Conference room - Victor 1

Not allowing me to continue, father ordered maids to bring us more food. It seemed that he was hungry and eating first was compulsory. I was standing with Vio in a corner of the room, discussing various ideas varying from quite clever to a total fantasy with dragons included. Sitting in the first row, Nero and Gregory were talking about funding and development plans for the future. I used this chance to drink the mana potion, it never hurt to have one more card to play.

Everyone pretended not to see the thing that Viktoria did, or didn’t care about it. For me and Vio, it was definitely the former case.

She had circled around Vincent and with one swift move from behind had injected his neck with something. Her next action had been to order the maids to bring a folding bed and now she was sitting on it with the sleeping Vincent’s head kept on her knees. Viktoria was patting slowly his blonde hair and played with his short ponytail, but a lot of sharp glances was sent my and Vio’s way.

I recalled her reaction when she had discovered the messages in my old phone asking about Rora and the one she had sent to Violet about the creepy bath. Neither of those two problems had been resolved yet.

Ten minutes later, father clapped once, signaling to everyone that the break time was over.

“Alright, let’s continue. Viki, you may remain over there, make sure your brother has sweet dreams. I’m sure he would be happy if he knew how close you are to him right now.”

“He’s rather cute while sleeping. Martha, record it.”

One of the two maids on a stand-by near the wall reacted immediately to Viktoria’s words with a quick ‘affirmative’, took out her phone and started recording the whole scene. None of those two girls had a cross-shaped mark, but they must have gone through the basic training.

“Victor, did you want to tell me something before? Something about a change in your true self?”

Alright, it’s time.

“Yes.”

Confidentially, I made use of the fact that father didn’t take that place yet and walked behind the rostrum. This position elevated the importance of my words, gave them more credibility and at the same time, father’s role of the chairman was downgraded by a level - confidence was the key.

Gregory took the central place in the first row of the chairs, right in front of me - I treated it as his silent approval and a test for me.

Violet sat down in the leftmost one of the second row. Nero went to sit in the back, right next to the place where two maids were standing, while Viktoria was sitting with sleeping Vincent on the right side of the room.

"There's something I need to tell you all. Something very important, concerning the change in my true self. The last week presented me with a challenge on top of a challenge which I had to overcome. The main driving force behind them was a person that's well known to my twin sister, Rora Toril."

It worked.

Viktoria’s playful mask cracked and splintered into hundreds of pieces, not caring about our brother anymore, she went to sit next to father. I had her full attention and needed to cloud her ability to think with anger and impatience.

“But allow me to explain my power first, after all, I became a shortie that can barely see you all from behind this tall rostrum. And don’t even get me started on all the changes that my body went through externally...”

I moved to the side and twirled in a cute way as if this was a fashion show.

“...and internally."

I pointed with a finger at one of my temples.

“You mean that the way you think has changed, or personality, or psyche, or sense of self, or sexual orientation, or something else?”

Fuck yeah! Thank you Nero! Got to love the curious scientist type! One less job for Vio.

“Well, it’s probably connected with the sense of self and psyche. It’s hard to pinpoint the exact area, but it’s even harder for me to think of myself as the Victor I once was. Although this is just a temporary change of appearance, my eyes have been opened and I will never be the same.”

Opened by the cute clothes, the pair of palm-fitting pointy apples and the smoothness of secret garden, screw Votr's soul reformation, this one is much more to my liking.

Father didn’t allow his expression to be read, but for now, he also didn’t stop me to demand an answer to his question - I hoped that it was a good sign. On the other hand, my twin was sitting with crossed arms, tapping repeatedly one of her fingers on a sleeve of her monochrome shirt. In the background, Vio looked a bit embarrassed and was slightly red since I had overdone the twirling part and showed a glimpse of the light blue panties.

“My active power is a bit like a premonition, but it’s really random, hard to grasp and underpowered. As for my personal demon, he’s called the demon of reflection Votroadan and is a huge jackass forcing me to undergo lengthy sessions during which I have to go through all of my memories time after time. But I’m getting away from the topic-”

“Exactly, tell me all about that who- Rora… now.”

Father smiled a bit when Viktoria corrected herself and tried to stay polite in his presence, nevertheless, he nodded to show that he was also interested in this part.

“She was the one who has introduced me to the world of espers and at the same time, she messed heavily with my head, since without fully realizing the consequences of this act, I had made a contract with her. Viki, remember the messages on my phone?”

Originally, I wanted to blame Aura and say that she used her power to force me into agreeing to Rora’s proposal, but it would be too suspicious if I tried to make excuses for everything.

“Of course I remember! That whore… ekhm. Don’t worry dear brother, I will use my full power to help you get out of it. She will pay for everything.”

Thanks 'dear sister'.

“That won’t be needed, I got out of it myself with the help of my demon, but not without suffering a heavy blow. That whore tried to change my whole personality, mold me into another person. She even started to implement fake memories into my brain, which even now are confusing me.”

Father should be smart enough to realize the consequences of this and a demon of reflection, but just in case...

