The year the letter was written.
The temperament of the artist mentioned in the letter.
Handwriting bad enough to stand out at a single glance.
And most important of all.
The 'it' that appeared in the letter.
"Beethoven."
Ludwig van Beethoven, the German-born musician.
"Beethoven the composer. Would you know him?"
"Of course."
Good. Since Yang Myeong-hyun knew about Beethoven, explaining would be much easier.
Fortunately, there was no sign yet of the room shrinking.
Though that grating screech would surely start ringing out again soon enough.
"I thought about what the 'it' van Gogh cast away might be."
=================
I resent you for casting away without hesitation the 'it' that is precious and priceless to me.
And my own 'it' has vanished completely now.
=================
"He broke off with a friend in grand fashion, and he threw away his life as well. And there must be countless artists who have done such things."
As Yang Myeong-hyun said, it was hard to pin down a single thing van Gogh had cast away in his life.
"Your view is valid too, Mr. Myeong-hyun. But that's exactly why—"
Van Gogh was a mentally very unstable and impulsive figure.
Whether in his relationships or in his own private emotions, his anger and sorrow ran fierce, and his expression of them was explosive.
And that van Gogh had thrown away something he possessed.
"That's why we have to think about the especially well-known traits of van Gogh and Beethoven. The museum tends to pick artists who are as popular as possible, so that visitors who didn't major in art can climb the Tower too."
A figure well known to the general public.
"Something van Gogh cast away, but which was taken from the other man by force. Someone whose 'it' vanished, precious enough that he came to resent van Gogh for kicking away his own good fortune."
And that was.
"It might be the ear, I think."
"Ah."
Yang Myeong-hyun let out a small exclamation, as if more persuaded than before.
Van Gogh cut off one of his ears, and Beethoven lost his hearing. Both of them had lost an 'ear.'
To put it precisely, Beethoven lost his sense of hearing, but inside a Tower filled with art, a metaphor this loose should be allowed.
"I understand why Brother Ji-san thought of Beethoven. I have heard that Beethoven had poor handwriting as well. But there must be a more solid reason to single out Beethoven from among all the countless other artists."
'We haven't talked long, but he seems to have a fair amount of knowledge about art.'
Then again, to climb up to Floor 10, you needed one of two things: help from other visitors, or knowledge of your own.
Yang Myeong-hyun was the latter, so an alliance with him would be all the more valuable going forward.
'But because he has knowledge, persuading him won't be easy either.'
Convincing him with words alone, the way I had with Jang Si-woon or Go Gyu-min, might be difficult.
It was a quest the two of us had to solve together, so I couldn't act unilaterally, and I didn't want to.
I needed evidence to persuade him. And if it had to be solid evidence.
'...Docent. If I showed him the data written in Docent, I could make Yang Myeong-hyun understand more easily.'
But doing that meant revealing my most important, exclusive Perk to Yang Myeong-hyun.
It was a Perk I hadn't disclosed even to Jang Si-woon and Go Gyu-min, who had climbed with me for a comparatively longer time than Yang Myeong-hyun.
'But there's no time.'
This wasn't because I trusted Yang Myeong-hyun; it was a choice made to escape this room.
"Docent, activate. Search: Ludwig van Beethoven."
A leaflet with the texture of parchment rose up between Yang Myeong-hyun and me.
The tightly rolled leaflet unfurled far downward.
Fwish-
=================
[Ludwig van Beethoven]
-Works
┗Symphony No. 5, 'Fate'
Für Elise
Piano Sonata No. 14
.......
.......
-Artist Information
┗Born December 16, 1770
.......
-Related Memories
.......
.......
=================
"...?"
'Looks like Yang Myeong-hyun can't see it.'
I'd never activated the Perk in front of Jang Si-woon or Go Gyu-min, so I hadn't confirmed whether others could see the leaflet.
In that case, could I share it by giving a command?
"Docent, share."
"!!"
The permitting command must have shared the leaflet, because the instant I finished speaking, Yang Myeong-hyun's mouth fell wide open.
