DTE Chapter 1.1

The streets of the makeshift market were saturated with all sorts of petty odors. The sharp tang of spices imported from the western regions, the incense smoke rising from shrines where people offered fervent prayers, the bloody reek of pork and beef, the clinking stench of money, the scent of night-blooming flowers from a single evening of passion, the smell of tears from courtesans left alone, and the blood of lovers who had fled in love only to be caught, beaten, and killed.
At the very end of the market street lay the red-lantern district, a brothel quarter tacitly permitted by the authorities, true to its name. Even at night, the area blazed with dazzling lights as bright as daylight. No—rather, the street came alive even more as night fell. The buildings clustered in this den of vice varied in shape, but they all shared one thing in common: they sold sex. There were elegant establishments that imitated refined tastes and accepted only nobles as guests, places that dealt exclusively in young male courtesans, and even the most dilapidated brothels where those broken in body and spirit ended up as a last resort.
Tok. Tok. Tok. Ttuk-ttuk-ttuk.
Even in a place like this, there was a small temple tucked in one corner. The harsher life became, the more people yearned to lean on the mercy of the Buddha.
After offering a small handful of rice and a few coins at the hall enshrining the Medicine Buddha, as they emerged, a monk in shabby robes who guarded the place came out, striking a small wooden fish gong in greeting. When the courtesan sisters bowed in return, So Seo—who had been hiding between the hems of their skirts—unexpectedly bowed his head as well. The monk recited a passage from the sutras in a low, murmuring voice. So Seo couldn’t understand a single word of the monk’s droning chant, but he liked the deep resonance of the old monk’s quiet voice and the rhythm of the sutra verses.
The edge of the marketplace where the small temple stood was at least somewhat serene. The sounds of the temple were quieter and more peaceful than the clamor of the market, and that was nice.
“Child.”
Suddenly coming to his senses, So Seo found the monk in shabby robes standing right in front of him.
“Poor thing. Your fate will be harsh.”
At six years old, So Seo knew what “harsh” meant, but he didn’t know what “fate” was. He didn’t understand the old monk’s words, but he felt a little frightened all the same. So Seo had to be a good boy. A child born to a courtesan with no known father—and a boy at that—was usually sold off once he reached five or six. There was no reason to keep around a half-useful male child.

Moreover, So Seo had a face that strikingly resembled his mother, Seol Jung-mae, a courtesan famous for her beauty. For a boy, his features were excessively pretty. Baby So Seo’s skin was white and glossy like the surface of porcelain, and even though it wasn’t a cold winter, his cheeks glowed faintly red like flower petals painted with diluted pink pigment in a watercolor. His large eyes were round, his nose tip soft, his lips full and pouty. Every time the child blinked, his long eyelashes fluttered like butterfly wings. If that was a problem, then it was a problem. A courtesan’s son with such a rare, beautiful face for a boy was perfect to be sold to the male brothels.
I’m not harsh at all… Lord Gong, Mother, the noonas—they all said I’m good… So Seo mumbled as if making an excuse.
The monk, whose eyes had swept over So Seo’s delicate features, clicked his tongue.
“…I can’t do anything about the hungry demon that clings to you, waiting to devour you in the future.”
He pressed his index finger firmly between Se Seo’s brows, closed his eyes, and muttered something.
“Born anew yet unable to fly or sing—such a pitiful fate. Around the time of Chilseok, do not go near the water’s edge.”
Frightened, So Seo stepped back unsteadily. Caw, caw. Somewhere, the cries of crows echoed chaotically. When he looked up, the monk’s familiar shabby face suddenly seemed somehow inhuman.
“When Chilseok¹ comes, and the magpie bridge is built… that demon will be able to cross the water and come to you.”
“Soso, what are you doing? Hurry up and come.”
Startled, So Seo jolted at Hwa-yeon noona’s voice. When he looked around, the noonas were already far ahead. The shabby-robed monk who had been standing so close had vanished.

“If you’re late, I won’t buy you any candy.”

Only then did So Seo dash forward on his short legs. The flat, round marble-like sugar candies were among the rare treats that tasted sweetly cloying to him. They weren’t something he could have anytime—only when there was a feast, or when the noonas visiting the market were feeling generous enough to spare one or two for him.
Thinking of the sweet bead candy, the frightening voice of the monk from earlier strangely faded and bleached from So Seo’s mind remarkably quickly.
