Characters / Premarital Relationship

Characters for the Korean Webcomic "Premarital Relationship." Currently under construction. Warning, spoilers may be unmarked.

Main Characters

Han Sang-Hyung

The male main character.

• Above the Influence: He's been in the same room with Suh-Eun, with her completely naked, on several occasions, but never tried to take advantage because she's made him well aware that she wouldn't like it. He's also got a 10+ year history of dealing with a female child-hood friend who has a habit of sleep-walking in her underwear, and he never tries to take advantage of that either, to Suh-Eun's shock, as said friend forced her way into, and spent the night at, their common home.
• Accidental Pervert: Invoked and double-subverted. He's forced to live with Suh-Eun in a house with sound-proof bathrooms, with no locks. After knocking, but getting no response, he turns off the light on her while she's in the shower, since the light switch is on the outside of the bathroom. When she angrily confronts him in the kitchen, she winds up dropping her Modesty Towel as he's watching.
• Accidental Marriage: In chapter 41, when he is approached by a Runaway Bride who is escaping her own Arranged Marriage, to help her hide from her bodyguards, he agrees to her idea to disguise themselves as a bride and groom. Although he's somewhat suspicious that his tuxedo fits perfectly, there's so much going on that he fails to realize she's leading him on until the room they duck into... is a chapel and they're greeted by an announcer, a high-powered spotlight, and the announcement that they're married.
• Accidental Truth: Choi Yuri takes his insistence that she's ill as him being denser than the typical harem lead. Then he produces a thermometer, takes her temperature and discovers that she is indeed ill, with a fever of 38.2 degrees Celcius, which is pretty serious.^note  For those not familiar with Celcius, that's 100.76 degrees Fahrenheit. Not life threatening, but serious enough to mandate bed rest for at least 24 hours.
• Adults Are Useless: Something he learns to his horror early in the story. He first tries confronting his grandfather when ambushed by the fact that he's got a fiance lined up for him, since before he was born, that he's never met, only for his grandfather to beat him up "for disrespecting adults." So he goes to his parents for help, and they immediately go into I Want Grandkids mode, shovel him off to the marriage interview with Suh-Eun to dump him there alone, and unchaperoned. To his horror, when he gets back home, after the unmitigated disaster that the meeting was, he finds out that his parents packed up his stuff and shipped it to the new "marital house" he ends up sharing with Suh-Eun, who is at least as enraged as he is, if not more so.
• Arranged Marriage: With Yu Suh-Eun.
• Armor-Piercing Response: And it isn't even verbal. In response to Park Yua's Armor-Piercing Question in chapter 26, he gifts her a teddy-bear, exactly like the one she gave him for his birthday because she knew she'd be the one hugging it, every time she came to visit.
• Awesome by Analysis: Contrary to what his self-deluded grandfather thinks, Sang Hyun is hardly stupid. The boy was clearly justified in bringing a thermometer to Choi Yuri's studio, as she was a Typhoid Mary, unwittingly infecting her staff with the flu, as is revealed in chapter 30, to her deep chagrin.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: He clearly finds Suh-Eun very sexually attractive, but the two of them can't resist quarrelling like a pair of terriers. This is not only due to the deliberately poor impression they made on each other during the "Marriage interview" that they were dragged to, but the fact that their inherernt personalities have a lot of irritating opposite polarities that they struggle to work through.
• Blessed with Suck: From the outside, his life looks truly enviable. He shares a house with not one but two attractive women who are perfectly aware of and okay with each other, provided they don't rub their respective affections in each other's faces, and the monthly allowance allows them all to live comfortably. The downside is that his life is being micro-managed by two senile and inflexible old men who are desperate to rush him into nuptuals and coitus with the girl who is to be his fiance, regardless of how much she resents it, they control the purse strings, have shown they see nothing wrong with Sexual Extortion, and will retaliate violently, both direct and indirect, if any of the household occupants so much as object too loudly to the heavy-handed tyranny. Oh, and while there's no direct supervision, the house is monitored by CCTV 24/7, as the senile old men have no desire to respect privacy either.
  • It gets worse in chapter 27. Sure, the senile old men stop meddling, but in return, cut off the monthly allowance, and he's the only one who has any marketable skills, though bless their hearts, the two women did earnestly try to get a job too.
• Childhood Friend Romance: Chapter 26 reveals that Park Yua's crush on him is fully requited. As far as he's concerned, they've been actively dating for over ten years. This makes her unspeakably happy.
• Covert Pervert: He finds Suh-Eun very attractive and he's fond of ogling her when she's not looking. By that point, he's already seen what she looks like au naturale, thanks to Yuri's machinations.
• Crazy-Prepared: He brings a medical thermometer with him wherever he goes, apparently so he can diagnose that a person is blushing from a fever, not a love-crush when put in that situation... Apparently justified due to his 10-year-long relationship with Park Yua.
• Curtains Match the Windows: His eyes and hair are the same shade of off-pink.