I skimmed the long stretch of leaflet and weeded out unnecessary content and duplicate information as much as I could.
Far more swiftly than when I'd sorted it alone last time.
'Analyzing and organizing data at the company used to make my skin crawl, but it all has its uses after all.'
It didn't overlap entirely with my job, but the skill I'd built running my eyes over data at a blistering pace came out.
Using my head and my hands at once, the leaflet I meant to show Yang Myeong-hyun was soon summarized far more concisely.
"First, the handwriting revealed in the letter."
"......."
"As you said, Mr. Myeong-hyun, Beethoven had terrible handwriting. And he's known as an extremely emotional and cantankerous artist."
The quest letter mentioned something similar.
"People think me a spiteful and cantankerous man, but could I be worse than you?"
Yang Myeong-hyun read out the passage from the letter in his hand.
Apparently finding my Docent ability fascinating, he looked back and forth between the letter and the leaflet, comparing the contents.
"The two lived in different eras and worked in different fields, but they clearly have a lot in common in temperament and in life."
Vincent van Gogh and Ludwig van Beethoven.
Both were geniuses who sublimated pain into art, but their paths in life were rough enough that the pain turned into madness.
There was also the irony that this made them immerse themselves even deeper in their own worlds and produce masterpieces.
"This dictionary must be a Perk that only Brother Ji-san could obtain."
Yang Myeong-hyun stared in wonder at the leaflet sorted by the Docent ability.
Afraid he might suspect I'd received special treatment from the museum and the Curator, I hurriedly waved both hands.
"But it wasn't handed to me for free. It's my own memory turned into data. I read a lot of books."
"In that case, it is hard to accept."
Hm?
Was it because I'd protested too hastily?
Yang Myeong-hyun's attitude changed firmly all at once.
"It is true that I have less artistic knowledge than Brother Ji-san. However, can you be certain that Brother Ji-san's memory is perfect?"
"......."
"When did you acquire that knowledge?"
"Mostly in elementary or middle school—"
"Quite some time has passed, then. On top of that, if you mainly read books, your memory of music is bound to be hazier. Is the auditory material sufficient?"
"...Enough that I can tell what a piece is if I hear it."
Yang Myeong-hyun's doubt was reasonable.
If I'd absorbed wrong knowledge about art, or if my memory was distorted, the Docent leaflet couldn't be trusted.
And as with Sugungga on Floor 2, it was certainly true that my knowledge of music was lacking compared to other fields.
My knowledge came mainly from the school library or from classes.
'If I wanted to explore art for free, that was the only road open to me. I didn't even have a smartphone until I stopped being a minor.'
"But the brain remembers more than we think it does, so—"
No. Appealing with excuses like this was pointless.
I steadied my breath and lowered my eyes a notch more coldly than before.
'Naturally I'm not under the arrogant delusion that whatever I say is unconditionally correct. But.'
"Then who is the artist you have in mind, Mr. Yang Myeong-hyun?"
"......."
If he found it hard to accept, he could at least put forward one opinion of his own.
"In any case, you accept the things van Gogh and Beethoven have in common, don't you, Mr. Myeong-hyun?"
"That is true."
"As you said, the hints we can guess from inside this space are limited, so, as I said before, we have no choice but to think of a popular artist by way of a striking trait."
"......."
"And the person painted in that frame."
I pointed my finger at the frame hanging on the wall above the bed.
It was the very painting I'd looked at carefully earlier.
"It doesn't match Vincent van Gogh's era; it looks exactly like a dress from the early 1800s. And that happens to be the period when Beethoven's hearing impairment set in and his famous pieces were released."
"If Brother Ji-san is right, she would be a woman connected to Beethoven."
"Right. And if she's Beethoven's woman, wouldn't it be 'Für Elise'?"
"Für Elise."
'Just the title might not give him a feel for which piece it is.'
Unfortunately, I was tone-deaf and had no confidence in producing a proper pitch out loud. In that case.
