– Jin-Hee’s Mother!! Exactly how close are your families for his mother to send such a photo to you? Why isn’t my mom friends with Genie’s mom?

– My hands are shaking right now. I swear I’ve never seen this side of Genie before. So this is how he smiles when he’s with his family. Here’s to Genie’s warm eyes that are looking into mine right now.

– He seems to have a mischievous look on his face. I guess he watched the show together with his family. I wonder if his family knew about Genie being Hanryang Doryeong.

After uploading her post, Park Eun-Soo kept checking the comments as if she had been hooked on doing this. Finally, she replied to the last comment with a happy smile on her face.

“Yes, everybody knew.”

Park Eun-Soo was the first in the family to know about Hanryang Doryeong. However, she didn’t tell anyone except her husband, Choi Min-Woo, who hadn’t seen the show. She didn’t even tell Woo-Hee about it because Woo-Jin asked her not to, so the secret was kept safe.

Initially, Woo-Hee was simply happy that Min Si-Hoo didn’t manage to clinch his fifth victory. But subsequently, she started looking suspiciously at Woo-Jin since the second episode. She still wasn’t sure because Woo-Jin feigned ignorance. Either way, she couldn’t imagine Woo-Jin hiding something big like that from her.

However, the moment Woo-Jin got his third victory, Woo-Hee grabbed him by the neck and shook him excitedly, questioning why he didn’t tell her about it earlier. She was convinced Hanryang Doryeong was Woo-Jin without needing his confirmation. After learning that she was the only person in the family who was kept in the dark, Woo-Hee asked if she was such a clueless person and fell into despair for a couple of days. Woo-Jin had followed the depressed Woo-Hee around and even cajoled her. Then, just as Park Eun-Soo was happily reminiscing about what happened, she suddenly received a phone call from her father.

– Why didn’t you tell me?

As soon as Park Eun-Soo answered the call, her eyes immediately widened when she heard the abrupt question.

“I’m sorry? About what?”

Park Eun-Soo’s first thought was that her father called because he found out that Woo-Jin had taken the bar exam. Even though her heart was pounding crazily, she feigned ignorance for the time being. Although Woo-Jin thought that Park Eun-Soo still hadn’t given up on her son taking the bar exam, she wasn't as zealous as she used to be. This was because many people loved and acknowledged her son, and she felt proud as she watched him steadily walk on his own path. Since he had already started the bar exam this year, he might as well finish it, but she was planning on telling him not to put himself through any more hardships. That was why she was worried that her father might interfere and make things worse.

– I heard that Woo-Jin is on the show called The King of the Masked Singers?

“Ah~! So that’s what you were referring to. We didn’t know anything about it at first either but happened to find out by chance after watching it on TV. Woo-Jin told us not to tell anyone, so we couldn’t say anything.”

– Am I “anyone”?

Park Eun-Soo was very confused after hearing the disappointment in her father’s voice that he couldn’t hide. Even though her father didn’t directly talk about Woo-Jin joining the entertainment industry, she assumed it was natural for him to oppose it, given his nature. Thinking that the whole incident with Blue Fit back then might make him more adamant against it, she tried her best to refrain from talking about Woo-Jin’s affairs about the entertainment industry as much as possible.

“You don’t watch shows like that anyway.”

– …

“Father?”

– Forget about it.

Park Eun-Soo looked at the phone, perplexed as the call was disconnected. She couldn’t understand why her father was acting so out of character. Her confusion stemmed from the lack of knowledge on how religiously her father watched all the movies and TV shows his grandson appeared in. He had even made a collection of all his works so far. So naturally, she also didn’t know that Park Hyun-Man had lost his temper and called his daughter after going on The King of the Masked Singers’ website, where he found and downloaded the episodes that Woo-Jin had appeared in. As always, it was difficult for children to understand their parents’ feelings.

***

Just as Kang Ho-Soo confidently predicted, many people desperately wanted to get an interview with Chae Woo-Jin. The agency’s phone rang all day, and the public relations team had been busy dealing with the reporters one by one. They were busy providing an appropriate amount of information about Chae Woo-Jin while simultaneously reviewing the content.

“Just today, we received two offers for historical productions,” CEO Jang Soo-Hwan mentioned.

