Hello! I finally translated this fic, kk. Sorry for the delay~. I thank a lot +Nawelle Benarab from Youtube for being so adorable and being the reason for this translation, haha. This chapter is yours, my little fairy! Hehe. (It was already written but either ways, the intention is what matters. Yehet!) 

First of all, I apologize for the pictures but since I'm using the original ones from the story written in Portuguese, the titles are in said language. What's written in them is merely the title of the chapter, so no need to worry. I hope you like my fic and comment whenever you see fit. It would make me certainly really happy.

Also, this fic is a SuChen, but other pairings and characters can and will appear. It doesn't have a date especifically, but probably happens around the 19-20th century or so.

Thirdly, as I've said before, I'm not a native english speaker, (I'm from Brazil so I speak Portuguese) therefore I'm really sorry for my mistakes and I would be really glad if you all could forgive them and point them out so that I can fix them.

Lastly, every chapter will have a little quote related with the story or chapter. In some cases, like from this chapter itself, I've made some changes on the original text regarding mostly gender and some other minor things. The quotes don't really belong to me either.

Thank you for the attention, love you all.

Sincerely, Akane.

Falsetto -> It comes from the italian and means "false tone". Is the vocal register by which the singer emits, in a controlled manner (not natural, hence "false"), higher or lower sounds than his vocal range. 

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Falsetto

Prologue: The Dead Heart

The heart dies, a slow death. Shedding each hope like leaves, until one day there are none. No hopes. Nothing remais. He paints his face to hide his face. His eyes are deep water. It is not for him to want. It is not for him to feel. He is an artist of the floating world. He acts, he sings, he entertains you... Whatever you want. The rest is shadows. The rest is secret.

                                                                           - Memories of a Gueisha.

The garment wrapped itself around the lean body with delicacy, like dripping silk in tanned skin. Hair being brushed incredibly slow, and the face being hidden by layers over layers of a make-up he didn't understand the reason for which it ought to be used.

These were the orders, so he obeyed.

He rested the brush once again on the stand, turning to the curtains behind himself. The boy massaged his own wrists before heading his way, nervous. His footfall were fast, his breath almost inexistent. Everything like he was instructed. Everything like it should be in that world.

He didn't choose to be an opera singer, he was forced. In that society, where having any kind of talent was more of a curse than a gift, he wanted more than anything to be unable to sing. Since, behind the heavy red curtains, there stood a universe that no one deemed even imaginable. One of which he was part of.

Singers are created to entertain others. Who, then, entertains them? No one, that would be the correct answer. They are like machines that, by some flaw, ended up having feelings and, due to that, when found must be trained to eradicate those undesired emotions.

And the world suffered with the lack of true humankind.

People started being separated between those who commanded and those that were ordered, and him, the innocent boy of brown hair, ended losing his comfort in the name of the whim of others. Was sold by his own family for a bundle of gold.

Then, he wondered if the society wasn't also divided in monsters.

Time passed. The concerts got more and more crowded, and soon they were changing cities for yet another performance. And they profited over the sweet and powerful voice, the simple and significative gestures, the convenient and real beauty. Increasingly, the boy became the machine they wanted so much, with a single difference in his life - that made him compare himself with the most beautiful thing he had ever been gifted with since he lost himself.

Like that black rose, he was falling apart with time.

It was his fault there was no way out, he was weak. A few went against the system and, from them, a small lucky fraction remained alive. He has always been lucky, but never brave enough to try.Therefore, he kept following the imposed rules to the letter, wanting to live as quietly as possible. However, as it arrived for so many before him, there was a moment when the delimitations became too strict. There was a moment, unknown by him, when he had to move out from his district in China into the Korean capital. "Expanding the business we extend the money!" was what his instructor used to say. 

When he stepped on that stage in Seoul, he never imagined he would break the greatest rulo of that institution. And what seemed so impossible turned his reality so fast that, for a single moment, he got scared. There was no going back, though. He knew that. Many had made that same mistake, many had been tortured or killed by that evil and prejudiced society.

Love is something uncontrollable, just as falling in love is. We can't decide when, nor with who or why. It just happens, no respect to any limits we try to put. And this said love that haunted him, took form in the desrespect of the prohibited limit of his existance.

Kim Jongdae fell in love with a stranger.