In an effort to forget about school, Kyong slumped his bag off his shoulder and sank into a purple bean bag chair in his room, grabbing his Xbox controller. He clicked open Vanquish and started to play. Shooting and ringing sounded as his fingers worked the keys. It was a bit loud, he decided, so he connected his bluetooth headphones and put them over his ears. It hadn’t been long before the headphones were ripped from his ears. Kyong turned as his heartrate quickened, “Father.” his voice was raspy, but came out nonetheless, biting at his throat.

“I come in to see how your first day at school went, and I find you playing violent games? And games about the American government… what about our government? You could learn more about that!” His fathers hand slapped him across the head, biting at his already existent headache. 

“Ow!” Kyong exclaimed. 

“You are what they call in America, in that song…” His father shook his head and narrowed his eyes, trying to grasp the name of a song. “a teenage dirtbag.” he spat.

Kyong gasped, “That is a great song. I’m actually impressed you have heard of it, father.”

“I only know about that trash because your brother was blasting it earlier. You are both idiots. How did I raise such ungrateful sons?” Kin-woo scrunched his face in disgust.

Kyong made a note to tease Hyeon with that little nugget later. He reached for his headphones but his father kicked them out of his grasp. 

“This is why you will not be king! You have no drive, no interest in our own hierarchy, just America and American things... Games and music.” he waved his hand around like he was trying to get rid of the words as he spoke them. “Maybe I should just ship you off to America, and forget about you becoming king at all.”

“I wish.” Kyong muttered.

“You make this school work, or else.” Kin-woo seethed. 

“Or else what?” Kyong muttered under his breath as his father left. He turned to make sure he was actually gone before retrieving his headset and putting it back on. He had the mind to turn on teenage dirtbag, just to spite his father. “Mika, play, teenage dirtbag.” He grinned as the song played, “Turn it up.” 

Dinner time approached and Kyong knew he needed to approach his father, Courtier and Hyeon. It was a rule in their house that they eat dinner together, no matter what. He paced down the halls, tracing his fingers along the paintings of past royalty that lined the walls. He stopped at the image of his mother, “Don’t worry mom. I won’t believe their lies about you. I know who you really were. You were my best friend, my everything. I know that you believe in me if none of them do.” he gestured with his head toward the dining room. “I will visit you soon, mom. I’m sorry I haven't already.” Kyong whispered. He hadn’t been to visit his mothers gravesite since the funeral. He couldn’t bring himself to. He had been pushing down the feelings as much as he could since her passing. He chose rebelion over sadness. He took five more paces and he was in the dining room. The large oak table spanned across the room. It was outlined with gold trim. Yes, real gold. The chair was tall-backed and velvet, his mother's favourite. He wondered why his father hadn’t changed them out. He had gotten rid of everything else that made him think of her. “Father.” Kyong breathed, attempting to pull out his chair, when a maid rushed over to do it for him. He gave her a small smile and took his seat. Kin-woo just sighed, “Son.” 

Kyong was surprised his father addressed him at all. He looked at his brother next, who had a smirk painted on his face. Now was the time to bring up that nugget, “I didn’t know that ‘Jeongak’ did a version of ‘teenage dirtbag’. That’s very progressive of them.” 

Hyeon glared and Kyong smirked. Next he looked at Courtier, greeting him with his eyes.

“How was your first day of school?” He asked.

“You already asked me that when you picked me up.” Kyong said.

“Yes, but your father might like to know the answer.” Kyong allowed his eyes to drift to Kin-woo, who was looking at him expectantly.

“Yes, we would all like to know about your first day at school.” Hyeon sneered.

“It was fine.” Kyong looked directly at his father, not giving his brother any attention.

“What happened? Your teacher said you were very popular, and that you studied well in all of your classes.” Kin-woo raised his eyebrows.

“You spoke with my teacher?” Kyong felt betrayed.

“Of course. I need to see how you're tracking in school. I asked for daily updates.” 

“Of Course you did.” Kyong muttered. His father seemed not to have heard him so Kyong spoke again, “Why are you treating me like a child?”

“When you stop acting like a child, I will stop treating you like one.” Kin-woo said matter of factly, scooping up some rice and putting it into his mouth. 

Courtier looked at Kyong sympathetically, before turning to Kin-woo. “Maybe you could switch to weekly updates.” 

“Why would I do that?” Kin-woo narrowed his eyes.

“Kyong is doing well in school, his teacher confirmed that, maybe a little bit of trust has been earned.” 

Kyong looked at Courtier graciously, mouthing thank you. Courtier nodded back at him. 

“Fine. Weekly.” Kin-woo said, shovelling more food into his mouth.

“Thank you father.” Kyong said, getting some food for himself. 

“Thank you father.” Hyeon mimicked, kicking Kyong’s foot under the table. 

Kyong glared at him.

“That’s enough,” Kin-woo said to both of them in a non-caring voice, not bothering to look up at them between bites. 

Kyong knew then that he didn’t care as much about his son’s brotherly relationship as he did for his own tolerance of them fighting. 

That night, Louella walked into Kyong’s room through the sliding door that separated it from outside and slumped down onto his bed. “It’s about time you finished dinner. I've been waiting outside your door for an hour.”

Kyong rolled his eyes, “Tonight’s theme was all about how my father watches me at school.”

“What do you mean, he watches you?” Her eyes widened with concern.

“He gets my teacher to give him daily reports on what I do. It was my first day away from him in forever and he was still keeping tabs on me.”

“That's sickening.” She screwed up her face.

“Yeah, and if it wasn’t for Courtier, suggesting he change it to weekly check-ins, I would suffocate.” Kyong, sunk into his beanbag chair and pulled over his controller, starting up the TV. He leaned forward and pulled over a second controller for Louella, holding out a controller to her. She took the controller and sat cross-legged next to him. 

“You know what you need to do?” she waited for him to sign in and get the game up.

“What?” He asked, without looking at her. His focus was purely on getting the game running.

“You need to go harder.” She turned to him, “What did you do today to spite your father?”

“Nothing really. I didn’t get the chance.” He admitted.

“What do you mean you didn’t get the chance? You were there for eight hours!” she was gobsmacked.

Kyong looked at her, “Well, I posted that Instagram story, so that was one thing. My father was so mad, but when I arrived, there was a mob of students and…”

“And?” she prompted.

“And it kind of freaked me out.”

Louella stared at him, “You are Kim, Kyong. You always have mobs of people waiting to see you.”

“Hey, I haven't been out in public for a long time, okay? It was confronting.” 

Louella rolled her eyes, “Listen. You need to try harder. You need to do something really big. Make that weekly check in count.”

“Like what?” Kyong sounded defeated.

“I don't know. Something huge, something big enough to get you sent back home. Something like fraternising with other students… or a teacher, even better!” her eyes were huge with excitement.

“Fraternising with a teacher…” Kyong but his lip. “That would work.” he turned to Louella, “But you know that if I do this, It will rule out any chance of us getting married one day…”

“Even better.” She smirked. “Okay, who could it be?” she was wiggling in her spot on the floor. “This is probably the baddest thing we have done to date.” she couldn’t get rid of the smile on her face.

Kyong laughed, “You're probably right.” he mused before adding, “There is this one teacher, Veronika…”