The Art of a New Age

"No matter how I look at it, the world is going to love you. Am I wrong?"

Not that he would have believed me if I had told him he was.

"..."

I couldn't give him any answer at all.

It was the instinct of a giant who had stood unbent through every storm of his age. Grandfather, of course, would trust that sense of his long before he trusted a word from me.

A heavy silence cut across the space between us. Then he broke it.

"So. You'll support Yugeon's dream. That's what you're telling me."

"Yes."

"But listen. If your brother's dream has nothing to do with Hyeon-gang, what do you mean to do then?"

"Pardon?"

"If he puts the business aside and says he'll live his own life, it won't be a matter of you supporting the boy. You'll have to step onto the front line and run things yourself, won't you?"

As expected, he never let anything pass quietly.

I had barely clicked my tongue when he pressed on.

"What, no answer?"

"I understand what you're saying. But isn't it a little early to fix my brother's dream in place?"

"He's a boy going into his third year of middle school. How much longer am I supposed to wait?"

"..."

He could have crushed the matter by sheer weight, and still he had left me a kind of opening. What more was I going to ask? The moment I got back, the first thing I had to do was talk to my brother.

Perhaps he read the thought. Grandfather reached for the telephone at once and pressed a number with the ease of long habit.

"It's me. Tell Yugeon I want to see him. If he leaves now, it shouldn't take more than thirty minutes, should it?"

His eyes stayed fixed on me, as if the conversation were with me and not with the receiver.

"Good. Have him waiting."

He set the receiver down. Then, slowly, one corner of his mouth lifted.

At that same hour.

He had never been particularly fond of games. And yet his studies had not suffered for it either.

After Martin took over the tutoring, Park Yugeon discovered that he actually liked to study. Unlike school, which only ever told him to memorize, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Martin taught what difficult problem a given formula had been invented to solve, and by what path it had developed from there. To Yugeon, raised on learning by rote, it was nothing short of a new world, and so he had no choice but to work several times as hard.

Perhaps it was because Yugeon followed so earnestly. Even Martin, once so blunt, began little by little to open his heart—enough that on his days off he would often come find the boy and pass the time with him, easy and unguarded. Today was the same, though there was no lesson at all.

"Close in! The ship beside you—destroy it! Yes, that one!"

"Aw, I'm dead."

"Mathematically speaking, you should have dodged."

"Nnngh. Isn't there another pack?"

"We already went through all of them last time."

"So they don't get updated, then."

"I have been saving my allowance, but..."

"I thought you might be. So I bought one!"

Martin must have been expecting a cheer.

He did not get one.

"..."

The boy wore a blank face, as if his mind had gone somewhere else entirely.

"What? Is something wrong?"

"No. It's nothing."

"I... I think I'm just tired."

Martin didn't believe him.

"What is it? Why are you like this?"

"..."

"You went to that event today, didn't you? Did something happen?"

Yugeon looked tangled up inside. There were plenty of thoughts in him, and not one of them settled. Maybe that was why it took him so long just to open his mouth.

"I was just... a little envious."

"...?"

"Today's event. It was where they formally recommended Jihun as Hyeon-gang's official successor."

The genius grandson, bearing every expectation of the founder alone.

"Jihun lived up to them beautifully again today. He took the microphone and gave such a fine speech."

Had the dam given way? Yugeon went on, each word set carefully in its place.

"I never wanted anything to do with management in the first place. The responsibility is enormous, and there is no freedom. Even so, I never meant to run from a first son's fate."

"Because if you refused, your brother would have to carry that fate in the end?"

Yugeon nodded.

"If someone has to be sacrificed... then I'll accept it. I have no right to feel wronged. I was born the eldest, and I've received plenty because of it... That's what I always told myself..."

"...?"

"But when I think I was pushed aside because I'm dull and incompetent, that part is a little bleak."

"Do you resent your brother?"

"No. I only envy him. If I were as clever as Jihun, how good that would be. If I could succeed brilliantly too, and be of some help to Father when things are hard for him... how proud I would feel."

The look lasted only a moment. Yugeon let out a long sigh.

"Sometimes I'm afraid. What if this envy turns into jealousy? ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠What if my own shortcomings drive us apart as brothers... When I think that, I can't stand how pathetic I am."

Martin looked at him with heavy eyes. Had it been a scientific puzzle, he would have solved it on the spot.

"..."

Human feeling, though, was too difficult a problem even for Martin. He was still turning over what on earth he ought to say when a sharp knock sounded behind him, followed by a low, steady voice.

"Young master. The Chairman is asking for you."

"Grandfather, you're here?"

My brother rose from the living-room sofa as he spoke, and a moment later his eyes came to me.

