Gathering Wives

Inside the grand Moretti estate, a suffocating silence hung in the air. The flickering candlelight cast wavering shadows across the long dining table, where the family members sat with solemn expressions.

Lady Evelyne Moretti, Kein's mother, looked restless. Her emerald-green eyes, usually filled with warmth, were now clouded with anxiety and unshed tears.

"Where is my real son?" Her voice was barely above a whisper, trembling with emotion. "I've always felt… something was wrong. Something has never been right."

Beside her, Kein's stepmother, Lady Clarissa, lowered her head with a somber expression. "I grieve with you, Evelyne. If all of this is true… then the Kein we've known all these years is not the real Kein."

Across the table, the siblings exchanged glances.

"I still can't believe it," said Adrian Moretti, the little brother. "The Kein we know has always been strange. From childhood to adulthood, his personality changed too drastically. It was as if… he was someone else entirely."

"I felt the same way," added their stepsister, Isabella. "Kein used to be a gentle and quiet child, but then suddenly, he became a completely different person—someone who had no hesitation in gambling, chasing women, and acting recklessly."

Their father, Duke Raphael Moretti, tapped his fingers against the table, his gaze sharp and calculating. "Cursing the past won't change anything. What matters now is finding out the truth. If the Kein we raised isn't the real Kein Moretti… then where is our true son?"

Silence gripped the room.

Then, in a voice barely above a whisper, Evelyne murmured, "Perhaps… we've lost him forever."

Raphael's expression hardened. "No. I will uncover the truth. If our son is still out there… I will find him."

Little did they know, their real son—Kein Moretti—had already returned.

But he was no longer the boy they once knew.

He had lived two lives.

And he had already chosen his own path.

Duke Raphael Moretti sat at the head of the table, his expression cold and unreadable. Beside him, Lady Evelyne wrestled with her growing anxiety. But this time, two voices that rarely spoke finally broke the silence.

Kein's biological sister, Cassandra Moretti, stood up, her sharp gaze cutting through the room.

"Father, I've always sensed a face of hypocrisy behind Kein."

All eyes turned to her.

She continued, her voice laced with the doubt and anger she had suppressed for years.

"I just returned from the academy, and now I find the family in turmoil… But honestly, I experienced something strange a few years ago. Back then, Kein looked at me… with eyes no younger brother should have for his sister."

The room turned deathly silent. Even the air itself felt heavier.

"Could it be that Kein has been gone since infancy?" she asked quietly, yet each word struck deep into the hearts of everyone present.

On the other side of the table, Kein's stepsister, Professor Selene Moretti—the one who had pursued Kein Moretti in the past—leaned back in her chair, shutting her notebook with a contemplative expression.

"That possibility exists," she finally admitted. "I studied a certain type of magic during my time as a professor at the academy. A ritual that allows the exchange of souls—it's not an impossibility."

Her eyes met Cassandra's.

"And logically speaking, that shouldn't be possible, should it? A younger brother viewing his sister as a woman rather than family—especially at such a young age. If the real Kein still existed, he would never have acted that way."

Lady Evelyne covered her mouth, her eyes trembling with emotion.

Duke Raphael, lost in thought, gazed into the distance, his mind tangled in possibilities he had never considered before.

If the child they had raised all this time wasn't Kein Moretti…

Then who had they treated as family all these years?