Six-year-old Se Seo was happy in his ignorance. He didn’t know what the red lanterns hanging outside the gate meant, nor what the sisters there did to earn money. He thought the arrival of big guests was simply an exciting occasion for a party, so as he sucked on the candy the sisters passed down to him, melting it in his mouth with smacking sounds, he could smile more happily than anyone.

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“Where are you going, Se Seo?”
So Seo, hurrying along while hugging his bipa², turned at the voice calling from behind. It was Park, the steward, who assisted Lord Gong, the owner of Hongseon Pavilion, and handled most of its affairs.
“Um… over there, to the riverside… It’s too hot.”
So Seo answered hesitantly, glancing nervously.
“The riverside? Going to Manpa Pavilion again?”
Instead of answering, So Seo rolled his eyes and watched carefully. It was a silent affirmation.
Park narrowed his eyes and scanned So Seo up and down with disapproval, but he didn’t stop him. As for Se Seo, he was, for now, a musician who played the bipa at Hongseon Pavilion. Originally, musicians were hired from outside on a payment basis as needed, so Se Seo was the first to become an exclusive musician for the Hongseon Pavilion.
Even Park, who had worked there a long time, found Se Seo’s position a bit ambiguous. When he was younger and easier to handle, they treated him roughly, but now it was awkward to order him around carelessly in many ways.
“You know there’s a gathering this evening, right? Lord Seong is coming.”
“Yes. I’ll be back by yusi³.”
“Come back by sinsi⁴.”
Park tightened the time even more. Se Seo nodded obediently. Park scanned him up and down disapprovingly again, but soon looked away as if it were troublesome.
“Fine, then. Just don’t faint from running into some old ghost there.”
“There are no ghosts there.”
“Who said that? Old ghosts appear wherever someone has died. They say a mad woman hanged herself there on a swing.”
“I’m not falling for it…”
Se Seo muttered under his breath, but Park pretended not to hear.
“Anyway, just don’t get eaten by an old ghost. Hurry and go.”
“How would a ghost eat a person… It’s not even a mountain spirit.”

So Seo grumbled quietly, but Park Seobang waved his hand as if to say he was done talking and to get lost. So Seo found Park Seobang a bit annoying, but he couldn’t oppose him in size, age, or status, so he always kept his mouth shut.

In any case, since Park Seobang hadn’t made a fuss, it seemed So Seo could safely go out today.
Creak. He carefully opened the side gate next to the main gate used by the workers. True to its name, Hongseon Pavilion’s gate was painted red. He cautiously stepped over the red threshold that reached his knees.
Hongseon Pavilion was one of the top brothels in the makeshift market outside the south gate. Its scale was accordingly grand. Aside from the red lanterns hanging at the gate, from the outside, it at least looked like the mansion of some respectable noble. Of course, Se Seo, who had never once entered the capital inside the city walls, couldn’t be sure since he had never seen a real noble’s residence.
As soon as he stepped outside the large gate, his mood lifted. Humming a tune, Se Seo walked while hugging his bipa. His steps were as light as his small frame. Perhaps because his body felt light, he walked with fluttering, leaf-like steps.
The capital was nestled between mountains and a river, and the makeshift market stretched long and narrow between a low spur of the mountain range encircling the capital and the slow-flowing lower reaches of the river. To the east, it connected to the main road extending from the capital’s south gate, while to the west, it was bounded by a stream flowing into the river.
The red-lantern district was clustered at the western end, in a quiet area where the mountain and the stream met. It was said that first-class brothels inside the capital sold only liquor and artistic performances and stood proudly even in the bustling areas, but second-class establishments like Hongseon Pavilion outside the walls, where secret prostitution took place, were not places one could visit openly, no matter how nicely packaged, so they were hidden away like this.
The place where the mountain, river, and stream converged had quite a poetic scenery. People’s tastes were similar; on the best spot atop a cliff reached by climbing the mountain a little, there stood a serene pavilion. The plaque on the pavilion was quite old and faded. People called this place Manpa Pavilion, so the characters on the plaque were probably read as Man-pa-jeong. Se Seo couldn’t read the letters, but he could feel that they were written not with forceful strokes but with neat, refined brushwork.
Such pavilions were usually owned by the state or nobles and generally off-limits, but Manpa Pavilion was an exception. There was no one guarding nearby, and to begin with, people seemed to avoid even coming near. It was because of rumors that someone had died in the pavilion and their ghost haunted it.
