British-Korean player Jae-in Kwon.
She is a world-class violinist and the leader of EverLake, one of the top 10 guilds in the world and one of the top four guilds in the UK.
She is also an artist with their own sense of musicality.
That’s why most people think it’s strange when Jae-in Kwon makes a somewhat weird remark- they only think, ‘Wow, the Blue Violinist is so unique from other people!’
That is why on the day she performed at Ho-yeon Hall…My classmates and I were flustered but didn’t think much of Jae-in Kwon’s words and actions.
That was my mistake.
Whoosh-!
The sound of the wind grew a little louder, so I looked up at the sky and saw an air-staged limousine landing.
Jared Lee came out of the limo, which stopped without an engine sound.
“Hello, Ui-shin. Get in.”
“Yeah, Hello.”Jared Lee spoke perfect Korean today also, and it felt like watching a dubbed show.
Jared Lee looked sickly than when I met him in front of Seokchon Lake.
The shine on his blonde hair was gone, and his cheeks were hollow.
“Sorry for calling you at this late hour. Jae-in wanted to come herself, but she’s in bad shape now……”
Jared Lee looked truly sorry.
At first, Jae-in Kwon said she would come to see me at Eun-kwang High.
While I was waiting for her at the main gate, I got a phone call again, and Jae-in said:
[My teammates won’t let me. I’m sorry. Please come, Ui-shin. I’ll send you a ride.]
I assumed what was happening and agreed to it right away.
Though, I didn’t predict that the team sub-master would come to pick me up.
“The team doctor and the other teammates tried to stop her, but Jae-in is stubborn······. We had trouble stopping her from coming here. She only allowed you to come on the condition that I myself pick you up.”
The car headed to the destination without any noise.
I heard Jared Lee muttering weakly to himself.
“This is all my fault……”
* * *
West Seoul Lake, Shinwol-dong, Yangcheon-gu, Seoul.
The building of the EverLake team near there.
On the surface, the building was a normal wooden one that beautifully matched the scenery, but the inside was heavily built with Other-world metal.
‘I guess, after all, they’ve gone through, this is understandable.’
The EverLake saw the British association getting destroyed by the Original clan, and during the Manchester Other-world attack, they lost the majority of their teammates.
They can’t help being sensitive to safety.
When I passed through three security portals connecting the interior of the building, Jared Lee, who was still sending messages to someone on the device, spoke to me.
“Ui-shin, um…… I have a request.”
“Tell me.”
“Can you encourage Jae-in to eat some food? She’s not eating these days. She’s an excellent player so she’s hanging on, but we don’t know when she’ll collapse. She won’t even use recovery item cards……!”
So Jae-in Kwon’s condition was more serious than I thought.
“Yeah, sure I will.”
“Great! Thank you, Ui-shin!”
Jared Lee began writing a bunch of messages with a gleeful face.
Perhaps he was sending messages like, ‘Bring all the food you can!’
As I passed through the fourth portal with Jared, I saw a door with blue violins carved on it.
In front of that Other-world metal door, EverLake team members were standing, all fidgeting.
“Is this that student? Ui-shin Cho?”
“Yeah, that’s the kid who came as a staff member. Long time no see.”
“Please try to get Jae-in to eat something. Please!”
There were also people who came as staff to the Ho-yeon Hall.
The person closest to the door opened it and smiled with their sullen eyes.
“We leave Jae-in in your good hands.”
No one followed through the door, maybe because the team members had been given a warning in advance.
‘The blue violinist’s room. Exactly how one would’ve imagined it.’
In a blue frame made of Other-world metal were posters of all Jae-in’s concerts.
On one side of the wall was analog printed posters, and on the other side was a hologram with a video of Jae-in Kwon’s performance.
On the display stand under the poster and hologram were trophies and awards.
‘She must compose and practice here, too.’
All over the room were dozens of music stands with music notes and quills placed on them.
On the table were ink bottles and blank music notes.
But ironically, here at this time, there was a sound that didn’t get along at all with the great violinist’s room.
Screech- squeak!
Noise that was likely to destroy my ears flowed out.
That sound, coming from the back of the room, could even be mistaken as an Enemy’s horrid cry as it died painfully.
‘Is it the sound of Jae-in Kwon?!’
As I approached the source of the sound, Jae-in looked back at me and stopped playing that destructiveness or whatever that was.
“Hello, Ui-shin.”
Jae-in Kwon was standing there, face pale as a ghost.
It was the same, calm voice I heard over the phone, but seeing that face, the voice seemed like it was pretending to be okay.
“Sorry to make you come all this way. Have a seat.”
I sat on the feathered-fabric sofa and saw that the table in front of me was filled with all sorts of food.
Pudding, jell-o, porridge, soup……
The food were all in a bowl the size of a paper cup and were all easy to digest.
The drinks were on a cart because there was no space left on the table, and they were all caffeine-free drinks.
“Can I eat them?”
“Of course.”
“You should eat too, senior.”
I said, serving myself a pudding with tart cherry and a glass of wild strawberry juice.
“I, well……”
“It’s uncomfortable to eat alone without the host.”
I thought of the EverLake team members, including Jared Lee, who would be standing nervously outside the door.
Jae-in Kwon hesitated and chose a bowl of blueberry jell-o.
But she didn’t pick up her spoon.
It seemed like I couldn’t solve her refusing to eat.
“You said you had something to say, tell me.”
“It’s about you, senior, and Lenna Lee.”
Thud.
The jell-o bowl Jae-in was holding fell to the floor.
The bowl didn’t break thanks to the blue carpet, but she didn’t move and just lifelessly stared at her fingers.
