Chapter 1183: The Truth [Part 3]

Lullaby looked toward him.

Lux’s gaze returned to the woman in his arms. Not Celestine. Aurelia. The real Aurelia.

The woman who had spent this entire nightmare pretending to be the sister everyone adored. She was still trembling.

"Where is she?" Lux asked quietly.

Aurelia shook her head. "I’m Celestine..."

"Where’s your sister?"

"I am—"

"Did you hide her?"

Her breathing quickened.

"Imprison her?"

The black spikes trembled.

Lux watched her expression carefully. "Or..." He paused. "...did you kill her?"

Aurelia went rigid.

The entire ballroom shook.

Violently.

Cracks spread across the marble floor. Chandeliers swung overhead, their crystals breaking apart and falling like glittering rain.

Aurelia screamed. "NO!"

Lux braced himself as the floor shifted beneath his boots.

"No! No, no, no!" Her fingers dug into his coat. "It’s not my fault!"

The spikes around them twisted. Some shattered. Others grew longer.

Aurelia shook her head desperately. "It was an accident!"

Lux’s expression changed. Finally... Something real.

"An accident?"

"Yes!" Tears streamed down her cheeks. "I didn’t mean to!"

The woman in blue watched them with obvious amusement.

Lux noticed. And suddenly, several things began fitting together.

The false identity.

The impossible dependence.

The obsessive insistence that Aurelia needed Celestine.

And the way the dream punished every attempt to separate them.

Lux looked down at the trembling woman.

Oh, you poor thing... What a spectacularly miserable contract you’d signed with yourself.

"So Celestine died."

Aurelia flinched.

Lux continued carefully. "The real Celestine. Whether it was an accident or something worse, she’s dead."

Aurelia covered her ears. "Stop!"

"And you took her place."

The ballroom trembled again.

But Lux didn’t stop. He wasn’t enjoying this. There was something profoundly ugly about watching someone cling so desperately to a stolen identity that she’d built an entire world to avoid remembering why she needed it. Still, avoiding the truth had trapped her here. And Kaelmor had apparently made certain she’d never escape it.

Lux lowered his voice. "You were Aurelia. The Disaster Star. Everyone hated you."

Aurelia sobbed. "Please..."

"And when she died, you became her."

The words settled between them.

Aurelia stopped struggling.

Lux watched her. "You took her name. Her position. Her reputation. And perhaps, for the first time in your life, people looked at you without disgust."

Aurelia closed her eyes.

Lux understood that part. Too well. Not the deception. The hunger. Being unwanted could turn affection into something monstrous when someone had been starving for it long enough.

Aurelia hadn’t merely wanted Celestine’s possessions. She’d wanted the world Celestine inhabited. A world where servants smiled. Where her father embraced her. Where people called her beautiful rather than cursed. Where she could enter a room without everyone looking for an omen.

And once she’d tasted that world... She couldn’t bear losing it.

Lux glanced toward the blue-dressed figure. "But there was a problem."

The woman smiled.

Lux ignored her. "You couldn’t simply erase Aurelia."

Lullaby’s eyes widened. "Oh..."

Lux nodded. "Two daughters entered that history. One died. If Aurelia disappeared, people would ask questions."

Yue looked between the twins. "So someone had to remain Aurelia."

"Exactly."

Lux’s gaze sharpened. "And who better than the man who specializes in stealing identities, rewriting circumstances, and making desperate people dependent on him?"

The woman in blue clapped slowly.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

"How clever, Your Grace."

Lux smiled coldly. "Thank you, Your Majesty. I would’ve preferred applause from someone less disgusting."

The woman laughed.

Yue looked ready to commit murder again.

Lux returned his attention to Aurelia. "Kaelmor took your original role."

Aurelia’s face crumpled. "He became the Disaster Star inside your dream."

The woman in blue tilted her head. "And I played my part beautifully."

Lux’s jaw tightened. The nightmare wasn’t simply replaying Aurelia’s past. It had rewritten the sisters’ roles around her guilt.

Aurelia became Celestine.

Kaelmor occupied the abandoned identity of Aurelia.

And the nightmare forced its prisoner to remain attached to the very identity she’d tried to escape.

Worse... Every time the false Aurelia tried to leave, the entire arrangement threatened to collapse. Because without someone playing Aurelia, there would be only one sister. One surviving daughter. One stolen name. And a dead girl whose absence demanded an explanation.

Lux looked at the woman in his arms. "You hated keeping her close. But you couldn’t let her go. Because if Aurelia disappeared..." Lux’s voice softened. "...people would start asking questions. They would search for her, investigate her disappearance, and eventually uncover what you desperately wanted to hide. If they searched deeply enough, they wouldn’t just find your secrets."

He leaned closer, his red eyes narrowing. "They would find the real Celestine. And then everyone would discover that the Lucky Star was already dead... and that you’d been living under your sister’s name all along."

Silence.

The ballroom stopped shaking.

For the first time since the nightmare had begun collapsing, the black spikes became completely still.

Aurelia stared at him.

Then whispered, "I didn’t want her to die."

Lux said nothing.

"She was my sister..." Her voice broke. "I didn’t want..."

She couldn’t finish.

Across the room, the false Aurelia smiled. "How touching."

Lux slowly turned his head.

That smile. He’d seen Kaelmor wear it while destroying lives and pretending every atrocity was merely an unfortunate necessity. Even inside someone else’s nightmare, the bastard couldn’t resist enjoying himself.

Lux’s expression became terrifyingly calm. "Now I understand."

The woman in blue raised an eyebrow. "Do you?"

"Yes." Lux loosened his grip around Aurelia, though he kept one arm supporting her trembling body. "You didn’t create this prison merely to punish her." He looked directly at the false twin. "You created a world where she could have everything she wanted, provided she never stopped hating herself for taking it."

The smile on the woman’s face thinned.

Lux continued. "And you made yourself the one person she could never escape."

Lullaby stepped closer.

Yue followed.

The dream remained motionless.

Lux’s red eyes gleamed. "Very clever." He smiled. "Unfortunately, Your Majesty..."

He looked down at Aurelia. Then back at the king’s imitation. "...you made one enormous mistake."

The false Aurelia tilted her head. "And what would that be?"

Lux’s smile widened. "You built a prison around a secret." He gently lifted Aurelia’s chin, making her look at him. "But now..." His voice became quiet. "...we know."