Instincts. They can’t be controlled by humans, and those who can control them are exceptional.

Most of the time, relying on instincts is good, as your instincts would at least want the better for you.

But relying on instincts and giving your body over to them are two different things. If you give your body to it, then the moment your body senses even a bit of danger, it will move to the path that won’t have danger.

Keryu knew those things, but he didn’t know that Alex did as well—a major flaw in his calculations.

In normal cases, Keryu would never have revealed the fact that he was a transmigrate, not until he was forced into a life-and-death situation. But right now, his body was being controlled by instincts, so all Alex had to do was lace his words with killing intent, making it clear that one more lie would mean death.

By doing so, he was forcing Keryu to tell the truth, and the guy did. He revealed his true name—the name he had on Earth.

The silence that followed Keryu’s—no, Max Wilson’s—confession was deafening. The air grew thick, the dim light of the cell casting harsh shadows on Eris’s face as she stared at the man she had once called her brother.

Her mind reeled.

‘No… no, this isn’t real.’

It had to be some trick. It’s some sick joke.

But the green glow of the lie detector burned into her vision, a cruel confirmation of reality. Her hands trembled at her sides, nails digging into her palms as she struggled to process what she had just heard.

Max Wilson.

Not Keryu.

Not her brother.

A stranger.

Yet she had loved him. She had trusted him, laughed with him, and shared secrets with him.

The boy she had protected when they were young. The boy who had clung to her sleeve, afraid of the dark. The boy who had promised to stay by her side forever.

Her lips parted, but no words came out. Her throat was dry, her chest constricted, as if a heavy weight had settled over her. She couldn’t breathe.

Alex, however, remained calm. His eyes glinted in satisfaction—this was exactly the outcome he had aimed for. But it wasn’t over yet.

“Two years ago,” he said, his voice cutting through the silence, “you took over Keryu’s body, didn’t you?”

Max—no, Keryu?—did not even hesitate. “Yes.”

Green.

Eris flinched as though struck. Two years. For two whole years, she had been living with a stranger.

She felt sick.

She realized now. The sudden change in his personality two years ago, which she had thought was maturity, was because of… this reason.

He hadn’t matured. He had changed, and she had celebrated that…

‘Urgh…’

She gripped her head as she felt her vision blinking. The load of this revelation was too much for her to take on even with the emotion suppressant.

Alex, on the other hand, stepped closer to Keryu, his gaze sharp and piercing. “Who were you before you came here?”

A blank stare. Then, emotionlessly, “No one. Just a normal twenty-nine-year-old man. I died in an explosion during an accident.”

Eris’s breathing hitched.

A twenty-nine-year-old man… had been inhabiting her brother’s body all this time?

The thought sent shivers down her spine, disgust clawing at her stomach. The Keryu she had known, the one she had loved, was gone. And she… she had never even noticed.

Alex continued his interrogation, unrelenting. “Is the real Keryu Ivanovich dead? Were you the one who killed him?”

Eris’s head snapped toward Keryu—no, Max.

Please.

Please tell me you didn’t.

Please tell me that he’s alive.

Max, however, just stared blankly at her, his expression eerily void of remorse. But he wasn’t to blame for that. He wasn’t even capable of thinking anything right now, much less feeling the consequences of what he was doing.

“Yes.”

Green.

Eris stumbled back. Her vision blurred as her breath came out in short, uneven gasps. The world around her spun, Alex’s voice fading into a distant echo.

The memories of her little brother flashed before her eyes again—the timid boy who used to cling to her hand, who used to shy away from crowds, who once said she was his whole world.

Gone.

Dead.

Replaced by… this.

Her legs moved before her mind could process it. She turned sharply, her boots scraping against the cold floor as she bolted for the door.

“Eris—” Alex started, but she didn’t hear him.

She didn’t want to hear him.

Her emotions were in disarray, and she knew that if she stayed, she would start blaming Alex for showing all of this to her.

Tears burned her cheeks as she ran, her vision obscured by the flood of emotions breaking free.

The emotion suppressant was useless now. Her grief, her anger, her betrayal—all of it surged forward like an unstoppable tide.

She had lost him. She had lost Keryu.

And worst of all—

She hadn’t even known.

…………………………..

It was only when the sound of Eris’s boots could no longer be heard, indicating that she was gone, that Alex’s smile returned.

“You did good,” he said to Max, patting the guy’s shoulder.

The last questions Alex had asked were a gamble. He had asked two questions in one because he knew that Max, in the state he was, would only be able to reply to one of those.

Fortunately, he replied to the first question, and Eris believed it to be the answer to both questions, making things easier for him.

Unlike Alex, Max was someone who always made a single plan, as most of the time they worked. Today would be the first time he would fail someone close to him because of that habit.

It would work as a lesson for him not to make the same mistake again, but that was fine. Alex had already achieved what he wanted from this visit.

There was one more thing he had planned for today, but looking at Max’s state right now, there was no way the guy could do what he was supposed to.

“Have a good rest. I will submit your acceptance of crime to the teachers’ council.”

With those words, Alex turned around, leaving the area without even looking back at Keryu—or Max.

He had many important things to do after this, which included spending time with Zahara, Sophie, and Mira. Then, he had to check up on how Eris was doing as well.

He can’t have her crying a lot after all. He had wanted to make her life better and not worse. So, after letting her grieve for a while, he was going to have her admitted to the academy, and for that, he would have to talk to Anos, the demon emperor, again.

‘Hah…’ Sighing as he knew it wouldn’t be easy, he walked away.

What Alex didn’t notice was that right after he moved away from Max’s cell, the time in that vicinity seemed to have frozen.

The assassins who were keeping an eye on Max as well as Max himself were frozen in their spots, and the one responsible for this was the very person Alex found a pain to deal with—Anos Voldigod.

He was standing beside Max, staring at him with an unreadable expression.

“So… my hypothesis someone turned out to be true, huh?”

With those words, he touched Max’s forehead. The next moment, strange black-purple energy left his finger and entered Max’s head, causing the guy’s body to twitch even with the temporal pause he was under.

“That would be the last thing I would give him.”

With those words, which sounded as if he were talking to someone, Anos left the scene, and the world continued to move as it was supposed to.

The only difference was that Keryu, who was supposed to be standing with a blank expression, was writhing on the ground with an expression filled with pain.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep