#kang sin jae

[teafiend]

[solrosan]

“ I won't tell a soul. I promise. “ + Jo Eun-sup 👀😏

Thank you for sending this in! (Please don't try to figure out exactly when this is set.)

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“I know that the heart wants what the heart wants, or whatever, but you need to have a serious talk with yours.”

Sin-jae looks up at Eun-sup who’s standing right in front of him. The new haircut doesn’t suit him – or it would, if he just bothered to style it, but he doesn’t. Because he’s Eun-sup and not… someone else. He takes a slow sip from his paper cup. The tea is lukewarm and too sweet.

“What are you on about?” he asks.

Eun-sup sits down on the step next to him. “First, Tae-eul, but that’s…” Eun-sup makes a sweeping, dismissive gesture with his hand. “Then, the second most handsome man in two universes.”

His cheeky grin makes Sin-jae want to hit him right in the face. Instead he finishes the tea with a grimace.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he mutters.

“You’ve been gazing longingly at me ever since I got back, and I’m pretty sure it’s not my charm that has suddenly won you over.”

Sin-jae glares at him, hoping it hides his horror. He’s caught himself doing it from time to time, but he hadn’t realized he’d been that obvious.

“I won’t tell a soul, I promise,” Eun-sup says, more quietly now. “Seriously, though, have a talk with your heart. You’re making yourself miserable, falling for these people you can’t have.”

Even though it’s true (and said in kindness) it sounds condescending, as if he’s not good enough for them. Which, granted, might be true too. He fights the urge to walk off, to leave Eun-sup there with his theories and his concerns and his stupid face and unstyled hair, because being seen for the idiot he is, is as comforting as it is emberassing.

After the longest silence that Eun-sup has probably managed in his life, he then says, “You deserve better.”

Sin-jae gives him a short, brief smile. “Will you just shut up?”

Eun-sup demonstratively zips up his lips, locks his mouth and throws away the invisible key. Then he smiles and – to Sin-jae’s surprise – remains quiet. After a while he gets up, Sin-jae’s point about this not being a conversation he wants to have clearly having gone through. He smiles and nods, then walks away.

“Eun-sup,” Sin-jae says, his voice slightly raised. When Eun-sup turns around, he smiles as well. “Thanks.”

Eun-sup’s smile widens and he gives him a playful salute, before leaving him alone on the step. Sin-jae sighs.

He really is bone-set on making his life as complicated as possible, isn’t he?

[nettlestonenell]

Part Two: 

Ardent Human Desire vs. Fate and the Manpasikjeok OR Why Are There So Many Obstacles Between Lee Gon and Jeong Tae-Eul’s Ultimate Reunion?

If you haven’t, please go back and read Part One: Questions About the Flute OR User Manual, Manpasikjeok Edition

Let’s agree to a few things to start, here.

1.       In a parallel universe, everyone has a counterpart/doppelganger.

2.       In TKEM’s version of this, your counterpart/doppelganger shares not only your birthday and therefore your age, but also your exact genealogy—which is to say you have the same parents, grandparents, bloodline across each universe. In TKEM this means you will have the same family name (Jo, Lee, Jeong, Myeong) across all possible universes, though your first names will change depending on your iteration. This also means that you are fated to be with the same family/lover/spouse across all possible universes. This is pre-appointed and applies to everyone. *exception: as the worlds begin to show their cracks, Jo Yeong’s parents have divorced, while Jo Eun-Sup’s stayed together, and have had twins. (The finale, when the worlds are again harmonized, reunites Jo Yeong’s parents and they do have twins, which seems to signal that this was their proper Fate)

3.       Episode 16, the series finale, seems to really muddy the waters of #2 in a way that I probably lean toward being sloppy consistency rather than deliberate revoking of world-building absolutes [Example: Jo Yeong’s parents are together in 2022 and have twins, but those children would be several years younger than their Republic counterparts (who are said to be starting Kindergarten at that same time), which is…not parallel universes in balance? It would signal exactly the opposite—that time and life flows entirely differently in each universe after repairing the flute…and 1:1 doppelgangers are no more--which is maybe yet another post needed to ponder that on…]

If we take on #2, we are left asking ourselves about three particular characters and their doppelgangers: Lee Gon/Lee Ji-Hyun, Jeong Tae-Eul/Luna, and Kang Sin-Jae/Kang Hyeon-Min

Across all universes, how are they fated to hook-up? OR Who is Jeong Tae-Eul’s true, fated love across all universes in the mind and will of Manpasikjeok?

