Post by ajk on Jul 26, 2013 23:36:07 GMT -5
Nighttime: Black-clad swordsmen are scrambling into the scene. Hard to tell how many, but at least a dozen. Looks like a palace of some sort. Now an intense-looking man is standing in the main courtyard, staring at the front door. Angry thoughts are in his head; something about the king and how "I thought of you as my real brother," and of a strong friendship that they shared in what apparently were happier times. As the man walks to the front door, the swordsmen scurry nearby. They keep pace with him, to the side, as he approaches the steps.
Attendants go out to meet him, led by a man identified as Yeongdo Cheom Ui, First Rank Senior Chancellor. The man announces his intentions--to see the king--and the attendants step forward to search him...with odd reluctance, and only at the chancellor's insistence. But they do so, and the man tolerates it passively. He's clean, and is allowed to enter. So this is the king's palace? Where are all the guards and attendants we're used to seeing around royal palaces? There's a strange vibe here, as though the heart of the nation is weakened and desolate.
Captioning tells us that it's 1371, the 20th year of the reign of King Gongmin. Given the narration we just heard, we've started off by jumping ahead in time.
The man enters what looks like an empty throne room, and begins to pray towards the empty throne. He speaks aloud--more of that brother stuff and of how much the king meant to him...Suddenly a flashback, and we're looking at a drawing of a woman. A large, exquisite drawing. And in front of it, a king, speaking angrily to our unnamed visitor, who kneels before him. The king is upset about this drawing possibly being "a ghost's image" and how, "according to what you told me, as life and death are all Buddha's ways, one person's image and presence being visible or not has nothing to do with being alive or dead." And so on. Now captions identify the visitor: Shin Don. He tells the king about how he himself constantly thinks about Princess Noguk--apparently the woman in the drawing, I guess his idea of keeping her "image and presence" alive. "So why," the king shouts in response, "are you telling me this person is dead?!"...Flashback ending, we return to the empty throne room and a visibly saddened Shin Don. He's being watched from the shadows by someone identified as Won Hyeon.
Simultaneously, at the king's residence: An older woman is outside, insisting to the king--the same king we just saw, who's inside, and who by now we deduce is King Gongmin--that SD has been proven a dangerous traitor and urging him to kill SD, both for his own protection "and to restore your dignity." Inside, the king is first kneeling before Noguk's image, then sitting down to eat a meal, looking almost amused at the woman's audible carrying-on outside. Poignantly, he pours a drink and sets it aside as if for his dead wife. Now the woman says something about her daughter-in-law being dead...so this must be Gongmin's mother. Boy, she sure has it in for SD; now it's complaints about his arrogance. On and on. But inside, now the king is offering food to the image. "Please eat." Uh-oh, has he snapped and gone bonkers from grief denial?
Back in the throne room, Won Hyeon now steps forward, because SD sensed him there and called him out. Won, we learn, is a longtime companion of SD's. "All I wanted," he tells SD with startling desperation in his voice, "was to see you sit on that throne." You ruined that, he says. I could have killed the king so many times. "Why did you stop me?" No answer. "Didn't you say you'd make a world where there are no nobles and lowly peasants? You'd use Buddha's ways to make a world where the lowly peasants become nobles, and the nobles turn into peasants? Wasn't this what you desired?" Wow, if he did, big talk...And Won really pours it on about the king: "If it weren't for Princess Noguk, he'd still be the bottom of the Imperial Family's barrel, wandering in the brothels of Yanjing, squandering his life away." But SD is still kneeling there, eyes closed, not even acknowledging this. Now even more urgently, Won urges him, "Will you just sit there and await your death? Rise this very minute, go out there and sweep away this damn palace!" Uh-oh, that does it. Suddenly SD's eyes open wide. Incredibly, a stone tile explodes out of the floor, and now Won is clutching his throat like an unseen force is strangling the life out of him. It releases its grip as SD laughs a little. (Uh-oh; hope they don't turn this guy into some sort of supernatural being.)
