Chapter 36: The Reason

The three of them were seated in front of Cashel on the sofa, two sipping tea and the original drinking water.

Cashel just sat in front of them on the single sofa, his elbows resting on his thighs as he watched all three of them, still very confused.

After his Andeen had come out, wondering if something was wrong, and after a few words, she asked him to come in so she could explain.

Cashel still hadn’t made dinner. He was hungry, but this was more important. Besides, it was very easy for him to order, despite the time.

It was nine p.m.

"So..." he began, when his Andeen finished her water and handed it over to the pink-eyed one, who just placed it on the coffee table beside the sofa. "Do I still get an explanation, or am I supposed to assume something?"

Andeen took a deep breath. She clasped her palms together, her head slightly tilted toward the ground before she began.

"So there are three of me..."

"I am aware."

"And it’s... it’s terribly complicated."

Cashel raised a brow. She was not making any sense. He glanced at the gun placed on the table between them, full and loaded, ready for anything.

But he wouldn’t want to hurt his wife, and her...

He glanced at the other two.

...versions of her.

"They can both see," he muttered under his breath, but it was loud enough for them to hear. That was the most confusing part. "Are they clones?"

"In a way, but not exactly," she vaguely answered, and a frown appeared on Cashel’s face.

He placed both palms on his face and leaned back into his seat, a low groan leaving his lips. He was confused, but his guard was raised so high it was exhausting him.

He was already wary and worried about just one, and now there were two, and she wasn’t giving him any good explanation.

He brought his hands from his face and looked at her again. His eyes softened almost immediately and he sighed.

"Andeen," he began. "Listen, I understand you weren’t planning to tell me this earlier. It’s a mistake on my part for assuming you’d be home late, so I hurried back," he chuckled softly. "But I need you to tell me what’s going on. Are they clones? Fragments...? Look, I don’t know how your abilities work yet, so..."

The Andeen with glasses, looking uninterested, narrowed her eyes. She glanced at the blind Andeen, her pale blue eyes darkening as she saw how she tried to form words but it was obvious she couldn’t find a way to explain it properly.

Heaving a sigh, she shifted forward on her seat and adjusted her glasses.

"Cashel," she called his name flatly, her tone lacking any emotion that it sent an ugly feeling through Cashel.

Cashel looked at her, his eyes narrowing when he saw her blank face. She didn’t call him honey, and her voice barely lacked any emotion, but her eyes gave that away.

"It creeps me out when you call me like that," he said before he could stop himself, and she frowned.

"I will not be calling you honey," she answered, and he almost smiled when he saw how soft her voice was at that word. "Do you want an explanation, or would you like us to discuss a nickname for you?"

Cashel was speechless. She was so blunt and... he glanced at the pink one and then back to her.

She was definitely scarier.

He rubbed his forehead and gestured at her to go ahead.

The glasses-wearing Andeen nodded and settled back into the sofa. "Then listen carefully, because I don’t particularly enjoy explaining things twice." Her eyes moved toward the original beside her before returning to Cashel. "We have existed like this for years, but without physical bodies. We were fragments of her consciousness, abilities, and classes rather than entirely separate people."

Cashel’s brows drew together. "Then when did you and her appear?" he asked, tipping his chin toward pink.

"The day sealed abilities began unlocking themselves."

Cashel immediately became more attentive, and she continued. "Her abilities have always been complicated. As a multi-classed Hunter, her classes don’t function the way most hunters do."

"The main body is a Mage. That’s why her mana is stronger than everything else. Nina and I inherited different aspects of the other classes.".

She paused and glanced at the pink-eyed Andeen. "We have existed in bodiless states for years. The last time we obtained physical forms, it ended in a catastrophe after a few months, so we remained sealed within the main body afterward. We weren’t supposed to separate like this again, unless it was a death situation."

"And something did?" Cashel asked.

"Yes."

The blind Andeen quietly placed her glass on the table. "It happened in the dungeon before I started looking for you."

Cashel’s eyes immediately shifted toward her. She spoke calmly, without the seriousness of the glasses-wearing Andeen or the exaggerated emotion of the pink-eyed one. She simply sounded like someone recounting something that had happened to her long ago.

’It’s already strange that there are three, She’s also acting different,’ he thought with a faint smile.

"My energy usually flows out of control, so during the fight I noticed it was easier to control, and then I got a system alert that one of them had been unsealed and was already causing issues, so..."

The timing bothered him. The ability had begun unlocking shortly after he used that card on her. Coincidence was possible, but Cashel had survived long enough to know when something felt too convenient to ignore.

He exhaled and reached over the desk, picking up the gun he recalled it. The weapon vanished into his inventory with a faint blue shimmer and looked at Pink.

She still stared at him, her cup over her lips, so he couldn’t tell if she was smiling or if she wasn’t. But her eyes still had that hurt look in them.

He took a deep breath, pushed the strands of hair over his forehead back, and sighed.

"So can you three fuse back?"

Blind Andeen shook her head. "Once that seal is off I can’t fuse with them anymore, unless it’s another skill, but it takes a considerable amount of energy and time. And it would only happen automatically when one is about to die, so it’s like a fail-safe."

Cashel nodded, he didn’t question the seal at all, because he would eventually get an explanation about that or find out himself.

Just like he hadn’t asked how she lost her sight or why she has three versions of her. It was Andeen, he obviously knew there was time for everything concerning her.

That or his patience wore off.

He finally looked at all of them at the same time. Three Andeens, very different versions, his wife... wives...Was it safe to assume that?

Without thinking he asked, "So does that mean I’m married to all three of you?"

"Of course," the pink-eyed Andeen answered before he even finished. "Y... you are. You must. If you... aren’t, t... then..." Nina stammered, her fingers tightening around the cup.

Cashel noticed it, and he could already imagine how their interactions were like. While the two extras whispered amongst themselves, his Andeen had her head facing him. It was like she was staring at him.

He smiled. "Andeen." All three of them shifted their focus to him. "Uhm... haha, this is incredibly weird," he chuckled softly, then sighed. "We might have to think of names for you two. I don’t think I can call you both Andeen."

"Oh!" Andeen exclaimed. "They have names."

Cashel narrowed his eyes.

"Nina and Olga."

Cashel frowned. "You named yourselves?"

Olga adjusted her glasses. "Would you have preferred being called Second Andeen?"

"No."

"Then there’s your answer."

Nina immediately leaned forward with a smile. "I picked Nina because I thought it was cute."