Is it Jeong Tae-Eul/Luna, and Kang Sin-Jae?

For example, if Shin-Jae of the Kingdom is fated for Luna, and vice versa, and he’s been taken to the Republic (against the will of the flute), he can’t be with Luna. BUT, if that is the fate, that those two are to be together--especially to have a child--then it translates across all parallel worlds, and means that Jeong Tae-Eul is meant for Kang Hyeon-Min, yes? The two Republic-based iterations. This also would illuminate two other things:

1.       The fact that Sin-Jae "has feelings for” Tae-Eul. She’s not the “right” iteration for him (he’s Kingdom and she’s Republic), but she’s the closest he can get to the satisfaction of his heart, in a frustrated Fate.

2.      It could be suggested -- Did you ever notice that the youth embodiment of the flute appears at least twice in situations that throw KSJ and JTE even closer together? In one, he’s leading that group of high schoolers past the TaeKwonDo center where KSJ first sees Tae-Eul, and in another he’s bullying KSJ so that JTE fights for KSJ. It doesn’t seem coincidental to me that the flute makes an appearance trying to throw these two together—even though they’re the wrong match. Poor thing, it’s trying, in its broken state, to still do its job, to still steer fate.

3.       But yet, Tae-Eul never--even long before meeting Lee Gon--has romantic feelings for Sin-Jae.

4.       And what we’re shown in the final episode of the series between Sin-Jae and Luna in the Kingdom could at best be called pre-romantic. (and more likely be termed platonic) Their relationship mirrors the JTE/KSJ relationship in the Republic, of her hyung-nim well before Lee Gon appeared, before KSJ expressed that he had feelings for her.

Is it Jeong Tae-Eul and Kang Hyeon-Min?

If it’s meant to be JTE and Kang Hyeon-Min as a fated couple, that’s impossible, as KHM has been rendered comatose in a way that we’re not shown is related to either the Traitor or the Treason. We are shown in Episode 16 what was “supposed” to happen was that he would NOT be struck by the car—his original fate doesn’t hold, there, and as such, his character in 2022, now a chaebol, is removed entirely from JTE’s circle of acquaintance. I’d say, importantly, in the Episode 16 re-set (pre-LG’s return), she not only never looks him up, she never encounters him, which if he were her fate or her potential fate, she surely would have.

Is it Jeong Tae-Eul and Lee Ji-Hyun?

I confess this is where my money is. Of course, Lee Ji-Hyun, in the Traitor’s made-over version of the Republic, dies at age 8, so JTE would never have met him, and therefore I posit would have lived as a single, childless woman until her death in that version of the Republic. (Without the LG re-set)

(Had she not met Lee Gon) I believe that JTE and LJH were fated, in the will and agenda of the flute. They are its preferred match.

What about Lee Gon, then? Who for him?

Remember, in Episode 16, Luna gets a found-family re-set, and PM Koo is jailed after some political intrigue (though not having risen as high as PM). While Lee Gon would not likely have met Luna 1.0 the street rat, it’s not impossible to think that he might, at some function or another, have met a politician’s sibling who was college-educated and working as a civil servant.

I choose to believe that all versions of JTE and LG are fated to be lovers and ultimately parents to children. It is only Lee R/Lim’s cockblock that makes it impossible for the Republic’s iteration of JTE to meet Lee Ji-Hyun, dead aged 8. 

Which is where Ardent Human Desire comes into play in altering Fate.

What is Ardent Human Desire when we’re talking about Fate?

Let me direct you to a little moment in a show called Goblin/Guardian: The Lonely and Great God, written by Kim Eun-Suk, the writer of TKEM. 