...and now another flashback. It's 1356, fifteen years earlier. Late one night. A friendly attendant named An Dochi is walking with SD, whose name back then was Pyeonjo; he had last seen Pyeonjo five years earlier in Yanjing (I guess when Gongmin was still there). They talk about the achievements of a favored "royal monk" named Bou, and An tells Pyeonjo, "you ran amok the entire Middle Kingdom for seven years and cleansed your spirit, yet you look even worse." Not nice! But Pyeonjo takes it in good humor--I guess it was intended that way. Whatever--he's here because the queen summoned him. An thinks it has something to do with her frustration about Goryeo's submissive, powerless situation...but now a door is opened and an important-looking man asks if this is the man the queen summoned. Yes, An says, and he's just come from a long journey (so he must be here straight from Yanjing). Wait a minute, that's the same guy we saw fifteen years later, the chancellor Yeongdo. Can't tell what his role is right now, but obviously it's significant if he's this close to the queen.
Now in an inner courtyard, waiting to see the queen, Pyeonjo tells Yeongdo of how impressed he is that the queen reads into the late-night hours, and worries so much about the country. How does he know she's reading in there? Weird...
Attendant An has gone to the king to report about this visitor. The king remembers him from back in Yanjing, at the Goryeo community there. "That charlatan monk." Why did the queen summon him? An says he doesn't know; Gongmin is skeptical about that. But now An kneels and starts going on about how "you called all the subjects and promised, that the day you'd become King, everyone would gather and celebrate the event screaming and cheering with joy. Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah for the King!" And now he's crying, as though that hopeful day of excitement and anticipation never materialized. Gongmin, seemingly resigned to agree with him, says, "When would I ever become independent anyway? Cheering? I don't need that. A simple welcome will suffice. In this Goryeo, a little frontier country at the outskirts of the great Yuan Empire, when will cheering here ever see the light of day?" An is devastated at the lowly condition of the nation and the people's indifference to their king. "There's still a long way before we can start cheering," Gongmin says matter-of-factly. And he grumbles about Noguk wasting her time with this silly monk, as though he could possibly do anything to help.
Now Pyeonjo is sitting before the queen. He sits and waits, while she slowly writes. Now she starts reading something aloud--some sort of government report about the state of the nation. A bleak one: undermanned military; food in short supply; taxes doubled; a struggling government. Turns out this is a record from the time of King Chungnyeol. More specifically from when Kublai Khan [info link] demanded provisions from Goryeo for its attack on Japan (there were two; one in 1274 and one in 1281; could be either). The queen is moved by the reports of tens of thousands of starving people back then. Now she reads from another report, from 1316 early in the reign of King Chungsuk [info link]. Another staggering list of demands. "And on top of that," she continues, "every year they chose 150 maidens, between fourteen and sixteen years of age, and sent them to Yanjing when needed, even twice a year." Her voice starts to break. "If this keeps up, how can Goryeo possibly survive? Not a single decent weed will remain in Goryeo." She looks at SD with tears in her eyes. "The entire records of your past kings are stained with these outrageous tributes. I can't believe Goryeo resisted all this time." As a Mongol princess, showing such compassion when she has no need to care one tiny bit, it's surprising. This must be a very special person. SD points out that the most recent Goryean kings, their posthumous names all signify loyalty--loyalty to the Yuan. Noguk knows this. "I'm a Mongolian woman," she tells SD; "My father lived succumbing to others, so he taught me to choose death if it means fighting for my honor." She adds that the Yuan Empire "will soon meet its doom." Huh? They're hardy desert nomads who have given up their way of life for "silk dresses and basking in vice inside monumental palaces." Apparently she thinks they're so far out of their element, they've gone soft and it will be their ruin. Her resolve is almost unnerving: We need an independent king--one who can be declared an emperor--and freedom from these crushing Yuan tribute demands. "You haven't forgotten the promise we made in Yanjing, have you?" So she knew him back then, obviously.
