Chapter Text
July 12th 1706, year 26
Kim Taehyung
-a 𝑦𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑤 𝑐𝑟𝑜𝑤𝑑
The door writhed behind him, announcing an entrance to the king's court of drunkards; Olymp full of low lives.
Remains of cretins sown along stitches in his warm clothing, shivers still giddily running down his trousers whilst the night's sober air haunted him into an alcoholic's dream. harsh wind burrowing into the warm tavern on the nook of Busan's city scapes.
He gazed across the messy topknots gathered around in heaps. those which soared to the ceiling in tipsy cheer with heads in tow. the typical Joseon celebration of the day afterparty taking place; with bottles of soju and imported diddles, traditional food littering the floors of passed out sinners.
Here celebrate vermin alike those below a rum barrel, so desperate and cruel and ridiculously self centered. and so unbelievably yellow to others.
A curious wonder inevitably takes over man, ponder of just how many here are reputable merchants and or sailors. just how many justifiably ripped someone's money today and now own bragging rights to such feat, how many here will return to dull lives when orange dust paints our skies. Would he be able to recognize them the following morning? Surely not. These people here are not the same as tomorrow's counterparts.
This pub of joint giblets, who would wish to bring their faults freely expressed here into the morn's populated streets?
then man tips his neck and accompanies the restless crowd in giddy freedom.
Deep brown almonds followed the room's curves, examining every chip of paint, every mop of hair, each and every folded face visible to him. as soon as he had walked the room, his powerful aura loomed closely behind him, gaining a few head turns and misbalanced bows. while others couldn't give less of a damn towards the higher militia position among them.
Taehyung found temporary solace in this strange exhilarating exemption for the most part; not being shackled by his family's title and constantly initiated into conversations he would rather not have. Bothered by his free uncontrollable thoughts, he took to unceremoniously biting the inside of his cheek— a way to ground himself and return to the task at hand.
Albeit, quite the lot stopped to stare at him, of sailors and delinquents, ladies bafflingly hushing over his beautiful appearance. none had the steel in their guts to approach such man, such power.
He, being a rumored foreigner who traveled beyond the surrounding seas, saw what none thought to exist. embraced many cultures and wrote novels in languages alien to Joseon, yet he was blessed with the face of their ancestors, the face of their country.
The hem of his long cloak cascaded past his brown dress pants, his button up peaking through the multiple layers atop it. a noble topknot was nowhere to be found, his hair rather pulled back into a low tail he had encountered in some country a while back.
Taehyung's cotton clothing were so very contrasting amongst bodies of robe and silk. in all ways but genetical, a stranger to his own country, his own culture— quite the spectacle to see.
Basking in such, stood the devil, in all his raw, blaring glory. shaggy hair and a vermilion glare, gazing pointedly at his newly entered acquaintance.
Long, burly legs rested on the table before him, hands behind his head in a tight lock as the torso stood a bridge between the distanced limbs. ladies swooned at his tensed muscles and coiled veins, protruding the baffling drawings woven in his golden skin, customary to the ridiculous position he rested in.
His glowing eyes examined the foreign man's steady approach ever since the moment the door so urgently creaked open. the grand entrance of an unknown traveller in this part of town, his part of town, was a rather common occurrence. his crowd of fiendish bastards always taking to an impish stand in order to dispose of intruders the young lad does not wish upon his line of sight.
this time, however, they looked to their leader, uncertain and deathly afraid to harm a hair on top the head of the notorious firstborn.
Unnervingly so, he recognized the man within moments and with an annoyed sigh and a shake of his head, allowed him a presence in his tavern.
Simply gazing further at the man who examined the room in benign disgust.
and in the second their eyes crossed and locked together, the tempter took to drinking from his half empty flask, taunting the other with a rise of a well shaped brow and a sly smirk.
Taehyung remained passive and strode through the heaps of people to meet the dead center. receiving stares and lustful claims from promiscuous females which flaunted over another's thighs prior.
he reached the circle of sobriety, meeting eyes with muscular men and giggling women, then in tow, with the inferno yowling beast of the seas.
That whom chuckled in spite at his faults and misconceptions for ages now, and shall continue to for centuries to come.
"Been sometime since you last swung by, brother."
He chuckled, taking to a broad stand and handing his sibling a prior filled glass of whiskey which sat glimmering on the wood table. In his other hand laid a silver flask.
Taehyung took the glass skeptically, fretting of a possible poisoning not uncommon of his mischievous younger blood. However, seeing the strangely genuine grin on the others face, gallantly accepted it.
"It has, hadn't it?"
At the crack of his baritone against icy silence and clinking of glass and steel, the surrounding peers cheered in reconciliation, dancing and shoving, creating a circle between the two men. Colliding of bowls overshadowing the tension between two long term enemies; sons of Seong, of the deities, masters of the sea.
the younger greeted the elder with bottles of ale, a tense celebration between two for tomorrow's sail — a new journey of men and the ancient old mystery.