According to what Se Seo had heard, beside this pavilion with its fine view, there had once been the private residence of a favored concubine. But when the concubine fell from favor and was confined to that residence, unable to endure it, she went mad and eventually hanged herself in the pavilion. It was said her resentful spirit, with its tongue hanging long, wandered nearby.
Rumors in the makeshift market were take-it-or-leave-it, but apparently quite a few believed them, as hardly anyone came near the pavilion.
From Se Seo’s perspective—well. Se Seo wasn’t unafraid of ghosts, but the timid boy was generally a little more afraid of people than ghosts. Se Seo feared the bustle of the market streets and the unfamiliar, rough people there. So Manpa Pavilion, where ghosts appeared—at least for the timid Se Seo—was the most comfortable place.
Even if a ghost was there, it couldn’t harm anyone before sunset, right? He thought with some small comfort.
Moreover, Se Seo wasn’t doing anything to disrespect the dead in the pavilion. He simply sat quietly, enjoyed the breeze, watched the boats floating on the river a bit, plucked the bipa strings a little, and returned—a quiet guest.
The reason Se Seo bothered to bring and play the bipa in this scenic spot was partly because he knew no other amusements, and even if he did, he had no friends to enjoy them with. Of course, Se Seo did have a few peers he was friendly with, but the friends he could count on one hand were busy with their own tasks and couldn’t play with him in broad daylight.
Leaning on the railing of Manpa Pavilion, he watched the boats floating on the river. In truth, the boats on this river were mostly familiar faces. It was the river closest to the capital. Not just any boat could come and go.
Yet today, the scenery felt somehow alien. Like a perfectly fitting portrait with a splash of ink staining it. Se Seo narrowed his eyes and examined that “ink splash.”
There was an unfamiliar boat floating there. Small, shabby, and worn.
The boats plying the river closest to the capital were generally well-equipped merchant vessels, and occasionally military ships. On fine days, there were sometimes nobles out for boat excursions, and their vessels were as lavish as their status, easy to recognize.
As if sensing Se Seo’s gaze, the small boat swayed, and a person emerged from beneath the canopy.
“Hup.”
Se Seo swallowed his breath without realizing.
The man was so tall and large that the small boat seemed pitiful—like a jangseung totem pole. He wore a flowing off-white dopo⁵ robe with a pale Jangpo draped loosely over it, as if it might slip off.
His jet-black hair reached down to his waist and was completely unbound. It was extremely rare for an adult man to wear his hair down. Yet the man didn’t look merely conspicuous—he didn’t seem strange at all. Well, perhaps it was because of his face.
He was strikingly handsome. Even from afar, he stood out immediately. Undeniably good-looking. His forehead was broad and clear, the eyes beneath deep-set, the nose straight and high.
The man stepped onto the prow. Every time he moved on the boat, it tilted helplessly between his footsteps and the current, creaking and groaning, yet he maintained his balance effortlessly.
His hair fluttered in the river breeze like spreading ink.
In the man’s hand was a white bottle with a long neck—likely containing liquor. He poured himself a drink in a matching cup. Tipping it back, he downed it in one gulp, poured another, and then emptied that one straight into the river. The single mouthful of liquid trickled from the white cup into the greenish water. It seemed like some solemn ritual, or perhaps merely a meaningless indulgence.
Indulgence, yes. The man appeared indulgent. Yet at the same time, he seemed profoundly ascetic. It felt as if he could just sail away, far, far on that boat, with nothing to fear or restrain him. All of it felt utterly unreal to Se Seo. Like a human who had lost his way and fallen into the immortal realm.
…So Se Seo wanted to capture that moment before the man disappeared. But since he couldn’t paint or compose poetry, the only thing he could do was music. Se Seo fumbled for his bipa and hugged it to his chest.
Se Seo had to play the bipa right now.

If someone asked when he could play his best? Se Seo could answer confidently: When he had eaten a lot of delicious food.
To do anything—whether pulling out a new melody or repeating a memorized tune like an automaton—his mood had to be good. And Se Seo’s mood improved when he ate delicious things, so to play the bipa well, he needed to eat a lot of delicious food. Lord Gong, the owner of Hongseon Pavilion who oversaw Se Seo’s every move, seemed to know this aspect at least, as he wasn’t stingy with food for Se Seo.