Now all of that flashback ends and we're where we started, in 1371, with Shin Don kneeling before the empty throne. But hold on, it's not empty any more; now Gongmin is on it. A strange image, mainly because the throne itself is so wide, almost like a bench. The king looks at SD and asks him a surprising question: Why are you opposing the construction of a shrine to Princess Noguk? SD says there's a continuing famine, which the king of course knows; the implication being, the nation can't afford it. But Gongmin accuses SD of hoarding personal wealth: a warehouse "filled to the brim with goods." You've become a greedy chancellor, he says--chancellor?--and now, " not only court officials, even peasants are screaming for me to kill Shin Don." SD responds, That's not what your wife would have wanted. It's been three years of mourning since her death, he says, (Wow, Gongmin really is stuck in his grief) "and a majestic shrine was erected at the entrance of Wangryun Temple." Isn't that enough? Or are you "trying to beat Qin Shi Huang at his own game and make something even more extravagant and opulent than Epang Palace?" (Qin [info link] was the first emperor of the unified China, back in 221 BC; Epang Palace [info link] was an enormous complex begun before Qin's death, so large that it was never completed.) Yow, that is quite a cynical jab at the king, and it sets Gongmin to yelling. The king forthrightly admits that he's still trapped in grief agony. And he's terribly hurt by SD's lack of support. They go back a long way together, we learn. Gongmin was taken from his family and sent to Yanjing at the age of twelve (as a royal hostage), and the two of them became friends there. "I understand you more than anyone else, and you know me more than anyone does." And it's come to this? They argue some more--and it's a good argument. Gongmin is so deeply frustrated at the nation's predicament, and wants "to at least show the Mongol barbarians that we've strengthened ourselves enough to do this much, shouldn't we?!" (Which seems like a shaky idea, because that might only encourage the Yuan to demand more from the kingdom.) Eventually SD denies the accusation of hoarding wealth. At that, Gongmin calls out to Won, who's lurking in the shadows. A groveling Won tells the king that he searched the warehouse and that it's filled with expensive items--gold, jewels and silk. Then the king goes in a different direction: "When I went to pray for Princess Noguk at Wangryun Temple and Gi Hyeon's gang prepared an ambush with soldiers to kill me, Shin Don ran there to save me, and their plot fell through." But you, Won, told me that this was false--"He tried to pave the way for their and his safety just in case the conspiracy failed." Is that right? The question sets Won off on some weird story about Lee In, one of the assassin gang who said Shin Don would get them all clemency if they needed it...but what's he talking about? The king doesn't know or care and angrily cuts him off. Okay, we can see what's going on here; the king is trying to frame SD--to get Won to cough up empty accusations to justify his killing SD. Won isn't a very good liar, though. And SD can see what's going on too. "If Your Majesty wants to kill me, how difficult can that be? There's no need to entangle the matter." Moving right on, he reminds Gongmin about Goryeo's long struggle against attacks from China and northern Barbarians. We've always kept our pride, he points out; and our faith; and our social-equality policy of rewarding merit no matter who attained it. Then: "Every time Your Majesty wants to make fun of me, you point your fingers at me saying I'm just a slave from Okcheon Temple. When you jest at me, in Your Majesty's face I can see a warm and positive energy." And I'll willingly die for you if need be. Then switching gears completely, SD reminds him about the Tripitaka Koreana [info link], and how the Goryean people carved Buddhist scriptures into more than 80,000 wooden blocks during the previous century--an amazing achievement, and accomplished even with the Mongol pressure crushing the country. "What protected Goryeo and maintained its independence all this time wasn't its military power. It was faith." With that, he rises, then kneels again and humbly bows to the ground before his king, then rises and backs slowly out of the room. The king calls out to him, "If you open that door and leave, you'll never be able to return." No effect; SD leaves and the doors bang shut with a jarring echo, leaving Gongmin to shout, "I want to see you on your knees, imploring me to save you!" SD slowly walks out into the middle of the empty courtyard, and suddenly fireworks begin to light up the sky. From where, and why? We don't know...but now we see the black-clad swordsmen run in from multiple directions and converge upon him...