• The Dulcinea Effect: He just can not resist the urge to come to the aid of a woman in need. This is something Choi Yuri exploits in chapter 31.
• Foreshadowing: The conver illustrates that he'd be in a relationship with both Suh-Eun and Park Yua, and it wouldn't be entirely voluntary.
• A Friend in Need: Despite not liking her very much, thanks to her deliberate efforts at making a poor impression, hoping to get out of the Arranged Marriage, Sang-Hyn showed Suh-Eun genuine charity in opening up his home to her, and gently teaching her how to cook so she stops being a Lethal Chef. She greatly appreciates it. This goes double when he genuinely comes to her rescue in chapter 19.
  • When Choi Yuri collapses from the flu, he comes to her aid too, despite having every justification imaginable to leave her to her own devices and let her suffer. This confuses the hell out of Choi Yuri.
• He Cleans Up Nicely: Remove his glasses, comb his hair and he's a hottie.
• House Husband: For all intents and purposes. He's by far the best when it concerns the household chores.
• I Gave My Word: In chapter 19, he gives up the chance to be free of the Arranged Marriage premise of the story to protect Suh-Eun from her status as a Living MacGuffin. Why? Because he promised to help her find a way for both of them to get out of the arranged marriage and get out from under their grandfather's thumbs.
• I Just Want to Be Free: All he wants in life is to become a mangaka and get out from under his grandather's thumb.
• Innocently Insensitive: During the "fake date" with Park Yua, since he's not aware of her late night Love Epiphany, he does and says all the wrong things to her, having great difficulty trying to understand why he's upsetting her, when the same exact behavior greatly pleased her just the day before.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Although his jerkish actions are either unintentional or purely in self-defense, he does have a truly decent and noble core to his personality, and when she stops to actually think about it, Suh-Eun really likes it.
• Love Triangle: It's offical in chapter 26. The chapter title even lampshades it.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Thanks to his efforts in respecting Suh-Eun's boundaries, and treating her like a person, his life's become a living hell, in large part thanks to his Obliviously Evil grandfather, and hers.
• Non-Action Guy: He has yet to show any true martial skill, although he did stop a guy from punching Suh-Eun in the face in chapter 19.
• Oblivious to Love: He's a bit slow on the uptake when it concerns women showing him affection. In his defense, he's been desensitized by the fact that his childhood friend has a habit of sleep-walking in her underwear, he's been privy to it, and knows this is her NOT being affectionate. Though he's not entirely clueless, to the shock of the audience, as when asked, he goes on to mention that he and Suh-Eun do indeed have something special between them.
• Perfectly Arranged Marriage: Suh-Eun is the eagle, and Sang-Hyun is the perfect rocky ledge that allows her to build her nest from which she can freely spred her wings and fly, and they both know it. Now if only those two busybody granfathers of theirs would just leave them alone...
• The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: According to the series synopsis, he's supposed to be an aspiring manga writer, but he's never shown doing anything that aligns with such a goal, not even taking art classes, nor knowing the Famed In-Story Choi Yuri. At least not until he goes in to an interview for animators in chapter 27, and meets Choi Yuri. Unfortunately, while his skills at illustration are revealed as top-notch, he's found to be utterly atrocious when actually trying to write his own story, getting his submissions constantly rejected as a result.
• Rescue Romance: Subverted, twice. In chapter 11, Yuri tries to invoke it by making Myung Group employees act very sexually agressive to Suh-Eun, hoping to goad Sang-Hyun to come to her rescue, which fails only because Suh-Eun saw through it. It happens for real in chapter 19, when he rescues her from being punched in the face by a suitor and classmate that simply would not take "no" for an answer, though romance wasn't on Sang-Hyun's mind.
• Sour Outside, Sad Inside: Most of him being a jerk comes in self-defense, but it's still perfectly understandable when one comes to realize he's had his life micro-managed since before he was born by an expy of Genma Saotome.
• Supreme Chef: One bite of his cooking has Suh-Eun seeing visions of angels with trumpets singing his praises.
• Thanks for the Mammary: Invoked. In chapter 11, part of Yuri's "date" scenario involves Myung Group employees deliberately pushing him from behind (while making it look like and accidental bumping) in suck a way that his hand winds up on her breast while she's wearing a practical, but rather revealing bikini that Yuri compelled her to wear. Her reaction is entirely predictable.
• Took a Level in Dumbass: Working under Yuri at drawing manhwa has apparently fried a few neurons, as stuff that was completely obvious to him in the early chapters has him completely stumped in chapters 33 and 34. Park Yua has to explicitly remind him that Suh-Eun is the second most popular girl in the school, as an example.
• Unwanted Harem: As of chapter 42, he's stuck with three self-proclaimed love interests, all of whom come from rich families that put a great deal of financial pressure on him...
• You Are Worth Hell: As he professes to Suh-Eun when he catches, and prevents her from falling into a dangerous area under a roller-coaster in chapter 39. For the record, the line below is with the wallet holding the entire monthly budget.

