I Acted Once, and Now They Call Me a Genius - Chapter 220

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 220
Kim Yeon-jun is a ten-year veteran unknown actor.
Truth be told, when you attach “ten-year veteran” to “unknown actor,” it doesn’t feel like much of a distinguishing modifier at all.
Unknown actors are so common in the world, and there are so many cases of people spending decades in obscurity before becoming actors that…… it actually feels more like a perfectly ordinary situation.
But the moment you attach that ten-year descriptor to a different noun, the story changes entirely.
A ten-year job-seeker.
A ten-year civil service exam aspirant.
A ten-year aspiring writer…….
Aren’t they all equally dreadful?
If Kim Yeon-jun had devoted these ten years to something other than acting, and had achieved no particular results as he has now…… people would unhesitatingly pass judgment on his life like this.
You are a failure.
You are wasting your life.
—But you still have your dreams.
When he confessed such worries to his friends, they would say things like that.
—I can’t say I could live like you…… but honestly, your life seems cool to me sometimes. No matter what, you’re living doing what you want to do.
Living while doing what you want to do.
When he heard those words, Kim Yeon-jun thought something.
What you want to do.
Was this really what he wanted?
At thirty years old, with no savings to speak of, he waited ten, fifteen hours just to perform a role he’d barely scrounged up through shoe-leather legwork—standing around as nothing more than background scenery next to a supporting actor for a few dozen seconds, then walking the midnight streets of Seoul for hours on end with a few ten-thousand-won in appearance fees clutched in his hand, finally dragging himself home. Was this the life he’d dreamed of?
……It couldn’t have been.
No one would dream of such a life.
At some point, he’d dreamed of walking a red carpet, holding up a trophy with dozens of cameras trained on him, tears streaming down his laughing face as he spoke those words.
—The thing is, everyone around me has always said I could do it someday. But you know what? I myself didn’t believe I could. Someone like me, unremarkable as I am—how could I be an actor? That thought started creeping in. But…… now that I stand here, I realize. It’s a cliché, but nothing is impossible.
If one just persisted long enough, could such a day ever come?
Could there come a day when he believed that no tree fails to fall after ten chops?
He couldn’t be sure of anything yet.
What Kim Yeon-jun knew was that this production of Yeokjeok was an enormous opportunity—the kind that came only once in an acting lifetime, if ever twice.
Jo Young-gyu.
While he couldn’t claim the role carried tremendous weight, that single character was nonetheless grander than many a leading role.
After all, it was Jo Young-gyu, and no one else, who would directly kill Jeong Mong-ju and seal the fate of Goryeo’s collapse.
But that same weight made it immensely difficult.
Throughout the story, Jo Young-gyu appears as nothing but Yi Bang-won’s instrument.
A right hand, one might say. Whenever Yi Bang-won has something that requires physical resolution, he steps forward to handle it on his behalf.
The problem was that if he played it straight, Jo Young-gyu would have no chance to shine.
Done poorly, the character could easily become mere tool devoid of any will of his own.
How should he approach this?
How could he preserve Jo Young-gyu’s character integrity while simultaneously capturing the audience’s attention more vividly?
“I think you need to establish Jo Young-gyu’s color.”
While Kim Yeon-jun wrestled with these concerns, Seon-woo offered a remark that seemed almost out of nowhere.
“Color……?”
“Yes. I believe everyone has a color that suits them. Take Yi Bang-won right now…… he has the color of spring trees. Like a life-filled brown trunk with green leaves cascading down from every branch? Everything about Yi Bang-won right now feels refreshing. Full of hope. But what about Jo Young-gyu?”
“……Well, if I had to say, I’d think he’d be colorless. Jo Young-gyu just follows Yi Bang-won blindly.”
“Why?”
“……Because that’s just how it is?”
“Why is it that way?”
“Um…….”
Kim Yeon-jun suddenly lost his words.
Why. Why is it inevitable? Truth is, he hadn’t thought deeper about this part. He’d simply assumed that because it was the Goryeo era, because of the historical context, loyalty to Yi Bang-won was just naturally what would follow.
“I want you to believe in him more…… in Yi Bang-won. To trust him more.”
“Believe in him more……?”
“Yes. Just as I’m intoxicated by the dream of Joseon, your character is intoxicated by the dream of Yi Bang-won. If Jo Young-gyu’s character is nothing but his instrument, then you maximize that very quality.”
A film has limited runtime.
It’s difficult to explore the full dimensionality of each character. And for a minor role like Jo Young-gyu, it’s even more so.
Then the approach to acting must naturally change as well.
