Taehyung Pescatore/History

Taehyung Pescatore was born 리 태형 (Tae-hyung Lee) and identifies himself as Italian and Korean. He later changed his last name to his mother's maiden name Pescatore. Despite Taehyung himself telling conflicting, cryptic stories regarding his past, his history is stated as the following.

## Life Before Passione

### Growing up in the Omelas Cult

Taehyung was the oldest son of a Korean father and Italian mother, both of whom were met and arranged to marry under the cult's orders; his father became a missionary for the cult soon after. It was noted that Taehyung's father loved his mother but it was unknown whether his mother felt the same way. He was born and raised in Degu, Korea before moving to Busan for missionary work, where his brother Luca Lee was born. Despite the cult's stance on interracial marriage, Taehyung and Luca were met with ridicule from their Korean peers and elders, both within and outside of the cult, due to their "mixed blood" and Luca was especially bullied due to having Klippel Feil syndrome. Taehyung became very overprotective of his younger brother as a result, especially as his parents' strict upbringing based on cult doctrine became more intense. Despite being treated differently due to his appearance, Taehyung eventually befriended six similar aged friends when he was 12, some of whom were former members of the cult, at his local middle school before he was pulled out to be homeschooled. The cult teachings forbade anyone to contact with non-members or even former members beyond work or preaching, but Taehyung continued to visit his friends. However, he didn't let them know he was a part of the cult.

Although both parents were strict, Taehyung and Luca were closest to their mother, which made their father occasionally jealous of their attention being towards her. When Taehyung was nine, his mother was diagnosed with tuberculosis and died months later in isolation. Due to the cult's teaching regarding modern medicine, Taehyung's mother was refused treatment and locked in a bedroom to "recover at God's mercy", in hopes that prayer and God's will would cure her. Both Taehyung and Luca would try to communicate with their mother through the door's keyhole while their father wasn't looking, only to be pulled away from the door when they were caught. Taehyung's mother ultimately died from illness and starvation, something that was swept under the rug and not properly reported to the police and local government.

The death of his mother had a major impact on his father, who threw himself into alcoholism and the cult began to look down on the family for not maintaining its Nuclear Family image due to the father's refusal to be remarried by cult orders. Taehyung began to spend less time at home and more time at school, spending time with his six other friends, who also felt lost in their world for their own reasons. Occasionally, Luca would join along, but was often put at home due to their father not wanting the world to see the effects of Klippel Feil syndrome on his own child and the cult's hypocritical view on deformities. Taehyung became a troubled delinquent with his friends as a means of venting out his frustrations and difficulty of life as well as avoid further physical abuse from his father; he noticed that Luca would not be beaten but Taehyung on the other hand would. He and his friends would often engage in activities such as vandalism, trespassing, and thief to pass time or get money to feed themselves for the night. He also developed an interest for writing, spending his time writing poems and stories about his struggles and emotions, sometimes sharing them with his friends.

When Taehyung turned 14, he was forced to be homeschool due to the cult's policy on education, forcing him to no longer be able to communicate with his friends beyond letter writing. However, Taehyung was also forced to keep his writings in secret due to the cult's policy also dictating a strict no-contact with outsiders and doing activities like writing when it is not for religious reasons. To continue talking to his friends and write freely, he often burned his work after completing it or kept them in a notebook that he hid in a nearby container junkyard he often goes to hide from his family and friends. The transition from homeschooling was actually meant for the cult to not only indoctrinate the children of the institution closely but also hide further abuse that the cult condoned as a means of maintaining a Nuclear family dynamic. Taehyung began staying home more often to avoid his father from now abusing Luca openly, often stopping his father before it escalated and taking the hit more often than usual. This created a rift between him and Luca, with Taehyung wishing that Luca didn't exist due to their father claiming to see their mother more often whenever he looked at the younger brother and Luca's syndrome appearing more prominent and contributing to other health issues. The inability to express his new frustrations and abuse also led him to isolate himself from his own friends, even lashing out on them occasionally, despite their efforts to reach out and help. It is unknown whether they were aware of the extent of Taehyung's abuse at that point.