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It's 24 years earlier, 1347, during the reign of King Chungmok (Goryeo's 29th king). A busy central street in an urban area. Eventually we learn that this is Gaegyeong, Goryeo's capital. We see a procession of monks walk through the street and pass through a guarded gate, probably into the royal palace complex. We see a younger Pyeonjo, walking with another man (who looks to be a monk like Pyeonjo) and taking in the sights. Entertainers of various kinds; all kinds of food for sale; and camels. Pyeonjo is utterly taken with that camel staring at him. Probably a rare sight here. The two enter a porcelain shop. Pyeonjo's companion admires a water dropper, but flinches at the price. Has to settle for a simpler one. As he pays for it, Pyeonjo discreetly shoplifts the pricey one! Ugh, not cool. As they leave, Pyeonjo refers to his companion by name: Won Hyeon! Same guy from 24 years later; didn't recognize him. He explains to Pyeonjo that "the Master" has a water dropper that leaks and might appreciate a new one. Then suddenly, several men walking hurriedly in the opposite direction accidentally bump into Won and knock him down. Accidentally...? Or did they do it deliberately and did we just see a flash of one of them reaching into Won's pocket? The men help Won up and apologize, and the two monks go to a cafe and have some lunch. Turns out they're running errands for this master, who gave them money to buy various supplies. Won discovers that his dropper broke in the fall. Without hesitation, Pyeonjo pulls out his stolen one. "Did you steal, again?" No, Pyeonjo says; "Nobody owned that thing in the first place. I just followed Buddha's will, that's all." Ugh. Won takes the dropper from Pyeonjo and says he's going to go give it back to the shop. But he can't just this minute, because there's a commotion in the street. "It's Master Bou! It's Master Bou!" We see an older-looking monk approach as the crowds part. Apparently the guy is a legend in these parts. Villagers surround the man with a mixture of respect and excitement...and now Pyeonjo runs forward and kneels in his path. He identifies himself: "I'm the son of a government slave from Okcheon Temple, and am now practicing with my Master at Gaetae Temple." And he asks, "How can a lowly monk like me save the world?" Bou stops and listens, but then walks on without answering. So Pyeonjo tries once more: "Is Buddha something alive, or dead?" Boy, there's a fat one...but Bou again ignores him and walks on, entering the same gate that the other monks did earlier. What, couldn't even acknowledge a fellow monk? Sheesh. Pyeonjo gets up and dusts himself off with a smile. They go back to finish their lunch...and suddenly Won realizes his money is missing from his pocket. Yeah, his pocket got picked by those guys. So Pyeonjo charges off to go looking for those guys, a nervous Won right behind him and begging him not to do anything rash.
Now we see what looks like some sort of important event taking place, inside a hall. Wait, this is actually the Goryean throne room! Not sure if this is the same room we saw in later years, but the bench throne looks the same. We hear a child coughing...wait, that's not just any child, that's the king! King Chungmok, who was put on the throne at age seven. He's ten now, and he sounds sick. A woman identified as Princess Deoknyeong is watching him. She's his mother. Also watching him is a slightly older woman identified as Lady Yoon, and a minister identified as Lee Je Hyeon. They all sit there staring at him as he coughs. Poor little guy, he's exhausted. And on that big wide throne, looks completely overwhelmed and out of place. Two other men in the room are identified as Choi Man Saeng and Gi Cheol. An attendant scurries up the throne steps to tend to the ailing boy. And it ain't good; he's coughing up some blood. We know what that means. Lee Je Hyeon mutters that this has been happening frequently lately. This Lady Joon, there's something shifty about her...she seems almost pleased at the boy king's struggles. Deoknyeong climbs the steps and comforts the boy, and as she does, Lady Yoon takes the hand of a boy standing next to her. He's identified as Kyeongchang Buwongun, the future King Chungjeong--who will succeed Chungmok. Gi Cheol rises impatiently from his seat and asks Master Buo, who's been observing all this, to say some prayers for the boy's health. He and his associate, Gi Won, motion for some other monks to perform a prayer ritual, which they now begin.
Pyeonjo has found the thieves. And has already called them out for it. They're laughing at him, totally unafraid. "That money," Pyeonjo tells them, "will buy goods used to render service to Buddha, so just give it back." They laugh and taunt him. It's not just the several guys from before, either; now it's more than a dozen. They all start throwing coins at his feet in mock pity, and then tell him to get lost. Pyeonjo endures all this calmly and without reaction. But then he takes off his backpack and rolls up his sleeves. Offers a silent prayer of forgiveness to his master for the "little lesson" he's about to teach. Won tries to talk him out of it, like something ugly is about to happen. But suddenly the thieves start coming at him and he's fighting them off. First one by one, and now he's flying through the air and beating the stuffing out of them....
