On the night a red moon rose above the royal palace, no one within the inner court dared to fall into true sleep.
In the ancient beliefs of Joseon, such a night was called Hongwol, the Blood Moon. A night when the boundary between humans and that which should never be named grew perilously thin, so close that even a single breath might cross it.
Court officials whispered prayers beneath their breath. Royal physicians burned incense without pause. The gates of the inner palace were sealed tighter than on any other night.
The sounds of that evening were filled with a haunting silence and the quiet agony of Royal Concubine Kim Bin, the First Concubine of the Kim clan.
Within her residence, soft cries of pain blended with the sound of rain. Blood stained the silk sheets. Her breath came heavy and broken.
Then.....
The cry of a newborn rang out, precisely as the moon deepened into a darker, crimson red, echoing the final, shuddering breath of the mother.
The child was born on that night.
At the moment of his first cry, the wind within the palace fell utterly still. Oil lamps flickered. And deep within the Forbidden Pavilion at the heart of the palace, an ancient seal trembled for the first time in several hundred years.
The boy was given the name Kim Doyun (김도윤), a name meaning virtue and balance.
Yet the royal physician, the first to lift the child into his arms, saw something that appeared in no medical text.
At the nape of the infant's neck lay a deep crimson birthmark, its shape like a flame…or the claw mark of a beast.
The physician hastily covered it with silk before anyone could ask a question. Whatever it was… it could not be spoken aloud.
For in the oldest of legends, only one kind of being was born with such a mark..... Either one chosen by the Guardian, or one remembered by a demon.
Not long after the birth, Royal Concubine Kim Bin smiled faintly as she gazed upon Kim Doyun, whole and unharmed. Then she closed her eyes and passed away.
There was no scream. No curse spoken aloud, despite the ominous mark foretold by prophecy.
Only her final breath, and a fading smile...as though she had seen someone standing beside her bed, accompanied by the cry of a newborn child.
Before her eyes finally closed, she reached out and touched the back of her son's neck.
Her fingers trembled as she whispered words no one else could hear.
"You… must grow up to be a good person. And live safely, my child."
That night, the rain did not cease until dawn. In the royal records, only two lines were written: "The First Royal Consort Kim Bin passed away from complications of childbirth last night."
"The secondary prince was born safely."
There was no mention of the crimson moon. No record of the ancient seal that trembled. And no one ever spoke of the forbidden pavilion.
Yet beneath the palace...in a darkness deeper than any night before.
A voice whispered for the first time in centuries.
"At last… You have returned."
At the grave of First Royal Consort Kim Bin, A drizzle fell over the royal burial grounds.
The King stood before the freshly covered grave.
There was no procession. No prayers were recited. Only the scent of wet earth and a silence heavier than any reproach.
"Kim Bin…"
He spoke her title, not her name. Throughout her life, he had never once called her by the name she bore as a woman before entering the palace.
The night before… was the last time the two of them ever met.
Harsh words were exchanged within the pavilion. Voices raised in anger drowned out the concern neither could voice aloud. The King turned his back and walked away, unaware that it would be the final time she would ever lift her eyes to him.
Royal Consort Kim Bin wiped the tears streaming down her face. She tried to steady herself, retreating inward to calm her emotions….when suddenly, a sharp pain tore through her womb.
She went into labor two months too early.
When news of her death reached him, every word he had never spoken turned into a silence that could never be undone. The wind passed through the wooden grave marker.
The King clenched his fist tightly, then slowly sank to his knees.
"You should not have left this way…"
The grave offered no reply. Only regret spilled forth, alone, into that morning.
Kim Doyun did not yet understand the meaning of the word "death."
He did not know that the arms that once held him so warmly would never return.
It was the Queen who took him in.
She lifted the infant into her arms and brought him into her own residence, ignoring every whisper that followed. She gently stroked his head, as though he were the child she had long awaited.
"From this day on, you are my son, Prince Doyun."
Within the same hall, the Crown Prince…a boy of only five years….stood watching his younger half-brother with clear, innocent eyes.
He stepped forward and tightly grasped the sleeve of the Queen's robe.
She lowered her gaze, surprised, to look at her trueborn son.
"I will protect him myself, Mother."
A child's promise… too pure to understand how cruel the world of adults could be.
The innocence in the Crown Prince's eyes drew a rare smile from the normally stern Queen. She gently placed her hand upon his head.
"You must be a good elder brother, Crown Prince Myeong in."
Kim Myeong-in, the young Crown Prince, smiled with unguarded sincerity at his mother, stretching on tiptoe as he tried to glimpse….Kim Do-yun in her arms.