Since everyone who dealt with me now acted that way, I tried not to dwell on Rilke’s expression. I pretended not to notice the stinging in my chest. Even if he had changed, I was grateful and glad that Rilke had come to talk to me.
‘Have you been well?’
Seeing Rilke made me think of Father. Already my eyes felt hot and my chest seemed to swell. When I heard about Father, I ended up crying after all.
But there was no time to sniffle. I didn’t know when my first visitor in a long time might leave.
‘Can’t hyung come?’
I asked what I was most curious about.
I wanted to see Mikhail hyung, who would have become Count Meyer by now as the family’s successor. He was now the only family I had left in the world.
‘Lord Mikhail is busy. It hasn’t been long since he received the Count’s title.’
‘Ah, right, of course.’
It had been half a year since I’d seen hyung’s face, but I felt like I was being childish. Rilke asked hesitantly.
‘If you’re disappointed with the Count, shall I ask him for you?’
‘No… no. I shouldn’t bother hyung too.’
He was a hyung who would hit and mistreat me at the drop of a hat anyway. We were originally distant brothers. Even thinking that way, it felt like a small boat was floating in my stomach. I ignored the anxiously rippling feeling inside.
‘Then why did you ask?’
Sometimes Rilke’s words surprised me. That was one of those moments.
I felt like a child being scolded. I was a head taller than Rilke, yet I felt myself shrinking endlessly.
Rilke’s blue eyes blinked. I stammered out the proper answer expected of a noble family’s son.
‘It’s just that hyung is working so hard. I was only worried he might harm his health.’
‘I see. But he does rest when he needs to.’
Rilke smiled. It was a smile like a spring flower blooming for the first time since entering this room.
‘He recently went to the lakeside villa with me.’
The estate at Lake Tien was the family’s summer villa.
‘Do you remember? Every time you went there, young master, you’d complain that there was nothing to do but fish. I found the scenery quite beautiful and pleasant just to look at.’
‘The villa with hyung?’
I almost asked, “Why you?” I held back, thinking it might be rude. But perhaps it showed plainly on my face, because Rilke said:
‘You didn’t know?’
Rilke kept breaking into bright smiles.
‘I’m the young master’s younger sibling now.’
Rilke Meyer.
That was Rilke’s new name.
And so, several years passed, and when I left the annex, hyung, the estate, my room, my friends—everything had become Rilke’s.
* * *
“Why on earth did I come back?”
Unable to understand, I asked myself in the mirror.
Faded, dim blond hair and a pale complexion, indistinct blue eyes. Even my cheeks swollen from being hit by Mikhail. This was definitely my younger self.
Even thinking it wasn’t a dream, I made a fuss for a while. I jumped up and kicked the wall, lay down and slapped my own cheek. Then I groaned because the cheek Mikhail hyung had hit hurt too much. Stupid.
In any case, I seemed to have definitely returned to the past.
But I didn’t understand why.
Everything needed a trigger, but I had just been boiling stew in my small house. The only flaw of my sturdy, warm little house was its poor fireplace facilities—could the smoke that came out badly when cooking have actually been heralding a magic fireplace? Or was the flat oat I’d bought unusually cheaply for the stew actually a magic grain?
In any case, it was a situation where I was suddenly standing in a splendid ballroom while boiling porridge. Since it felt to me like I’d suddenly stood up from sitting, I almost toppled forward.
I lay down on the bed, being careful of my still tingling cheek. I was staring blankly at the ceiling of the annex room where I’d spent quite a lot of time in my life when I heard a knock.
“Come in.”
The servant flinched when they saw my state. Only then did I remember I was sprawled flat on the bed. As I hastily sat up, the servant, who wouldn’t even make eye contact, quickly set down a tray on the console and left. I caught a glimpse of their face wrinkled as if smelling a foul odor.
Right, pheromones.
I swept up my complicated hair.
I got up from the bed where I seemed to have been stuck for about half a day. I opened the window. Looking at the annex garden visible from my room with its lush vegetation, I also aired out the bed and blankets.
