Divination…eh. The word “sketchy” popped into my head, but I held my tongue. Divination is a load of bullshit anyway, so there’s no harm in hearing her out. It would be dumber for me to interrupt her after coming all this way. I can always laugh in her face after I’ve let her finish.
“We can receive the word of the Lord Eltania by randomly drawing cards with pictures on them. I’ve brought some with me, if you’d like to see.”
Thankfully oblivious to my urge to rain on her parade, Melissa pulled a deck of cards out of her bag and handed them to me.
They’re…very elaborate. I couldn’t see any difference between each card. It would definitely take a master craftsman to make cards so consistent in size and shape.
Apparently, it was important to select them as randomly as possible—though I guess that tracked, since the cards you drew could determine the fate of your nation.
I cut the deck a few times, then I drew the card on the top.
“What’s this…a river?”
The drawing on the card I’d just drawn resembled a flowing body of water.
“It can also be interpreted as flowing water.”
I had been more specific in calling it a river, but I guess it wasn’t wrong to use your gut reaction to interpret the card.
I drew another card—
“Next is—money.”
“Literally, yes. But it could also mean gold.”
I had pulled a card with an illustration of a coin on it. As I flipped through the deck, I noticed the cards had a variety of objects and concepts drawn on them.
Okay…now I think I see how this works.
“Choosing cards at random and divining the Lord Eltania’s will from them is our calling. Basically, choosing the cards is our job, and reading them requires a specialist.”
“……I see?”
So it’s a game. Like, if I paired the water card I drew earlier with a rain card, that could mean a flood. And if I drew an unlucky card—like the moon or something—after a money card, that could predict a crash in currency value.
And drawing those cards was the job of Priestesses like Melissa. But considering the grand name and legendary status, it seemed like nothing more than petty fortune telling to me—
“All right… I’m now going to receive His Word. I’ll need your help…”
“Very well. What do you need me to do?”
“Shuffle the cards, then divide them into however many piles you’d like,” Melissa said matter-of-factly. “Think as little as possible… And treat them with care.”
Now I get it… If you get the results you were expecting, you can’t exactly say you “knew it” all along. Still in a state of half doubt, I shuffled the deck as instructed.
“You’re good at that,” Melissa said.
“I was bored a lot back at home.”
It was probably also because I was no stranger to gambling in my past life, but she didn’t need to know that. Melissa said nothing more to me. After shuffling the cards, I divided them into five piles.
“All right…watch me.”
The air around Melissa grew icy. All traces of the timid rabbit in her eyes were extinguished and replaced with the serenity of a priestess. Her delicate fingers leisurely and gracefully fell onto the stack of cards.
Then she drew the first one.
“Ahh—!” I gasped.
I didn’t realize that some of the cards were so obvious.
“Is that…a skull?”
“Yes. A human skull. Since it’s so explicitly inauspicious, the Skull card usually is an omen of a catastrophic calamity.”
Melissa set the Skull card in the center of the table, then she drew from a different pile.
“The Sword card.”
“So that means…weapon? Or could it represent war?”
“You’re smart. I was right, you’re definitely—never mind. I’ll tell you later.”
The second card she drew was the Sword, which I deduced to mean weapon or war. What had made me interpret it so quickly was the catastrophic calamity omen from earlier. It had guided my mind to the history I’d experienced in the other timeline.
A catastrophic war.
That was surely pointing to Colorne’s great invasion that had brought the former Eltania to ruin.
My heart jumped in my chest. No…don’t freak out yet. Omens of great wars are a staple of inauspicious prophecies.
But if the next card she draws is one of the three I’m thinking of…
Either the Lion…or the Moon…or—
“Ahh…”
Deep down, I already knew what she would draw. I tried to keep calm, but my heart still beat wildly.
“That’s right. This is why I’ve been following you.”
—or the sulberia flower.
Suddenly, I was utterly convinced of Melissa’s supernatural ability.
On the card she drew was the very flower that the Lord Eltania loved. Without her telling me, I knew what it meant. The sulberia flower meant Mylene.
The Hair of Sulberia would bring about a war of catastrophic proportions. I thought I was the only one who knew about that future.
Shit…her power is real. I might’ve not believed her if there wasn’t war in the cards—
I pressed a hand to my mouth. Melissa gave me a curious look.
“Do you…have an idea what this means?”
“I wish I didn’t. I only half believed it, too… Fuck!”
Melissa gasped. “So…is that the real you?”
“Hm? Ohh—shit, yeah, might’s well drop the act. Yeah…this is the real me.”
It took Melissa’s question to make me notice I’d let my good-girl mask slip.
“I see…it’s a bit of a shock, but for some reason, you seem more…natural?…that way.”
“Oh, I have a hell of a time keeping up the rich-girl facade. Have to keep up appearances, ya know.”
It was a failure on my part to let my mask slip, but if I could be my true self, I was much more comfortable that way.
“So, what about your usual persona?”
“It’s a fake. I have to be the bare-minimum proper lady to avoid suspicion.”
“I get that… Looking back now, you did seem oddly crass whenever you had your training sessions with the prince and princess.”