Juno removed her hand from his face and took a step back. “I’ll contact you.”
Noticing she was telling the truth this time, Jupiter nodded. “I’ll be waiting.”
Juno walked past him. As she approached the door, she saw John. She felt guilty. Why did this happen at Peter’s funeral?
“My lady, I will handle everything else. Please rest.” John’s face always showed no emotion, but his gaze seemed to question her.
Juno nodded. “Thank you.” She hurried out of the annex.
The annex where the funeral took place and the mansion were in close proximity to each other. Juno walked as fast as she could to her room. The door slammed. She was about to bury her face in her hands until she realized she didn’t get back her glove. How pathetic.
Everything was a mess. She was sure John noticed. Her unexpected meeting with Jupiter reignited a fire within her heart; it burned more intensely than before. Juno staggered to her dressing table. In the mirror, her face was a mixture of excitement, guilt, and sadness. Juno tried to pretend nothing happened. At some point, she was running, no longer pretending to walk, but it was only her in the mansion. She hurriedly opened the door to the study and entered the workshop.
“Huff, huff.” Juno tried to catch her breath. Still, she thought she could calm down here. It was her first time in the workshop since Peter’s death. As always, there were books and junk laying around. “It’s still the same.”
When she smelled the comforting scent of books in the familiar room, she relaxed. Eventually, she spotted something unfamiliar in the workshop. What is that? It was a huge doll, the one Peter was working on for a while. Juno approached it and checked its face.
“Oh.”
It was Peter. The doll looked younger than he actually was, but the doll was more or less a replica of Peter.
“So, you made a doll with your own face?” He really was narcissistic. Juno laughed at the absurdity as the doll’s eyes moved to look at her.
“That’s correct.”
Juno froze. The doll then opened its mouth.
“…Juno.”
“Why are you…”
“It’s me. Peter Sergien.”
Juno frowned. Perhaps it was because of this that she could think clearly. Should I say it’s a good thing?
She sighed. “Since Teacher modeled you after himself, it’s no surprise you’d say that.”
“It’s really me.”
Juno stared at the doll. Something had to be wrong with it.
Then, John entered the workshop. “My lady.”
When she saw him, she remembered what had happened with Jupiter, but she pushed the event to the back of her mind. “John, what’s this doll for?”
Hebe, who had entered the workshop with John, waved. “My lady!”
“Hebe, this doll is weird. He thinks he’s Peter.”
“My lady, allow me to explain,” John said as he approached her.
“Do you actually believe this doll?”
“Yes.”
“How does that make any sense? How can it be him? He’s dead.”
“I transferred my memory,” the doll said.
“What?”
John added, “In simple terms, it’s a brain transfer.”
“…What nonsense are you two talking about?” Juno’s gaze flitted between John and the doll who claimed to be Peter.
The doll who claimed to be Peter nodded at John.
John handed a letter to Juno. “Master gave me this. He told me to give it to you if it works.”
“There was only a small chance it wasn’t going to work,” the doll remarked.
Juno stared at the doll who claimed to be Peter, then looked at the letter. It was written in Peter’s handwriting.
“I can confirm it too,” Hebe said with a smile.
Is that why Hebe didn’t attend the funeral? His smile was pretty, but Juno couldn’t smile back.
John pointed at the letter. “Everything is explained there.”
Juno removed the seal. She didn’t know what was going on, but she knew she had to read this letter to understand what the doll, John, and Hebe were saying.
***
Juno reread the letter.
Peter Sergien, her teacher, didn’t like the gods. That was something she knew. And since he hated them so much, Peter refused to die.
“You really are him, huh?” Juno had read the explanation of the process involved in making the doll. She put down the letter and sighed.
“You’ll get used to it,” Peter sarcastically replied.
“Is that a joke?”
“Yes.”
Despite wanting to yell at him, Juno decided to ask the question that’s been on her mind since reading the letter. “Can a doll with Teacher’s memory really be considered Teacher? It’s just a memory and not the person himself.”
“Perhaps.”
If the doll truly had Peter’s memory, could he be Peter? “Why are you so sure you’re Peter Sergien?” Juno asked.
“Because I know I’m Peter Sergien.”
Juno couldn’t deny that. Everything from his facial expressions to how he talked to her was the same as before.
“…I am a person who believes in things such as a soul. So, Peter, until I see Teacher again.”
“Hm?”
Juno believed in the concept of a “spirit”. However, dolls were nothing like humans. “I think John, Hebe, and the other dolls are alive.”
“And?”
“I don’t know. I just want to feel at ease.” It was hard to understand, but she thought she could accept that doll, Peter, just as she accepted John and Hebe.
“My lady accepts him as Master!” Hebe exclaimed.
Juno narrowed her eyes at him. Initially, she was worried when he disappeared earlier. “Hebe, when did you know about this?”
“Before the funeral…”
It coincided with the time when she couldn’t find him. “Why wasn’t I told about this?”
“You’d be sad.”
“Why?”
“Well, my lady is …” Hebe trailed off.
John said, “You care about Master a lot, correct? I also thought you wouldn’t accept it so easily.”
Juno gestured for him to stop. “All right.” With everything explained, Juno wanted to change the subject as naturally as possible. “If you’re really my teacher, I have something to say.”
Peter nodded. “Get out, both of you.” When the workshop door closed and the two were left alone, he asked, “What is it?”
“You promised me something. I let it go because of your death, but I have to know now.” Juno didn’t want to scold him about dying. She accepted his death and buried him without complaints. I was satisfied not knowing his intention. However, as she prepared for the funeral, a person came to mind. Peter said he had no relationship with her father or Lilith. She wanted to see if she was right.
“Who asked you to marry me?”
“Do you not even have an inkling of who it is?”
She remembered the person who consoled her at her mother’s funeral. “No, this funeral reminded me of him. He was close to me and had medicine made by an alchemist.”
“…Go on.”
His bitter smile confirmed her suspicions, but she wanted to make sure. “Nereus, correct?”
“Yes, my younger sister’s husband, Nereus.”
Juno wiped away her tears. It was him. “Did… he ask you for a favor?”
“Correct.”
“What about marrying me?” Nereus wouldn’t have asked for such a ridiculous thing.
Peter shook his head. “That wasn’t what I was asked to do.”
“…”
“I was keeping an eye on you. Of course, I didn’t do it all the time. I had to work. But one day, I heard Marquis Trish was trying to find you a marriage partner. A perverted noble was in the middle of negotiations with him. There wasn’t much time left, so I said I’d marry you.”
In a sense, Peter was part of Nereus’s family. However, Juno was the one to prepare Nereus’s funeral. She still had the urn with his ashes. “But he doesn’t have a family…”
“Because my sister had passed away already.” Peter shrugged. “Nereus and I aren’t friends. I can’t even say I was on good terms with my sister, but she was very happy with him. I decided it was fine to do him a favor.”
Juno recalled the day she visited Peter’s room and how he was looking at a large portrait. There was a woman in the portrait. It was clear there was something Juno didn’t know, but she didn’t want to open old wounds.
She remembered Nereus. Someone who was always there for me like a family member. The one who gave me the strength to move forward. What was Nereus thinking at the time when he asked Peter, whom he wasn’t even friends with, to look after her?
