Chapter 35
This perfect body, immense wealth, and the beautiful women who love me. All of this was given to the shell named 'Kim Minho,' not to my soul.
(If I'm caught, it's over. The moment this shell is peeled away... I'll be cast out onto that cold, rainy road again.)
I clenched my fists tightly. The pain of my fingernails digging into my flesh actually calmed me.
(Never... I won't let it be taken. And I won't give it back.)
I got up from the sofa and walked towards the kitchen with faltering steps. To survive, to keep this position, I had to act even more thoroughly. No, not act, I had to become real. I had to make those women love, no, worship my soul, not just this shell.
"Haa...."
I forced a smile, approaching Hye-jeong and Hye-seon from behind, as if shaking off the remnants of a nightmare. I wanted to confirm their presence, my lifelines and my trophies.
"Oh my, Minho, are you awake?"
Perhaps sensing my presence, Hye-jeong, who was tasting the stew, turned around. She was dressed only in a thin apron over a white slip. Her collarbones were exposed above the delicate shoulder straps, and her slender waistline was emphasized by the apron strings tied tightly. There she was, a hot and soft 'woman of reality,' the complete opposite of the blurry ghosts from my recent nightmare.
"You're up? Did the smell wake you?"
Hye-seon, who was flipping meat nearby, also greeted me with a bright smile. Her appearance, wearing an apron over a tight dress, was domestic yet subtly overflowing with sensuality.
"......Yes. Because of the delicious smell."
I replied in a hoarse voice, squeezing myself between the two of them.
"Let's see, why is our son sweating so much? Did you have a nightmare?"
Hye-jeong approached with a worried expression and gently wiped the cold sweat from my forehead with the back of her hand. The moment her warm touch reached me, my frayed nerves seemed to melt away.
"Just... I had a scary dream. A dream of going back to how things were... to a time when I had nothing."
At my words, Hye-jeong's and Hye-seon's eyes wavered for a moment. They knew. That the 'past' I spoke of was not the real Kim Minho's past, but the miserable life of my previous existence.
"Silly boy. They say dreams are the opposite."
Hye-seon feigned a bright smile, picked up a piece of well-cooked meat with her chopsticks, and brought it to my mouth.
"Here, say 'aah~'. You need to eat meat and regain your strength. Only then will we spoil you again, right?"
I opened my mouth and ate the meat she offered. The savory juices burst forth with every chew. The rich, fatty taste coated my tongue. This was the taste of capital. The exquisite flavor of top-grade Han-u that a beggar could never even imagine. But even if my stomach was filled, that terrible sense of lack that gnawed at my soul did not disappear.
And the next morning. Escorted by Hye-jeong, I revisited the university hospital's VVIP Center where I had been hospitalized immediately after the accident.
"Don't be nervous, Minho. Mom is right here."
Her voice was subtly trembling, but the sensation of her ample breast against my arm was warm and comforting.
"Welcome, Kim Minho-nim. And Shin Hye-jeong Director-nim. The professor is waiting."
We were immediately guided to the neurosurgery department head's consultation room. He was the most authoritative professor at one of the nation's leading university hospitals. He continuously let out exclamations of admiration as he scanned my full-body MRI and CT scans displayed on the monitor.
"Hahaha, this is truly.... astonishing every time I see it."
The professor adjusted his glasses and looked at me.
"As I told you at your last discharge, there's no explanation other than a miracle. The traces of the cerebral hemorrhage have completely disappeared, and there's not even a hint of the fractures. No, your muscle mass and nerve response speed are even better than before the accident. In terms of physical age alone, you're at the level of a teenage athlete."
A medically perfect diagnosis. A normal guardian would have been overjoyed, but Hye-jeong's expression, sitting next to me, was rather dark and subdued. If his body was perfect, it meant there was only one problem left.
"Um... Professor-nim."
Hye-jeong swallowed dryly and cautiously opened her mouth.
"Is his body... truly perfectly fine? Could there be... some subtle damage to his brain that we don't know about, causing him to see things...?"
"See things?"
At Hye-jeong's words, the female professor's gaze sharpened. She closed the chart and turned to face me with a serious demeanor.
"Minho-gun. Could you tell me specifically about the symptoms you've experienced since being discharged?"