You must perform with enough intensity that a single glimpse of that facet can leave a profound impression on the audience.
In Jo Young-gyu’s case,
“You need to have faith in me.”
“Faith…….”
Kim Yeon-jun repeated the word with an awkward expression.
In plain terms, it was a mad idea. How many people could come up with the word “faith” when thinking about the relationship between a warrior and his lord?
Yet precisely because of that, Kim Yeon-jun could understand.
How Kim Seon-woo’s name had risen so dramatically in the span of a single year.
‘Different.’
The ability to probe characters.
The ability to understand and construct scenes.
The ability to manipulate and direct human psychology.
Everything was on an entirely different level from any actor Kim Yeon-jun had ever seen. It was as if the man had something completely alien in his head—just hearing a few words from Seon-woo and the character of Jo Young-gyu that he’d spent months researching and analyzing shifted completely in an instant.
And that transformation was, honestly…… absurdly attractive.
Kim Yeon-jun slowly descended into Jo Young-gyu’s mental image.
Having faith in Yi Bang-won. That single piece of advice became the most decisive guidance.
Why have faith in Yi Bang-won?
His character, temperament, purpose—all of it would have captivated him. Moreover, Jo Young-gyu’s own nature was such that once he’d given his heart to someone, he could never turn his back on them.
Kim Yeon-jun slowly cultivated that belief within him.
The kind of faith where if Yi Bang-won said the sun rises in the west, he would nod in agreement.
And Seon-woo, watching Kim Yeon-jun, smiled faintly.
From Kim Yeon-jun, who had lacked true color until now…… a soft yet vivid light was beginning to radiate.
And then Kim Yeon-jun opened his mouth.
“Seon-woo, now I understand. What color Jo Young-gyu has.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. Jo Young-gyu’s color is…….”
Both Kim Yeon-jun and Seon-woo opened their mouths at the same moment.
“”Moonlight.””
Even after speaking, surprised at the synchronicity, Kim Yeon-jun looked at Seon-woo.
“……Did you crawl into my head and back out? How did you know?”
“I just had that feeling. I guess you performed with such vivid presence that the word just came to me.”
“Ha…….”
Kim Yeon-jun stared at Seon-woo as if bewitched.
Truthfully, moonlight wasn’t quite a color to speak of, so he wondered how Seon-woo had landed on that exact phrasing.
Seon-woo didn’t mention that he could see light pouring from Kim Yeon-jun that looked exactly like moonlight to anyone watching.
Instead, he looked up at the sky and opened his mouth.
“……The rain has stopped.”
“Ah, it has.”
The rain that had been pouring all day had indeed ceased.
Above the dark clouds that had passed, a moon hung beautiful in the sky, and Seon-woo smiled.
“Good. Shall we go over it once more?”
“……Yeah.”
Kim Yeon-jun nodded.
And in that moment, he thought something. That he now understood a little better how Jo Young-gyu had felt looking at Yi Bang-won.
That feeling of witnessing an extraordinariness that transcended one’s own nature, something impossible to fully comprehend…… it surely resembled what Kim Yeon-jun felt now when looking at Seon-woo.
* * *
The next day.
Because it was the day after rain, the sky boasted an exceptionally clear light.
However, the pavilion where filming was to take place still had quite a bit of moisture clinging to it, and when the staff members tried to wipe it away with towels, Seo Tae-rok suddenly roared.
“What are you doing!”
He bellowed and stopped them in their tracks.
The reason was that after the rain, the pavilion needed to retain that damp, fresh feeling.
Watching Seo Tae-rok, the staff bowed their heads repeatedly.
One might wonder why he’d make such a fuss over mere moisture, but Seo Tae-rok was by nature uncompromising when it came to such details.
Had they wiped away the moisture, he might well have used that as justification to wait indefinitely for rain to fall again before resuming shooting.
“……I’d heard the rumors, but you’re quite something.”
Yun Kyeong observed the set with a tense expression.
She had come to the location in advance of the upcoming shoot to sharpen her senses. And part of “sharpening those senses” meant experiencing Seo Tae-rok’s directing style firsthand…… and indeed, Seo Tae-rok displayed an obsessive compulsion more pronounced than any director Yun Kyeong had ever encountered.
Even during the script reading, she’d sensed he wasn’t an ordinarily particular person, but here on set…… the atmosphere was genuinely extraordinary.
He even set the angle and position of every camera and light himself down to the minutest detail.
There was actually an anecdote about it. When Seo Tae-rok was still a novice director, a more experienced camera director tried to adjust the frame through the lens and reposition the camera, claiming that the lighting was preventing the shot from coming out properly.
