The Twins' Confession
I'd expected it.
No — "expected" was underselling it. This was closer to certainty.
I feel fucking great.
The eastern annex of the Royal Palace. The psychologist's office. Morning sunlight slanted in through the window, dust dancing in the beams, and spread across my desk lay a stack of documents... the emotional-stabilization report Queen Elena had sent over. The official reason I was here.
The door burst open. No warning. No knock.
"Do-hyun!!"
Mia. Silver hair gleaming in the morning light, cheeks flushed red, her maid's uniform hanging slightly askew — she'd run here. Sprinted the whole way down the corridor.
Her breathless chest was rising and falling in the gaps of that disheveled uniform — and my cock sprang up first. ...Fuck. What kind of bastard gets hard in front of a woman who came to confess? Hold it. Clamp it down, hard. There I sat, legs tucked under the desk, playing the dignified gentleman, while the only honest thing about me lived below the belt. I hated admitting that this loser was me.
Nia followed behind her, black hair in twin tails, half a step back from Mia. As always.
"Mia. Knock."
"Ah — sorry! But that's not the important part..."
Mia's eyes sparkled. That violet... the trait the twins shared. The same color. But where Mia's eyes held fire, Nia's brimmed with water. Same eyes, different light.
When one bursts outward, the other seals herself inward. Common enough with twins — one got loud, the other went quiet. Nobody assigned those roles; they divided them on their own, without even realizing it.
"I like you."
Mia said it. A frontal assault.
Standing right in front of my desk, hands squeezed into fists, cheeks red as a tomato, eyes locked straight on mine.
"I like you, Do-hyun. From the moment we first met."
A fastball. A pitch buried dead center — not the corner, the middle. Impossible to dodge.
Behind her, Nia swallowed. A small sound. But I heard it.
"Mia."
"I know it's sudden. But if I kept holding it in, I felt like I'd burst. I wake up in the morning thinking of nothing but you. I think of you while I eat. Even tidying the sheets, I swear I can smell you..."
The words came pouring out, like a dam had given way.
That was Mia, down to her basic blueprint. She doesn't store emotion; whatever comes in goes straight back out. Happy, she laughs on the spot. Sad, she cries on the spot. Likes someone — she says it on the spot.
Better than bottling it all up to fester inside. If anything, hers was the healthy way to be.
Feels fucking great.
"At first I just thought you were so cool. You're tall, and you came from some strange world and stood so proudly in it. But then, little by little... when you smiled, my chest would thump. When you talked to someone else, my stomach would hurt..."
That's how it is for everyone the first time they fall in love. One person fills the skull and crowds out everything else; the moment he glances elsewhere, it hurts right under the sternum. You go stupid, like you're drugged. And you never notice it yourself — that it's nothing but hormones.
"So... I like you. For real."
Mia finished. She gulped for air. Cheeks red. Hands trembling. But her eyes didn't waver.
A brave woman.
Silence stretched. Two seconds. Three.
Then I heard a sound.
A sob. Small and thin — a sound that had tried to hold itself in, and failed.
Nia.
I turned my head. Nia stood at the door, both hands clamped over her mouth, black hair spilling loose along her face. And from her eyes... something clear was sliding down.
"Nia?!"
Mia whipped around in shock.
"I... I too..."
Nia's voice. Trembling. Like someone calling through a fog.
"I like you too..."
The second confession.
Mia's face went rigid.
"Nia, you..."
"I'm sorry, Sis. I'm sorry. But I can't hold it in anymore either..."
Nia was crying. Quietly — in Nia's way, swallowing every sound. Her shoulders shook.
"I think of you when I wake up too. My chest hurts when you smile too. I'm... I'm the same as her..."
Twins falling for the same man. Not unheard of. Same face, same blood — how strange can it be that even who they love turns out the same? Share a taste in clothes, share a taste in food, and you share a taste in men. Simply put... they end up loving the same one.
Mia looked at Nia. Nia looked at Mia. Same eyes. Violet. But what filled them now... love, yes — and jealousy, and apology, and a sting of betrayal.
Complicated. Shit, this was complicated.
"You went first, Sis. Why didn't you even ask me?"
Nia's voice shook... resentment threaded through it.
"Nia, I..."
"We've always done everything together. Picked our clothes together, split our snacks, never had one secret between us. So why this... why did you come here alone and..."
"I didn't know either! I didn't plan to say it today — it just burst out of me!"