Attendants go out to meet him, led by a man identified as Yeongdo Cheom Ui, First Rank Senior Chancellor. The man announces his intentions--to see the king--and the attendants step forward to search him...with odd reluctance, and only at the chancellor's insistence. But they do so, and the man tolerates it passively. He's clean, and is allowed to enter. So this is the king's palace? Where are all the guards and attendants we're used to seeing around royal palaces? There's a strange vibe here, as though the heart of the nation is weakened and desolate.
Captioning tells us that it's 1371, the 20th year of the reign of King Gongmin. Given the narration we just heard, we've started off by jumping ahead in time.
The man enters what looks like an empty throne room, and begins to pray towards the empty throne. He speaks aloud--more of that brother stuff and of how much the king meant to him...Suddenly a flashback, and we're looking at a drawing of a woman. A large, exquisite drawing. And in front of it, a king, speaking angrily to our unnamed visitor, who kneels before him. The king is upset about this drawing possibly being "a ghost's image" and how, "according to what you told me, as life and death are all Buddha's ways, one person's image and presence being visible or not has nothing to do with being alive or dead." And so on. Now captions identify the visitor: Shin Don. He tells the king about how he himself constantly thinks about Princess Noguk--apparently the woman in the drawing, I guess his idea of keeping her "image and presence" alive. "So why," the king shouts in response, "are you telling me this person is dead?!"...Flashback ending, we return to the empty throne room and a visibly saddened Shin Don. He's being watched from the shadows by someone identified as Won Hyeon.
Simultaneously, at the king's residence: An older woman is outside, insisting to the king--the same king we just saw, who's inside, and who by now we deduce is King Gongmin--that SD has been proven a dangerous traitor and urging him to kill SD, both for his own protection "and to restore your dignity." Inside, the king is first kneeling before Noguk's image, then sitting down to eat a meal, looking almost amused at the woman's audible carrying-on outside. Poignantly, he pours a drink and sets it aside as if for his dead wife. Now the woman says something about her daughter-in-law being dead...so this must be Gongmin's mother. Boy, she sure has it in for SD; now it's complaints about his arrogance. On and on. But inside, now the king is offering food to the image. "Please eat." Uh-oh, has he snapped and gone bonkers from grief denial?
Back in the throne room, Won Hyeon now steps forward, because SD sensed him there and called him out. Won, we learn, is a longtime companion of SD's. "All I wanted," he tells SD with startling desperation in his voice, "was to see you sit on that throne." You ruined that, he says. I could have killed the king so many times. "Why did you stop me?" No answer. "Didn't you say you'd make a world where there are no nobles and lowly peasants? You'd use Buddha's ways to make a world where the lowly peasants become nobles, and the nobles turn into peasants? Wasn't this what you desired?" Wow, if he did, big talk...And Won really pours it on about the king: "If it weren't for Princess Noguk, he'd still be the bottom of the Imperial Family's barrel, wandering in the brothels of Yanjing, squandering his life away." But SD is still kneeling there, eyes closed, not even acknowledging this. Now even more urgently, Won urges him, "Will you just sit there and await your death? Rise this very minute, go out there and sweep away this damn palace!" Uh-oh, that does it. Suddenly SD's eyes open wide. Incredibly, a stone tile explodes out of the floor, and now Won is clutching his throat like an unseen force is strangling the life out of him. It releases its grip as SD laughs a little. (Uh-oh; hope they don't turn this guy into some sort of supernatural being.)
