新世界 emperor

      the sudden chinese startles yoorim, even more so because she understands it and recognizes who it’s coming from. she turns to see minghao, and a soft smile graces her face. 

      yoorim considered herself great at reading people. she was incredibly curious by nature, and she enjoyed understanding people to see how they ticked. minghao, however, was one of the few people that always surprised her. despite being in a relationship for a few months, she still didn’t fully understand him as a person. she knew this was probably on purpose – keeping that mystery makes it easier to keep people at arm’s length.

      when they first started dating, yoorim had been extremely worried. she’d been dating well-off men on and off for the past two years to satisfy her mother’s incessant dream of yoorim getting married and having three kids by 23. but with minghao, he was the first person where it wasn’t her choice to date him. the two had been arranged by their families, and yoorim had been terrified by that just because it seemed a lot more serious and binding. 

      but to her relief, the two hadn’t really anything in common, and minghao also felt that the relationship should end. so after a few months, it was over. since then, the two hadn’t spoken to each other. until now, of course.

      yoorim gives a polite bow, “minghao, it’s nice to see you here. it’s been a little while since we last saw each other.” she places the sweater in her hands back on the rack, “ah, i’ve been doing good i suppose. my mother and father are… good as well. business is doing great from what they’ve told me. what about you? you look very nice today.”

It felt weird, almost unnatural for Minghao to uphold formalities in such a way -- he couldn’t remember many times he had had to do that since coming to Seoul -- but even he knew when a situation called for adequate behaviour. Which was basically whenever someone was close to or on equal social footing as he was. There was absolutely no reason to suck up to no name rabble after all.

Now if this girl had been someone who had dumped him he might not have been as inclined to keep the nice tone. But no such thing had happened; no ugly falling outs simply a mutual agreement that maybe they just weren’t meant for each other, unsurprisingly, Minghao couldn’t help but think as he doubted that he would ever find such a ridiculous thing as love.

But it also made this thing surprisingly awkward. He felt obligated to remain and chat her up due to pleasantries and common etiquette, but all he could think of was stupid questions that would lead to no further advancement in a conversation. 

Holding himself back from blurting out that of course he looked nice, that much was only natural, but instead in the last moment he gave an acknowledging nod. “Your flattery is appreciated,” he said in return and continued: “I must bear myself with poise at any time after all.” Perhaps a bit stuck up after all, but he actually tried his best for a change. Holding out a hand palm up gesturing to his conversation partner he returned the favour. “As expected you’re even prettier than last time I saw you yourself.”

Unlike some people, Tzuyu liked to go to out and let her hair down every once in a while. Sure, this kind of thing was childish and swarming with people that could have stood to be reminded of their place in society, but she was willing to let them away with being loud and boorish for one night. Besides, she was turning plenty of heads and garnering whispers. Positive, negative? Who cared? She was getting attention, that’s all Tzuyu cared about.

Well, that and dragging Minghao out to mingle with the commoners. Tzuyu could barely contain her glee at how flawlessly her plan had worked. If she was right about her brother being scared of the events, then she had something to hold over him for all eternity. If she was wrong (perish the thought!), at least she had succeeded in making him come out and mix with everyone else. It was a win-win as far as she was concerned.

Though she was loathe to admit it, being surrounded by some many stalls with such interesting things made her temporarily forget her plan and lose sight of herself. Without meaning to, Tzuyu darted from stall to stall, admiring their wares with an almost childlike expression before Minghao rudely brought her back to Earth. Scowling at first, Tzuyu crossed her arms and stuck her nose in the air with a haughty, indignant noise.

“Don’t be ridiculous! I could have brought anyone with me, they would have all fought for my favour! Is it so wrong to want to hang out with my brother and be there for him in case he gets a fright~?” The words were teasing, but as always, laced with the venom Tzuyu reserved for her ‘beloved’ brother.

Despite her words, it was obvious that Tzuyu was incredibly excited about this whole ordeal. How incredibly pathetic. He was definitely not someone to indulge in such foolish errands and although he did know how to seek enjoyment in careless endeavours, this whole thing was just foolish. Using puny tricks for the sake of scaring each other senseless for the sake of amusement? And it wasn’t like he could eat the food anyway, not with the diet he was supposed to be on.

“Then just bring one of your little slaves along next time,” he said indifferent to the offense that his sister’s words suggested. “I’m sure it would be so much more fun to hang out with the gold diggers that like to swarm around you than with your older brother. I can’t make you look better and feed your ego after all. Don’t worry though, it’s not your fault. I mean, anyone would pale next to me after all.”

Finishing his piece of mind Minghao rose his head in his superiority and let a hand pat Tzuyu’s shoulder quick well knowing that she was not going to appreciate it. But it was fine, it wasn’t like a bit of humiliation hadn’t hurt her every once in a while. Or was the word humility? Either way it worked he supposed.

“Oh, and what am I–a mind reader? You ask me not to make assumptions, and yet you presume that I’d presumably know what you think and what you mean by saying a simple you’re in the way? ” Seolhyun practically scorned at his words, scoffing at how ridiculous the male sounded. 

“Firstly, when you said that I was in the way, what did you expect me to think? That my body is standing right in front of the shelves you want to look at or that I’m blocking your way?” Now the urge to smack the male’s face was even stronger, and Seolhyun deepened her scowl. 

