Passion: Diaphonic Symphonia Novel - Chapter 10

Christoph Tarten.

Whether it was Christina or Christoph, the name didn’t matter now.

Jeong Taeui had never imagined such a person as this young man when thinking about the mysterious, dangerous individual who was close to Ilay.

He knew he would be an extraordinary person, but he didn’t expect him to be so visibly extraordinary from the first glance. No, even if he had an extraordinary appearance, he might have been more easily convinced if he had been a hulking man who looked like he’d been raised by wolves in some deep mountain.

With that face and appearance, to be in Ilay’s league, it felt like a scam.

“…The main building has offices, reception rooms, and a hall. The East Wing houses the elders, and guest rooms for visitors from outside are also there. The West Wing is where blood relatives of my generation and below stay. Or their guests. You won’t have reason to go to the main building or East Wing anyway, so you only need to know the structure of the West Wing. The first floor has… …Are you listening?”

Christoph, who had been rattling on without a single breath, turned to Jeong Taeui, who was standing quietly, not moving. Jeong Taeui smacked his lips and mumbled, “Mmm.”

“I’m listening… But, hey. Do we have to stand here like this? Can’t we go inside?”

“Are we close enough for you to enter my bedroom?”

“We’re close enough for me to stand in front of your wide-open bedroom door and watch you change.”

Christoph paused for a moment, the hand that had been taking out a new shirt from the closet, and looked at Jeong Taeui.

Christoph, who had blocked Jeong Taeui at the threshold of the bedroom, telling him not to enter, was in the middle of changing and explaining things to Jeong Taeui.

He put on his shirt and faced Jeong Taeui directly.

Tapping the buttons of the shirt he had put directly on his skin, he said, “Right.”

“I forgot to tell you something first. Looking and talking is fine. But touching is not.”

“What?”

“Don’t touch me. Or my belongings, unless I specifically tell you to.”

“…Are you a germaphobe?”

“Hardly. I don’t mind dirt or mess. I just dislike physical contact with others.”

“How did you manage in the Mobile Unit, then? You must have had to rub shoulders with people.”

“I never took on tasks that required me to rub shoulders with anyone in the first place. …Mobile Unit, huh. How much else did you hear about me from Kyle?”

“Well… just that you’re Ilay’s friend?”

Jeong Taeui said, frowning slightly. As soon as he spoke, Christoph also frowned.

“Nonsense. Why would I be friends with a lunatic like that? What am I lacking?”

“…”

It had been a long time since he felt like defending Ilay.

When he met Ilay again, he’d have to tell him. That he met his friend Christoph. Though he somehow felt that Ilay wouldn’t care about the word “friend” anyway and would just ask how he met him.

“But, do I really need such a detailed explanation of this house’s structure when I’ll just be getting the book and leaving quickly?”

Jeong Taeui asked him, who was buttoning the last button of his shirt. He stared intently at Jeong Taeui with an extremely odd look, then, without even looking, pulled a trouser hanger from inside the closet. He picked out the pair of trousers at the very front of the neatly hung row, again without looking.

“Then tell me. Until you get the book, where do you plan to sleep, eat, and spend your time without knowing the layout of this house?”

Christoph retorted.

Indeed, this was why Kyle said he wouldn’t be easy to deal with.

“When will you return it?”

“When I get tired of it.”

“…So, what’s on the first floor of the West Wing?”

Jeong Taeui resigned himself and asked again. Christoph’s eyes narrowed slightly. Only then did he examine the trousers, pick off a tiny speck of dust stuck to the hem, and slip his legs into them.

“The first floor of the West Wing has a dining hall and a main hall. A reception room. There’s also a hall in the basement with games like chess and billiards, but it’s full of idiots so it’s best not to go there. Same with the sauna. The second floor has private studies. The third and fourth floors, as you can see, are private spaces like bedrooms.”

After putting on his trousers, he put on a tie. A belt. A knit vest. Finally, a wristwatch.

Christoph finished dressing and looked up. Noticing Jeong Taeui’s admiring gaze, he asked with his eyes, as if to say, “What?”

“No, you just look like some young master of a noble house when you dress like that.”

Jeong Taeui said, scratching his neck. Only then did he realize he had said something foolish and clicked his tongue. He wasn’t “like” a young master; he was one.

Come to think of it, here was another one. A person who could instill prejudice against those born with a silver spoon.

Christoph suddenly scrutinized Jeong Taeui from head to toe. Jeong Taeui, who had only dropped his bag in the room Christoph pointed to and immediately came here to stand, was naturally dressed exactly as he had been when he left Berlin.