...and now another flashback. It's 1356, fifteen years earlier. Late one night. A friendly attendant named An Dochi is walking with SD, whose name back then was Pyeonjo; he had last seen Pyeonjo five years earlier in Yanjing (I guess when Gongmin was still there). They talk about the achievements of a favored "royal monk" named Bou, and An tells Pyeonjo, "you ran amok the entire Middle Kingdom for seven years and cleansed your spirit, yet you look even worse." Not nice! But Pyeonjo takes it in good humor--I guess it was intended that way. Whatever--he's here because the queen summoned him. An thinks it has something to do with her frustration about Goryeo's submissive, powerless situation...but now a door is opened and an important-looking man asks if this is the man the queen summoned. Yes, An says, and he's just come from a long journey (so he must be here straight from Yanjing). Wait a minute, that's the same guy we saw fifteen years later, the chancellor Yeongdo. Can't tell what his role is right now, but obviously it's significant if he's this close to the queen.
Now in an inner courtyard, waiting to see the queen, Pyeonjo tells Yeongdo of how impressed he is that the queen reads into the late-night hours, and worries so much about the country. How does he know she's reading in there? Weird...
Attendant An has gone to the king to report about this visitor. The king remembers him from back in Yanjing, at the Goryeo community there. "That charlatan monk." Why did the queen summon him? An says he doesn't know; Gongmin is skeptical about that. But now An kneels and starts going on about how "you called all the subjects and promised, that the day you'd become King, everyone would gather and celebrate the event screaming and cheering with joy. Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah for the King!" And now he's crying, as though that hopeful day of excitement and anticipation never materialized. Gongmin, seemingly resigned to agree with him, says, "When would I ever become independent anyway? Cheering? I don't need that. A simple welcome will suffice. In this Goryeo, a little frontier country at the outskirts of the great Yuan Empire, when will cheering here ever see the light of day?" An is devastated at the lowly condition of the nation and the people's indifference to their king. "There's still a long way before we can start cheering," Gongmin says matter-of-factly. And he grumbles about Noguk wasting her time with this silly monk, as though he could possibly do anything to help.
Now Pyeonjo is sitting before the queen. He sits and waits, while she slowly writes. Now she starts reading something aloud--some sort of government report about the state of the nation. A bleak one: undermanned military; food in short supply; taxes doubled; a struggling government. Turns out this is a record from the time of King Chungnyeol. More specifically from when Kublai Khan [info link] demanded provisions from Goryeo for its attack on Japan (there were two; one in 1274 and one in 1281; could be either). The queen is moved by the reports of tens of thousands of starving people back then. Now she reads from another report, from 1316 early in the reign of King Chungsuk [info link]. Another staggering list of demands. "And on top of that," she continues, "every year they chose 150 maidens, between fourteen and sixteen years of age, and sent them to Yanjing when needed, even twice a year." Her voice starts to break. "If this keeps up, how can Goryeo possibly survive? Not a single decent weed will remain in Goryeo." She looks at SD with tears in her eyes. "The entire records of your past kings are stained with these outrageous tributes. I can't believe Goryeo resisted all this time." As a Mongol princess, showing such compassion when she has no need to care one tiny bit, it's surprising. This must be a very special person. SD points out that the most recent Goryean kings, their posthumous names all signify loyalty--loyalty to the Yuan. Noguk knows this. "I'm a Mongolian woman," she tells SD; "My father lived succumbing to others, so he taught me to choose death if it means fighting for my honor." She adds that the Yuan Empire "will soon meet its doom." Huh? They're hardy desert nomads who have given up their way of life for "silk dresses and basking in vice inside monumental palaces." Apparently she thinks they're so far out of their element, they've gone soft and it will be their ruin. Her resolve is almost unnerving: We need an independent king--one who can be declared an emperor--and freedom from these crushing Yuan tribute demands. "You haven't forgotten the promise we made in Yanjing, have you?" So she knew him back then, obviously.