In my room, having returned five years to the past, faint pheromones lingered. Probably from me a few days ago, who couldn’t control my pheromones and had unknowingly released them in abundance.
Five years ago, I couldn’t sense this.
Come to think of it, it was absurd. That an omega couldn’t sense pheromones even less than ordinary people.
“No wonder they were disgusted.”
My uncontrolled pheromones were sharp and prickly. Like a green plant full of thorns. Since they had a similar texture to my controlled pheromones, I suppose I was just indifferent to them, but to others they would feel irritating and, mm, sexually uncomfortable too. I could see why the servants who entered my room changed every time.
I finished airing out the room with an unsettled feeling. What the maid had left was food.
The bread with white insides was very soft. The fresh salad and neat oatmeal porridge were also delicious. They were incomparable to the rough porridge I’d been making, using only less-refined grains. Even eating with the ridiculous appearance of my neck tilted because the inside of my cheek was torn, I kept exclaiming in admiration.
Was this so delicious?
Five years ago, I don’t think I appreciated meals at the Count’s house much. Was the food I ate outside for five years really that terrible?
Come to think of it,
“It doesn’t hurt.”
I stroked my body in wonder.
I couldn’t feel at all the fever that had made my whole body tingle, that had made me shudder so painfully until this time. It was the same body, only different in whether I could control pheromones or not. The unexplained high fever must have definitely been related to pheromones.
And pheromone control seemed to be a matter of experience, not a physical problem. Seeing how I can do it so well now even though it’s the same body, when I couldn’t do it five years ago.
I looked around the neat gray room restlessly, then lay down again. Though they were my things, they felt unfamiliar. The food was delicious and the bed was cozy, but that was all. I felt strangely unsettled inside.
Why now of all times?
What was Joachim Meyer like at twenty?
It was the most intense period in many ways. Though my days hadn’t been very bright since I was 14, I remember this year being the hardest.
On the other hand, five years later, at twenty-five, I had been living a reasonably satisfactory life.
I was happy enough, so I don’t know why I came back. And to the hardest time at that.
The experience of returning to the past was certainly a remarkable experience I’d never seen in any book. But I wasn’t a mage, nor a magic swordsman. I wasn’t an important person. Except for events that only plunged me into misfortune, I was an ordinary person who knew nothing. Really an unremarkable life.
After self-reflection, the conclusion came easily.
Just live similarly, and leave the house the same way.
Let me just endure one difficult year reasonably and find peace.
It was hopeful that at least bearable days were waiting a year from now.
* * *
On the fourth day, as my numbly swollen cheek subsided, my confinement was lifted.
And I was thinking that each day five years ago was much more bearable than I remembered. Having a healthy body that didn’t hurt was that remarkable.
“The master has asked you to join him for breakfast.”
The confinement was lifted at an earlier point than in the past. I awkwardly left the annex at the butler’s message. It was the first time going out after being cooped up in my room for a week.
The butler looked at me strangely as I looked around, so I just rolled my eyes. It was exactly as I remembered. The garden in front of the main building was arranged in a tranquil green. Stepping on the paving stones between the lawns divided as if measured with a ruler, a neat tak-tak sound echoed under my shoe soles.
I suddenly recalled the back garden visible from my room’s window. Walking there produced only the rustling sound of sparse grass brushing against one’s body. Because overgrown vegetation left unattended for so long densely covered the paving stones. I was the only one who saw that free-spirited appearance.
The dining room door engraved with the caged Satyros, the Meyer family’s symbol, was wide open.
The large dining table was empty, and only the servants preparing things came and went quietly.
The wide stone table, well-polished, sparkled in the lemon-colored light descending from the chandelier. I sat at what I roughly remembered as my seat. It was the spot facing the wall with the mosaic painting.
Inside the mosaic frame woven to match the table’s size, a tree bearing golden fruit was spreading its branches. It was a family tree diagram full of pomp and circumstance, reflecting the current house master’s taste.
