I Acted Once, and Now They Call Me a Genius - Chapter 223

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

Episode 223
Clumsy.
Isn’t it said that everything seems infinitely easy before you begin?
That was precisely how Yi Bang-won felt now.
He didn’t fully grasp how much blood would be shed in founding a nation, or what meaning lay in that blood—the weight of it all eluded him.
It was because he was still young, and at the same time because he was intoxicated by the dream of building Joseon.
So this scene posed quite the challenge for Seon-woo as well.
He had thought about it again and again, right up until he arrived here today, yet a way to make Yi Bang-won seem neither childish nor immature in front of Kang-ssi proved frustratingly elusive.
And even pooling ideas with Im Seong-hee and the other actors didn’t change much.
In fact, Im Seong-hee had said,
“Why can’t you just reinterpret the character? This version of Yi Bang-won is completely hopeless.”
She’d been half-joking, but the other half was sincere.
As she’d wrestled with it earnestly alongside him, she’d come to feel more and more acutely just how difficult Seon-woo’s interpretation of Yi Bang-won was.
“He feels young, yet there’s something about him that makes people unable to do anything but follow…”
Kim Yeon-jun watched Seon-woo pondering this and thought to himself,
Acting really is difficult. Seon-woo had given him such a crystal-clear answer about Jo Yeong-gyu in a heartbeat, yet when it came to his own performance, he was wracking his brain like this.
Though to be fair, it was partly self-inflicted. If he’d simply played Yi Bang-won in the style people already knew, he wouldn’t need to agonize at all.
But there had to be a reason for what Seon-woo was doing.
Clearly, he must see that this approach would make for a better work.
In fact, Kim Yeon-jun himself had felt, when performing faithfully to Seon-woo’s interpretation of Yi Bang-won, a sense of fulfillment he’d never experienced in all his years as an actor.
In any case, worrying about Seon-woo’s concerns seemed pointless.
He was about to slip into spectator mode, thinking, ‘He’ll figure it out and do great,’ when
“Hyung.”
“Huh? Me?”
“Why do you follow Yi Bang-won?”
“Well, why follow him, you ask…”
“Jo Yeong-gyu can see that Yi Bang-won is young too, can’t he? Or am I wrong?”
“Hmm. It’s not that his youth isn’t obvious—rather, it just doesn’t feel like a weakness in him.”
“Because you have faith in him?”
“That too, but people are just like that anyway. The same trait can seem good or bad depending on how you look at it. What seems principled to one person can seem stubborn to another.”
Seon-woo nodded.
It was certainly a valid point. But something felt incomplete about it. And then Yoon Kyeong, who’d been listening quietly, gently nudged Seon-woo’s ribs.
“You’re not asking me?”
“…What do you think, senior?”
Yoon Kyeong laughed, covering her mouth.
“Hee hee hee.”
With her in a hanbok, laughing like that, she really did look like an actual noblewoman. She puffed out her chest confidently and opened her mouth.
“Your youth is no ordinary youth.”
Seon-woo’s Yi Bang-won is young.
But being young doesn’t mean it evokes only weakness and insufficiency.
“Because he’s young, he dreams. Because he’s young, he isn’t anxious. Because he’s young, he only looks forward. From the perspective of age, it might seem like simple fearlessness, but that doesn’t make it wrong. Rather, it’s an answer only the young can choose.”
Yoon Kyeong’s eyes gleamed.
“And precisely because of that, I—Won-gyeong loves Bang-won.”
“…”
Seon-woo found himself at a loss for words.
Not from lack of understanding. He thought he grasped exactly what Yoon Kyeong meant.
It wasn’t that she followed him despite his youth.
Rather, she could follow him precisely because he was young.
There was a power in Yi Bang-won’s youth that captivated people.
A purity in chasing only the right path without fear.
And now, the answer Seon-woo had found was being displayed unfiltered before Seo Tae-rok.
“General Choi’s soldiers guard every thoroughfare in Gaegyeong. Should our movements be detected at all, it will become clear that the general has turned his troops.”
