"Would you like a ride today, my lady?" One of the many servants in this house bowed as Kyungmi made her way to the main door, wearing her simple black coat over her dress. Seoul's weather has always been chilly, chillier now that it's late August.

"No, thank you. I'm good." Kyungmi replied to the servant who gave an extra bow again before opening the main door. After receiving a sermon which consisted of dramatic acting, pacing and shrieking from her fake blonde mother, Kyungmi had been sentenced to an extra couple of hours of lessons about wine-making and other subjects. After pulling Kite and Spike back outside, she had decided to distract her depressed self by going to the bookstore, secretly. She never actually tells her family that she goes to Park's Books, because they will never understand her and would say something like, "Why go to such a rundown place?" or "Instead of using that money to buy books which take up too much space, why not buy a new set of clothes or a manual on wine-selling?"

Kyungmi walked out of the door only to be greeted by the lights of one of their many cars. She squinted her eyes and watched on as the car pulled to a stop, then the panicky driver seemed to jump out of his side and opened the passenger door where Yifan, the eldest, stepped out; looking pissed.

Oh great. Kyungmi thought as she tried to think of ways to not get on this brother's way. Yifan was notorious for having absolute control over everything in the business, and also for getting mad over every little thing. With that in mind, he has a lot of things at the top of his hate list; one of which was Seoul's moody weather.

"Christ," Yifan, who only had his suit on when he left and was therefore unprepared for the chill, made his way up the steps to the main door, "This is why I never trust the weather reports. They don't know a goddamn thing about what they're doing." He stopped midway and gave a glare at Kyungmi's direction. Kyungmi unconsciously twitched, Yifan always seemed to scare the living daylights out of her.

"H-Hello," Kyungmi greeted, as if they weren't siblings. Yifan eyed her attire carefully.

"And where are you going?" He spoke coldly.

"Church." Kyungmi instantly replied. She had no idea where that came from but it was the first thing that popped into her mind, what with Yifan's murderous stare burning on her.

"In this ty weather?" Yifan eyed her incredulously.

"Y-Yeah," Kyungmi tried her best not to make an obvious lie, which was proving to be pretty difficult. But she had a flash of genius come her way, "Umma scolded me today. I thought I'd go to church and... you know... get a confession…?"

"Huh," Yifan bought the rather obvious lie and turned around to walk inside where he decided to let out some steam, "Damn it, heads! Get that fire running in my room or else!" He turned his attention to Taecyeon, who paled, "You, bring my files over and be quick about it." Taecyeon his heels out of fear and rushed out.

Kyungmi tried to hold back a laugh as she eyed Taecyeon get an earful from her brother.

Talk about payback. Thanks, Yifan. She thought as she made her way down the steps, out the gate and down to the busy streets of Seoul.

The middle-class streets of Seoul seemed to have magically lifted Kyungmi's mood higher. Before making her way to the bookstore, she had stopped over a bakery and bought a pretzel to eat. Her black coat didn't go unnoticed though, because even though she had picked the simplest one out of her closet, it seemed to shout out the expensive brand name it came from. Her thoughts were proven right when she threw the wrapper of her pretzel in the bin. There was a man who was sitting nearby on a bench who turned to look at her, took his hat off and lowered his head.

"Good day, Mae-sshi." How the man knew who she was surprised her but she smiled and greeted the man back, then she made a quick walk out of there before any other person decided to make a big deal of her presence there.

Being a Mae was almost like being a celebrity. It couldn’t be helped considering the family (more or less) appears on the newspapers for their business miracles almost every week. Having that thought in mind, Kyungmi reasoned out to herself that that must’ve been the reason why the man knew who she was – and she hated being known.

Finally, she saw the familiar Creamie's Ice Cream Parlor sign come into view and beside that parlor was Park's Books. It was a humble store, the walls painted with hunter green, the store's sign nailed above the single glass door and behind the glass windows that sandwiched the door were stacks of books and new arrivals. She walked inside, the signature jingle of the bell introducing her arrival. Mr. Park popped his balding head from a shelf and a fatherly smile graced his face.

"Ah, Kyungmi," He squeezed his way through stacks of books, hoping not to knock some over. "Welcome, welcome." It had taken him ages to accept that name and Kyungmi several tries to get him to stick by it. Mr. and Mrs. Park used to address her formally and she would always reassure them that it wasn’t necessary at all.

Then, a beaming lady behind the counter came into view, "Is it Kyungmi? Oh! It’s Kyungmi! It's good to see you. Come inside quickly, the weather's horrible today."

"Good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Park." Kyungmi nodded before looking down at her feet, careful not to step on any form of literature.

"Oh, please, no need for the formalities, Kyungmi.”

Kyungmi blushed, she felt uncomfortable calling older people so casually, probably because she never seemed to do so with her own parents, "Please, it's all right. I've gotten quite used to calling you Mr. Park.... Mr. Park." She chuckled nervously. Damn, I'm bad at this kind of thing.

Thankfully, Mr. Park wasn't like the rich people Kyungmi was often with and he gave a hearty laugh before motioning Kyungmi to come to the counter. "Well, if you insist. So what'll it be today? Another Michael Frayn book perhaps? Or would you like to have a go at the Lord Ramage Series by Dudley Pope?"

Mr. Park's love for literature was as infectious as it was fascinating. He seemed to have all of the books in his store down to memory. The offers were tempting but Kyungmi chose to concentrate on the green leather bound book she had brought with her today. "Thanks but I think I'll finish this one first. Actually, I just needed a place to read, without having any disturbance... if you know what I mean, Mr. Park."

"Ah...." Mr. Park fixed his round glasses and gave a small smile, "Well, you're welcome in here Kyungmi. Now, let's see here... the back should be good for you?"

"Yeah. I'll take the back again. Thank you, Mr. Park!" Kyungmi smiled and squeezed her way to the back part of the store where she would often hide from public view to read the books this kingdom had to offer. She had done this for almost a year now. The back area also had a mi