At that moment, Seo Tae-rok said this, according to legend.
—If you don’t want to listen to me on my set, don’t come here.
And he simply took the camera himself.
He cut the camera director loose right then and there.
It was an anecdote that illustrated just how seriously Seo Tae-rok took controlling his set.
As such, for an actor, Seo Tae-rok was an exceptionally demanding director. A director who observed and sought to control your every movement.
If you could meet his expectations, all well and good. If you couldn’t…… something genuinely dreadful might unfold. Indeed, there was a well-known story of an actor who, after Seo Tae-rok reshot the same scene over a hundred times, simply vanished from the set.
In any case, such was Seo Tae-rok.
Yun Kyeong watched Seon-woo and Kim Yeon-jun, now wearing microphones, from in front of the set. How many retakes would the two of them face today? Could their acting satisfy Seo Tae-rok?
‘During the script reading…… it was somewhat entertaining.’
Seon-woo’s acting definitely had something of genius about it.
He possessed the ability to unfold characters that ordinary people couldn’t even imagine, with perfect naturalness. To see Yi Bang-won portrayed with such boyish, refreshing qualities was entirely new.
Yet precisely because of that, today’s shoot seemed like it would be considerably chaotic.
A new path inevitably required more trial and error.
To earn Seo Tae-rok’s OK sign, a stickler for detail that he was…… would require many more takes.
And then,
“The sun is warm.”
Seon-woo’s performance began.
Atop the pavilion, Seon-woo’s hand extended to feel the sunlight…… Yi Bang-won’s expression held only freshness. Even though a nation now stood at the precipice of collapse, there was no sense of fear about it.
Was it because Yi Bang-won was a monster?
“These past few days have been monsoon season. The currents of the Yalu River would be savage, and the earth would be a swamp—muddy and deep with each step.”
No, it wasn’t that.
It was because Yi Bang-won was a boy.
He did not yet understand the weight of war, the weight of a nation’s fall and rise.
“The soldiers’ morale would be in the depths. Frustrations they can’t voice would fill their chests, and they’d wonder why they’re suffering out there.”
And so he remained simply joyful.
Despite possessing the insight to see through the nation’s affairs, he lacked the maturity to understand the full weight of those affairs in his heart.
“But perhaps Father will have to change direction. He has always understood the hearts of soldiers. Not to mention the hearts of the people.”
And watching Seon-woo, Yun Kyeong furrowed her brow.
That strange emotion she’d felt during the last script reading returned.
An emotion she couldn’t quite make sense of herself.
Immaturity means naiveté. And naiveté is contemptible.
But did Seon-woo’s Yi Bang-won look contemptible right now?
No, it did not.
If anything…… he looked radiant.
And Yun Kyeong’s actor’s intuition quickly grasped the reason.
‘……No one finds a dreaming boy contemptible.’
The younger one is, the more diverse one’s future dreams tend to be.
From astronaut to president…… all manner of virtually unrealistic professions tend to tumble out.
But no one calls the children who voice such dreams contemptible.
That purity was precisely why children were special.
Was that the reason?
“You mean to retreat?”
“Yes. War will not happen in Yodong…… it will unfold in Gaegyeong.”
Jo Young-gyu’s gaze as he looked at Yi Bang-won was also somehow natural to understand.
Eyes full of absolute faith, as though looking upon a god. That gaze made Yi Bang-won’s purity seem transcendent, something almost divine, and
‘Ah…….’
With muscles throughout her body contracting as if to coil, Yun Kyeong stifled a gasp.
It was beautiful.
“We must move. Come, Young-gyu.”
“Where do you mean, sir?”
“Once word of our retreat spreads, the king will immediately move to take our family hostage. It’s the only straw he can grasp. From now on, we must see further and walk ahead.”
Jo Young-gyu’s actions were minimal.
He looks at Yi Bang-won, lowers his head, guards his back.
Nothing more—yet that reverent manner in which he treated him, as though Yi Bang-won were a god, seemed to magnify Yi Bang-won’s presence in an instant.
And so the weight of this simple exchange—merely “let us save our family”—expanded infinitely.
“Let us hurry. The king must fall behind. We must leave him not even the straw to cling to.”
In that moment, Yun Kyeong suddenly thought something.
It was bold. Daring, even genius. But could Seo Tae-rok truly accept it? Could a man who sought to control everything truly allow such a variable?
Yun Kyeong turned her head to look at Seo Tae-rok.
And in that instant, she felt her spine tingle.
Seo Tae-rok was smiling.
His face twisted into a grotesque grin.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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