“Did you say excuse me, you’re blocking the bookshelf? No, you just said you’re in the way.” Seolhyun was irate with this self important male. “And if you think that I’d need to stoop to such a fucking degree to get you in trouble while putting my own image at risk–dream on. You’re not even worth a fraction of my time, honey.” She turns back to her book, browsing through the books yet again. She just had one more fucking book to find, and she could finally rid herself of this insufferable plebeian who clearly didn’t understand basic manners. “You can keep your dick very safely in your pants, and I won’t give a fuck. Newsflash, hun. You’re not all that great.” She paused for a moment before turning back to browsing through the shelf in front of her, completely deciding to ignore the male as she quickly ran her finger along the titles of the books, eyebrows furrowed in concentration as she tried to find the title that she needed to complete the entire makeup of her textbooks.

Well. This was starting to get incredibly tedious to deal with. But he wasn’t about to lose his patience over the insolent rabble who knew no better than to bare fangs in an attempt to remain self-important. He supposed that was just how commoners acted when they were obviously in the wrong but didn’t want to admit it. No, he was not going to lose his temper over something that was supposedly second nature to human beings. How grand of him.

But the fact still remained that he needed his book and that this woman refused to move despite his obvious dismay with her current position. How could someone be so foolish? It was absolutely beyond him.

Seolhyun was just having a splendidly fine life searching for the books she needed for her current studies in K-ARTS when a male’s rude voice reaches the timbre of her very ears.

You’re in the way. Almost instinctively, her lips pull downwards into a distinctively disgruntled frown. Who the fuck was this male to tell her she was in the way when he was the one that had got in her way? Plus, she didn’t take up much of the aisle. It wasn’t as though he didn’t have space to even move. Seolhyun’s eyes flicker over the wide space behind her, her lip curling prettily in distaste at his words. Her body didn’t even occupy half the space of the aisle, and there was more than enough space for him to slip past her, even with extra berth.

“There’s something called manners, you know.” She can’t help herself but respond snarkily at his words, already deeply unhappy with how her previously wonderful day was turning out to be. First, she had to get new textbooks, since she’d misplaced her old ones, and then secondly, this pretentious little male had to come and insist that she was in the way when there was enough space behind her to fit at least two more people in the aisle.

The nerve of him–Seolhyun wanted to smack her book in the male’s face. Such depths of inconsiderateness.

“An excuse me would have warrantied me simply moving out of your way without much problem. But…rude much? There’s space behind me enough to fit two people, and you say that I’m in the way.” Clearly, his words pissed her off, and she wasn’t about to let him go without giving him a piece of her mind. “Don’t you have eyes to at the very least–see that much?”

Had he heard her right? All he did was state the obvious and Minghao didn’t for a second believe that anything he had said warranted such a reaction. He was simply stating facts: he needed that particular part of the bookshelf and her frame stood in a position that prevented him from accessing it, and yet, now here he was, having his ears rambled off with pointless complaints about his manners of all things.

“How long are you going to keep up that unsightly display?” he asked obviously disinterested, obviously not agreeing with her words. For how could Minghao possibly be wrong in what he said and did? That was simply impossible. Incomprehensible. What kind of person even remained so insistent after obviously being told they were an inconvenience? Minghao could easily have mirrored the woman’s ire, but he was far above such for such meagre reasons. This woman was not nearly as infuriating as a certain other girl in his life, and thus he could easily remain calm in her presence.

@lmxminghao

She owed her brother an apology. At least, that’s what her step-father had told her over the phone the previous night. And no matter how much Tzuyu had wheedled and whined, the man had stood firm. She was to apologize within the day and he’d be checking with Minghao as to whether or not said apology had been delivered.

It figured he’d take Minghao’s side. The idiot was his son after all, she was just a step-daughter. (Even if her step-father treated her like a princess, before her exile at least)

Arriving home from a photo shoot, Tzuyu invited herself into her brother’s room, placing down a colorful bouquet of flowers before him. Though the flowers looking pretty and joyful, Tzuyu had picked out blooms that represented her true feelings, hidden under the guise of repentance. A fact Tzuyu knew Minghao would figure out quickly. Not that she cared. The apology had been delivered, no-one had said it was to be sincere.

“I’m so sorry, big brother. Can you ever forgive me~?” Apologetic words betrayed by a fake sugary-sweet tone and an even faker looking smile.

Honestly it wasn’t that big of a deal. Tzuyu had in an attempt to learn about the commoners’ skill of ironing accidentally burnt a hole in a very particular piece of clothing -- namely one of his shirts, and of course Minghao had ratted her out to the higher ups as being useless. Not that he could iron himself but it was the thought that counted. He didn’t mind much for he had plenty of shirts, but somehow the fact that it was her who had ruined it just made it impossible for him to put water under the bridge and let bygones be bygones.

No, he just had to rub it in and make a big deal out of it. And of course she responded in ilk if one was to judge by the extravagant bouquet that presented itself upon their shared dining table. Perhaps a sweet gesture in anyone else’s eyes, but to Minghao the language of flowers was easily read, and the bouquet spoke only of ill will and loathe. Not exactly something one would feel sincerity in and not exactly something that screamed ‘forgive me’.