"Come in."
The door opened in a swift sliding motion to reveal a woman of medium height. She had a round face with bright brown eyes but it looked like she had been crying judging by how the eyes seemed red around the edges. When she entered the room, she walked in with such grace that it didn't seem like she had been troubled by his unusual arrangement at all.
"Azil..." She looked at him intently as if terrified to look away, "How are you?" Her tone was gentle like a mother's and it made him wince. In his life, his parents had never been so kind and her affectionate manner filled him with both longing and repulsion at the same time.
At least now he knew what his name was. Getting that information had been easier than he expected.
She walked closer towards him and broke him from his stupor. He felt like a third person even though it was technically his body now.
"I'm okay..." Rahey trailed off. What did Azil call her? Did he refer to her as his mother or something else? Such small things became very important all of a sudden.
At least that's what he thought.. One look at her face made it apparent to him that he had been mistaken.
For all his scheming and plotting, there was something that Rahey did not understand and it was that in the present moment, the woman did not care about how he addressed her or how he behaved but was only filled with immeasurable happiness and relief that he was healthy.
Rahey felt slightly sick looking at her. She would never in a million years suspect that he was not the child she had looked after but some strange impostor from another world.
Rahey suddenly wished he hadn't let her in.
"Is it...is it okay if I hug you?"
He nodded stiffly, unsure of what to do. Without any hesitation, she threw her arms around him in an embrace. She smelled like carnations for some reason. It was a smell he wouldn't have known if not for how abundant they were on his college campus.
He would have been comforted by the hug but memories of his old life were flooding his mind and he felt the same unhappiness from back then.
The woman unwittingly parted from him when he began to gently nudge her away. There were a few tears in her eyes again. Just how much had she been crying?
Without realizing, he reached out and put a hand on her shoulder.
"Don't cry."
The words were unlike him in every way possible- not because of what he said but because of his intentions in saying it. Reassuring someone was always for his own personal gain. Telling someone kind, encouraging words meant thinking carefully about how to phrase it and meant expecting a certain reaction or affection from them. This time- he didn't think about any of that. His words came from the heart without any motive.
"Azil..." But the name felt like a knife to his heart as dramatic as it sounded. The person who was deprived of familial love for many years was now being offered that under someone else's name. It didn't sit right with him.
'I'm not your son.' He almost said. 'I'm not him.'
"Could you please go?" Were the words he ended up saying. The woman looked visibly dismayed but he didn't think he could stand another second near her.
"O-okay. I'll come visit you later." She kept looking at him until the very end and when the door finally closed, it felt like he was allowed to breathe at last. He had felt so excited over the past few days thinking about how to take down his enemies but now it was as if a bucket of ice cold water had been poured over his head.
What was this feeling? Was it remorse? He hadn't done anything wrong and it wasn't like it was his choice that he ended up there. If he hadn't been sent to that body then the young master would have surely died.
On one hand he wondered if it was possible to return to his old life. He didn't want to go back but it would be selfish of him to steal someone else's life.
On the other, there was no realistic way of going back. Would it be so wrong to pretend to be someone else? Azil or whoever's mother wouldn't have to go through any more grief and he wasn't foolish enough to be poisoned twice.
...
In reality, it was because he felt exclusively bitter as he remembered his past. He just wanted to forget it all.
***
4 years previously- in Rahey's life
"Since you started high school, have you considered what we expect from you even once?"
Rahey looked down at the floor. The apartment was large and filled with the perfect arrangement of furniture but it felt so empty. His mother was sitting at the kitchen table with some papers for her work. She was going to be leaving in a week for a long-term project so it would just be him and his father. Not like that was any better.
"Yes."
"So have you decided then? We considered all options and we think you should strive to become a doctor. It's a very noble profession."
Rahey couldn't bring himself to say anything.
"From tomorrow on you can start attending cram school and preparing for the medical exam. We'll handle everything so just focus on your studies."
Her words sounded dependable. If she had told this to someone on her team then they would surely think she was a kind, selfless person who could make anyone's dreams come true.
"What if I..." He trailed off. What if he couldn't do it? Then what?
His mother glanced at him with a raised eyebrow. "What is it?"
"Can I do something else?"
"What do you want to do?" Her tone was crisp, uninterested.
"Something related to humanities." He could barely hear himself. "Maybe..."
"No, they don't have a good scope or pay as well and I'm sure the people going there won't be up to your standard."
His standard? Did he have such a thing?
"Okay."
Just whose life was he living?