~Chapter 116~
I turned my head toward the direction of the voice.
Everything in my field of vision had come to a standstill.
Everything—except for one thing.
Only the ghost butterfly fluttering its wings in front of me was moving.
“Ghost butterfly?”
I murmured softly, and the butterfly bobbed up and down in the air as if to say yes.
[What a delightful party. Thank you.]
Once again, the ghost butterfly spoke directly into my mind.
[After the party is over, let’s meet again at the magic circle.]
Hearing that, I reached my hand out toward the butterfly.
“Wait, Butterfly—what was that vision you showed me earlier—”
“Ruby?”
Damien’s voice woke me.
When I looked around, everything had started moving again.
The curses were still gathered around Emily, cheering.
“Woohoo!”
“Waaah!”
The curses all cheered together, clapping their hands to celebrate the opening of the second act of the Halloween party.
Damien lowered his voice to ask me, “Ruby, did something happen again?”
“The ghost butterfly thanked me for bringing it to the party. And it said to meet at the magic circle after the party…”
“You didn’t get to ask why, did you?”
“No, I’m not sure about that.”
Was it about to tell me something new?
Or maybe it wanted to explain about the vision it showed me earlier, of Damien crying?
“For now, let’s just enjoy the party and head to the tower later. Don’t worry too much.”
“Alright.”
I gave Damien a little smile, and Emily’s voice rang out across the room.
“Tonight is our night! Let’s all have fun!!”
At Emily’s shout, everyone threw up their hands.
“Let’s have fun!”
Seeing the curses look more lively than usual, I couldn’t help but smile.
Damien, who’d been looking down at me, gently placed his hand on my shoulder and whispered,
“This is the banquet you wished for, Ruby—one with all the curses together.”
When I looked up at him, he too was smiling softly, trying to reassure me.
“Everything will be fine, so let’s just enjoy tonight.”
That gentle gaze and warm smile made my heart feel at peace.
It made me feel strong, knowing that no matter what happened, someone would always be by my side.
“I will.”
I nodded, and reached out my hand to Damien.
“Let’s go have fun together.”
“Of course.”
Damien took my hand as if escorting me onto a ballroom floor, and gave me a light kiss before leading me into the crowd of curses.
“Then, let’s start with the ‘Scare the Most’ Curse Contest! Contestant number one, Kiki!”
[Kikikikiki, Kiki!]
As befitting curses who loved to surprise people, the first event of the Halloween party was a scare contest.
To be fair, Damien and I were the judges; the final score was fifty percent from us and fifty percent from the votes of the curses in attendance.
Each curse showed off their best tricks, sometimes pulling pranks no one could have expected.
One, for instance, pretended not to be at the party at all, only to leap out of the fireplace at the very last moment and scare everyone.
The twins switched clothes, perfectly fooling everyone.
“Alright, let’s announce the winner.”
The winner was Kate, John’s new girlfriend, the ghost who crawled along the ceiling.
She wowed everyone with her incredible skill of changing the length of her hair at will, creating a sight so frightening it could give someone a heart attack.
“Next up—the scary story contest!”
The second event had the curses all sitting together, swapping ghost stories.
If human ghost stories are scary, just imagine how terrifying curses’ stories could be—my heart pounded with excitement.
“And then suddenly, someone pounded on the door from behind—bang, bang, bang!!”
“Kyaaaaaa!!”
Being curses, their acting was much more convincing than any human’s.
Honestly, even I froze in fear a few times.
I never imagined oral ghost stories could be so vivid and thrilling.
“Uwaaah… That was scary.”
Some of the younger doll curses were so frightened by the stories that they hid in my skirt or clung to me, crying.
Luhi looked down at the doll curses huddled on my shoulder, shaking his head with a look of exasperation, then snatched the handkerchief from Damien’s breast pocket and tossed it to them.
[Lu-hi (blow your nose).]
Damien, suddenly deprived of his handkerchief, narrowed his eyes at Luhi.
“Um, Damien. If you need a handkerchief, you can use mine.”
“Ah, thank you, Ruby.”
At my words, Damien returned to his usual self.
[Luhi, Lu-hiruhiruhi!!]
But for some reason, Luhi was still grumpy. To soothe him, I tore off a piece of my own handkerchief and tied it around his neck like a little scarf, and only then did he cheer up.
“Sometimes I worry I’m spoiling Luhi too much,” I said, watching him hop away with his new scarf.
“Luhi is a curse—he’s not so young anymore. Don’t indulge him too much. Isn’t it difficult?”
“It’s not hard, but sometimes I wonder if I’ve let him become too selfish lately…”
Still, he’s much better behaved than other curses.
He doesn’t go around scaring people for no reason.
Just then, I felt a tug on my skirt.
“Ruby, hey, hey. Let’s go dance.”
“Let’s go dance, let’s go dance.”
“Ballroom, ballroom.”
After the scary stories, it was time for the dancing.
The curses’ dance party was much wilder—and flashier—than any human ball.
They ignored the music playing from the old gramophone, each dancing to their own rhythm.
The younger curses who didn’t know how to dance just held hands and spun around in circles, laughing gleefully.
Everyone moved wherever they pleased, doing whatever they wanted, and nobody minded. Everyone was having fun.
“Hey, you humans! Show us your skills for once!”
The twins giggled and pulled Damien and me into the center.
We laughed, shouted, and danced freely among the not-quite-living, not-quite-human company.
There was no sense of strangeness.
Just like these curses, we too were people the world saw as “odd.”
The party went on late into the night, filled with laughter and noise, until everyone else had gone to sleep—until two in the morning.
“The moon is bright tonight.”
After putting the exhausted curses to bed or covering them with blankets, Damien and I headed up to the tower rooftop, where the magic circle was drawn.
A round, brilliant white full moon hung in the sky.
“It really is. Perfect for Halloween.”
“Maybe a werewolf curse will show up.”
Damien chuckled at my joke.
As we stood before the magic circle, ghost butterflies appeared and gathered around us.
They spoke to me.
[Thank you. Both the party with the living, and the party with the dead, were wonderful.]
“It was my pleasure. I’m glad you enjoyed it.”
Damien and I both bowed our heads in respect to the ghost butterflies.
[Are you prepared to give up everything for the third rite?]
It was a question heavy with meaning.
To ask if we were ready to “give up everything” was always frightening.
But memories of everything Damien and I had shared so far flashed through my mind.
How he’d saved me from marrying that old nobleman, how we’d learned about each other’s hobbies and gone on dates, how even after learning each other’s secrets, we’d promised to stay by each other’s side.
Remembering all that, I found myself wanting to be bound even more deeply to this person.
“Yes, I am ready to give up everything.”
The moment those words left my lips, the bodies of the ghost butterflies turned a vivid violet.
Thump—
A sound echoed from somewhere, and the moonlight shining down on me changed color.
“…The purple moon.”
The prerequisite for the third rite had been fulfilled.