“I understand. But precisely because of that, it’s better we move now than be caught. At most, it will take ten days for Father’s army to return.”
“Ten days…? It took two weeks just to reach Wihwado. How could the return possibly be faster?”
“Father must feel it too—that from this moment on, a single day’s difference can change who rules this nation. Moreover, the journey back will be lighter of foot than marching to the battlefield, won’t it?”
He doesn’t pretend to be a half-baked adult.
Doing so would only emphasize Yi Bang-won’s immaturity all the more.
Yi Bang-won is young. But that doesn’t change who he is. He possesses an intuition ordinary people could never glimpse, and that intuition becomes the pillar that lets him stand firm before anyone.
Just as Yi Bang-won has faith in his father, so too does he have faith in himself.
So Kang-ssi, relying on practical calculation, cannot help but be overwhelmed by Yi Bang-won’s presence.
Calculation and judgment can never overcome belief.
Moreover,
“Mother, wouldn’t it be better to move as my husband suggests? Doesn’t the general himself say that my husband is the son who knows his heart best? If my husband is certain the general will return, there must surely be reason in it.”
Those who believe in Yi Bang-won are not he alone.
Right beside him, Won-gyeong takes his side. In her eyes as she looks at him burns a faith as deep as her affection—the certainty that Yi Bang-won cannot be wrong.
Even Jo Yeong-gyu, standing behind them, said nothing, yet his quiet presence at Yi Bang-won’s back was impossible not to feel in this moment.
Young though he may be, Yi Bang-won is ultimately a giant possessed of the qualities to read and shape the currents of his age.
“…Very well. If we go, where do you intend to go?”
In the end, Kang-ssi relents.
And at this moment, Seon-woo felt an indescribable rush of pleasure.
He feels it—at the same moment Kang-ssi’s wall of resistance crumbles, this entire courtyard floods with Yi Bang-won’s vision.
Yes, with the colors of perfect spring.
“We depart for Pocheon now.”
A perfect scene.
And Seon-woo isn’t speaking of only his own performance.
Im Seong-hee’s Kang-ssi.
Yoon Kyeong’s Won-gyeong.
Kim Yeon-jun’s Jo Yeong-gyu.
The emotional arcs of every character meshed like gears, precisely and intricately, building the scene.
In Seon-woo’s brief career as an actor, had there ever been a more perfect take? At least, he thought not.
“Cut.”
And Seo Tae-rok seemed to share very similar feelings.
The muscles of his usually rigid face had gone slack, seeming almost liquid now. His eyes were slightly glazed, like a drunk man’s.
Had the take just now been nothing but pure pleasure for him?
In this moment, Seo Tae-rok recalled the early days when he first held a megaphone.
Clumsy and inexperienced though those days were, every moment shone so brightly—even the mistakes were beloved.
Yi Bang-won’s youth had persuaded more than just Kang-ssi.
A film director, long since aged, had become a believer too.
* * *
A film cannot be made alone.
It’s obvious, but lately Seon-woo felt he was beginning to truly understand what that meant.
The shooting environment was completely different from his drama work.
There was far more time spent with the actors gathered together, pondering each scene.
Not that the drama cast worked any less hard.
The shooting time was similar, but the runtime produced from that time was far more compressed in film.
Where a drama might spend not quite six months to produce roughly sixteen hours of runtime, film uses the same time to create about two hours.
The density of care and time that can be poured into each scene simply cannot be the same.
“…I’m starting to understand why actors who only do film are like that.”
In drama shooting, there were often scenes you couldn’t be satisfied with but still had to move past.
You sensed something more could emerge with just a bit more time, but the shooting schedule was so tight there simply wasn’t room for it.
“In some ways, film actually allows for peace of mind.”
Yoon Kyeong nodded at that.
“Of course, because you can pour relatively more time into it, you develop an anxiety about not leaving any scene less than perfect. But in any case, I’m grateful to be able to act better, even in that way.”
“Absolutely.”
“And I think you’re definitely a film actor, Seon-woo.”