  Sang Hyun:"You getting hurt would be far worse than losing a wallet."

Yu Suh-Eun.

Granddaughter of the matriarch who runs the Myung Group international corporation, and the female main character.

• Abomination Accusation Attack: She's quick to accuse Sang-Hyun of being a raging pervert and other sexually deviant things. She outgrows this quickly, at least by the in-story timeline due to the fact that the real target of her rage is not Sang-Hyun but rather her grandfather, whom she sees as basically selling her into sexual slavery.
• Action Girlfriend: She's clearly been trained in martial arts as she's shown off some advanced fighting moves on several occasions, even throwing a guy who tried to assault her.
• Aren't You Going to Ravish Me?: In chapter 11, she finds herself trapped in the same room with Sang-Hyun, wearing only a bedsheet, and she's conflicted between being scared of him taking advantage of her in her sleep, and having serious doubts about her sex appeal when he promises not to. Sang-Hyun calls her out on it, at which point, they both go to sleep happily and platonically, to the ire of both their grandfathers and Yuri.
• Arranged Marriage: With Sang-Hyun.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Though reluctant to admit it to anyone, even herself, she grows quite fond of Sang-Hyun because he treats her kindly, as an equal, with genuine respect.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Although she has yet to show sexual interst in Sang-Hyun, she does want him to show such interest in her, and when she realizes that the two of them quarrel like a pair of terriers as a result of his attraction, it makes her smile.
• Blessed with Suck: She's the granddaughter and heir of a very wealthy and successful business tycoon. Unfortunately, he doesn't see her as a person, but only as a political tool, at best, and effectively sells her into sex slavery to honor an agreement he made long before she was born, that she was not a party to. He is also so vindictive that he puts her on the open market as a Meal Ticket, purely to spite her for not happily going along. Even after she's physically assaulted by a suitor who wouldn't take "no" for an answer, the teens of the highschool she's forced to attend doesn't comprehend why this is a bad thing, with the exception of her fiance, and his childhood friend.
• Break the Haughty: Her loss in cooking skill to Sang-Hyun had this effect on her. To her shock, he didn't berate her, and helped her improve.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Downplayed. She clearly does not like the idea of "sharing" Sang-Hyun, not even with Park Yua, despite being firmly opposed to dating him herself, or the whole arranged marriage. It's downplayed in that she's at least willing to tolerate it if Park Yua makes an effort to do romantic or "couples" stuff with him only where she can't see it.
  • As the story progresses, it becomes less and less downplayed in every chapter.
• Compliment Backfire: When Sang-Hyun tried to praise her for the fact that she has encyclopedic knowledge of the 5384 employees of her grandfather's company, and can recognize them on sight, she was deeply offended that he didn't find her impressive before that.
• Crippling Overspecialization: She knows everything about her grandfather's company, and its employees, as her grandfather groomed her to, but lacks any form of marketable skills. What's worse, her Inferiority Superiority Complex makes her attempt to overachieve, and fail spectacularly when attempting to learn something new, as she always tries to outdo, or boss around, the one teaching her. The one time, on-screen, she succeeded in learning something was an utterly humiliating experience for her.
• Date Peepers: After being goaded by Yuri in chapter 22, she starts stalking Sang-Hyun, on his "fake date," rationalizng that it's to stop her grandfather's machinations.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: She warms up to Sang-Hyun in a hurry once she realizes that she likes it when he treats her like an equal, as opposed to putting her on a pedestal like the employees of Myung Group, or as a mindless puppet with no purpose but to serve someone else's will, like her grandfather does.
• Don't You Dare Pity Me!: In the early chapters, she was so scared, hurt, and angry that she'd been "sold" to Sang-Hyun that she spent the first night of their "married" life, sleeping right outside their front door, after she was hired and fired from three part-time jobs, on the same day, without having any success finding some other living accomodations. He had to physically drag her inside so he could feed her breakfast and let her bathe herself. Of course, he didn't know about the sound-proof bathrooms.