"That's what makes it worse! You always do this. Do it first, apologize after..."
Sisters at war. Two who had grown up stuck together like one body had just met the first thing they couldn't divide. You can halve a snack. You can't halve a man. So they fight — normally speaking.
"Enough."
Both of them stopped. Looked at me.
I rose from my chair and walked to them.
Mia... silver hair, red cheeks, no tears, but her lips caught between her teeth. Every emotion on her face in plain sight — anger and guilt and love, all tangled together.
Nia... black twin tails, tears falling, fists clenched in both hands. Head slightly bowed, eyes still lifted to my face — resentment and hope and love, all tangled together.
The same feelings, worn differently. Twins, mirrored.
I opened both arms. Pulled Mia in with my right, Nia with my left.
"..."
"..."
Both of them went stiff at the same instant.
"You're both precious to me."
Mia's precious. Nia's precious. Ask me to pick one, and I can't.
I meant it. Not a pretty lie — the genuine thing.
I liked Mia's bright energy, the kind that opens a morning. I liked Nia's quiet depth, the kind you sink into staring at a night sky. Only the two of them together made a full day.
...That said, the man thinking these thoughts was a little disgusting. Look at me, gift-wrapping I want them both in such elegant packaging. Shit. Still — sincerity is sincerity.
Mia buried her face in my chest. Nia too. Both my shoulders went damp — both of them crying, Mia out loud, Nia swallowing it down.
"But... then what do we do?"
Mia asked it with her face still buried, voice thick with tears.
"The three of us."
I said it simply.
"The... three of us?"
"All three of us?"
They asked in unison, heads coming up. The same violet eyes looked up at me. Surprise, confusion... and just a flicker of hope.
"There's no reason for you two to fight over it. Mia likes me. Nia likes me. I like you both... so there's only one answer."
The sensation of [Common Sense Alteration] climbed all the way to my fingertips.
One sentence would have been enough to erase their conflict: it's only natural for the three of us to be together. The moment that thought took root in their minds, the jealousy and the betrayal would have smoothed away, seamless.
I stopped right on the edge of casting it.
Back in chapter 50, I'd confirmed that nothing that wasn't a person could be read. This was the reverse. Being able to read someone didn't mean I was allowed to write them.
"No. I'm not the one who gets to write the answer into your heads."
Both of them looked at me at the same time.
"Loving you both — that's my feeling, and mine to own. But whether the three of us happens is for each of you to decide. If even one of you says no, it ends right here. Don't answer as a pair just because you're sisters."
First I met Mia's eyes.
"Not because it comes bundled with Nia. What does Mia herself want?"
Mia opened her mouth, then shut it. For the first time, the thought came before the answer.
"I like you, Do-hyun. And I don't want to lose Nia either. So I want to try it — the three of us. In return... if I get jealous sometimes, I'm allowed to say so?"
"Of course. Don't sit on it — say it."
I turned my gaze to Nia.
"And Nia? Without worrying about your sister."
Nia wiped her tears.
"I like you too. I want to start it together. But I don't want it to have to be three all the time. I'd like us to each have time alone to talk with you — my sister too, and me."
Mia nodded straight away.
"Deal. I hang out with Nia separately sometimes anyway."
"Don't call it hanging out, Sis."
A small laugh passed between them. Not a conflict scrubbed clean by magic — a crack of daylight that opened because they'd finally heard each other out to the very end.
I ran the conditions over once more in my head.
If even one of them asked to stop, everything stopped. Jealousy and discomfort got spoken, never hidden. No forcing them into matching choices just because they were twins. And if I ever wanted to use mind magic on their hearts, I would explain the reason first and ask permission.
"Knowing all that — do you still want to start it, together?"
Mia held out her hand to Nia. Nia took it.
"Together?"
"Together. But apart sometimes, too."
"I like that!"
You can't cut a man in half, but you can divide a schedule. A strangely practical conclusion.
The two of them looked up at me.
"Do-hyun! Please take good care of the both of us!"
"...Please take care of us."
Without a single line rewritten in their heads, they had arrived at the same conclusion.
One difference, though. This time, the choice belonged entirely to the two of them.
Then Mia's face suddenly turned grave.
"What?"
"Which one of us is prettier?"
"Mia!!"
Nia pinched her sister's arm.
"Ow! It's a joke, a joke!"
Laughter spilled out. Real laughter, welling up from the gut.