“Can I keep talking?”
I decided to ask permission about this topic.
Strictly speaking, I’m completely an outsider on this.
“Yeah. You’re friends with her, and even saved her once.”
She was looking at me with her blue eyes.
Jae-in Kwon even knows I saved Lenna Lee.
She gave me permission, so I opened my mouth.
“It was weird since Ho-yeon Hall. You and the EverLake team acted awkwardly.”
“Awkward? How?”
“The first thing that hit me was the name.”
On the day of the Ho-yeon hall performance.
All my classmates were wearing staff nameplates with our names written hugely.
“The name ‘Lenna/Lena’ is very rare in our country. If you check the name registration system, there are less than 300 people who use the name Lenna.” (Lena and Lenna are spelled the same in Korea.)
“Is that a problem?”
“Lena is the name of your mother and the name of your song, the one you played for encore, ‘for LENA.’ So if you see a person who uses that rare name in Korea, the normal reaction would be to point it out. But no one mentioned it, as it they promised not to, that day.”
The members of the EverLake team were very kind to us that day and had many conversations with us.
They even wanted us to come to the after-party.
However, Lenna’s name was not mentioned once.
It was so different from Blue Tiger’s disciples, who reacted quite heavily when they saw my name, Ui-shin Cho, written on my nameplate.
“You seemed surprised that Lenna was a staff instead of her name. So it was like you knew she was coming already but didn’t know how.”
Jae-in stared silently at me as if my inferring was not wrong.
“The second thing that bothered me was the psychic-made violin.”
“It bothered you that I gave her a psychic-made violin? I have close to a hundred violins, so it wouldn’t be strange to present one.”
“Yes, actually, the fact that you had so many became a clue.”
“What do you mean.”
I looked around at the many posters and videos on the wall.
“All of your many violins are blue. You’re famous for playing only blue violins.”
“Oh……”
“The violin you presented to Lenna was platinum, right? You prepared it in advance to give it to her if she seemed interested in violins. Otherwise, it’s hard to explain why you had a platinum violin just before the performance.”
In the 1,000-page material Saeron Moon gave me.
When I checked all the information about Jae-in’s violins there, I did not see any violins other than blue.
Tremont Blue, Royal Blue, Queen Blue, Bing Blue, Oriental Blue, and so on.
There were various blue violins, but nowhere was there a platinum one.
Just like her player nickname, ‘Blue Violinist,’ she was obsessed with blue-bodied violins, and this obsession had never been broken.
She did not refute my opinions.
“The third is Jared Lee.”
“Jared?”
“It was strange that Jared Lee, the team sub-master, came to see our class, gave instructions directly, and helped us.”
“He might have done it because you guys were my school juniors.”
“Even so, there were more strange things.”
I deployed a hologram of the list of the Ho-yeon hall staff members among the materials sent by Saeron Moon.
Among them, I showed her the last page, with me, Se-eum, Lenna, and Yuri’s name, with the description, ‘Eun-kwang High’ written beside them.
“This is the list that your team members received that day of the concert.”
“Is this a problem?”
“Yes.”
How?”
“Jared Lee knew our age. No age or grade is written anywhere on the staff list.”
It is known that the Anonymous Supernova was a first year, so it was possible that they had guessed my age.
However, there was no information about player nicknames on the staff list either.
The only people who associate my real name with my nickname are school officials, or have been introduced to someone in advance, or have investigated me.
‘It’s hard to think that those who have come to Korea in a hurry knew that.’
Jared Lee said that day:
“Besides, these kids are still young. Only seventeen.”
“I thought of the possibility that he could’ve done his research about us with our names, but there was too little time. He must’ve known Lenna’s age for sure, so that’s why he said that.”
We became staff at the last minute.
Jiho Hwang was debating whether we would be staff or not till the end.
“For these reasons, I think that the team members of EverLake, especially you, have known Lenna before.”
“Yeah, I know Lena.”
From here it was just my guess.
“And Jared Lee was in trouble a while ago when it was revealed that he had sent more than 30 billion won over 10 years to a relative player who was permanently excommunicated for his involvement in the Dream auction incident.”
Jae-in’s face became paler.
“The source of the funds transferred is your private property. However, you never interacted with a player nor have received a benefit from the dream auction.”
So maybe Jae-in Kwon wanted to financially support someone through Jared Lee.
“I think you were purely trying to help someone financially.”
30 billion is not a small amount of money.
So it has to be someone that is precious enough to ask Jared to go through all that trouble, like family.
‘Jae-in said that she lost her mother and brother during the Great Manchester attack, but what if she had a family member that survived?’
Jae-in is a British Korean.
Her father is a Korean who uses the surname ’Kwon’.
Her mother is English with the name ’Lena’.
Although it isn’t common, some people, especially in English-speaking countries, name kids after grandparents.
The princess, who was born into the British royal family after 25 years, was also named after her great-grandmother and grandmother.
The person Jae-in gave the platinum psychic-made violin to was ‘Lenna’ Lee.
Is this a coincidence?
‘And just like who Jared was sending money to, Lenna’s parents were involved in the Dream auction and became permanently expelled from player’s association. What if they were the same people?’
They had the same surname as Jared, ‘Lee.’
Her name is the same as Jae-in’s mom, ‘Lenna.’
There were still parts where I was vaguely guessing, but still, it was hard to see all this as just a coincidence.
“Is Lenna Lee’s real name, Lenna Kwon?”
Jae-in looked at me without saying anything for a while.
“That’s right. Lenna is my only family.”
A drop of tear fell from Jae-in’s blue eyes.
“Lenna is the daughter of my brother who died in battle…… My niece.”