• Groin Attack: One of the first things she does when Sang Hyun retaliates against her facade during the marriage interview, telling her, quite loudly, that he's just as much of a victim of his own grandfather's machinations as she is of hers, is knee him in the groin. She's lucky she was wrong about his character, as he was perfectly justified to retaliate in kind, but did not do so.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: Spending her entire life micro-managed by her grandfather, who has enourmous financial and political clout, since before she was born, has driven her to try and be the best at everything, and this made her loss to Sang-Hyuk in the kitchen utterly devastating. To her shock, Sang-Hyun didn't lord it over her, and gently showed her where she went wrong so she could improve, and improve she did.
• I Just Want to Be Free: She repeatedly tries to get everyone in earshot to realize how much she resents having her grandfather micro-manage her life since before she was born. Only her fiance and his female childhood friend get it.
• Insecure Love Interest: When she thinks Park Yua and Sang Hyun are genuinely dating, she withdraws into herself, visibly distraught.
• Lethal Chef: She tried to make a boullabaise, and wound up making a dish that summoned ghosts. Fortunately, she gets better after a single lesson from Sang-Hyuk. Her problem was that she tried to make an advanced meal before fully grasping the basics. When trying to cook a simpler meal, she fared much better... until chapter 39 shows that even making a simple sandwich is beyond her, and said sandwich also winds up summoning ghosts. Seems she can only cook well when Sang Hyun is holding her hand through it.
• Living MacGuffin: After her grandfather's puublic announcement in chapter 18, she's become a trophy in a game of "find the next heir to the company." Neither her grandfather, nor her female classmates can understand why she's so upset by the idea, with the sole exception of Sang-Hyun's childhood friend who is close enough to the situation to understand said grandfather's true motives.
• Meal Ticket: Thanks to her grandfather's actions in chapter 18, this is how the entire male population of her highschool sees her, with the exception of her arranged marriage fiance, Sang-Hyun.
• New Transfer Student: Her grandfather transfers her into Sang-Hyun's class at the beginning of chapter 18.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Her and Park Yua physically dragging Sang-Hyun to an amusement part when he's downtrodden after having his manga work rejected was genuinely intended to cheer him up, and it did... until he realized his wallet was missing with the entire monthly budget inside.
• Opposites Attract: What attracts her to Sang-Hyun most, though she's loathe to admit it, even to herself, is that his personality and hers are pretty much as opposite as one can realistically get. (She's a thrill seeker, while he prefers to take it slow and easy.)
• Reluctant Fanservice Girl: She's often under-clothed against her will.
• Perfectly Arranged Marriage: At considerable embarrasment and grief, she acknowledges, out loud, that she needs Sang Hyun to be the one maintaining the home and hearth, and has no complaints in how he handles the household budget. In her thoughts, just prior to meeting Park Yua, she comes to realize that maybe, just maybe, there's nothing wrong with the marriage to Sang-Hyun itself, although she's perfectly correct in that the way her grandfather, and his, are handling it is utterly attrocious, though both of them insist otherwise.
• Rich Bitch: How she presents herself when faced with unwanted admirers. It's entirely an act.
• Sex Slave: How she views the way her grandfather pushed her into the Arranged Marriage. She's right!
• Sour Outside, Sad Inside: One of the biggest things she has in common with Sang-Hyun is that she's lived her life under the thumb of an uncaring tyrant since before she was born, and she hates it. Her prickly personality makes much more sense when this is taken into account.
• Sustained Misunderstanding: She catches Park Yua and Sang Hyun shopping for her birthday present, and presumes they're there on a date instead. Since the two of them are actually preparing a surprise birthday party, they fail to correct her...
• They Just Dont Get It: In Chapter 1, she tries to get a job and gets rejected from no less than three places on the same day. In chapter 27, she tries again, thinking that getting a job for herself is going to be a simple task... and fails just as spectacularly.
• Tsundere: A downplayed, and justified Type-A. Since most people don't see her as herself, but only as a means to gain favor with Myung Group, she's rightly become quite cynical at dealing with people. Her grandfather's methods of foisting her off into an arranged marriage don't help.
• What Is This Feeling?: When she really gets jealous, having no basis for comparison, she can't recognize what the particular emotion is and it throws her off-balance, mentally.
• When She Smiles: She first smiles in chapter 11 once she realizes that Sang Hyun and herself suffer from Belligerent Sexual Tension, and he's sufficiently Above the Influence that she can sleep comfortably in the same room as him despite wearing nothing but a bedsheet.