The three of us laughed, there in an office flooded with morning sunlight — a woman standing at each of my sides, both of them laughing.
I wished I could keep this scene somewhere. No such thing as a camera in this world, though.
"Then starting today, can we attend to you in your room?"
Mia asked, eyes shining.
"Attending to me?"
"We're your assigned maids! Drawing your washwater in the morning, laying out your clothes, preparing your meals..."
"I can manage all that alone."
"Why would you do it alone when you've got us!"
Mia puffed out her cheeks. A protest puff.
"...I brew a good cup of tea."
Nia said it quietly. A pitch. Nia's idea of a sales pitch.
"Fine. Mornings, then — Nia on tea, Mia on breakfast."
"Yes!!"
"...Yes."
A bright answer and a quiet one. Same joy, different volume.
Mia suddenly grabbed Nia's hand.
"Nia, let's work even harder from today!"
"...Mm."
"We've got to look good for Do-hyun!"
"Sis, it's not about looking good — we mean it..."
"Same thing!"
Nia sighed. But the corners of her mouth were climbing — a smile she couldn't hide.
These two. Their balance was uncanny. Nia reined in Mia's runaways; Mia hauled Nia out of her shell. Twin complementarity — a perfect pair nature itself had made.
And I was about to devour that pair whole. Kang Do-hyun style.
...Even by my own assessment, I was a fucking piece of work.
"Now — it's work hours. Go work."
"Yes~!"
"...Yes."
The two of them headed for the door. Mia out first, Nia following. At the threshold, Nia turned back.
Feels fucking great.
"Do-hyun."
"Hm?"
"...Thank you. For choosing both of us."
A small smile. A shy one. But the depth of gratitude and relief inside it... sank into my chest deeper than Mia's brightest grin ever had.
Did I have any right to that gratitude? No. I took it anyway. Things like a conscience — I'd thrown mine out a long time ago.
Nia left. The door closed.
Afternoon. Back in the office, I stared at my own palm for a while.
A residual hum of the [Common Sense Alteration] I hadn't cast still lingered in my fingertips. Throwing away the easiest answer had made the conversation long and the conditions complicated. And yet, strangely, I liked the complication.
A relationship I actually wanted had to leave room, at the very least, for the possibility of refusal. That was the lesson Elena had taught me.
Evening. The maids' room.
Mia and Nia sat side by side. Their first training in information work.
"From today, write down whatever you see and hear around the palace. But no stealing, no sneaking anywhere dangerous. I'm not ordering you to seduce anyone, either. Only what comes to you naturally, in the places you already come and go."
"Spies who put safety first?"
Mia tilted her head.
"Informants. And coming back alive is priority one."
"Yes, Captain!"
"I'm not your captain."
"Then... boyfriend-captain?"
Nia jabbed her sister in the ribs. Mia shook with the laughter she was choking down. Discipline had collapsed before the first report even began.
The first real piece of intelligence came from Nia.
"Today the royal archivists moved thirteen boxes out of the eastern storeroom. All of them empty, and their catalogue numbers ran in sequence."
"Where to?"
"A separate sealed chamber, on Her Majesty's orders. One of the archivists said something odd. That 'there was an old order to leave the blanks empty.' Whoever gave that order had been erased from the ledger."
Mia took over.
"So I was about to ask, and Nia stepped on my foot. It hurt."
"You told us not to press further."
"Good work, Nia. And Mia — reporting only what you saw was right, too. Don't dig into this any further. If the same thing happens again, just write it down."
Both nodded at the same time.
Their very first assignment had turned up thirteen empty boxes. Too neat to call coincidence — the line and the number on the black piece matched exactly.
The night had gone deep.
Mia reached out her hand first.
"Tonight... will you come to our room? We'll go over the conditions we set this morning, one by one."
Nia didn't shy away either.
"I want it too. Just... don't rush."
"Understood. If even one of you says stop, everything stops that instant."
The two of them went back to their room ahead of me.
I stayed alone in the corridor, recounting the number.
Eleven people I'd shared a bed with. Marga, the latest of them.
And then the two twins, still standing at the door of the heart, not the body.
So much for not counting people like achievements — there I went, counting again. Fuck. Habits die hard. Still, today it wasn't the number that surfaced first; it was the conditions each of them had attached.
A little later, I stood before the twins' room.
Through the door came their small voices, nervously checking in with each other. I raised my hand.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
Three raps against the door.