Apart from the historical films and dramas that had already aired or started shooting, all the remaining upcoming productions wanted to cast Woo-Jin. The production teams examining the situation and weighing their options before jumping in seemed to have become more anxious since yesterday.

“Tsk, these people are too late. They need to have good intuition like Director Yoon Seon.” CEO Jang Soo-Hwan probably already had a production in mind, so he didn’t even bother giving more details of the other productions that had sent in their offers today.

“Director Yoon Seon?” Woo-Jin asked.

“Ah, Director Yoon Seon made an offer to cast you in his movie. I specifically didn’t tell you about it earlier because I didn’t want to disturb you when you were preparing for the bar exam. Still, if you want to do a historical production, this one is much better than the other offers that came in today.”

“He’s a good director. Is that a historical film as well?”

Even though he believed that Director Yoon Seon was a good and talented director, more importantly, Woo-Jin liked that he wanted to cast him before Hanryang Doryeong’s identity was revealed. If they wanted to hire Chae Woo-Jin after seeing Hanryang Doryeong, it meant that there was a limit to the image they wanted from him.

“It’s called Red Enemy — its screenplay surfaced in Chungmuro[1] three years ago, but the shooting still hasn’t commenced because Director Yoon Seon was very picky when it came to casting the main lead. A lot of agencies and actors covet the role, but he’s offering it to you!”

Even though it surfaced in Chungmuro three years ago, Woo-Jin didn’t know anything about it. Thus, he was not as deeply moved as CEO Jang Soo-Hwan. However, judging from CEO Jang’s reaction, he had high expectations for it.

“You mentioned that it was a historical film. What is it about?” He was curious whether it was a movie centered on historical events based on actual historical figures or a mix of reality and fiction, where the characters were made up.

“You know who Prince Myeong-Hwan is, right?”

“Yes…I do.” Jang Soo-Hwan failed to notice the momentary pause in Woo-Jin’s reply. His eyes became slightly fuzzy. Even though it had been a long time, Prince Myeong-Hwan was an idol that people in the arts looked up to and aspired to be.

“It’s the life story of the man whose father, King Gyeong-Jo, named him Myeong-Hwan, where ‘Hwan’ stands for ‘retreat,’ but he changed the character of his name, changing its meaning to ‘flame.’[2] They named the movie Red Enemy, based on the sentence ‘My heart is red because of the flame within it.’”

“You’re saying….”

“That’s right — you’ve been cast as Prince Myeong-Hwan!”

After reading the screenplay of Red Enemy, CEO Jang Soo-Hwan coveted the role and wanted one of his actors to land it. Previously, DS had also recommended a couple of actors, but Director Yoon Seon rejected all of them. However, the tables had turned this time around. It was meaningful that Director Yoon approached them first and proposed to work with Woo-Jin.

“CEO Jang…”

The excited Jang Soo-Hwan had already started imagining Woo-Jin as Prince Myeong-Hwan; he couldn’t hear anything. After Woo-Jin called out to him a couple of times, he finally snapped out of his thoughts and came to his senses. Jang Soo-Hwan’s face was beaming more than ever because he was looking forward to meeting the most perfect and beautiful version of Prince Myeong-Hwan anybody had ever seen thus far.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t want to take on the role of Prince Myeong-Hwan.”

“Huh? What did you say?” CEO Jang Soo-Hwan asked Woo-Jin several times to clarify because he thought he might have misheard him. When he finally understood what Woo-Jin said, he cried out loud.

“Why not? Woo-Jin, think about it carefully! We’re talking about Prince Myeong-Hwan here. The Prince Myeong-Hwan!”

Jang Soo-Hwan could not comprehend Woo-Jin’s decision and listed all the actors that had portrayed Prince Myeong-Hwan so far. Some of them were even given the title — ‘Korea’s Top Actor.’

“Do you by any chance not know much about Prince Myeong-Hwan? That’s not the case, right?” CEO Jang had the urge to grab a history book right away. Prince Myeong-Hwan occupied several pages in historical texts as the driving force, as well as the victim of the coup.

“I don’t want to portray him because I know him well enough.”

Woo-Jin looked away, frowning. His attitude meant that it was something he truly didn’t want to do. However, Jang Soo-Hwan couldn’t let go of his desire to get Woo-Jin to portray Prince Myeong-Hwan. Even though he had never forced an actor to take on a role they hated, he held onto Woo-Jin and continued talking.