Park Yua

Sang-Hyung's childhood friend, who has been his neighbor for the vast majority of 10 years. Although she appears on the cover, she's not formally introduced until chapter 12.

• Armor-Piercing Question: To Sang-Hyun in chapter 26. Naturally, he has the perfect answer.
• Armor-Piercing Response: She uses one to breach the decades' old echo-chamber Sang-Hyun's grandfather forged with Yu Jisuk.

  "That's because you never care about anything, Grandpa! And we started dating about last year."

• Becoming the Mask: And in record time. In less than 24 hours after her outburst where she claims she's got a Childhood Friend Romance going on with Sang-Hyun, and she's not going to give up on it, she comes to realize that she genuinely does have feelings for him.
• Big Damn Kiss: She plants one on Sang-Hyun at the end of chapter 25, and then runs off while he, Suh-Eun, and their grandfathers are too stunned to react.
• Calling the Old Man Out: While Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun have both repeatedly tried to get through to their respective grandparents just how badly they're handling the whole Arranged Marriage thing, to no avail, her outburst finally manages to break through the echo chamber and at least rattle Sang-Hyun's grandfather, wherein he turns to Yuri to try and find a way to remove her from the equation. To say that backfires spectacularly is an epic understatement.
• Childhood Friend: With Sang-Hyun.
• Childhood Friend Romance: It doesn't actually hit her until chapter 22, but this certainly applies between her and Sang Hyun, at least from her end.
• Childhood Marriage Promise: Of sorts. She frequently mentions that Sang-Hyun once promised to "take care of her for life."
• The Cloud Cuckoolander Was Right: Her thought process starts out being quite rash and bizarre. On careful analysis, once she lays out her reasoning step-by-step, neither Sang-Hyun nor Suh-Eun can deny that she's actually quite rational, and her view point is logically sound.
• Gamer Chick: She's addicted to video-games of all kinds. Her experience with Virtual Novels proves instrumental in countering Choi Yuri's machinations.
• Innocent Fanservice Girl: She sleepwalks in her underwear so often Sang-Hyuk carries spare pajamas that he can shove her into, and she honestly sees nothing wrong with walking around the house in nothing but a towel, while Sang-Hyun is present. All this is before she has a Love Epiphany.
• Like an Old Married Couple: As lampshaded in chapter 13 by their classmates. They're always walking to school together for 10 years, and hanging out together.
• Love Epiphany: One of these hits her hard the night right before she goes out on a "fake date" with Sang-Hyun. Not being psychic, Sang-Hyun is rather slow to pick up on it.
• Marshmallow Hell: On her introduction, she drags Sang-Hyun's head into her chest when he tries to wake her up to prepare her for going to school. He reacts, violently.
• Minor Living Alone: Implied. No parents answer the door when Sang-Hyun checks up on her in chapter 12, and she was in her house, alone, obviously for an extended period of time.
• Please Put Some Clothes On: Said word for word to her by Suh-Eun when the two meet while she is wearing nothing but a towel in chapter 14.
• Pretty Freeloader: Surprisingly subverted. While it is true that she's not shown partaking in any of the household chores, what she does offer is far more valuable. Her highly ethical and competent relationship advice, which the other two main characters are free to accept or ignore at their leisure, and the fact that she keeps their morale high, in exchange for free room and board, as well as the open invitation to share her gaming sessions with her every once in a while, is recognized in-universe as an exceptional bargain. Prior to chapter 21, she was more than content with this arrangement.
• Rage Breaking Point: Lampshaded by a graphic rage meter, no less. In chapter 20, when Sang-Hyun's grandfather storms into the house, and starts pushing him, Suh-Eun, and herself around, making nuptual arrangements without their consent, purely based on the fact that Sang-Hyun rescued Suh-Eun from a mob by making a public Love Confession, Park Yua utterly flips and starts Calling the Old Man Out.
• The Rival: At the end of chapter 34, it's official. She and Suh-Eun pointedly begin competing over being Sang Hyun's "number one." Since he Took a Level in Dumbass by this point, Sang Hyun completely fails to comprehend their behavior.
• Skewed Priorities: Rather than immediately find out why her neighbor and caretaker is suddenly moving away, she spends the entirety of Golden Week marathoning a video-game.
• Tsundere: Type B. It takes seriously pissing her off, or being very close to her to see her stop being amiable and polite. Sang-Hyun is very close to her.

