Welcome! This Is the RPR Motel — Episode 8

"Sohee, ma'am!"

She opened the door warmly, and Sohee stepped over the threshold, instinctively drawing in a deep breath, as she always did.

"Something about this place just puts me in a good mood."

At those words, Riri broke into a beaming smile. Nothing delighted her more than knowing the space she had created was loved.

Riri dabbed a cloth with a herb renowned for melting away stress and held it out to her. Sohee had spent the past few nights staying up late piecing together stories—her mind and body must have been exhausted.

"This should help clear your head a little."

"Thank you."

Sohee pressed her face into the cloth and inhaled deeply. Just as Riri had promised, the crisp scent seemed to chase away the fog that had been clouding her thoughts for days.

Riri was a hamlet resident—one of the people of the Village, the largest community in all of Wicheon.

"The Village is where those with nowhere else to go came together and built a life. It. Is."

A few days after becoming manager, Moon Jar had sat her down and explained all about the Village, the place that made up the largest portion of Wicheon.

Wicheon was the afterlife for characters born from the written word—novels, poetry, essays, and the like—and so everyone living there, including the hamlet residents, had been created as fictional characters.

But not one of them had ever appeared in a story. Not once.

"They never got to appear in a work? Why not?"

"The author either stopped midway through creating them, or finished them and then decided they didn't fit the story. So they were never used. That. Is. All."

"...I see."

"Characters like that gathered one by one, and now they live in the Village in numbers too great to count. There. Are."

In a word, hamlet residents were characters who had been discarded—or kept on hand, just in case. Naturally, no names had ever been given to them, so they had simply been assigned short, repetitive two-syllable names.

Just like Riri here, or Kuku in the kitchen.

When Sohee had first heard that explanation, her heart had grown heavy and stayed that way for a long while.

People with no family, no one looking for them, no one wanting them—people with nowhere to go. Because that had been her, exactly.

But it didn't take her long to realize how condescending that pity had been.

Having watched Riri for a long moment with a fond gaze, Sohee finally spoke.

"Hey, Riri. There are a few scents I need."

"Is another guest coming?"

"No."

"Then what would you use them for...?"

Sohee looked at her gravely and lowered her voice.

"Is there such a thing as a scent that... seduces people?"

"There is."

"What if we hung it outside somewhere?"

Riri tilted her head, then asked again.

"...Is this for luring in customers, by any chance?"

"Yep."

It was the new marketing strategy Sohee had been agonizing over for days.

Had Moon Jar heard, he surely would have scolded her for fooling around with half-baked schemes again—but Riri simply smiled. Every time she had seen her, Sohee had been someone earnestly racking her brain over how to run the motel well.

"A nice scent relaxes people, doesn't it? So I was thinking of soaking some wooden sticks with fragrance and hanging them at the entrance. What do you think?"

"Then there's really no need to use a seductive scent at all."

"...You never know."

"Fragrance isn't a magic love potion, you know?"

Riri gave her a playful scolding even as she rose from the sofa and made her way over to the cabinet where she kept her aromatics. Pointing at the bottles one by one with her finger, she began blending in her head.

"Hmm, honestly, I can't guarantee it'll help bring in customers, but I'm all for it. It seems like a lovely idea for creating a positive image of the place, at the very least."

"Right?"

"Yes. A good scent leaves behind good memories."

Sohee smiled, satisfied.

"Great. Then I'll leave the choice of fragrance entirely to your good taste, Riri."

"Of course. And while I'm at it, I'll prepare some for the lobby and the consultation room as well."

"Perfect. You're the best, Riri."

Riri's face flushed red. And because even that reaction was adorable, Sohee had no intention of ever being stingy with praise—at least where Riri was concerned.

Riri, the maid without a name. When Sohee had first looked into her backstory, she'd been a little surprised. Compared to other hamlet residents, quite a lot of her character setting had been written.

In the end, the author had decided the gap in status between crown prince and maid was far too wide to ever bridge, and so Riri had been thrown away. Instead, the author had created a foreign princess with unnaturally sharp senses—the one who would enter a contract marriage with the crown prince in the romance novel that followed.

Sohee watched Riri's back as she busied herself with her work, genuinely glowing with excitement.

Exceptionally capable, yet looked down upon for her low birth.

Why did that one line keep nagging at her? From the moment she'd brought Riri on, Sohee had resolved to recognize her abilities often—no matter what.

