Chapter Text
The palace courtyard was quiet, except for the sound of whispered scandal.
Word spread faster than fire: Yook Dong Sik, the Minister of Rites’ son, had been discovered in a forbidden tryst with one of the royal guards. The servant who accused him wept as she spoke, claiming she had seen it with her own eyes. The court erupted in murmurs — an omega consorting with a soldier? A disgrace punishable by death.
When the rumor reached the council chambers, Minister Yook collapsed where he stood, his face turning the color of ash. He had spent a lifetime building his family’s honor; now his only son had destroyed it in a single breath.
The accused was dragged before the court, still in disheveled robes, his wrists bound in crimson silk as if to mock the color of sin. King Seo In Woo, seated on the jade throne, watched him with the calm curiosity of a man studying an insect.
“Yook Dong Sik,” he said softly, his voice sharp as lacquered steel. “Have you anything to say in your defense?”
Dong Sik lifted his head. His eyes burned with something older than shame — fury.
“I do,” he spat. “I’ve waited eighteen years to say it.”
The court froze. The guards moved. The King only arched one perfect brow.
Dong Sik’s lips twisted into a smile that didn’t belong to a nobleman. “You tyrant dog,” he hissed. “You’ve bled this kingdom dry — now it’s your turn.”
And then, before anyone could breathe, he lunged.
The knife flashed. The King staggered back, crimson blooming across his robe. Gasps rippled through the hall — treason, madness, divine judgment.
As the guards seized Dong Sik, the King’s hand pressed against his wound, his gaze locking with his attacker’s — not in rage, but in shock, as if seeing something impossible.
And somewhere, beyond the pillars and the mortal noise, the gods were watching.
Two souls burned at once.
Two bodies fell.
And when their eyes opened again, the world was no longer the same.
The room shimmered with gold and shadow, the kind of lavish detail Dong Sik had only ever seen in historical dramas—or nightmares.
He sat up too fast, and the heavy robes slid down his chest like molten fabric. The sleeves alone could feed a village. The bed was wide enough for an entire conference.
“This… is not my apartment,” he croaked.
The voice that came out of his mouth was wrong. Deeper. Polished. Commanding. It vibrated in his chest like thunder—and that scared him more than the crown on the pillow beside him.
He ran a hand through his hair. Long. Thick. Too perfect. His nails were clean and shaped, not bitten from deadlines and caffeine.
Everywhere he looked, there were servants frozen in fear, their eyes downcast, waiting for orders.
Orders. From him.
“Uh… I’d like to rest,” he managed, the words sounding strange even to his own ears.
The servants bowed so quickly their foreheads almost hit the floor. “Yes, Your Majesty!” they chorused, scurrying out like startled birds.
When the doors closed, the silence hit him.
Dong Sik stared at his hands—larger, tanned, calloused. His pulse hammered beneath skin that wasn’t his. He flexed his fingers, testing the strength in them. His reflection in the polished bronze bowl near the bedside made his stomach twist. The face staring back was the king’s.
Seo In Woo’s.
He swallowed hard.
“Okay, maybe this is a dream,” he whispered. “You drank expired coffee, fell asleep on the couch, and now you’re starring in a palace hallucination. Totally normal.”
He pinched his arm. It hurt.
The memories flooded back: the flash of a knife, the shouting, the fall.
He remembered the jump—the way the rooftop wind had felt before everything went black.
His chest tightened.
“Oh god,” he muttered, gripping the sheets. “I did die.”
He looked around at the silk draperies, the incense curling like ghostly ribbons, the ridiculous luxury of it all.
“So this is hell,” he whispered. “Figures. Hell has good interior design.”
He lay back, staring at the ceiling carved with dragons and constellations.
“Great,” he said to no one. “I die once, and the afterlife gives me a job.”
It was the smell that woke him first—damp stone, stale straw, iron.
Not incense. Not royal musk.
Seo In Woo opened his eyes to a ceiling so low he could touch it. He wasn’t in his bedchamber. He wasn’t even in the palace proper.
When he sat up, the blanket that slid from his shoulders was rough and gray. His body felt wrong—lighter, weaker. When he tried to stand, his knees almost buckled. The chain around his ankle clinked softly.
The Cold Palace.
The place reserved for disgraced consorts and those the King wished to forget.
His jaw tightened. “This has to be a dream,” he muttered. “Or someone’s curse.”
He moved to the cracked mirror hanging crooked on the wall—and froze.
The reflection that stared back was Yook Dong Sik.
The omega. The would-be assassin.
The boy who’d called him a “tyrant dog” and stabbed him in front of the entire court.
In Woo’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “No. No, no, no…” He slammed his palm against the table. “This—this is sorcery!”
He paced the small cell, the chain dragging like a mocking echo. “That omega witch—he’s done something. Some forbidden charm.”
He pressed both hands to his face, horrified by the softness of the skin, by the faint scent of sweetness that clung to him. “I smell like vanilla,” he snarled. “I’m cursed and I smell like dessert.”
From outside the barred window came the distant clang of guards changing shift. He could hear them whispering:
“The consort’s gone mad.”
“He threatened the King’s life.”
“The Minister’s family will be ruined.”
In Woo’s chest burned with rage. Threatened the King? He was the King!
He kicked the wall, immediately regretted it because, apparently, Yook Dong Sik’s bones were made of glass. He gritted his teeth, forcing himself upright.
“Fine,” he said through clenched teeth. “If this is the work of that simpering omega, I’ll find him. And when I do—”
He stopped, realization sinking in.
“—he’s walking around in my body.”
His fury wavered into something colder, almost fear.
He sank down on the cot, clutching the chain around his ankle like it might keep his sanity tethered.
“Gods,” he whispered, staring at his borrowed hands, “what have you done?”
Outside, snow began to fall.
Inside, the tyrant king sat trapped in the body of the man who had tried to kill him—his pride frozen as solid as the walls around him.