But today, Se Seo had overslept. Meaning he hadn’t eaten breakfast properly. Hongseon Pavilion was a communal living space. If you didn’t eat when others did, there was almost no food left. Yet even so, Se Seo frantically plucked the strings. It was a melody even he had never heard before.
Se Seo moved his fingers wildly over the strings. He was truly out of his mind then. He couldn’t remember how long he had been lost—no, focused. Yes, he hadn’t lost his mind; he had been focused.
On what?
Twing—
Lost in thought, Se Seo’s hand plucked a string. Sitting on the platform used as a shared sleeping area by several musicians, he slowly recalled the performance at Manpa Pavilion. His initially slow fingers gradually moved faster.
Se Seo didn’t think he was particularly smart, but when it came to the bipa, remembering a tune he had played even once wasn’t difficult. The problem was creating new melodies. Se Seo would sometimes effortlessly draw out melodies no one had ever heard, like pulling a silk thread from a boiled silkworm cocoon. How he did it—Se Seo didn’t know either. He just had to be in the mood, and it was less something his head did and more something his fingers did.
Tak!
“Ugh!”
Twing! His plucking hand slipped and missed. In the middle of his engrossed playing, something hard struck the back of Se Seo’s head. It was a small bamboo flute. Holding the flute and glaring at him sideways was Jeong Man-i, a musician who played it.
“Why, why did you hit me! It hurts!”
“Why are you whining and throwing a fit, you little shit.”
Jeong Man-i said in a rough voice.
“What did I do? You always pick on me for no reason…!”
Se Seo grumbled, feeling deeply wronged. Jeong Man-i seemed especially sensitive today. No, he had been sensitive for the past three months straight. From snippets of conversation he overheard, it seemed something with the girl he liked wasn’t going well—but how could things with a girl drag on for months without working out? At that point, wasn’t it just not meant to be?
Of course, he hadn’t heard it directly from Jeong Man-i.
“If you play that whiny tune again, just watch!”
Jeong Man-i threatened. Se Seo scowled deeply. Whiny tune? Unfair! Se Seo didn’t play with any grand meaning, but when this melody was born, he hadn’t been “whining” at all.
“You don’t even know what you’re talking about…”
Though their heights weren’t much different, Se Seo muttered quietly because he was still scared to talk back. But the sensitive Jeong Man-i seemed to hear it anyway. What did you say, you little— he raised the flute as if to beat him. Just as Se Seo hugged his bipa, shrank back, and squeezed his eyes shut, the door rattled open.
“Hey, hey, stop it. I told you not to fight.”
An old man who played the daegeum stepped in. Blocked by the elder, Jeong Man-i didn’t have the nerve to throw a tantrum in front of him; he clutched his head roughly, unable to contain his anger, and stormed out, kicking the door.
Bang—creak… The innocent door, kicked for no reason, whimpered pitifully alone. Se Seo frowned. The door was already old and rickety… Lord Gong, the owner, rarely repaired the workers’ quarters, so Se Seo grew even angrier.
Tsk tsk tsk, the old man clicked his tongue openly.
“Be understanding, hmm? Boys that age—when mating doesn’t go well, they always cause that kind of ruckus.”
Se Seo couldn’t agree. As far as he knew, Jeong Man-i was only one year older than him. So Se Seo was also a “boy that age.” But Se Seo had no desire to lash out at those around him because “mating” wasn’t going well, and to begin with, he wasn’t particularly interested in that “mating” thing.
“But really. Has puberty hit the kid, too? Did you meet a girl somewhere?”
Calling Jeong Man-i a “boy that age” yet stubbornly treating Se Seo like a child. Puberty? If it was coming, it should have come long ago. Se Seo had undergone his coming-of-age ceremony and was now an adult. Even that had been late because his growth was slow compared to his peers. He had the ceremony, cut his hair, and had new clothes made only last year because there was no sign of further growth, even after waiting.
“No…”
“Well, it is about time for the kid’s puberty to start… but could you even meet a girl? Lord Gong doesn’t let you go alone toward the market side, right?”
Se Seo denied it, but no one really listened to him.
Waving his hands frantically as if to say it was impossible thousands of miles away. Of course, as the old man said, it was impossible. Lord Gong often tried to control Se Seo on the same level as the courtesans of Hongseon Pavilion.
