Driving Them Mad, Ratings (2)
Once short clip videos extracting only the original without the shaman were uploaded, shocked reactions poured in.
While general viewers focused mainly on the plot flow, the Villab fanbase was lost in Jeong Seo-hoon's expressiveness.
Taejong's Wish, its rival, crashed with dismal ratings, and other dramas avoided competition altogether.
Even by terrestrial standards, Haegeuk's massive ratings propelled it toward the finale.
"We should all watch the finale together and pray for a ratings update, right?"
At Kim Sang-hee's suggestion, Jeong Seo-hoon, Han Seo-hee, and Lee Seo-hyeon gathered to watch the last episode.
Yoon Jin-won, who played the nephew king, joined them.
As the broadcast began, the final CF played, and Kim Sang-hee clasped her hands in prayer.
"Buddha, please allow a righteous 40%."
"When did you convert from Chicken-and-Beer Church to Buddhism?"
"No chicken-and-beer in our drama, so praying to Buddha instead."
Kim Sang-hee seemed more desperate than during Illegal.
Probably the trauma of missing 30% by a mere 0.1% resurfacing.
CF ended, the screen darkened briefly, BGM swelled, and the title appeared.
Haegeuk: The King's Uncle (Finale)
"Summon Han."
The uncle who seized the throne commanded.
But the Han clan shaman never appeared, no matter how long they waited.
The uncle bellowed at the eunuchs and old retainers.
"I ordered Han summoned—why hasn't he come? Go find him now!"
"Forgive us, but we don't know where the Han shaman is. We've never even seen his face."
"What? Then how have you summoned him until now?"
"None of us has ever gone to fetch the Han shaman to say Your Highness summons you."
A massive shock struck the uncle's head.
No one among the ministers knew where the Han shaman was or what he looked like.
Whenever the uncle issued the order, the shaman came on his own.
Yet no one had actually seen him.
"What is this? Have I been conspiring with a ghost all this time?"
"Forgive us."
The ministers could only beg forgiveness, offering no excuses.
Doubting the king's sanity was treason too grave to voice.
Eventually, even the guards who escorted him to the Park clan shaman during his Grand Prince days were summoned.
"Forgive us, but we never saw the Han shaman ourselves."
"This is..."
It was enough to make ghosts weep.
The uncle kept waiting for the Han shaman to appear.
But he never came—as if he never existed.
"Dig where the young pine stood alone by the altar pond."
There too, they found old royal burial goods with the bones.
Traces of the curse remained, but no traces of the ritual.
The uncle began harboring forbidden doubts.
Was there never any ritual to begin with?
Father didn't redirect a curse on brother to me—he cursed us both.
His healthy brother died suffering from boils, hardening the uncle's suspicions.
Father wouldn't sacrifice the second son to save the first.
Over the agony of festering skin, endless nightmares continued.
Nightly, vengeful spirits of loyal ministers, bodies red with blood tears, visited.
"You are no king, Grand Prince."
"Merely the king's uncle who usurped the throne."
His brother's ghost came too.
"I trusted you—why desecrate my tomb and exile my son!"
Father's spirit appeared.
"Yuya... why destroy this nation's fortune with your own hands?"
Grandfather's wraith too.
"Killing you was more vital than purging ministers and in-laws. How unjust, so unjust."
Night after night, he woke drenched in sweat.
The Park shaman never reappeared—was he even real? No one knew his whereabouts or face.
The uncle even doubted if he was trapped in a long, bad dream.
As leprosy's pain intensified daily, the shaman's old words grew clearer in his mind.
"As long as the former king lives, rebellions to restore him will never cease."
The echoing specter piled suspicions and anxiety toward the eastern exile.
"Do not take that final step. Then you may reign for millennia."
But if he did, the nation's fortune wouldn't last six centuries.
Sometimes the high monk's serene voice echoed, but leprosy's stabbing pain drowned it.
The cries swelling endlessly in his head were...
"Your Highness, take the nephew's life..."
"Do so, and you shall live..."
Did he crave the throne to survive, or cloak throne-lust as survival instinct? The line blurred.
"Feed on cleanly killed corpses, Grand Prince."
"Yuya, your disease will vanish like that..."
The voice was sometimes the shaman's, sometimes the vanished monk's tone, occasionally mimicking his dead brother.
"I'll administer poison to the deposed prince."