Today I had stood before the distinguished guests in his place. Would he think I had taken the eldest son's rights? That was the part I couldn't help feeling sorry for. He made himself smile anyway, and welcomed me.

Grandfather sat down on the sofa and asked him,

"Surprised, your grandfather calling you in out of nowhere?"

"N-no, Grandfather."

Being summoned was one thing. The unusually warm tone seemed to leave my brother a little flustered.

"What were you doing?"

"My tutor came over."

"Studies going all right?"

"They're fun."

"And where in the world do you find a child who says studying is fun?"

"It isn't that I like every subject. Math and science are a little fun, though."

A good sign. Electronics would be the industry that fed the future, and even just to understand the engineers at its center, a person needed at least a basic grounding in the sciences. Grandfather, as I'd thought, seemed pleased with the answer.

"Thought about university?"

"Yes. Now and then."

"Where do you want to go?"

"My goal is Seoul National University, but..."

"Why? What is there you can't say to your grandfather?"

"I haven't chosen a department yet."

"You haven't?"

Born the eldest son of Hyeon-gang, the business department was a foregone conclusion. For him to say otherwise anyway... he was talking around it. There was a department he actually wanted.

"There must be one you're interested in, no?"

"Com— computer engineering. I am curious about it."

"What do you want to do with computers?"

"There's no end to what you can do with them..."

My brother let the sentence trail away.

"Then tell me."

"It's..."

"You're a boy. Why all this stalling?"

"I... I want to make a crystallization of mathematics and science."

"And what is that supposed to be?"

"...?"

My brother squeezed his eyes shut and forced it out. At an answer no one had seen coming—

"Ha!"

Grandfather's brow crumpled all at once. I was no less thrown. But perhaps it was still too early to be surprised. My brother had an answer that went one step further.

Click.

"Back already?"

The door opened, and that was Martin, already on his feet as the words left him. Then Grandfather appeared on my brother's heels.

"What the—"

Martin's eyes jolted wide.

Grandfather didn't spare a reaction like that so much as a glance. He headed straight for the computer, and my brother trotted after him.

"It isn't anything great. I wrote the script, and Martin coded it and put it in. That's all."

"A script?"

"Yes. This."

My brother drew out no fewer than five thick study notebooks. They had been opened so often the covers were soft and dog-eared, the pages dark with handling.

"Instead of the studying you're supposed to be doing..."

"I— I'm first in the whole school."

"In the country?"

"...Around two hundredth."

"If you hadn't been wasting time on this, you'd have made the top hundred!"

Jihun got to do whatever he wanted... In a child's heart, my brother might have used me as his excuse. But he never once brought me to his lips.

So I tried to turn the mood.

"Hyung, I want to see it too. Is that all right?"

"Yeah."

He took one of the notebooks and held it out to me. If I showed an interest, Grandfather might look as well, if only for form's sake. That was the idea, at first.

And then—

Huh? Why is this so meticulous?

The pages stopped me cold. It was a kind of setting bible. A fantasy world was common enough, but inside it the traits of every class had been written out in extraordinary detail.

And after that, line upon line, packed to the margins.

Hm.

Even so, my brother had calculated how the laws of physics would apply and how every sort of object would interact, and he had built the whole bible around those sums. Nor was that the end of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it.

There are illustrations too?

Drawings that pushed each trait to its limit were set in throughout, enough to make even an unfamiliar rule easy to grasp.

"Hyung, you put all of this together... by yourself?"

He nodded.

"How long did it take?"

"Three months."

At that rate he might as well have given up on studying altogether... and yet he was first in the school. Well, then.

"Grandfather, look. This is nearly professional."

I was in the position of having to leave management to my brother, so it must have looked as if I were putting on a show. Sure enough, the look that came back told me to cut the obvious performance.

A hundred tellings aren't worth a single look!

"Just look. Five minutes, and you'll feel it."

Sure enough, Grandfather opened the notebook as if he were only giving in, and his face—

"...!"

—began to change from one moment to the next. If it had been nothing much, he would have shut it at the first volume.

But the pages kept turning. Flip. Flip. He was already into the second notebook.

That was when I gave my brother a quiet jab in the side and mouthed a few silent words. Fortunately, the meaning seemed to reach him. He switched the computer on at once.

A heavy whirr, and the machine came to life. They had set one in my room and one in his so that we would study, but I had already lived through the age of smartphones. As if I would have spared a glance for that obsolete hunk of a PC.

A DOS window rose on the black screen, and my brother set to typing with an easy hand. It was English, and even so it looked like five hundred characters a minute at the least. A moment later, gray letters floated up onto the display.

He had said Martin did the coding. The screen was entirely in English. Put into plain words, it came to this.

By then Grandfather had turned his eyes to the screen as well.

"What is this?"

Still that half-sidelong look. My brother met it and asked,