Yesteryear

Prologue

It had rained yesterday, today and tomorrow. Wooyoung loved the thrumming of the drops on the glass as they raced each other to reach the bottom first. Nothing soothed Wooyoung's sleep more than the pitter-patter of nature's tears against his window, but he hadn't slept at home to relish in it. He had spent the past and future nights in a cosy inn of Edo, 1765, where he had attended a contemporary tea ceremony for Sencha tea. The heady aroma of the green leaves still lingered in his nose and cleared his foggy mind.

Wooyoung got to leave Europe only rarely. The institute he worked at focused on European history, so he wasn't required to explore anywhere beyond those borders. When the director of the department, Bang Yongguk, had offered the journey to Wooyoung, he had agreed immediately. The cultural exchange was a welcome rarity in his field of work.

With one hand in his pocket, the other one clutching his briefcase, Wooyoung scaled the stairs taking two at a time. The building he worked at could have been a museum with its grand noble halls and pillars made of white marble. In some areas, it was just that. Whenever the voyagers got tasked with bringing an item back from their trips for research, it got displayed in expensive glass displays for the public to marvel at.

On his way through the grand foyer, Wooyoung glanced at his wristwatch as he rounded the frolicking fountain in the middle of the hall. Its never-ending stream of water stubbornly tried to reach for the glass dome high above that cast the entire foyer in the bright light of day.

Still enough time to go. Yongguk had asked Wooyoung to join him in his bureau first thing in the morning. When Wooyoung passed his own office, he slipped his jacket off so he wouldn't get too warm. Yongguk froze easily.

With his jacket tucked under his arm, Wooyoung knocked on the door leading to Yongguk's office. Only after a grumbled response, he allowed himself in.

Yongguk sat hunched over his desk surrounded by books and mountains of papers that had no apparent order to Wooyoung but were strictly sorted to suit Yongguk's work process. He had a mug of coffee by his side that left a dark circle on the expensive wood of his working table. When Wooyoung stepped in, the man took his hands out of his messy hair to fix Wooyoung with his stare from eyes that hadn't slept thoroughly in years.

"Morning, Wooyoung," he greeted as he beckoned Wooyoung to sit opposite his mess. As Wooyoung put his bag and jacket down on the ground neatly, he smiled at the scratch in Yongguk's voice. It had been three days or three hundred years since they had last talked to each other. No wonder he sounded gruff.

"Good morning." Wooyoung tried his brightest smile to light the room shrouded in twilight since Yongguk hated light and always shut the blinds halfway. It took some adjusting after the bright halls outside, but Wooyoung was used to it.

"How was Edo?"

Yongguk himself rarely travelled. Despite adoring his job and being fascinated with the concept of travelling through time ever since he had been a child, his body didn't take kindly to the different climates and health efforts it had to adjust to. Most often when he went on missions, he came home exhausted and with a fever. Still, he had far more experience than Wooyoung, who had worked in the field only for two years. As a mentor and supervisor, Wooyoung couldn't ask for a better person.

"Fascinating. Sitting with a shogun is an entirely novel experience compared to meeting a king. Both exude a power we don't see anymore today, but their values and beliefs lie on the opposite spectrum. Aside from power and money, of course."

Yongguk nodded. His chair creaked under his weight as he leaned back. It was old and wobbly, but Yongguk swore on its comfort.

"Even among power and money, they display it differently. It's less about showing off what you have rather than investing it. Our kings lived lavishly; most of their power was for show," Yongguk agreed wisely as he tugged a file from a dangerously wobbling tower. He opened it to check if it was the right one before he handed it over to Wooyoung. Inked skin slipped out from under his pullover when he stretched to reach.