“There’s veal pâté and roasted lamb.”
The excessive menu for breakfast was also the house master’s taste.
“Isn’t hyung here yet?”
When I asked about Mikhail’s whereabouts, the sous chef hesitated.
“Please tell me your menu.”
Firmness showed on his face.
Not wanting to be treated as a spoiled brat who needed to fix his habits, I chose the first option.
An uncomfortable gaze lingered slightly at the edges before disappearing. Since it was my fault, I had no intention of blaming them.
The second son who couldn’t control his pheromones and brought shame to the family. On top of that, rumors that he pushed his well-reputed younger sibling from the terrace must have spread abundantly.
“I heard you slept all day, but you look perfectly fine.”
The house master appeared.
Mikhail sat at the head seat, wiping his hands on a towel, and I looked at him with fresh eyes. From my perspective, it was the first time seeing hyung in years.
Bright blond hair and a vivid complexion, neat features.
A face that still looked more like Rilke’s real sibling than mine.
“I heard you can control your pheromones now.”
I’d wondered why he called me earlier than before, and it seemed news had already reached him.
“Truly remarkable. Didn’t all those various methods prove useless?”
It seemed the servants who brought meals or cleaned had told Mikhail. I recalled their faces, clearly flustered every time they entered the room.
“I’m not certain.”
“Not certain?”
His eyes rolled.
“Even now, sometimes they surge up unexpectedly. I’m not controlling them completely, just less than before.”
Mikhail’s eyebrow rose slightly.
The past me hadn’t been able to control pheromones until leaving the house.
I couldn’t know what ripples this previously non-existent pebble would cause in my future. For now, I had to say pheromone control wasn’t complete.
“Well, it wouldn’t make sense for pheromones that troubled you so much to suddenly become clean. Still, your attending physician seemed surprised.”
“That person?”
I recalled the physician with dark circles under his eyes who had visited briefly.
I was indifferent since he just gave me medicine and left as if fleeing, but as a pheromone specialist, he must have observed in his own way during that time.
“Get your medicine before you go. He said he represcribed medication to match your condition. He’ll probably come down later.”
While eating roasted veal, Mikhail asked various things about my pheromone control.
“Your attending physician seems to be making efforts in his own way, but we can’t leave such a sudden development to just one person. I should bring all the pheromone-related mages from the empire right away. It would be good to commission research too. They should be able to find the reason for this phenomenon.”
I almost spat out the apple compote I was eating.
“Ugh, ahem, I don’t want that.”
Mikhail, who had been cutting veal, looked up. I deliberately widened my eyes. But as Mikhail’s gaze began to grow fiercer, I slowly lowered my head and broke apart the pickled apple.
“It was the same when I was young. The more Father tried, the worse it only got. I’m truly grateful to God as things are now. But, uh,”
“Speak properly.”
“I’m worried that if they make some proposal and I do as they say, I might return to how I was before.”
The truth was I was worried they might discover I was controlling pheromones perfectly. Hmm, perhaps recalling memories from the past at my words, Mikhail murmured.
“What about just hearing the magical pharmacist’s opinion?”
“Just a little. Please just watch how things go for a bit.”
I don’t know why he wants to call anyone, whether mages or physicians, when no one could cure my illness anyway.
Until I finished eating the pulverized apple pieces, Mikhail said nothing. Rilke didn’t come down either. As I glanced at the empty seat across from me, Mikhail said, “And,”
“Come back to the main building now.”
“…Pardon?”
“You can’t live in a corner forever, can you? Since your condition has improved, I’ve prepared your room.”
I obediently answered that I would.
The attending physician came down right on time. The elderly physician still had gray shadows under his eyes.
When I just looked at the new medicine placed in my hand, Mikhail gave me a look as if asking what I was doing. I swallowed it on the spot.
And that evening, as soon as I moved my residence to the main building, my pheromones ran wild as if to prove a point.