Eventually, Taehyung walked into his father, visibly drunk, beating Luca when he came home earlier than usual. In a rage, Taehyung grabbed a nearby empty beer bottle and struck his father with it, using the broken edges of the bottle to stab him multiple times until Taehyung hears Luca crying. By the time Taehyung came to his senses, his father lie on the ground in agony and Luca was desperately praying with the belief that their father would miraculously heal and stop bleeding. At the same time, he called Taehyung a murderer, a criminal, and similar names for killing their father, refusing to acknowledge him and crying out of grief. Taehyung tried to reason with his brother, desperately trying to take him with him away from the home, but found his efforts useless. Luca attempted to stop him from leaving, forcing Taehyung to push his brother to the ground in order to leave.

Between the time Taehyung killed his father and began being homeschooled, he discovered that his mother's Italian identity allowed both him and Luca to have Italian citizenship and passport. However, he learned that the cult ordered his father to have it locked away, against his mother's wishes, so he could never use it. His mother luckily had the passports done before she was forced into isolation, which meant the passport had yet to expire when he discovered them in a locked compartment behind his father's bed. Realizing that he had committed murder and not knowing what else to do, he attempted to pack whatever stuff he could carry and decided to use the money he had been saving to go to Italy.

### Escaping South Korea

Taehyung decided to leave most of his money with Luca before departing, apologizing to his brother before he ran off.

He used some of his money to get a bus ride from Gimhae International Airport and bought the first ticket to Italy he could get, claiming to be going home after vacationing in Korea with one side of his family. He finally arrived in Naples International Airport, unsure of where to go afterwards, and only having a carry-on full of the possessions he could carry and money left over. He decides to reach the closest beach he could find in order to clear his mind and figure out what to do next.

## Joining Olio's Team

Unbeknownst to Taehyung, a potential candidate that was recruited by Hitman Team #22 was conducting a test for Polpo in order to be inducted into Passione at the beach. However, the candidate accidentally unlit the lighter due to the ocean breeze. In panic, they dropped the lighter at a nearby rock and abandoned their task. The tide, at the time, was rather high, and caused the lighter to be washed into the ocean. Taehyung eventually arrived a few hours later after they departed, and the tide caused the lighter to be washed to Taehyung's feet when he sat down in the sand. Not thinking too much about what it was, Taehyung grabbed the lighter and unexpectedly turned it back on while wondering how the lighter could have been lost. This activated Polpo's Stand Black Sabbath, who used some nearby rocks and Taehyung's shadows to appear. Taehyung ended up seeing the Stand, watching in horror as it stabbed him, and passed out from its effects, unknowingly gaining his Stand as a result.

A mafioso from Passione that had witnessed the scene before him immediately notified Polpo of Taehyung's initiation, causing Polpo to call back Black Sabbath and order The Hitman Team to collect Taehyung. Cassio Montagna and Zura Grattachecca were sent to retrieve a now unconscious Taehyung, who's Stand is now growing out of his back, and brought him back to the team's headquarters.

Taehyung woke up in the Headquarters' basement, bound by chains and blindfolded with gauze. Taehyung began panicking, causing WINGS to act out of control and knocking down whatever items were in the sparse room. The noise alerted Olio Nero and Cassio to check on him, and the two attempted to calm him down, finding him struggling to escape from his chains and the effects of WINGS leaking out of his eyes and other parts of his body. Cassio explained that he was bound due to his own safety and neither of them knowing what his Stand's abilities hold, and also blindfolded him due to seeing colorful liquid seeping out earlier and using the gauze to hold it in case losing too much would harm him further. Taehyung mentioned he felt cold due to his shirt being torn by wings, and Cassio offers him a blanket for the time being, saying that they took off what remained from his shirt in case it could harm him than do good. Both him and Olio explain Taehyung's situation, able to get him to eventually calm down, and attempted to get as much information about him as possible. Despite not getting much out, Taehyung was able to say his name and begged them to not send him back to Korea. They promise that they will do what they can and sent Taehyung to meet Polpo the next day, who later explained more of what had happened on the beach. Because Taehyung did not die from the task, he was forced to become a member of Passione and put in The Hitman Team, as it was not only Passione's policy but also to avoid Taehyung from being sent back to Korea. He is placed under Cassio's mentorship, seeing that Cassio was most sympathetic to his situation.