Yoon Kyeong turned to him and raised a finger.
Her gaze and tone were firm, as if she wouldn’t accept any objection.
“Film people tend to be naturally stubborn. Even when you think ‘isn’t this enough?’, something still bothers them and they can’t let go. It’s tiring.”
“…You mean I’m tiring?”
“Oh, gosh! N-no, that’s not it! Except when you talk about your thesis—that’s all!”
When he talked about his thesis, she meant he was tiring.
As Seon-woo’s face fell, Yoon Kyeong hurried to pat his back.
“But it’s fine! At least when you’re involved, the shoots themselves are actually the fastest! Director Seo Tae-rok rarely finishes in under ten takes, but your scenes never go over ten!”
Before shooting, they certainly ran through simulations several times more intense than usual among themselves.
Seon-woo had a habit of wanting to try every possible angle and feeling beforehand. In a way, it was robbing Peter to pay Paul—ultimately the time invested was the same, sometimes even more.
But there was no complaint about it.
Not only could you sense Seon-woo’s passion for acting, but his perspective had a distinctly special quality.
Even looking at the same scene, the same character… he possessed an intuition about how to express it more brilliantly that was quite uncommon.
It was a crucial quality for an actor.
How brilliantly you could imagine something determined how brilliantly you could perform it.
‘Perfect man.’
Yoon Kyeong rested her chin on her hand, watching Seon-woo.
Inoffensively handsome—a face that wouldn’t divide people’s tastes. A reasonably tall frame. Absurdly talented enough to rise to leading-role level in just a year. And a Seoul National University background, uncommonly refined for this industry.
It was hard to judge his character yet, but judging by the #nomorehate thing alone, he seemed unlikely to have major issues.
Impossibly perfect.
It actually provoked a competitive streak in her.
Yoon Kyeong held the philosophy that no one could be truly perfect.
The more flawlessly Seon-woo appeared, the more she felt a slightly mischievous drive to find some flaw in him.
…But no matter how hard she looked, she found nothing.
She’d even wondered if maybe his hands would be ugly, but they were long and slender—beautiful, even.
“Why are you staring at me like that?”
“Oh, nothing. Just thinking my husband is quite impressive.”
“…Ha ha.”
Seon-woo laughed as if he found it absurd.
Whether you called it audacious or not, it was a slightly bewildering thing to say, but by now Seon-woo well knew that almost no one in this business was entirely normal.
‘Looking around, I’m probably the only sane one here.’
To survive among these strange people, he’d have to work harder himself.
While Seon-woo was mentally gathering himself with that resolve, a staff member approached and spoke.
“So, you’ll climb up this stone wall here… then take Yoon Kyeong’s hand and help her up. That’s all.”
What they were filming now was a scene of escaping Gaegyeong in the dead of night, heading toward Pocheon.
And Yi Bang-won had to comfort a panting, breathless Won-gyeong as he guided her. There was no dialogue. This scene would quickly cross-cut between Lee Seong-gye’s army turning back and the household’s escape from Gaegyeong.
There was no grand acting required—just climb the wall as the staff said.
The problem was that the wall was nearly chest-height on him…
“…”
Seon-woo’s expression became determined.
In truth, it was a height any adult man should be able to climb without difficulty. And Seon-woo, having consistently practiced his interpretation of Yi Bang-won, had done extensive training mounting saddles, so scaling this stone wall was no problem at all.
“What are you doing? Why not climb?”
“I was calculating the trajectory.”
“? Trajectory? Isn’t it just climb up?”
“…”
Seon-woo didn’t answer, just gripped the stone wall.
And he ran through the simulation in his head: Lift the right foot first, then push off the ground with force…
Thud!
“Ugh…!”
“A-are you alright!?”
“Actor!”
“Seon-woo!”
He could slide right off the wall.
As terrible pain shot up from his lower back, Seon-woo saw the concerned faces looking down at him and just closed his eyes.
…Since filming “The Traitor” began, this was the greatest hardship he’d faced.

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