But the young nephew staunchly refused.
The guards, forbidden from touching the prince, were helpless.
They could only kneel, endlessly begging obedience to the usurper king's command.
The uncle, in scholar's plain robes, took only the Inner Guard Captain and quietly headed to the exile.
The young nephew rejected death with tear-streaked terror.
"Nephew. I hear you refuse the tonic I sent. So I've come myself."
"No! Uncle! You've taken everything—now my last breath too?!"
"Fear not. It won't hurt. Curse me, resent the late king who died young."
"Guh... guh...!"
The uncle gripped the nephew's throat with both hands, lifting lightly, then strangled.
"I'll send you to your father so I'm not lonely. How could I let vulgar hands end the life of the precious nephew I carried on my back?"
"This uncle will see you off personally."
The nephew's struggles slowed to feeble throbs.
Focus faded from his eyes, defiant hands went limp.
"Farewell, Your Majesty."
Flopping the dead nephew on the mat, the uncle collapsed powerlessly, staring blankly at the still corpse.
Whispers echoed.
"Take the life..."
"Cleanly killed corpse..."
"Then... the disease will vanish..."
His dazed eyes refocused on the body.
Greed for power, survival thrashings—all chained to primal hunger.
Hunger itself.
That instinct overflowed his eyes like drool.
Hunger-filled pupils fixed on the nephew, the screen, drawing closer, larger.
The devouring pupil swallowed the screen black, leaving only quiet, delicious smacking in dark silence.
Red subtitles in blood-dripping flame form rose calmly.
Devouring vengeful spirits, the uncle suffered leprosy until death—a wretched end.
Scene shifted.
Gentle hands carefully gathered mangled bones, flesh chunks torn away, like treasures.
An old man, tears streaming as he collected the corpse, turned.
A serene high monk stood, eyes closed, turning prayer beads.
"How did Your Reverence know of the body abandoned here?"
"All is Buddha's guidance."
"Truly grateful. Truly, truly..."
Fearing discovery, the elder slung the coffin and hurried down.
"The vile king killed his nephew and donned the dragon robe."
The monk, standing tall, murmured eyes opening slightly.
"This single cornerstone will one day utterly topple the royal house."
Each slow step left a curse-like murmur.
"I see it. Thieves rampant nationwide, suffering masses overflowing, traitors offering the land to foreigners basking in glory—far future."
Clear wooden fish taps spread far through the woods.
"You endured disgust mingling with them. Our vengeance done—rest easy..."
Wind billowed the monk's robes, metal fragments at his waist jingling.
Pieces identical to the old royal burial goods gleamed in sunlight, ringing purely.
Haegeuk: The King's Uncle
End
When the uncle's corpse-like eyes filled the screen, glaring hungrily, Han Seo-hee shivered as if being devoured.
The gaze was so feral it sparked visceral disgust toward Jeong Seo-hoon.
...
Turning away, she glimpsed Jeong Seo-hoon's eyes fixed on the screen—same glare, eerie smile.
Eek, scared me.
He must've mimicked his acting while watching.
She almost mistook the 'nephew-killing uncle' for sitting there.
Right then.
"Why so, my lady?"
Heavy, chilling hunger in the voice—not quite Jeong Seo-hoon—froze her stiff.
"Even if my path leads to hell, didn't you say you'd come with me?"
"Uh, uh..."
Invisible beast's infrasound pinned her; fingers trembled, immobile.
"Just kidding. Relax."
The bonds snapped; she exhaled freely.
Seizing the moment, she playfully swatted his shoulder—innocent skinship chance.
"Ah, really! You scared me, oppa!"
Regaining breath, she saw only she froze at his improv.
"Han Seo-hee-ssi, your immersion's no joke? Diving into Crown Princess right off-camera."
"Seo-hoon-ssi's acting was intense, but didn't expect you to be that scared."
"You two didn't plan this prank on us, right?"
Everyone chuckled, treating it as fun happenstance.
Han Seo-hee laughed along outwardly, but inwardly tilted her head.
What was that? So real and vicious...
As a child at the zoo, a tiger's roar made her collapse trembling.
Just like that—vivid, sharper even.
But she alone overreacted? Weird.
"So, what's the rating?"
"I'm going insane. Seriously losing it."
Kim Sang-hee shot up, clawing her hair.
"39.1%?! Just 0.9% more mercy! Aaaah!"