“…Why. Do you want me to go change too?”

“No… I was just thinking about Rick’s skewed aesthetic sense.”

At the subtly nuanced tone that didn’t sound like a compliment, Jeong Taeui grumbled in agreement, “You can say that again…”

“And dinner is at seven.”

Christoph said, walking from the bedroom towards the door. Behind him, on the wall directly opposite Jeong Taeui, the wall clock pointed precisely to seven.

Following him as he walked past Jeong Taeui into the hallway, Jeong Taeui sighed.

How to put it, he still felt like he hadn’t gotten a handle on things. The feeling of moving without properly grasping the situation always came with a vague sense of unease. The feeling of not yet belonging to any environment.

It wasn’t the first or second time he had been thrown into an unfamiliar place, but this one felt unusually unsettling.

From the moment he entered this house, he sensed subtle energies intermingling among the people. An atmosphere where familiarity and hostility were divided, coexisting within a single household, which was peculiar.

Even now, it was the same. As they walked down the hallway, they occasionally passed people. Their reactions were one of two: his side, or your side.

“Did they have a gang fight or something? Why’s the atmosphere like this?”

Jeong Taeui mumbled, passing a young man who glared fiercely at Christoph and at him trailing behind.

Christoph, who was a few steps ahead, slowed slightly and turned his head.

“Didn’t Kyle tell you?”

“? What?”

“Tarten is always in a state of gang warfare.”

“Huh?”

Jeong Taeui asked back with a peculiar expression. Christoph continued walking forward, speaking casually.

“The Tarten family decides the candidates who will inherit everything in the family at an early age. They carefully screen the children of the bloodline and choose three or four of the most outstanding ones. From then on, they enter a competitive system. And the children who weren’t chosen as candidates line up behind promising individuals for their future, enthusiastically cheering for their chosen betting ticket to win.”

His tone was remarkably calm, as if he were talking about the dinner menu.

However, Jeong Taeui, listening to those words, was momentarily dazed and then soon became uncomfortable. He frowned, pondered for a moment, then sighed.

“Competition can help bring out people’s abilities more easily… I don’t know the exact circumstances, but it sounds a bit inhuman to an outsider’s ears.”

Christoph glanced at Jeong Taeui. After a brief pause, he spoke as if to himself.

“Humans who were inhuman from the start remain inhuman even if they withdraw from competition.”

“Well, it’s not a matter of inherent nature—… Anyway, that’s not something to discuss. But competition, do they really have to do it?”

“Only the children selected as succession candidates. The rest just have to wait for one of them to be chosen, so they don’t directly compete. …Ah, everyone wishes for the candidate they support to win, so there’s that competitive spirit.”

“Then those selected children. Do they have to compete unconditionally if selected? Is there a right to refuse?”

Christoph didn’t answer. As if he hadn’t heard. But they weren’t even a few steps apart in the quiet hallway, so he couldn’t have not heard.

Only when they descended the last step of the upper floor of the stairs and reached the landing did a slightly belated answer return.

“Of course there is. You have the chance to refuse if you don’t want to. I did.”

Jeong Taeui looked at Christoph’s back, who was walking ahead without ever looking back, and his eyes widened slightly.

“Then you were also one of the succession candidates?”

The words, “Didn’t the family elders who selected the candidates consider personality or social skills?!” welled up in his throat, but he couldn’t bring himself to say them, having only just met him.

Then he suddenly mumbled, “Ah.”

He recalled the conversation between his uncle and Kyle, where Richard Tarten was mentioned as being very promising.

That must have been it. The most promising among those who had the potential to inherit Tarten.

As they finished descending the stairs and reached the first floor, another young man passed by. That young man also glared at Christoph with wary eyes as he walked past. A short curse was also heard.

Seeing Christoph walk on without reacting, even though he clearly heard it, Jeong Taeui thought that in this respect, he was at least better than Ilay.

Jeong Taeui sighed deeply. Feeling quite stifled, he scratched his arm vigorously and asked,

“If he refused, he’s no longer a competitor, so why are those guys like that? If you withdraw from the competition, isn’t there no need to be wary or hostile anymore?”

“That’s why they’re idiots. They just try to think whatever they want…”

Christoph mumbled indecipherably, clicking his tongue in displeasure.

Jeong Taeui also clicked his tongue, following his lead.

If the family atmosphere was like this, staying here would be like walking on thin ice. Even now, everyone who passed by glared fiercely at Jeong Taeui along with Christoph, and it seemed it would only get worse, not better. Moreover, somehow, judging by the proportions, it seemed Richard had far more allies than Christoph.

