TGBAP 48

[A human came.]

“Human?”

Lucian frowned deeply. Coming up beside her, he discovered five humans huddled tightly together.

“This is the first time someone’s come here.”

[They must have come because they heard rumors. It hasn’t happened even once since you came, but it used to happen once or twice every year.]

“Hah, what a bunch of pathetic trash…….”

As if annoyed, Lucian’s eyes sank low.

[I took care of it, so they’ll leave soon.]

“Someone’s coming over there?”

[……What?]

Ria hurriedly looked out the window. Someone with a hat pulled low was coming this way.

“I’ll see with my own two eyes what kind of brazen bastard it is.”

Lucian hid himself beside the front door and waited for the other person to come in. Ria stared at that blankly, then looked out the window again.

The face of the one wearing the hat began to come into clearer view.

[Something’s strange…….]

In an instant, her eyes went wide. A face so familiar, yet unfamiliar.

[L-Lucian! Get out of there right now!]

At the same time Lucian looked at her with an expression asking what was wrong, the door opened.

Lucian immediately turned his head, waiting only for the other person to step inside.

As soon as the hat-wearing person fully entered the mansion, Lucian pounced on him. It was already too late to stop him, so Ria hurriedly shut the door, just in case something happened.

“What rat bastards are sneaking into my house……!”

With his left hand, Lucian grabbed the other person by the collar, and with his right, he raised his fist. But soon, he couldn’t do anything.

“……Huh?”

A small sound snapped Lucian back. The situation unfolding before his eyes felt unreal.

“……Me?”

The other person’s words seemed to speak Lucian’s inner thoughts for him. But Lucian knew. This person was not him. It was…….

[Get off him right now!]

Ria separated the frozen Lucian from the child who looked just like him.

The Crown Prince!

If it wasn’t a doppelgänger who looked exactly like Lucian, then there was only one possibility left.

That bastard was Lucian’s twin older brother, Leopold Odelion.

She glanced at Lucian, whom she had hidden behind her.

He still couldn’t take his eyes off Leopold. And Leopold was the same.

“How can this be……?”

Leopold’s eyes shook. But as if he had calmed down, he crawled over this way while still sitting on the floor.

“……He looks exactly like me, doesn’t he?”

Lucian was currently wearing the diamond necklace, so his hair and eyes had changed to brown. It looked like he’d come down while preparing to go to the village.

[Thank goodness, at least.]

At her mutter, Lucian, stiff as a block of wood, twitched.

“Who are you? Who are you that you look so much like me? I am Leopold Odelion. What is your name?”

The hand Leopold held out was full of goodwill and curiosity. Lucian stared at it blankly, then ground his teeth.

“Ria! Get that bastard out right now!”

As if she’d been waiting, she used magic. Leopold panicked as his body floated up.

As objects inside the mansion began to move with a spine-chilling racket, he glanced down at Lucian.

“What is this…… uaaaaaah!”

Ria kept him floating so he couldn’t even continue his thoughts. Leopold, who had ended up flying through the air, screamed.

She didn’t forget to light fires here and there so it would feel like a ghost’s doing, or to sow confusion with the toy’s bizarre noises.

After moving Lucian farther back, Ria opened the door.

In that moment, Leopold and Lucian’s eyes met.

“Never come here again.”

The instant those words ended, she threw him straight out of the mansion.

As Leopold rolled on the ground a few times, the children who had been beyond the fence instantly rushed out and checked on him.

After confirming they fled beyond the fence, she turned back to Lucian.

[……Lucian, are you okay?]

Lucian was trembling, thrown into confusion.

What in the world should she say to him?

Should she tell him the truth—that he was born as the younger twin and abandoned here? Or should she say that the child from a moment ago was his older brother?

No answer felt right.

“……He really looks exactly like me.”

Muttering something, Lucian suddenly jerked his head up.

“Ria…… what am I supposed to do now?”

His golden eyes were filled with despair, and without realizing it, Ria pressed her lips tight.

[Lucian…….]

“Because I’m a twin, because I was born the younger twin, I was abandoned by my family.”

At his words, Ria’s soul wavered for a moment.

“Because I’m a being that shouldn’t have been born in the first place, a being that shouldn’t be alive……. I resent the family that made me like this. So when I met them, I wanted to say something—anything……!”

Lucian’s cheeks trembled, soon soaking with tears.

“I couldn’t say anything……!”

[…….]

“On top of that, that guy who’s supposedly my brother didn’t even recognize me! What am I supposed to do?! Who am I supposed to pour this rage onto?!”

His voice, full of pent-up bitterness, made her understand Lucian’s behavior until now.

Lucian had learned everything. That’s why he suffered so much and couldn’t say a word to her.

Ria couldn’t bring herself to offer him any comfort.

Right now, no matter what she said, he wouldn’t be able to hear it.

So there was nothing she could do except hold him.

As soon as he was in her arms, Lucian’s body trembled even more. His tears fell to the floor in plops.

“Ria! Why was I even born……? It’s not like I wanted to be born a twin! Why do I have to be the only one in pain……!”

She knew it was maddeningly painful, but those words would only eat away at him.

Ria cupped Lucian’s cheeks with both hands and met his eyes. His golden eyes, stained with tears, wavered.

[Lucian, there is no one in this world who shouldn’t have been born.]

“……Ria.”

[Yes, just like you said, you might have been abandoned by your family. Your family might have forgotten everything while you’re the only one suffering. But that can’t be a reason to deny your existence!]