Jung So Yeon.

When she starts licking her lips, run!

A childhood friend of Sang Hyun that left Korea as a small child, due to illness, but returned in chapter 42, to claim Sang Hyun as her fiance.

• Accidental Marriage: Averted. It certainly wasn't "accidental" on her end. She staged a very elaborate prank where she and Sang Hyun wound up in a wedding chapel dressed as a bride and groom with one of her bodyguards loudly announcing "From now on, you're both married." While Sang Hyun did have his suspicions, she dragged him along and they were so thoroughly hounded, that he was very, very effectively kept off-balance until the prank was completely carried out.
• Cassandra Truth: She would often tell her father about "her darling" Han Sang-Hyun. Her father thought the boy was an imaginary friend until they met in person.
• Childhood Friend Romance: Park Yua isn't the only girl in Sang Hyun's past with a romantic interest.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Sang Hyun is angry about being pranked into an "accidental" marriage, she formulates the idea that he's mad about the "marriage" taking place in a chapel... as opposed to having rented out the whole building the chapel resides in.
• Entitled to Have You: To Sang Hyun. She insists he's her fiance, no objections accepted.
• Foreshadowing: Chapter 38 has Choi Yuri lecturing Suh Eun about Sang Hyun's love interests, and there are three images, one of Park Yua, one of Suh-Eun, and one with a "?".
• Insistent Terminology: She insists on calling herself Sang Hyun's bride.
• Lecherous Licking: Every time she's about to pull a prank, she licks her lips as seen in the page image.
• Mafia Princess: Her father is a "retired" Yakuza boss.
• New Transfer Student: She transfers herself into Sang Hyun's school in chapter 42. As if the poor boy didn't suffer from enough jealousy death-glares due to the Park Yua and Suh Eun situation.
• The Prankster: Ever since they met as small children, she's loved to prank and surprise Sang Hyun.
• Red Eyestake Warning: She has pinkish eyes, and she's dangerous in a scheming prankster sort of way.
• Runaway Bride: Double Subverted. Upon being introduced, she's apparently fleeing her bodyguards who are pushing her into her own Arranged Marriage, something that pings Sang Hyun's Dulcinea Effect meter at maximum. It's later proven to be an elaborate prank... until her father's introduced, and then it's revealed that she was going to be forced into an arranged marriage until Han Sang-Hyun defeated him in a sword duel, that he demanded.

Antagonists

Yu Jisuk

This is his default expression.

Yu Suh-Eun's grandfather, and one of the primary reasons the main characters suffer in the story.