"That, um, 'nee-na nee-na nee, you're a gorilla~' You know it?"
"......."
When I awkwardly hummed a song from way back when, Yang Myeong-hyun's expression grew a notch more peculiar.
Receiving his flatly narrowed gaze made me quite self-conscious.
It felt as if another layer of distance had opened up between us, close as we already weren't.
"Brother Ji-san, did you not say you were twenty-eight...? You have more years behind you than I thought."
"Years behind me? No, look, in my neighborhood this was around for quite a—hah, never mind. Anyway, that's the piece called 'Für Elise.'"
I didn't want to go so far as the pathetic excuse that I'd heard my brother's friends singing it from a distance.
I'd just have to be treated like an old man.
Fwish-
=================
[Für Elise]
-Piece Information
┗ Formal title: Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor.
Released April 27, 1810.
.......
.......
-Who is 'Elise'?
=================
"Theories about Elise's identity are still divided, but since Beethoven dedicated many works to the women he loved, Elise is presumed to have been a real person as well."
"......."
"So I think we can write back to Beethoven and choose 'Für Elise' as the art we want."
"...Unlike me, who cannot think of any answer in particular, Brother Ji-san even has evidence."
Got him.
"I cannot refute it."
~~~
Just then, a beautiful piano melody flowed through the room.
'Für Elise' was ringing out!
As Beethoven's piano pieces go it was on the easy side, but that didn't make it shallow.
A piece in which you could discover the aesthetics of a simple melody.
"It seems that was the correct answer."
'The correct answer....'
Why was it? Judging by 'Für Elise' ringing through the room, my deduction had been right.
And yet something felt off. The correct answer, he said.
"Brother Ji-san. Would it be all right to write the letter in Korean?"
"...Well, it shouldn't matter. The writing in the letter looks like Korean to us too."
I'd already made my whole case to Yang Myeong-hyun; there was no point in harboring doubts now.
And that doubt was only a feeling.
Standing on the bed, Yang Myeong-hyun bent his back and dipped the pen into the ink on the desk.
Then, in that awkward posture, he wrote the letter out against the desk.
=================
-To Beethoven
I regret that you caught sight of the half-sound I cast away.
=================
"You write well."
"It is nothing. It is my trade, if you can call it that, so it would not do if I could not write even this much."
"Oh, Mr. Myeong-hyun. Are you a writer?"
"......."
'What? Why is he ignoring me? No, wait. It's my fault for talking to him while he's busy.'
He was writing the most important reply, and here I was distracting him with small talk.
And he might want to hide his occupation.
At a glance, Yang Myeong-hyun didn't seem like the sort to openly lay bare his inner self.
I turned my body aside so Yang Myeong-hyun could concentrate on writing the letter.
But the framed painting visible beyond his bent back was somehow strange.
A large tree at the center of the painting, and a natural landscape.
The white sky seemed to depict a cloudy daytime.
'Huh...? A star?'
Staring hard at the frame, I found a difference from the painting inside the real van Gogh work. At the edge of the white sky, a brightly shining yellow star had been dotted in.
'Why is there a star if it's daytime?'
CREEEAK.
Just then, as if the Tower, which had held back for a good while, had decided the time had come, the room shrank.
There was a sound of the bed and chair breaking as they collided.
The room heaved more violently than at any time before, and the frames on the walls shook as well.
"Uh, uh!"
And in the end the wire of a frame hooked on its nail snapped.
I hurriedly stretched both arms over Yang Myeong-hyun's back and rescued the framed painting.
"What is it?"
"The frame almost fell, but I caught it. It's fine, so don't mind me and keep writing."
"Understood."
Once Yang Myeong-hyun confirmed I was safe, he immediately turned his focus back to the letter.
I took another look at the painting inside the frame I'd caught.
'A star. A star that looks like a mistake in a daytime sky.... Vincent van Gogh wouldn't make an error like that. Which means—'
The museum had put this mark in on purpose. But why on earth?
It was as I turned the frame front to back, wondering whether there were more clues on it.
"...?!"