“…….”

[I’m right here by your side! Because of you, I spoke with a human for the first time and regained the will to live! And even so, you’re going to deny yourself just because of family? That’s the same as denying me! If it isn’t you, then even if I exist, it’s not truly existing!]

Three hundred years is long and long, a boring and painful time. She couldn’t dare predict when it would end, or how this pain would be severed.

Then Lucian appeared before her. Because he could see her and speak with her, she could feel alive for the first time in three hundred years.

[Lucian, what is “family” to you? Do you have to be connected by blood for it to be family? Then what about me? What about Kaiser? Then what are we, who have been by your side all this time?]

Lucian bit his lip hard, tears spilling.

“Ria and Kaiser are my family…….”

[Right. Family is being together by each other’s side. Those people are merely connected by blood—people who have nothing to do with you at all.]

“Ria…….”

[Yes.]

“Ria, don’t ever abandon me…….”

[That will never happen. So…….]

Don’t torment yourself too much.

Lucian began to cry out loud. It was the first time he’d cried since he turned ten.

That meant he had worried for a long time, suffered for a long time, and swallowed it all down inside.

So that he could let everything out in comfort, Ria willingly opened her arms to him.

‘For Lucian, I could give even more than this.’

* * *

“I’m telling you it’s true! There was a kid who looked exactly like me!”

“Haah, Your Highness, it was an illusion.”

After returning to the imperial palace, Leopold’s group all went home except Harry.

Everyone was already uneasy because Shulan had seen a ghost, and now Leopold was saying something that strange too, so they hurriedly sent the kids back.

‘At this rate, won’t some strange rumors spread?’

At least it was lucky it was friends who’d been together since long ago; if it were someone else, Leopold might go around shouting that he saw a ghost. Or that he hit his head and is talking nonsense.

“There really was!”

“Please stop, really! Didn’t you just look in a mirror wrong?”

“Do you think I’m an idiot? And what kind of ghost grabs you by the collar! Besides, his hair and eye color were different from mine!”

“Then it must have been the ghost’s doing! Didn’t Shulan say he saw a ghost! Or what, are you saying there was a doppelgänger or something?”

“Doppelgänger? Yes…… that’s it!”

At Leopold’s reaction as if he’d found the answer, Harry’s eyes went cold.

“I’m only saying this just in case, but you must not say weird things like doppelgänger to other people.”

“Why?”

“Why do you think! It would blemish Your Highness’s reputation! There’s no way people would just believe a story like that!”

Leopold made a sulky face. But Harry had no intention of backing down.

“Anyway, take my words to heart. Since you are the sole heir, your position won’t be in danger, but shouldn’t you avoid anything that could be used as a weakness?”

“……Hmph, fine. Like you said, you don’t believe me either, so who would? Go on, get out.”

“Haah. Then I’ll be going. And don’t even think about going back there again. Understood?”

“Are you my teacher? Why do you nag so much?”

“I’m anxious, that’s why! If I’m the only one watching out for you, what am I supposed to do? You say you want a younger brother? Just know that if you have siblings, you’ll fight even more often than this. I’m really leaving!”

Harry snorted, “Hmph!” as he left the room. Leopold watched and grumbled.

“You insolent bastard, not believing me.”

But he really saw it. A doppelgänger who looked exactly like him.

The hair and eye color were different, but if he disguised himself the same way, other people would probably ask if they were twins, they looked so alike.

“No, if I looked like a twin, stones would fly at me.”

He knew well how fierce the persecution against twins was in the empire.

When he was young, he had taken that as something natural, but maybe because he’d spent the last two years studying abroad, recently the perception of twins had improved a lot.

“Rather, in other countries, they see twins as symbols of abundance and fertility.”

Here, in the Audrian Empire, it was the complete opposite. Not only where he’d studied abroad, but even all the neighboring countries had a good view of twins.

And thanks to the twin sisters he became close to during his studies abroad, twins didn’t seem disgusting at all—only fascinating.

Even without speaking, they read each other’s thoughts, and they live like lifelong friends.

Was it because their sisterly bond and friendship looked especially strong? After he went abroad, his longing for siblings grew even stronger.

Since he was the eldest, he couldn’t dream of an older sibling, and the only realistic thing was a younger one, but…….

“What if that kid really is my twin sibling…….”

As Leopold recalled the child he saw at the ghost mansion, he soon let out a small laugh and shook his head.

“That’s nonsense. I’ve been an only child since the day I was born.”

That child must simply be someone astonishingly similar to him.

Leopold flopped onto the bed and thought of that child.

Whether he opened his eyes or closed them, the child wouldn’t disappear from his mind. Rather, the afterimage grew thicker, wavering right before his eyes.

“……I want to see him again.”

A brief silence flowed. With his eyes closed, Leopold pictured that child. How long had it been like that? Suddenly, a brilliant idea flashed through his head.

“If I don’t really have a sibling, I can just make one, even if it’s fake!”

His face was astonishingly similar too—wasn’t that possible? Even if they aren’t real siblings, there are plenty of people who live close as sworn brothers.

“Alright! That’s it!”

Leopold praised his own brilliant brain.

So excited, he failed to even consider that the other person might refuse him.

No—more accurately, it was that he didn’t think of it at all.

Leopold was born a noble imperial grandchild, and up until now, there were hardly any cases where someone refused him.

And so Leopold, caught in a misunderstanding that was and wasn’t a misunderstanding, simply plotted to go back to the ghost mansion again.