• And Then What?: He has molded his granddaughter's entire life around eventually forcing her into an Arranged Marriage with a boy she's never met, her consent or well-being be damned, not to mention being his company's heir. He is also petty enough put her on the open market as a Meal Ticket to utterly break her if she dares object too strongly, or refuses to offer herself up as her fiance's Sex Slave. Should he actually succeed in his agenda, not only does this ruin her life, but it will likely bring the company he spent his life building crashing down, along with the lives of its 5384 employees, the moment he's too infirm to grasp the reins, for any reason.
• Armor-Piercing Question: He has one for Suh-Eun near the end of chapter 13. "Do you hate him?" (meaning Sang-Hyun.)
• Dirty Old Man: What other interpretation can there be for a guy who forces his granddaughter to live in a house with 24/7 CCTV surveillance, purely for the sake of hoping to watch her involved in sexual relations with the fiance he picked out for her who was also forced to live there. Not to mention agreeing to all of Choi Yuri's "plans" ostensibly designed to make it happen.
• Faux Affably Evil: In Chapter 18, as he's making the formal announcement, he uses a lot of sweet-sounding words to make it look like he cares about his granddaughter's well-being and is trying to get away from his family's Arranged Marriage tradition. In reality, he's a Principles Zealot wholly wedded to the idea of Arranged Marriage and is deliberately setting her up to be a Living MacGuffin out of spite that she's not happily acting in her designated role as Sang-Hyun's Sex Slave. Sang-Hyun's grandfather agrees with the idea once he learns of it, and calls it "perfect" because it's intended to drive Suh-Eun into Sang-Hyun's arms broken and desperate.
• Four Eyes, Zero Soul: He wears glasses, and is such a Principles Zealot that he's willing to utterly trash his granddaughter's life by selling her off as a Sex Slave so he can honor a promise he made long before she was even born.
• Friend or Foe?: He was believed to come from the DPRK (ie North Korea), and was almost shot as a result, until "Elder Park" stood up for him.
• Hate Sink: He is so loathed as a character, that not only does the audience want him run over with a truck, but nobody bats an eye when Suh-Eun desperately seeks out a gun so she can shoot him.
• Hypocrite: He loathes when he thinks people are giving him excuses when their plans don't turn out as intended, but when his plans blow up in his face? He makes up any and every excuse he can to blame someone or something else.
• I Don't Pay You to Think: To his own granddaughter. When she, being a minor, proves reluctant to enter carnal relations with Sang-Hyun, due to knowing him less than a month, and tries to voice her perfectly rational objections, not to mention trying to figure out why her grandfather's so desperate to rush things, his reply is "that conversation ended long ago."
• I Owe You My Life: The reason he orignailly promised his daughter's, yet unborn, hand in marriage to Sang Hyun's yet unborn son, and then granddaughter to grandson when both wound up having sons is that Sang Hyun's grandfather saved his life during "the war of June 25" ie the Korean conflict.
• Jerkass: In addition to all his other faults, he sees nothing wrong with discussing his granddaughter's life, and her fiance's and completely ingoring their input like they're not even present, despite being in the same room as them.
• Jerkass Has a Point: A surprisingly benevolent example. One of the few things he did right in arranging the marriage between Sang Hyun and Suh Eun was doing his research into the boy's character first and concluding that Sang Hyun was of sufficient moral character to be considered a fiance and heir. At least if Choi Yuri's proclamations are accurate in chapter 30.
• Never My Fault: He never acknowledges when he's in the wrong about something.
• Obliviously Evil: He does not comprehend nor care that his obsession with having his minor child granddaughter enter carnal relations with Sang-Hyun, another minor, that she's known less than a month, purely for the sake of forcing the both of them into a Shotgun Wedding so he can fulfill a promise he made with Sang-Hyun's grandfather over 50 years ago, long before Suh-Eun was even born, is making her life a Living Hell.
• Pet the Dog: He's not a complete jerkass. In chapter 30, the moment he found out Choi Yuri collapsed from the flu, he called her up to check up on her well being, before doing anything else. Presumably he treats the rest of his employees at least that well.
• Principles Zealot: He is so utterly devoted to the idea of having his granddaughter, Suh-Eun forced into an arranged marriage with Sang-Hyun that he will take up any plan he thinks has even the tiniest chances of success. In fact, even after seeing that his "perfect plan" to force her to seek out marriage with Sang-Hyun out of desperation due to making her a Living MacGuffin by promising inheritance rights to whomever manages to take the engagement ring from her, nearly has her punched in the face, by a Gold Digger that simply refuses to take "no" for an answer, he still refuses to back off. It's only because Sang-Hyun came to her rescue that she walked away unharmed.
• Put on a Bus: Near the ending of chapter 28, one of Yuri's flashbacks shows that he's left the country "on business" and is a secondary reason why Yuri's been suspended. (The primary reason being, of course, failing to get Suh Eun and Sang-Hyn sexually entangled with each other.)
• Right for the Wrong Reasons: If ever one of his plans has the intended results, it's in spite of his machinations, though he's quick to take the credit, and shift the blame.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: As the head of Myung Group, he has so much money and influence, nobody bats an eye at the fact that he outright buys Sang-Hyun's high-school, transfers Suh-Eun into it in the middle of the school year, and publicly announces "open season" on her, by promising inheritance rights on whoever can get lay claim to "her heart" by taking a ring he put in her pocket.
• Selective Obliviousness: He and Sang-Hyun's grandfather have, over decades, built such an elaborate mental echo-chamber where they constantly try to out "yes-man" each other, that he can't possibly acknowledge, let alone comprehend, any flaws in his reasoning or alternate viewpoints and actions than anything he's already decided on.