“Why? Is it because something upsetting happened while you were studying about Prince Myeong-Hwan?”

“There are…quite a lot of reasons.”

“This is not something you should decide on the spur of the moment. We still have some time, so let’s think about it over the next few days before giving an answer.”

Jang Soo-Hwan patted Woo-jin on the back and gently coaxed him as though he was comforting a child. He didn’t forget to place Red Enemy’s script in Woo-Jin’s hand while he was at it.

“Are you really not going to do it? You might not know this, but people have been talking about Red Enemy for a very long time. Director Yoon Seon is one of the most renowned directors, so there won’t be any hiccups during the film production. You don’t have to worry about the production or anything at all. So why don’t you just trust him this once?”

Upon hearing that Woo-Jin turned down the part, Kang Ho-Soo’s response was not much different from Jang Soo-Hwan's. He spoke up for Director Yoon Seon just in case Woo-Jin had any misunderstandings about him. He had never expected Woo-Jin to be reluctant to take on the role of Prince Myeong-Hwan.

“It’s nothing to do with the director. I just don’t want to act as Prince Myeong-Hwan.”

“Prince Myeong-Hwan is a very well-rounded character, so I thought you’d like him. Is that not the case?”

“I’m not interested because many people have already portrayed him.”

Realizing Woo-Jin still had no interest in the role, Kang Ho-Soo used Jang Hee-Bin[3] as an example.

“ Jang Hee-Bin has been portrayed by so many actresses, but still many actresses covet that role whenever there’s a new drama or movie about her. Prince Myeong-Hwan is Jang Hee-Bin for male actors. There are so many different interpretations of him, so yours could be very different depending on how you act. I think it’ll be a good idea for you to do some serious research about him before coming to a decision….”

After hearing Kang Ho-Soo’s appeal, Woo-Jin held back his laughter with all his might and nodded without sincerity. Regardless of how much he thought about it, he couldn’t feel any enthusiasm towards it.

Prince Myeong-Hwan. He knew him too well; that was why he didn’t want to take this role. Prince Myeong-Hwan was one of his identities from his past lives, so it was impossible for him to not know who he was. He was born as the sole legitimate child of King Gyeong-Jo. When he was born, the kingdom already had a crown prince who was 14 years older than Prince Myeong-Hwan.

The situation was very similar to that of Prince Gwang-Hae and Prince Yeong-Chang[4], just that, unlike King Seon-Jo, King Gyeong-Jo was wary of Prince Myeong-Hwan and kept his distance. To be precise, the issue was that Gyeong-Jo had regarded Queen Moon-Jin, Prince Myeong-Hwan’s biological mother, and her family as enemies. Therefore, in Gyeong-Jo’s eyes, Prince Myeong-Hwan was nothing more than a threat to his royal authority.

King Gyeong-Jo had never once looked after his children as a father. He named him Myeong-Hwan — ‘Myeong’ for inscription and ‘Hwan’ for retreat. Even though ‘Hwan’ had several meanings, Gyeong-Jo was clear and firm about its meaning and told his young son to remember it for the rest of his life.

At the young age of 7, Prince Myeong-Hwan was married to a woman from a humble family and was chased out of the palace. When his wife was 20, she gave birth to a son, and both mother and son died a mysterious death a few days later. Prince Myeong-Hwan was 17 years old at that time.

The world that had never been fun started to become very dull. After ascending the throne, his older brother was always wary of him and would monitor and harass him. On the other hand, Prince Myeong-Hwan’s mother wanted her son to ascend the throne, even if she had to stage a coup with the help of her family.

‘I was fed up.’

He was very sick and tired of his family and blood relations. He had often gone to bed praying that he wouldn’t wake up in the morning. If he were to take on that role, he wasn’t confident enough to act it out without getting his personal emotions involved.

1. Korea’s Hollywood. ☜

2. A lot of Korean names use hanja (Chinese characters), and in this case, his original name (Hwan) was 還, but he changed it to 煥. ☜

3. She’s the consort of King Sukjong of Joseon and the mother of King Gyeongjong. She was the Queen of Joseon from 1689 until her deposition in 1694. ☜

4. Grand Prince Yeong-Chang and Gwanghaegun of Joseon are actual historical figures. King Seon-Jo named Prince Gwang-Hae as his successor. ☜