"What changed you one week and 3 days ago?"
Aaron’s heart raced at the question, his survival instincts tingling like crazy and his eyes darting into Claire’s.
Adrenaline rushed through his veins, and even with a mana boosted brain, he failed to wrap his mind around the fact that Claire had noticed the differences.
Well, it was only obvious that she did.
What he didn’t expect was that she didn’t ask him about it earlier, hell, she didn’t even pretend that something was off.
It gave him a false sense of security, making him act closer and closer to his real personality, which deviated greatly from how the ’Aaron Cross of Solaris’ was supposed to act.
Of course, Claire did it intentionally to figure out what was going on with him. Not acting any different than she usually would.
And yes, her plan worked, Aaron stopped acting like Aaron, and she became more and more suspicious of him.
But through the journey of finding something missing, she also began to have a small, tiny thought that infested in her brain like a cancer.
’Maybe it wasn’t so bad.’
Aaron felt more serious now, he didn’t uselessly ramble about not being pampered, she could actually feel the ambition in his eyes... there were many smaller changes, but the crux of the matter remained unchanged.
Claire had already discovered that something was different with him, and his unusual bump in magic only steeled that idea.
"Calm down your heart." She exhaled a cloud of smoke on his face, casually taking another puff as she hovered over him, "You can tell me."
Aaron’s heart indeed calmed down, closing his eyes and exhaling, "It’s... weird." he began and Claire went silent, simply listening to his words.
"You already know it happened a week and 3 days ago." he said and she nodded in response.
"That night, something changed. Some foreign memories began to flood my brain. They destroyed everything. My thoughts, my memories, my habits, my personality... everything." Aaron looked into her eyes.
He shifted his story to be from the Solaris’s Aaron’s pov. He imagined how it would’ve been like for him, thinking and mixing his imagination with the solid truth.
Claire’s mouth opened in surprise, but she closed it, her eyes widened but not interfering.
"The memories belonged to someone also named Aaron Cross, a resident that belonged to a world much different than ours." He smiled, "A world with no mana, no magic, no other races. Just humans, animals, and the earth."
"How’s that even possible... mana is the basis of life..." She said in disbelief.
"Maybe." Aaron didn’t reject her words, "It’s possible that people there didn’t know how to interact, or even detect the mana. I only received the memories of the man. What I know is what he knew."
"Memories... of another man?" she asked slowly.
"Yes, kind of." Nodding, he continued, "It’s like using a flash drive, you have a folder named Aaron Cross in your drive, you install it in my computer, I make another folder here with the same name, and then take all the files from your flash drive and put it into my computer."
Aaron believed he wasn’t being dishonest, he was simply omitting the whole truth and framing it in a way that... saved him.
"I see." Claire hummed softly, "What happened after it?"
"Existential crisis." Aaron lowered his head, "The memories began to clash, my life against his. It consumed me whole, I had no clue who I even was.
I forgot most of the things that were supposed to be known. I forgot the relations I had, people I knew, everything..."
She stared at him, unblinking, disbelief and doubts obvious on her face, "How’s that possible?" She asked rhetorically, more to herself rather than him.
Alas, her inner voice gave the same answer as Aaron, "I don’t know."
"In that world, there was no mana. The only thing that mattered was brute strength, or mental intelligence. And as you probably know, with men’s higher average height and greater base strength, they were more dominant than the women." he shared.
Claire scoffed, "Makes sense, and the way you’re telling me, I don’t think even a movie would be able to cook such a... story."
Aaron shrugged, "I am not lying. If I wanted to lie there were better ways to do so, which sound more believable than this."
"I guess that makes sense as well. Then after you forgot your own identity, you adopted his’? Why didn’t you tell me?" she asked gently.
"Truth be told, I was scared to. I didn’t know how you would react, what would happen to me, I don’t know. So I chose to hide the fact."
Claire sighed at his words, flicking her cigarette away and resting her head on his chest once again. This time, it felt warmer than before.
"You can tell me from now on." she promised, drawing circles on his chest, "What happened then?"
Aaron smiled widely, telling her most of the hidden truths, just changing the perspective of his storytelling.
He even told her about the title and its perks, though he changed the name from ’Otherworldly Soul’ to ’Otherworldly Memories’.
Throughout the whole storytelling, Claire kept her head on his chest, laying lazily and asking whatever doubts she got in between.
Through the tales, Aaron also hinted to the harem, telling it has been his memories’s last wish.
And since he had become the Aaron who was from Earth, it is now his wish.
He promised her that he would love all his women equally, and he was currently trying to unlock the other blessings of his title. But he thinks that it would probably unlock when he becomes stronger.
Maybe when he achieves level 25, at the time of class upgrade?
Claire seemed to agree with his assumptions, but she refused to comment on his fantasies until the whole story was finished.
They caught up to the present time.
Claire looked up at him, stretching her sore arms, "I don’t like to share, you know?" she said with a click of her tongue.
"Eva said the same thing, but she also said that she’s fine with it if you are." Aaron added, making Claire’s eyebrows knit, her tongue clicking louder.
Then she sighed, "I don’t like it too much, but you already have a skill that would need more contact with other women, and I would rather not have you going behind my back or hiding stuff from me."
Aaron didn’t know about this world, but in his books, that sounded like an indirect confirmation, making his smile wider.