Eventually, Taehyung would open up more about his past, albeit in conflicting and cryptic ways. The team quickly realized this, but welcomed him nonetheless.

## Death

Before Taehyung died, he saw a vision of six individuals calling to him and telling him to join them. It is unknown whether the individuals are his friends or other people, as his friends are still confirmed to be alive. Taehyung comments how for once he no longer feels pain and was ready to go.

While in Giorno's body, Taehyung was tasked to fly around the colosseum in order to see where Father Diavolo was hiding. Unbeknownst to him and the rest of the team, Father Diavolo's Stand allowed him to fly as well, leading him to be able to attack and kill Taehyung while both were in the sky. When the team realized a time skip had occurred, Giorno noticed something fall from the sky and realized it was Taehyung. By the time Zura and Gigi Una are able to catch him, he was supposedly dead already, which was confirmed when Giorno tried to heal him and commented how empty the body felt. The team question how Taehyung is able to be killed in such a way, which provided them better clues to Dark Twisted Fantasy's abilities. Once Giorno returned back to his body, Taehyung's body briefly regained WINGS behind his back before it dissipated into a pile of black feathers that Taehyung's body fell on. Giorno, like what he did with the original Narancia, covers him with vines of white lilies, vowing that no further harm will go to Taehyung, and promised that the remaining team will come back to him. Andreas Arancini mentioned how he was smiling when he dropped onto the pile of feathers, implying that Taehyung was still alive and clinging on at some until Giorno finally woke up in his own body; he swore he heard Taehyung mutter the word "Luca, take care..." in Italian beforehand.

Meanwhile, Clara is staring out an open window of her apartment in the early hours of dawn, having returned home from being in Venice but still feeling worried for her teammates after they left her. Sheila enters the room to mention how her sister just spent all night looking outside the window instead of sleeping. As Clara was about to respond, a black-and-white parrotbill lands on the window sill, staring at Clara and cocking its head as if it was familiar with her. Sheila excitedly approaches the bird and Clara asked if she knew what kind of breed it was. Her sister then talked about the time when Taehyung once visited their home a while ago and gave her a book about birds; he taught Sheila about the particular bird in the window sill, which he called a "뱁새" (Baepsae, which is Korean for crow-tit), and a quote that went along with it. Sheila began quoting Taehyung by saying "뱁새가 황새 걸음을 걸으면 가랑이가 찢어진다" ("If a crow-tit walks like a stork, it will break its legs."), albeit saying it an Italian accent and neither of them not knowing exactly what she is saying or what it means. As a result of Taehyung's knowledge, Sheila only knew the bird by its Korean name and begins cooing at it without thinking much further. Clara began to have a feeling that something terrible happened to Taehyung, especially as the bird began to nuzzle itself at her hand on the window sill. She also wonders if she had gone crazy for thinking of such things. Before she could react further, the bird flies off into the morning sky, and Clara felt a deep pang in her heart as it disappeared into the sky.

## Post-Fate of Zephyr

At Taehyung's request, Giorno had his body cremated and had plans to have it be thrown into the wind over a cliffside in a beach area he used to spend his summer with his friends. It was unknown how the Omelas Cult eventually discovered Taehyung's whereabouts and when he died, but six cloaked and masked members arrived to Passione's headquarters unannounced two days after his death before Giorno was able to perform the latter; they commented how it wrong for Giorno to cremate a body despite Taehyung still being an "official" member of their religion and demanded him to give his remains back. Despite Giorno's efforts to keep Taehyung in Italy, something that Taehyung himself had requested to his team before his death, he was eventually forced to give Taehyung's body and belongings to them.

Unbeknownst to Giorno at the time, Zura managed to switch out the cremated remains with fake ashes, and secretly went to South Korea herself, along with Gigi, to release the ashes, while also trying to investigate and find Luca. She later told him about what she actually did when she returned- both swearing to keep the situation a secret to avoid the cult from being suspicious. Giorno still kept a memorial of Taehyung, which he visits regularly. With Zura's information regarding Luca and at Taehyung's request, he managed to get Luca adopted by a family and finish his education.