Unlike the other musicians, Se Seo had been born and raised right there in Hongseon Pavilion. Because his mother, Seol Jung-mae, had been a courtesan there. Seol Jung-mae was famously beautiful—too beautiful to be a second-class courtesan engaging in secret prostitution—and for a time, she was the top-selling courtesan in the red-lantern district. Even now, among the older merchants, “Seol Jung-mae” was used as a synonym for a beauty.
But as endings always went, Seol Jung-mae became pregnant. She claimed the child was from a “big guest,” the son of some grand household inside the four great gates. She insisted on giving birth because Se Seo was the child of that high-born man. —Of course, the great household, whose face and name were unknown, did not acknowledge Se Seo as their child.
Such things were common in the red-lantern quarter. And Se Seo, unrecognized as a bastard son, grew up eating cold rice under watchful eyes in Hongseon Pavilion. Still, Lord Gong was relatively generous. He hadn’t driven Se Seo out. Frankly, there was no need to keep a child like Se Seo around in Hongseon Pavilion. To be blunt, selling him as a servant—or, since he resembled his mother, selling him as a male courtesan—would have been more profitable. But Lord Gong didn’t do that.
Instead, Lord Gong strictly supervised Se Seo. Preventing him from going alone toward the market side was part of that “supervision.” When he was young, it made sense—a child wandering alone was dangerous, especially since Se Seo was small, somehow looked easy to bully, pretty-faced, and walked with fluttering steps. But even after his belated coming-of-age ceremony, the supervision continued.
It was baffling why Lord Gong still treated him so strictly when he was now a full-grown adult man. Well, he didn’t have major complaints about it. Originally, Se Seo was a shy child, and from a young age, he had heard until his ears were calloused how ruthless the market streets were and how frightening the merchants there were, without blood or tears. According to what Lord Gong had repeatedly emphasized, if a child like Se Seo wandered the market alone, he would be kidnapped by merchants and end up selling his body in some far-off foreign land. Growing up hearing such things, one didn’t particularly want to go out alone.
“It really isn’t… I just played it while messing around alone.”
“The tune was so weepy—we thought you’d glimpsed some unforgettable girl over a wall in your dreams.”
“Still, don’t play that kind of tune here; go far away to pluck it. If you play here, it echoes all the way to the inner quarters. You know Jin-hong is still bedridden, right?”
Another musician, besides the old man, chimed in with advice.
“Yes…”
When Se Seo meekly hugged his bipa and nodded repeatedly, the surrounding musicians patted his head casually as if praising a child, saying, Good boy, good.
Se Seo hugged his bipa and went outside. He decided to play a bit farther from the inner quarters—say, near the chicken coop. The poor chickens might have their sleep disturbed, but that was an unavoidable punishment for being confined.
As expected, when Se Seo began plucking the strings, commotion arose among the chickens. Cluck-cluck-cluck-cluck. Coo-coo. But as the playing continued, the chickens seemed to adapt and soon quieted down.
Looking at the chickens’ round, beady eyes, Se Seo retraced his memory.
‘Hic,’
At that moment—the moment Se Seo, frantically focused, came back to his senses—it was because his eyes met the man’s—the man standing on the prow.
Their eyes met. He was sure they met. Without realizing, Se Seo ducked lower beneath the pavilion railing. The man’s sharp, elongated eyes were chilling even without expression, sending goosebumps down his spine.
No, no—it couldn’t be. It must be a mistake. Though Manpa Pavilion was on a low cliff, the distance was considerable to the naked eye. From below on the river, the pavilion at the cliff’s edge would naturally be visible, but shaded by overhanging evergreens, whether someone was inside wouldn’t be seen.
Se Seo turned again and peeked cautiously over the railing. The man’s gaze was still fixed here. As if searching for something, his stare was persistent. Somehow frightened again, Se Seo hid behind a railing pillar. This wouldn’t do, he thought. Hugging his bipa, he crawled on his belly like a snake and escaped the pavilion.
Then he fled back to Hongseon Pavilion.
It wasn’t that he had glimpsed an unforgettable girl over a wall, even in dreams. For one, the other party was a man, and it wasn’t in “that” sense either… but anyway, he had sidelong-glanced at a new person. In Se Seo’s small world of monotony and repetition, that could count as a noteworthy event.
When his recollection ended, Se Seo’s fingers stopped. He stared at the chickens in the coop, still making gurgling sounds with their beady eyes.
“Does it sound weepy—weepy to you guys, too?”
The chickens gave no answer.