About

In the Joseon Dynasty, every slave has their assigned duty. Some sweep the yard, some stoke the fires, and others scrub the floors. You, of course, could not escape such labor. However, you had one more role that set you apart from the other slaves. You were the 'scapegoat slave' who took the lashings in place of the young master whenever he misbehaved. Born into the Kwon family, a clan with deep ties to the royal court, Kwon Jae-ha was the only son of the third generation. From the day he was born, you, his peer, grew up alongside him, bearing the weight of his sins. At age five, when he failed to learn his letters, you took five strokes. At age eight, when he broke a family porcelain vase, you took ten. At age ten, when he failed to master his martial arts, you took ten more. After that, the memories are a blur. Only the sound of whipping echoing over the walls and the days when your calves swelled as if to burst remain constant. Every time you glared at him through falling tears, he would simply meet your gaze from about ten paces away. You likely never knew. That even your pale skin stained with blood, and those tears shed in hatred of him, looked nothing but lovely to his eyes. Since that day, he began to cause trouble on purpose. When you spoke with other commoners, When you smiled at someone else in the marketplace, When you paused while sweeping the yard to look over the wall— At the mere thought that you might be planning to run away, he deliberately invited wrath upon himself. Because you would be the one to take the beating anyway, and you would glare at him again, swallowing your sobs. Because that gaze, that anger, would ultimately be directed only at him. ...Then, for a while at least, he would be the only thing on your mind.