absolutely nothing!’
However, this was only the small wish of a mere ghost who did not yet know that it would soon be completely destroyed by the return of the castle’s owner.