“Is that why you’ve said that your true self has changed? Is that why you suddenly wanted to take me in?”

Vio played her role with perfect timing, saying her part with a mix of surprise and anger, but before I could answer, father decided to make a move.

“Nero, is Rora Toril capable of doing this?”

“I’m afraid that yes, she has a previous record of completely changing Aurora Toril personality, but this is the first time I heard that a contract with Ruby can be broken.”

I clicked my mental tongue, the old man had to go one step too far.

“It can be broken... I broke mine after all.”

This unexpected assistance from my twin shocked me slightly, her monochrome self was being contaminated with an increasing saturation of red. On the other hand, due to it, I didn't react in time to retake the lead of this conversation.

“Vic, allow me to fill in the blanks. This could explain many things, like the small changes in your behavior and the way you talk. Isn’t this also a good strategy to explain any inconvenient memory that you don’t want to show me? You can simply label it as a fake that was planted by this Rora and strengthened by your demon of reflection. Good work, I wonder how much planning went into this and how much was coincidental.”

I was really close to breaking in sweat during my entire speech, but only now, when father started to analyze it in details with a faint smile, I felt an overwhelming pressure crushing me. The illusion that our positions were reversed simply by changing places was easily broken.

“Not to mention that the fight you had on the cemetery with Adam Toril is acting in favor of your words. I was sure that it was all about the old man Sun’s phone, oho? Looks that I’ve found something you didn’t want me to know.”

When he had mentioned Luna’s vessel my confidence in being able to warp everything into a harmless version took a heavy hit. An additional weight was placed on my shoulders - even if I managed to open the box, Luna might not be inside.

“Father, I wanted to talk about this with you, please give me this guy.”

“Sorry Viki, too late. I already used him as a bargaining chip with TET, right Nero?”

“His power is quite useful after all.”

Hearing that Adam had been caught improved my mood a bit while I was continually scanning the brain in search of anything else that could be used to reinforce the idea that my memories couldn’t be fully trusted.

The memory of me committing suicide? - Fake planted by Rora and fortified in my brain by Votr’s reflection.

The memory of me waking up in Victor’s body? - Fake planted by Rora, fortified by Votr’s reflection.

The memory of me being bound with the 'I promise' geas? - It will be most certainly used against me, but I should be able to somehow live with that.

“Let’s continue. Victor, is there anything else you want to say? Uncover a bit of the backside of your mind? Or will you now tell me about the thing you don’t want me to know the most?”

The embarrassing memory of me becoming Rora’s dog? - I already prepared the ground for it and no one ever died from shame alone.

The embarrassing memory of me playing with this body? - It was only a little and I didn’t do anything overly drastic.

Any of the memories from my previous world? - Fake~

Any of the memories from this life that should not be shown to father? - … the one when I changed the colorful casings of his phones in the study which caused him to make a few bad calls and lose a lot of money and which was successfully blamed on Viktoria may be a bit bad, but other than that - safe~.

In other words, all bases were covered. Everything could be either blamed on Rora and the reflection reinforcement caused by Votr or the changes that occurred due to my passive shapeshifting skill.

Just in case, to raise my chances even by a little, I decided to use Three Answers to try predicting the outcome.

What will happen when I say ‘I don't want you to know about’?

One - Action: Saying ‘I don’t want you to know about…’ while talking to Gregory.

Reaction: The memory of the entire situation from the beginning of the conference will be replayed.

Two - Action: Saying ‘I don’t want you to know about…’ while talking to Viktoria.

Reaction: The memory of the entire situation from the beginning of the conference will be replayed.

Three - Action: Saying ‘I don’t want you to know about…’ while talking to Violet.

Reaction: The memory of user exploring his own little sister's body will be replayed.

Forget about being close to breaking in sweat, I was literally soaked with it right now. If I had said those words without knowing the secret behind Nero power then that would be the end. My entire thought process from the moment of entering this room would be revealed to everyone. Each of my excuses would lose any force of doubt and not one, but ALL of the secrets I wanted to disturb, warp or hide would come outside.

“Vic? Are you alright? You’ve turned ghastly pale.”

Asked father in an intrigued tone, the girl next to him was also waiting in anticipation.

Sorry Vio! You may punish me for this later!

I looked at my little sister, to focus her as the target of my next sentence and very quietly whispered ‘Violet-’, which was followed by:

“- I don’t want you to know about…”

Everyone in the room experienced the situation right after my awakening in which on the surface I was lamenting the state and changes done to my room, but the true essence was focused nearly entirely on experiencing pleasure. Each emotion, sensation, and feeling was recreated down to the tiniest details.

The scene ended when I got a hold of myself and stood up from the bed.

It was transmitted to Violet who would probably never want to talk to me again without half-killing me first, Viktoria who should already be familiar with similar things but would use it as a source of eternal jokes aimed at me and Vio, Gregory who I bet was secretly counting on this happening from the moment he had ordered to leave me alone in the room and Nero who… I didn’t even want to think that this old goat had experienced how my little sister’s body felt like.

I wonder if Vincent’s dreams were affected in any way?