A moment of set-up: the Grim Reaper has a tea room behind a solid (to living human eyes) wall. In it he entertains dead souls before they leave this world. In one episode, a living human man comes through the door, begging for a bathroom. Both Goblin and Reaper are stunned: no one living should be able to come through that door, much less see it. It’s not their Fate. Fate is unchangeable, right? But after directing the living man (in pain from a need for the toilet), they muse that ardent human desire can perhaps open any door (alter any assigned fate). [Something Goblin is eager to accomplish, subverting fate]

Seeing as it’s from the same author’s mind, I’d argue that that concept comes into play in TKEM, too.

From the Night of the Treason forward, Lee Gon has an ardent human desire to find JTE. Not Luna. No, he wants to meet the woman from the Republic who’s a police officer. That’s 25 years of a (let’s be clear: non-sexual, non-romantic at the time) persistent desire that never lessens, never fades. Furthermore, it’s a desire of the king who’s a potential player of the flute, of the growing child who heard the flute call to him. Of the man who chooses ultimately to retrieve the flute whole at ultimate personal risk (and risk, even, to his relationship with JTE, the object of his Ardent Human Desire).

And the flute tests him—in fact, I will argue with you all night and into the weekend that what we’re shown of him opening every door in the universe is just that: a test by Manpasikjeok. “Are you sure she’s what you really want?” it’s asking him. “How far will you go to find her? How many iterations of her happy can I show you until it lessens your desire for her? Until you give in?”

I think it’s terribly important that in no iteration does LG find a JTE doppelganger that’s in a bad situation, in need of rescuing. [Case in point: Luna 1.0 street rat--he’s allowed to see nothing similar] He expressly tells JTE that she is happy every time he finds a version of her. And yet, because of how fate works in TKEM’s universes, he likewise never finds her married or involved with anyone, or with children—because, as Part One laid out: if one Lee Gon/JTE has children (same birthdays)/hooks up with their fate, then ALL iterations of Lee Gon/JTE have children (same birthdays)/have hooked up with their fate--particularly once the timeline and flute have been repaired.

We know that if those JTEs had met their LG iterations they would have AT LEAST recognized our LG’s face when he presented himself. But they don’t. Nope. She is always employed, always still living in the same building with one, if not two, parents. Because of that we’re never shown that LG has trouble locating her (as JTE did in the Kingdom locating her mother, checking their address, b/c there her parents were both dead).

This shot will never look above-board.

To think about how these/this situation works, keep in mind that last leap during their epilogue dating trips—where LG had just left the Kingdom and they were blipped back there only minutes later. The flute, in its whole form, is clearly controlling where they are sent and when (and perhaps that’s a different post, too, about how the flute is preparing/teaching Lee Gon to be its eventual player). The flute, when whole, controls where you end up. It’s not a transporter where you dial up your destination, it’s spinning a roulette wheel if the roulette wheel is fixed by the House.

Here, in the immediate wake of resetting the night of the Treason, the flute is actively NOT LETTING Lee Gon get to JTE. It is MAKING HIM open every door in the universe, seeing if he will persist, showing him what it wants him to see. (Her happy and at peace, not in need of him.) The flute is trying to see if it can convince Lee Gon to let her go since, as they are from two different worlds, they are not each other’s assigned fate.

Obviously, showing him a JTE in straitened circumstances would only encourage him to find her. That’s not going to lessen his desire, so the flute doesn’t go that route. Instead, it shows JTE with purpose, first (I think) as an airline pilot, then a soldier, a graduate of the police academy, and finally as some version of an ‘Idol’ (I think.) [*All positions that also do a surprisingly good job of showing qualities that would sync well with being the Queen of the Kingdom, so perhaps the flute is a little conflicted about JTE as well…]

And what’s more, during this time, as LG is opening every door in the universe (and also, I assume, only being able to venture into the liminal space and leave the Kingdom occasionally b/c he’s still got King Work to do), the flute decides to put someone directly in bitterly lonely Tae-Eul’s path as well.

And it’s not to break her heart (nor viewers’). 