Now all of that flashback ends and we're where we started, in 1371, with Shin Don kneeling before the empty throne. But hold on, it's not empty any more; now Gongmin is on it. A strange image, mainly because the throne itself is so wide, almost like a bench. The king looks at SD and asks him a surprising question: Why are you opposing the construction of a shrine to Princess Noguk? SD says there's a continuing famine, which the king of course knows; the implication being, the nation can't afford it. But Gongmin accuses SD of hoarding personal wealth: a warehouse "filled to the brim with goods." You've become a greedy chancellor, he says--chancellor?--and now, " not only court officials, even peasants are screaming for me to kill Shin Don." SD responds, That's not what your wife would have wanted. It's been three years of mourning since her death, he says, (Wow, Gongmin really is stuck in his grief) "and a majestic shrine was erected at the entrance of Wangryun Temple." Isn't that enough? Or are you "trying to beat Qin Shi Huang at his own game and make something even more extravagant and opulent than Epang Palace?" (Qin [info link] was the first emperor of the unified China, back in 221 BC; Epang Palace [info link] was an enormous complex begun before Qin's death, so large that it was never completed.) Yow, that is quite a cynical jab at the king, and it sets Gongmin to yelling. The king forthrightly admits that he's still trapped in grief agony. And he's terribly hurt by SD's lack of support. They go back a long way together, we learn. Gongmin was taken from his family and sent to Yanjing at the age of twelve (as a royal hostage), and the two of them became friends there. "I understand you more than anyone else, and you know me more than anyone does." And it's come to this? They argue some more--and it's a good argument. Gongmin is so deeply frustrated at the nation's predicament, and wants "to at least show the Mongol barbarians that we've strengthened ourselves enough to do this much, shouldn't we?!" (Which seems like a shaky idea, because that might only encourage the Yuan to demand more from the kingdom.) Eventually SD denies the accusation of hoarding wealth. At that, Gongmin calls out to Won, who's lurking in the shadows. A groveling Won tells the king that he searched the warehouse and that it's filled with expensive items--gold, jewels and silk. Then the king goes in a different direction: "When I went to pray for Princess Noguk at Wangryun Temple and Gi Hyeon's gang prepared an ambush with soldiers to kill me, Shin Don ran there to save me, and their plot fell through." But you, Won, told me that this was false--"He tried to pave the way for their and his safety just in case the conspiracy failed." Is that right? The question sets Won off on some weird story about Lee In, one of the assassin gang who said Shin Don would get them all clemency if they needed it...but what's he talking about? The king doesn't know or care and angrily cuts him off. Okay, we can see what's going on here; the king is trying to frame SD--to get Won to cough up empty accusations to justify his killing SD. Won isn't a very good liar, though. And SD can see what's going on too. "If Your Majesty wants to kill me, how difficult can that be? There's no need to entangle the matter." Moving right on, he reminds Gongmin about Goryeo's long struggle against attacks from China and northern Barbarians. We've always kept our pride, he points out; and our faith; and our social-equality policy of rewarding merit no matter who attained it. Then: "Every time Your Majesty wants to make fun of me, you point your fingers at me saying I'm just a slave from Okcheon Temple. When you jest at me, in Your Majesty's face I can see a warm and positive energy." And I'll willingly die for you if need be. Then switching gears completely, SD reminds him about the Tripitaka Koreana [info link], and how the Goryean people carved Buddhist scriptures into more than 80,000 wooden blocks during the previous century--an amazing achievement, and accomplished even with the Mongol pressure crushing the country. "What protected Goryeo and maintained its independence all this time wasn't its military power. It was faith." With that, he rises, then kneels again and humbly bows to the ground before his king, then rises and backs slowly out of the room. The king calls out to him, "If you open that door and leave, you'll never be able to return." No effect; SD leaves and the doors bang shut with a jarring echo, leaving Gongmin to shout, "I want to see you on your knees, imploring me to save you!" SD slowly walks out into the middle of the empty courtyard, and suddenly fireworks begin to light up the sky. From where, and why? We don't know...but now we see the black-clad swordsmen run in from multiple directions and converge upon him...