I paused for a moment, then began to explain what had happened.
"......I dream. Every single night."
"What kind of dream?"
"I... dream of dying. On a cold, rainy road, crushed by a motorcycle, spitting blood as I die."
I deliberately shivered as if terrified. Hye-jeong then put her arm around my shoulder, comforting me.
"And... that guy comes to me."
"That guy?"
"A man who looks exactly like me. His face and voice are identical to mine... but only his eyes are different. He looks down at me with very cold, contemptuous eyes and says."
The professor's pen stopped. A tense atmosphere filled the consultation room.
"'Give it back now. It's mine,' he says."
Feeling Hye-jeong's hand caress my cheek, I dropped the decisive line.
"It's not just seeing him. When I fall asleep... that guy stands at the head of my bed and strangles me. Every time I wake up gasping for air, I hear a whisper in my ear. 'Get out of the way. It's my turn to go back in now. You're just a shell! Get lost!' he says."
When I finished speaking, a heavy silence fell over the consultation room. The professor placed the pen she was holding down on the desk. Then, with a deep frown and a very serious, rigid expression, she stared at me.
"......"
As the silence lengthened, Hye-jeong's anxiety intensified. The doctor's reaction was too grave to dismiss it as a simple stress-induced nightmare.
"Pro-Professor-nim...? Our Minho... he's okay, right? It's just due to the shock of the accident..."
Hye-jeong asked, forcing a smile, but the professor shook her head.
"Director-nim. This is difficult to view as simple PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder)."
The doctor looked at my brain scan on the monitor, then took off her glasses and spoke in a very cautious and grave voice.
"Cases that are difficult to explain medically are occasionally reported. It's a phenomenon where brain function is normal, but the integration of personality doesn't occur, leading to an internal conflict."
"Conflict?"
"Simply put, it means a 'war' is taking place."
The professor continued her explanation, holding two index fingers together.
"Currently, two selves coexist in Minho-gun's mind. One is the 'Current Self' that awakened after the accident. This is the rational, calm personality that seeks to live the present life."
The professor's gaze sharpened.
"And the other is... the 'Pre-accident Self'."
Thump.
The moment she heard those words, all color drained from Hye-jeong's face. The pre-accident self. Because that was the image of the son who disliked her.
"S-So... the old Minho... is trying to come back out?"
"That's right. The doppelganger phenomenon Minho-gun is experiencing, the sensation of being strangled... This is not a simple nightmare."
The professor tapped the chart.
"The past self is pushing out the current self, attacking to regain control of the body. From a neuroscientific perspective, it can be seen as a state where past habits and memories imprinted on brain cells are rejecting present reason and staging a rebellion."
"Oh my god..."
Hye-jeong staggered and clutched my arm. Her eyes were trembling violently.
"Is there no way?"
"We will combine it with medication, but that alone won't be enough. We need to change the brain's circuitry itself."
"Change the brain's circuitry... What do you mean by that?"
In response to Hye-jeong's question, the female professor calmly continued her explanation, pointing to the brain scan on the monitor with her pen.
"If the memories of the previous personality are attacking the brain with 'fear' and 'habit,' then the current personality must defend the brain with an even stronger sense of 'stability'."
"Stability...?"
"Yes. Neuroscientifically speaking, the stable secretion of 'Oxytocin' and 'Dopamine' is essential."
The professor adjusted her glasses and began to offer extremely common-sense and medical advice to the guardian.
"We need to make Minho-gun's subconscious feel that 'his current life is much happier and safer' than 'returning to the past'."
Hye-jeong leaned forward, as if not wanting to miss a single word from the doctor.
"Then... what exactly should I do? What can I do for him?"
"The most important and effective treatment is 'the care of family members'."
The professor smiled warmly and looked at Hye-jeong.
"In particular, 'emotional connection' with the person the patient trusts most is paramount. For these emotional issues, the support and care of family members are the best treatment."
The doctor's words were textbook. It was an extremely wholesome and ethical prescription: to warmly embrace a son suffering from identity confusion due to the after-effects of an accident, and to comfort him with words of love.
However, to Hye-jeong, who had already tasted her son's masculinity and been conquered by him, those words were translated and heard with an entirely different meaning.