Maiden Ofelia

**Ofelia**, also known as **Maiden Ofelia** is the spirit of a young socialite in Lobevia and Namporschia. She was said to live in a very rich house in the 1750s with a very rich mother and father, her mother married her father due to his wealth and her father was a very wealth lawyer who was born in Borogovia but moved to Lobevia because his job's headquarters were situated there.

## Story

Ophelia was raised by her mother and father in northern Lobevia nearing the borders of Namporschia in a rich Victorian-styled manor lined with topiary and fountains, her father was a very wealthy lawyer and her mother was the most infamous socialite in their little village housing around a hundred people. The village treated the family like royalty because of their fancy etiquette and extreme wealth, it was found that they owned up to a near 10.5 million dollars with very valuable items that remained untouched to this day. Ophelia was raised into the socialite life by her mother and was taught to attend monthly fashionable social gatherings alongside her mother. When Ophelia turned seventeen, her father wanted her to marry into a wealthy family but Ophelia declined, not wanting to marry just yet and wanted to focus more on living the socialite life, but her father grew angry and ordered his four servants to lock her into the dungeons below their basement stairwell and starve until she was forced to wed. One of the servants of their manor, Erik Becker, who was a young poor man from Lopphargia, secretly admired Ophelia and planned on asking for her hand in marriage, but to do this, he must win her heart first, so he broke Ophelia out of the chamber and brought her to the woods so she would escape. Ophelia's father walked round the castle and was angered to find Ophelia missing in the chamber and grew into a state of anger that caused him to break three large windows of their corridor with a garden hoe and ordered his servants to find Ophelia at once, but was shocked to find that one of his four servants were missing. He theorised that that servant murdered his daughter and the entire village went into panic thinking there was a murderer on the loose. A kindly foxhunter, his stallion and his foxhounds were hunting in the forest to find Ophelia and Erik in the forest running north into Lopphargia to escape from Ophelia's father and he chased the two down with the stallion accidentally kicking the two unconscious onto the forest ground, he brought the two back to the kingdom where they eventually awoke to find Ophelia's father and the court surrounding the castle. In a state of anger, Ophelia's father offered both his daughter and Erik life sentence and thought he didn't need Ophelia anymore because she didn't want to marry into a wealthy family. Ophelia's mother's similar selfishness agreed with her husband and the two as punishment up until the day of Ophelia and Erik's sentence left them to sleep in the village's sewers. Unfortunately, the day of their life sentence, Ophelia and Erik were both found dead in the sewer ways with unknown causes of death but some believe it could've been from either suicide, a wild animal attack or disease. It is believed Ophelia's spirit is unknown of her death and still walks the forest grounds running frantically as she believes her time is still slowly declining and her screams could be heard at the wee hours of the night.

## Myths and Debunks

Woman's screams, wails, whispers, and cries in Lobelia and southern Namporschia are supposed calls of Ophelia, who is unknown that she is already dead and is mourning because she believes soon she'll be in court and die a slow and painful death. Some families believe if you hear the call of Ophelia, it means you'll either get married to someone whom you don't love or soon you'd die and be murdered by someone you'd think wouldn't kill you, however, the forests nearing Lobelia and Namporschia's borders (Where Ofelia lived) are abundant of wildlife such as foxes, who's screams sound much like a woman's and their screams are generally heard at night. Barn owls and eagles also have a screeching call but are generally not heard at nighttime, so the most likely culprit are red foxes. Many consider the borders between Lobevia and Lopphargia to be the most haunted part of the world because of regular fog occurrences, cloudy weather, and the story of Ophelia.

## Popular Culture

Ophelia in the story "Who is She?" seems to be based on local folklore from the same region of Gas Lamp Tea's headquarters. Specifically, she bears resemblance to the spirit known as Maiden Ofelia in the neighboring countries of Lobevia and Namporschia.

Ofelia, also known as Maiden Ofelia, is said to be the ghost of a wealthy young socialite who lived in northern Lobevia near the borders of Namporschia during the mid-18th century. According to folklore, she died in tragic circumstances after being cast out by her aristocratic family, much like the character of Ophelia in "Who is She?". The specific details of Maiden Ofelia's history vary across tellings, but she is often associated with haunting the forests and manor homes of the region in a similar melancholic spectral form.

Her enduring legacy as a mysterious figure in local folklore seems to have inspired the character development of Ophelia for Gas Lamp Tea author Sir Charles Winterbourne. Thus, while not an exact retelling, "Who is She?" drew from the popular legends surrounding the evocative spirit known as Maiden Ofelia to craft its ghostly protagonist and tap into deeper traditions of the area.