lol hi!!
Starting at the beginning of their timeline: Seo-in (ML) is adopted by a rich family when he’s quite young — but the reason he’s adopted is because he looks eerily similar to the adoptive couple’s son (Jaewon). This is important because this Jaewon had a twin who died, and the mother is distraught and basically tries to make Seo-in the replacement. Jaewon is chronically ill, a psychopath, and hates Seo-in. For their entire childhood, Jaewon torments Seo-in with his past (Seo-in’s birth parents are murderers) and ruins anything he can about Seo-in’s life. Their parents don’t do anything about it because, again, their mother is desperate to have a perfect family with two sons. No matter how much Seo-in tries to tell her about Jaewon’s behaviour, she just brushes it off and essentially asks him to look past it, with Jaewon being sick and all.
Fast forward to middle school! Seo-in is living in hell, because he’s basically a slave for Jaewon — this psycho threatens to tell people at school about the fact that Seo-in’s parents are criminals, and poor Seo-in is already being ostracized, so what else can he do but go with it..sigh. At some point, Seo-in figures out that there’s someone Jaewon hates other than him: a boy in Jaewon’s Judo club (Yeongwoon, MC) that wins more often/is better at Judo than Jaewon. Seo-in takes advantage of this by befriending Yeongwoon to piss off Jaewon. One thing leads to another, and Seo-in goes from befriending Yeongwoon with ulterior motives, to genuinely feeling comfort and love for him. He tells Yeongwoon that he has a crush on a guy but isn’t sure, and that he wants to test out the physical aspect — so they start getting freaky after school most days, jerking each other off and making off and whatnot. We know from reading their future (S2) that they were both in love at this point, and Seo-in was actually planning to help Yeongwoon move out (away from his abusive father) and live a peaceful life with him.
Jaewon, that little asshole, catches Seo-in and Yeongwoon getting it on one day. He secretly records a video of them and confronts Seo-in at school later, saying that he’ll fuck up that part of Seo-in’s life too and that he shouldn’t have dared to find happiness. Seo-in tries to protect Yeongwoon from this psycho’s antics by saying that their relationship means nothing to him and that there’s no point in targeting Yeongwoon, and Jaewon challenges him by saying, essentially, “if that kind of stuff means nothing to you, do it to me. Kiss me!”
Seo-in kisses this little shit to prove it, but we know, again, from reading their future (Yeongwoon has lots of flashbacks of seeing this scene), that Yeongwoon witnesses this and is heartbroken. He starts acting distant from Seo-in, and when Seo-in returns from a family trip that summer, he finds out that Yeongwoon has run away from home/his abusive father. He also comes home afree that and sees that Jaewon has outed him (and himself, I forgot to mention he’s also gay and is very promiscuous and also careless with his health). He basically says “wow you have two gay sons!” Their family fights, but their mother once again tries to sweep it under the rug because she can’t stand not having her ideal family. Seo-in is sent abroad for modelling work.
Fast forward to the present. Jaewon is dead — he was chronically ill, but these recent chapters hint that Seo-in killed him, and their mother knows. Seo-in is back from his work abroad, and Yeongwoon works as a manager for an actor named Hae-yool.
Yeongwoon follows Hae-yool to see if there is some sponsorship relationship going on (he’s been informed by their agency that he should investigate), and is surprised to see that Hae-yool’s sponsor is Seo-in. Some back and forth ensues, an article is released slandering Hae-yool, and Yeongwoon is let go from his position — just in time for Seo-in to swoop in and ask for him to be HIS manager instead, since he has just returned from abroad and wants his manager in Korea to be someone he knows.
There’s season one. Damn. Season two is just dealing with the boys and their feelings/flashbacks, and some other things. Here are some last summarizing points:
- Seo-in is changed after Yeongwoon leaving in middle school. He feels betrayed/abandoned, and like the only person he could bear to be around was gone. He spirals and begins to engage in promiscuous, emotionally overstimulating activities — just like Jaewon used to do. He participates in orgies and gets off inflicting pain during said orgies. His hair is dyed the same colour as the late Jaewon, and it is unspoken in his family that he has basically replaced him.
- Yeongwoon has very painful memories of Seo-in. He tries his best to deny it/run away, but he can’t help but be swayed by Seo-in and go with what he wants. Thanks to this, he is in a sex relationship with him, with the excuse of “you can’t be involved in scandalous things like orgies, and I’m your manager so just use me.”
- Hae-yool, the actor that previously employed Yeongwoon, has feelings for Yeongwoon. In one chapter they establish that he doesn’t feel the same, but Hae-yool is still butthurt about this and also thinks Seo-in is crazy, so he’s been lurking and trying to fuck with them. He can kind of tell that Seo-in has a special spot for Yeongwoon. In recent chapters, he releases an article about Seo-in’s promiscuous sex life. Seo-in’s mother is in denial about this, but can’t stay delusional for long when she sees Yeongwoon and Seo-in together (she knows about their past because of when Jaewon outed them) and also questions Seo-in, and he just says “yes mom, that’s me in the picture in the article kissing men.” She freaks out, and is currently trying to get Yeongwoon fired/away from her precious son.
- Yeongwoon’s abusive father was also in a lot of debt. A loan shark named Taegu would often come to collect his dues, but because Yeongwoon’s father begged Taegu to keep him out of it (he was young at the time), Taegu just tells Yeongwoon that he’s his father’s friend and is visiting. Yeongwoon knows this is bullshit, but doesn’t say anything — he mentions that Taegu gave him pocket change as a kid and IS kind of a nice guy after all. They have an interesting relationship in this way, but it’s hinted that Taegu feels something a little more for Yeongwoon… feels a little weird to me, but hey this isn’t my manhwa lmao.
- Seo-in tries acting like he barely remembers their past together, but in these last few chapters he’s realllly struggling to be nonchalant lmao. He drunkenly tells Yeongwoon to not leave him like he did before (like in middle school) and Yeongwoon gets all blushed and they get freaky blah blah. This is what the most recent chapter is!
This is basically a summary of everything that’s happened, and I tried to make it make chronological sense lmao. Also that scene at the beginning of chapter 1… I assume hasn’t happened yet, but will happen at the climax of the story.
That’s the best I can do lmao!
Sorry it’s so long lmao… and for the typos
Oh my I did not realize someone who do this much thx I'll have something read it to me later....
i would give u a 5 if this was a response on AP lang exam like that was thoroughh
That was genuinely so helpful since I have the memory of a gold fish, thankss
Someone who read every word sum up this pls like what the first season was about where we are now the story pls someone who has good reading comprehension HELP ME