Think about when she encounters Lee Ji-Hyun on the street. On my original views it seemed to me that he didn’t take any notice of her at all (she is, at her height, well out of his line of sight), but upon closer re-watch he DOES actually have a second of looking at her. It’s not extended eye contact, and maybe not direct eye contact at all, but he does see her. In this, the flute gives Tae-Eul the chance to see her original, pre-LG fated love. And what does it have him dressed in, just for her sake?

That’s right: his military uniform. It’s not the same coat Lee Gon wore when washing rice, that was white—but it’s the black one he and Yeong are wearing in their selfie. “Here he is,” the flute/Fate seems to be saying to her, “he could be yours if you’ll only accept him.”

[*It is also perhaps because Lee Ji-Hyu- iterations are serving his military service that the other JTE-iterations have not met him yet in the other parallel universes]

But the Ardent Human Desire of these two lovers refuses to be swayed, even after a year of separation and total ignorance of each other’s post-reset situations. Persistent. Ardent. Human. Desire.

The flute is indebted to both of them. They each took steps that culminated in a destiny/fate they each chose to embrace (to use Prince Buyeong’s words). They sacrificed their own Ardent Human Desires to fix the timeline and the parallel universes while knowing it might well separate them forever from that which they desire (the exact opposite of villainous Lee R/Lim’s actions). [In fact, making  ultimately Kingly choices, shows of wisdom and worthiness.]

The King Lee Gon chose for not only his subjects, but also the citizens of the Republic, and the future Queen JTE chose to brave the liminal space with Lee R/Lim for her love, the King.

And in the wake of that, fate—and the Manpasikjeok—agreed to bend.

Which is why LG and JTE then become what is fated.

[dramafics]

Heridas Abiertas (Exit Wounds) by @ibelongtomousse (blau)

Drama: The King: Eternal Monarch

Summary: Yeong gets not-so-accidentally married, dies for a while, considers a career change, and takes a vacation. In that order.

Rating: Mature

Pairing: Jo Yeong/Kang Sin-jae

CW: Grief/Mourning

Chapters: 8/8

Tags: Latin-American Literature, Happy Ending, Post-Canon

Notes: A dreamlike dive deep into the guts of a flashy but somewhat shallow show, endowing its universe with grace and depth. Two supporting characters, both prickly, damaged men, get a sweeping love story of their own, and in the process shed new light on some of the show’s dark corners. Full of poetry, allusion, delightful original characters and carefully crafted, beautiful sentences. This is a romance to savour.

[jipuragi]

Sinjae x Yeong...One Night Stand AU

Yang Sinjae is an antisocial detective at the Jongno PD who drinks too much coffee and doesn't get enough sleep.

He's been running himself ragged solving cases in the Violent Crimes Unit while untangling the secrets of his newly discovered adoption and doesn't have time for the new assignment he's been ordered to do.

He's been instructed to leave his heavy case load alone and instead help with security matters for the official state visit of the King of Corea and he can't say no.

That night he goes drinking and like a dream, he meets a gorgeous stranger from out of town who has the face of an angel and scorching kisses like the devil, and they spend the night together.

Will their attraction continue to burn when Sinjae finds out his one night stand is Captain Jo Yeong, the King's own Security Chief? Or will it fizzle out?

[sunsoothed]

kang sin jae jo yeong are def not a pda couple. very secretive very soft kinda people. they'd be very cute and very dangerous

[casdecns]

episode twelve

[sunsetswerve1995]

It's honestly insane to think back how for the first like third of this drama basically everyone was criticizing it. They have really turned this drama around, and it's one of the best I've ever seen. I see almost no one speaking bad about it now (except for the loosey goosey time rules). I can't remember the last time a kdrama had me switching from being on the edge of my seat one second to sobbing the next.

I've spent the last few weeks spending the whole week waiting for Friday and Saturday. They've really knocked it out of the park with this one. Congratulations to all of the cast and the production team. I may eat my words next week if Tae Eul and Gon don't get a happily ever after but right now I'm in awe of the show they've created.

I want to go back and rewatch everything to see what details I've missed. Maybe now that so much has been explained there are things in those first episodes that will make much more sense.