Should he call it a troubled path, or should he say he chose the wrong side?

“Ah… I don’t like taking sides and fighting…”

Jeong Taeui shook his head.

And no matter how he thought about it, this was an overwhelmingly disadvantageous situation, he mumbled, counting on his fingers, “The other side has more numbers, they seem to have better connections, and they’re even a promising successor candidate…” He almost bumped into Christoph, who had stopped and was waiting for him.

“If you want to go to Richard’s side, then go.”

Jeong Taeui asked, “Huh?” in response to his calm words, taking his eyes off his fingers. He soon realized what he had said and frowned.

“It’s the same taking sides whether I stay here or go there. I don’t like either. Besides, you seem to have forgotten, but I didn’t come here to fight. Give me the book, the book.”

Christoph narrowed his eyes. He stared intently at Jeong Taeui for a while as if scrutinizing him, then suddenly mumbled,

“You said you were in UNHRDO.”

Jeong Taeui closed his mouth. And like Christoph, he stared intently at him.

“…Did Kyle say that much?”

“No, Kyle just said he’d send someone instead.”

Jeong Taeui silently looked at Christoph. If not Kyle, there was only one possible point of contact he could think of.

As he thought, Christoph said casually,

“Why would Rick go through that trouble, knowing it would be a bother? At least among the Mobile Unit guys, there’s probably no one who doesn’t know.”

“Haa…”

Jeong Taeui just mumbled aimlessly, not knowing how to answer.

Christoph tilted his head. He looked at Jeong Taeui at an angle for a long time, then sighed.

“I just can’t figure out why he went to all that trouble…”

“Why don’t you just insult me directly instead?”

Christoph, who had sighed as if to be heard, looked at Jeong Taeui, who was sulkily grumbling, then tilted his head the other way. This time, only slightly.

“Do you prefer that? If you prefer direct insults to roundabout ones, I can do that much.”

“Are there no other options…?”

Jeong Taeui slumped his head.

“How can you live in such a harsh world?”

As Jeong Taeui mumbled grumpily, he lifted his gaze at a small, “Hmm,” breath.

Christoph was looking at Jeong Taeui. With eyes as if seeing something strange. The corners of his mouth faintly twitched.

…Ah. Again.

Jeong Taeui looked at the corners of his mouth.

He scratched his neck awkwardly, looking at those lips that seemed to be aimlessly searching for what expression to make.

How to put it, the feeling was…

It wasn’t sinking, nor was it melancholic; it was something he couldn’t quite express.

But Christoph soon turned away as if nothing had happened, and Jeong Taeui followed behind him again.

He soon found the dining room.

Walking down the first-floor hallway, past the hall, he saw a large open door. Delicious smells and murmuring voices flowed from there. Seeing it in the distance, Christoph, who had been walking silently with an expressionless face until then, suddenly turned to Jeong Taeui as if remembering something.

“Ah. And your name.”

“Huh?”

“It’s an unlucky name. Call it something else.”

“…”

Jeong Taeui stared intently at him with triangular, narrowed eyes.

He found the utterly rude remark strangely familiar, and then he remembered hearing such a thing before when they met. That it was an unlucky name.

“No, what’s wrong with my name—”

Before Jeong Taeui could furiously shout, “My father gave it to me, and it’s a perfectly good name!”, Christoph casually covered his mouth with his palm and pushed him away.

“In my opinion, that name probably doesn’t suit this region. There might be some bad luck associated with it. So call it something else.”

Jeong Taeui looked at him with an extremely bewildered expression, as he spoke quite seriously without batting an eye.

Christoph continued, without a hint of question on his face as he suddenly leaped into the realm of superstition.

“There are plenty of other Korean names. Hmm… I met a Korean reporter when I went to Bosnia the other day. What was his name? …Ah, right. Young-soo. That name would be fine too. Kim is the most common surname in Korea, isn’t it? Kim Young-soo. That’ll do.”

“…Did you hear something from Ilay, by any chance?”

“Huh? Rick?” The face asking back was bewildered.

He had intentionally chosen a common name, but it seemed it was truly common, or perhaps there was some connection.

Jeong Taeui vigorously scratched his head. He didn’t understand why he had to change his name, but he also had no reason to stubbornly insist on keeping it and blush.

Right, after all, a name is for the convenience of the person calling it.

“If you insist, then I guess I’ll be Kim Young-soo here…”

Jeong Taeui mumbled with a sigh. Christoph stared at Jeong Taeui expressionlessly, then turned his head upon hearing that.

His steps towards the dining room seemed somehow satisfied.