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It's 24 years earlier, 1347, during the reign of King Chungmok (Goryeo's 29th king). A busy central street in an urban area. Eventually we learn that this is Gaegyeong, Goryeo's capital. We see a procession of monks walk through the street and pass through a guarded gate, probably into the royal palace complex. We see a younger Pyeonjo, walking with another man (who looks to be a monk like Pyeonjo) and taking in the sights. Entertainers of various kinds; all kinds of food for sale; and camels. Pyeonjo is utterly taken with that camel staring at him. Probably a rare sight here. The two enter a porcelain shop. Pyeonjo's companion admires a water dropper, but flinches at the price. Has to settle for a simpler one. As he pays for it, Pyeonjo discreetly shoplifts the pricey one! Ugh, not cool. As they leave, Pyeonjo refers to his companion by name: Won Hyeon! Same guy from 24 years later; didn't recognize him. He explains to Pyeonjo that "the Master" has a water dropper that leaks and might appreciate a new one. Then suddenly, several men walking hurriedly in the opposite direction accidentally bump into Won and knock him down. Accidentally...? Or did they do it deliberately and did we just see a flash of one of them reaching into Won's pocket? The men help Won up and apologize, and the two monks go to a cafe and have some lunch. Turns out they're running errands for this master, who gave them money to buy various supplies. Won discovers that his dropper broke in the fall. Without hesitation, Pyeonjo pulls out his stolen one. "Did you steal, again?" No, Pyeonjo says; "Nobody owned that thing in the first place. I just followed Buddha's will, that's all." Ugh. Won takes the dropper from Pyeonjo and says he's going to go give it back to the shop. But he can't just this minute, because there's a commotion in the street. "It's Master Bou! It's Master Bou!" We see an older-looking monk approach as the crowds part. Apparently the guy is a legend in these parts. Villagers surround the man with a mixture of respect and excitement...and now Pyeonjo runs forward and kneels in his path. He identifies himself: "I'm the son of a government slave from Okcheon Temple, and am now practicing with my Master at Gaetae Temple." And he asks, "How can a lowly monk like me save the world?" Bou stops and listens, but then walks on without answering. So Pyeonjo tries once more: "Is Buddha something alive, or dead?" Boy, there's a fat one...but Bou again ignores him and walks on, entering the same gate that the other monks did earlier. What, couldn't even acknowledge a fellow monk? Sheesh. Pyeonjo gets up and dusts himself off with a smile. They go back to finish their lunch...and suddenly Won realizes his money is missing from his pocket. Yeah, his pocket got picked by those guys. So Pyeonjo charges off to go looking for those guys, a nervous Won right behind him and begging him not to do anything rash.
Now we see what looks like some sort of important event taking place, inside a hall. Wait, this is actually the Goryean throne room! Not sure if this is the same room we saw in later years, but the bench throne looks the same. We hear a child coughing...wait, that's not just any child, that's the king! King Chungmok, who was put on the throne at age seven. He's ten now, and he sounds sick. A woman identified as Princess Deoknyeong is watching him. She's his mother. Also watching him is a slightly older woman identified as Lady Yoon, and a minister identified as Lee Je Hyeon. They all sit there staring at him as he coughs. Poor little guy, he's exhausted. And on that big wide throne, looks completely overwhelmed and out of place. Two other men in the room are identified as Choi Man Saeng and Gi Cheol. An attendant scurries up the throne steps to tend to the ailing boy. And it ain't good; he's coughing up some blood. We know what that means. Lee Je Hyeon mutters that this has been happening frequently lately. This Lady Joon, there's something shifty about her...she seems almost pleased at the boy king's struggles. Deoknyeong climbs the steps and comforts the boy, and as she does, Lady Yoon takes the hand of a boy standing next to her. He's identified as Kyeongchang Buwongun, the future King Chungjeong--who will succeed Chungmok. Gi Cheol rises impatiently from his seat and asks Master Buo, who's been observing all this, to say some prayers for the boy's health. He and his associate, Gi Won, motion for some other monks to perform a prayer ritual, which they now begin.
Pyeonjo has found the thieves. And has already called them out for it. They're laughing at him, totally unafraid. "That money," Pyeonjo tells them, "will buy goods used to render service to Buddha, so just give it back." They laugh and taunt him. It's not just the several guys from before, either; now it's more than a dozen. They all start throwing coins at his feet in mock pity, and then tell him to get lost. Pyeonjo endures all this calmly and without reaction. But then he takes off his backpack and rolls up his sleeves. Offers a silent prayer of forgiveness to his master for the "little lesson" he's about to teach. Won tries to talk him out of it, like something ugly is about to happen. But suddenly the thieves start coming at him and he's fighting them off. First one by one, and now he's flying through the air and beating the stuffing out of them....