What's the point of holding back praise from someone this talented?

Leaving Riri to her concentration, Sohee carefully slipped out of the workroom.

It had been exactly one day since the scented sticks went up.

"Sohee, ma'am."

Sohee looked up from the front desk. She'd been in the middle of sorting out wages and taxes to pay out.

"Hm? What is it?"

Kuku, freshly arrived for his shift, was walking toward her. His footsteps were hurried, but his expression and voice remained as low and even as ever. Something had clearly happened. She slowly rose from her seat.

"Is something wrong?"

He let out a long breath before answering.

"It seems a guest has arrived."

"...!"

She rushed to check her face in the mirror. Having needlessly inspected her attire, she hurried toward the entrance. Just then, Riri—who had come in for her shift—approached with an excited look, lowering her voice.

"Sohee, ma'am! Outside right now—"

"We got a guest just one day after hanging the scented sticks. It's all thanks to you."

Whether that was true or not was anyone's guess, but Sohee gave Riri a knowing wink and hastened to the entrance. Delighted, Riri followed on even more excited feet and took her place right beside the door.

Sohee drew in a long, deep breath, flung the door wide open, and greeted her guest with a radiant smile.

"Welcome! This is the Love Regression, Possession, and Reincarnation Motel!"

Glittering silver hair, a dress the color of azure. Unless the woman was a cosplayer from Sohee's world, she was unmistakably a character from a romance-fantasy realm.

Sohee guided the woman to the consultation room, then swiftly read through the life record laid out at the front desk. Clutching the file, she stepped inside.

"Lady Elisha Brown? You're welcome to take some time and decide after a simple consultation, so please, have a seat."

Sohee sat down with a gentle smile. The woman, still standing motionless, hid the lower half of her face behind her fan and looked Sohee up and down.

"...?"

Sohee looked up at the unmoving woman. But Elisha still did not take her seat, nor say a word. Thinking she perhaps hadn't been heard, Sohee tried again.

"Um, then, first of all, which of the three paths—regression, possession, or reincarnation—would you like to—"

"Possession. I take it your skill in that is certain?"

The woman—Elisha Brown—snapped out the words, sharp as a blade. Sohee smiled warmly at the guest who used her fan as a screen to hide her expression.

"We do everything we can to raise the odds. Please, have a seat."

"Odds?"

Elisha stared at her, her beautiful face frozen into ice.

"Did I give up dissolution just to raise some odds?"

Standing bolt upright, Elisha looked down at Sohee.

No greeting. Not even the courtesy of pulling out a chair. Really.

How irritating.

The woman suddenly remembered the day her beloved Cedric's heart had turned—when he had offered her no seat, and ordered her thrown out as a wedding guest. Her lips pressed into a displeased line. The mere irritation of it curdled into something far worse as that memory layered itself on top.

Doesn't she know who I am?

Dead, yes—but she had once lived an entire life under the illustrious name of saintess. Adored and revered by all.

Of course, it had all come crashing down the moment the real one appeared.

I'll go back and reclaim everything. I'll possess the body of that woman—the real saintess—wherever she may be, and be treasured more dearly than ever. I, of all people.

Elisha Brown: a prominent supporting character in the romance fantasy The Saintess with Silver Wings. She had played the part of the fake saintess until the real one appeared, and when she'd tried to kill her, she had ended up with her neck on the chopping block.

"Hmm, the core details look workable, so I believe we can prepare something. First, you'd enter the story through regression. After that comes the possession—and who exactly were you hoping to possess...?"

"Who do you think? The real saintess, obviously!"

Elisha Brown, huffing as though she could barely contain herself, glared fiercely at Sohee.

Lifeless black eyes, porcelain skin, silver hair falling to her waist—her delicate frame and the aura that drifted around her gave off a beauty so untouchable it felt almost daunting.

And on top of that, she possessed a modest but genuine measure of holy power, so everyone had believed her the true saintess.

Although, how to put this.

Sohee, frowning faintly, set down the papers and looked the woman straight in the eye. People actually believed this woman was the real saintess?

Sohee opened the file again—what for, she couldn't quite say—and asked.

"So, why, exactly?"

"Why do I want possession? Isn't it obvious? I'm going to take back what was mine."

Sohee tilted her head, puzzled.

Stealing the real saintess's body... that doesn't quite add up, does it?

"You weren't the real saintess to begin with, though. What exactly do you mean by taking back what was yours?"