adora • lookism

21. [Han]gyul Baek (1)

(brace yourselves, my friends)

••••

Hangyul Baek had a very specific view of beauty that he could admit was not quite equal to that of society in general.

He couldn't exactly be sure when it had begun. From birth? From childhood? From the moment he'd learned to see the artifice in people's faces?

He'd spent a period of time wondering if perhaps he was defunct in some way for seeing beauty in what others labelled repulsive. But no matter how often or from what angle he looked, he simply could not fathom how anyone could find those uninspired, identical faces crafted by his father beautiful. In his eyes, they looked like little more than blank paper cut-outs of faces: vapid, meaningless, monotonous... in one word, boring.

Was he a blind man in a world of the seeing? Or was it everyone else who was blind, and he alone who could see?

In the end, he figured that it didn't matter. If he was blind, he would remain blind. If he was alone, let him remain alone. The approval of others hardly mattered when he had an entire kingdom with which he could seek the advancement of true beauty.

Perhaps it could be considered a lonely path. But he had his brother and his work, and that had been enough for him.

That had been enough for him, at least.

••••

"I still don't understand how you can feel assured letting Ari be alone in the same room as Taejin Cheon," said Hangyul Baek, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed. "You know as well as I what he's done. In fact, you probably know better than I do. That man is lower than a worm."

"I've made sure to leave Ari with enough safety measures to take care of such things. She values her freedom, and I should respect that," Eugene replied. Hangyul raised a brow at the video call interface, and Eugene conceded with a smile. "Besides, it's not like I don't know where she is at all times. I'm always keeping an eye out, so it'll only take a couple minutes for me to send someone if she needs it."

Hangyul frowned pensively. 'Keeping an eye out' was only doing the bare minimum, in his opinion. After all... "A lot can happen in a few minutes. I may not like the man, but I have to acknowledge Director Cheon's strength. No matter what kind of tools you've given Ari, I don't see how she would be able to fend that brute off long enough for help to arrive."

"You underestimate her," said Eugene, leaning his cheek into his palm. "And so will Director Cheon. Ari is clever enough to use that. Maybe she doesn't have any overwhelming strength, but she has her own way of taking care of things. Perhaps she wouldn't need much help at all to deal with him."

"I wonder," said Hangyul, unconvinced.

At the doubt on Hangyul's face, Eugene only continued to smile. "If nothing else, I'm glad I can at least rely on you to keep her out of danger, Hangyul."

Hangyul smiled back, equally pleasant. "Well, it's not often that you ask me for a favour, Eugene. I can hardly ignore my old friend's request, not to mention something so simple."

It was his own fortune, really: after all, thanks to Eugene's request to keep an eye out whenever she came around to the clinic, Hangyul had been given the chance to know Ari.

Hangyul glanced at the two screens arranged in front of him. One of them was cluttered with several different display windows, packed with all the data he'd need to study in preparation for his next surgery. The other screen held just a single display window, filling up the entire screen from corner to corner. The sounds of a quiet conversation could be heard from the monitor, which had been set at a volume low enough to be just barely audible.