The Miracle Doctor Returns: Divorce To Hidden Identity

Chapter 5

The moment I stepped through the glass doors of Skydome Pharmaceuticals, my breath caught. The lobby stretched wide and gleaming, its marble floors reflecting the chandeliers above like rippling stars. Gold-plated trim lined the walls, and the faint scent of sandalwood floated in the air. A giant LED screen displayed the company’s latest medical breakthroughs, but I barely noticed it.

What froze me in place was the people. Rows of employees in tailored suits and lab coats stood at attention, bowing slightly as I passed. Their voices rose in unison, steady and deferential.

“Welcome, Chairman.”

Chairman.

The word stabbed through me. My head throbbed, the echo of an identity I didn’t remember claiming. I looked around, searching for a smirk, a hint of mockery. But no—it was real. Their eyes held nothing but respect, even awe.

Linda walked a step ahead of me, heels clicking against the polished stone like the beat of a metronome. Her presence was steady, a silent anchor amid my storm. “They’ve been waiting for you,” she murmured without turning. “Remember, even if you don’t recall them, they recognize you.”

I clenched my fists. I didn’t recognize myself.

We stepped into a private elevator lined with black glass that reflected my face—pale, conflicted, uncertain. The ride shot upward, smooth and soundless, until the doors opened onto the top floor.

The office awaiting me was less an office and more a kingdom. Walls of glass offered a sweeping view of the city below—skyscrapers dwarfed by our vantage point, the sun glinting off rooftops like scattered coins. A mahogany desk, wide enough to host a banquet, sat before me, its surface bare save for a leather folder. The carpet underfoot was thick, muffling my steps.

I swallowed hard. “This… this isn’t mine.”

Linda moved gracefully to the desk, her hands resting lightly on the folder. She flipped it open, pages of crisp paper neatly arranged within. “Factories,” she began, her voice calm, clinical, “in seven provinces. Research patents under your name—over fifty breakthroughs in modern pharmacology. Real estate—villas, penthouses, estates abroad. Overseas accounts. These”—she tapped the folder—“are only a fraction of what you own.”

I stared at the words but couldn’t absorb them. My mind screamed for an explanation, a loophole, something to prove this was a cruel performance staged for my confusion.

I shook my head. “No. This has to be a trap. Someone’s setting me up.”

Her expression didn’t waver. Instead, she walked to a panel in the wall, pressing her palm against a scanner. A safe embedded in the wall clicked open. From inside, she withdrew a stack of documents, a velvet box, and several framed photographs. She laid them out before me like evidence at a trial.

“These seals,” she said, pointing to a carved jade stamp, “bear your mark. They unlock contracts only you can authorize. These statements—signed with your hand. And these—” she pushed the photos toward me—“show you standing with the board of directors during last year’s global summit. Unless someone finds your twin, this is your life.”

I picked up one of the photographs with trembling fingers. The man in the image wore my face but not my expression. His gaze was sharper, colder, a man who carried the weight of empires in his eyes. Could that really be me?

Linda’s voice softened, though the weight in her words pressed hard. “Charlie, you lost your memory because you were attacked. Your enemies wanted you erased—body and soul. If they learn that you don’t remember who you are, they will finish the job.”

Her words slithered into my chest, coiling around my uncertainty. I wanted to argue, to throw it all back at her. But deep down, a strange instinct stirred—a faint echo telling me she wasn’t lying.

“And if I refuse?” I asked quietly.

Her eyes met mine, unwavering. “Then you won’t survive.”

The silence between us was sharp, cut only by the faint hum of the city beyond the glass.

I leaned against the desk, trying to steady my breathing. I was being asked to step into the shoes of a man I didn’t know—a man who apparently had power, wealth, enemies, and an empire under his name. Could I even play that role? Or would the real me crumble under its weight?

The phone on the desk buzzed suddenly, jolting me. I picked it up, the screen flashing with a name that made my stomach tighten.

Nancy.

I hesitated, then answered.

Her voice exploded through the speaker, raw and furious. “Charlie, where the hell are you? My mother’s condition is worsening again, and you just left? Do you think you can play the hero once and vanish?”

I closed my eyes, her accusations piercing through my fragile calm.

“And that rich Carl?” she continued, her tone laced with venom. “He’s gone missing. Do you know how suspicious that looks? You disappear, and suddenly he vanishes too. Do you want everyone to think you had something to do with it?”

My grip tightened around the phone until my knuckles whitened. The old me—the man she thought was weak, disposable—might have stammered, apologized, tried to soothe her wrath. But something inside me shifted.

I opened my eyes and gazed out at the city sprawled beneath me, the empire I supposedly ruled. My lips curled into a sneer I didn’t recognize but felt strangely natural.

“Tell your mother,” I said slowly, each word deliberate, “that the next time she opens her eyes, she should remember who saved her. As for Carl… if he’s missing, maybe he finally realized he was standing in the wrong man’s shadow.”

Before she could reply, I ended the call, setting the phone down with a quiet finality.

Linda studied me carefully, but for once, she didn’t speak.

For the first time since waking up in that hospital, I felt a spark of something real—not fear, not confusion, but power. It was terrifying. It was intoxicating.

Whoever I had been, whoever I was becoming, one truth crystallized in my mind: memory or not, this world already treated me as a king. And kings didn’t kneel to anyone.