Sang-Hyun's grandfather, "Elder Park."

We don't blame you if you want to punch this face in.

The primary antagonist to kick off the plot. He's the reason Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun are in an arranged marriage.

• Did Not See That Coming: Despite knowing that Sang-Hyun and Park Yua have been hanging out for over a decade, ever since they were small children, he still has the gall to be shocked that she'd react with rage, making a Childhood Friend Romance claim when he dismissively tries to kick her out of the "marital house" in chapter 21.
• Dirty Old Man: The aspect of Sang Hyun's life he's trying to micro-manage the most is the boy's sex life, and like Yu Jisuk, wants to see the sexual relations occur with his own eyes.
• Everybody Calls Him "Barkeep": He's only reffered to as "grandpa" or "grandfather" in the story. He's never introduced by name.
• Expy: He's basically what Genma Saotome would be like if he were raised Korean instead of Japanese.
• Fat Bastard: He's clearly overweight and is a terrible human being.
• For Your Own Good: He has wholly convinced himself that his grandson is just too damn stupid to know what he likes, have his own goals and dreams, or how to handle the highly unreasonable arranged marriage situation he's been thrust into. As such, he's bent on micro-managing every aspect of their married lives as much as possible, and responds with violence, physical, emotional, or financial, if Sang-Hyun should ever dare push back, or even complain too loudly.
• Hypocrite: He demands to be treated with "respect" by his grandson at all times, but not only does he fail to show his grandson any respect, he lives in a wholly unrespectable manner.
• I Reject Your Reality: He specifically lampshades in chapter 22, that even if Sang-Hyun and Park Yua actually are dating, prior to Suh-Eun being shoved into their lives, he still refuses to accept it, and insists that the arranged marriage take precedence, despite the fact that neither Suh-Eun nor Sang-Hyun had any input, consent, or foreknowledge before it was suddely thrust upon them, out of the blue.
• I Was Quite the Looker: He used to be quite striking in his youth.
• Jerkass: To highlight how little he cares about the lives of his grandson, and fiance, when he storms into their house in chapter 21, he starts happily discussing "gifting" Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun another house when the two can't even afford the house they're currently forced to live in without assistance, being minors and all, and does so as if the two teens are not even present.
• No Name Given: His name is never mentioned. The closest to his name being mentioned is Yu Jisuk calling him "Elder Park" in chapter 22.
• Obliviously Evil: Even if his life depended on it, he just can not comprehend how he's harming his grandson or the arranged marriage fiance by his machinations.
• Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: He's old and doesn't have the slightest trace of good manners in his whole body.
• Selective Obliviousness: Just like Yu Jisuk, he is absolutely incapable of seeing, hearing, or comprehending anything that doesn't line up with the mindset that the arranged marriage is being handled by him in the best possible way.
• Sexual Extortion: He sees nothing wrong with tying Sang Hyung's allowance, used to pay the monthly bills at the house he and Suh-Eun share, (which they were forced into), to their compliance with any date plan he or Yuri orchestrate, even if such a plan includes sexual relations.
• Smoking Is Cool: He certainly thinks so. He's introduced smoking from a kiseru, that he uses to beat up Sang-Hyun "for disrespect" every time the boy tried to bring up an objection to the Arranged Marriage.
• Strong Family Resemblance: In his flashback, regarding "The War of June 25" (ie, the Korean Conflict), he looks surprisingly similar to Sang-Hyun.
• This Cannot Be!: When Park Yua openly announces that she and Sang-Hyung were dating before Suh-Eun was literally shoved into his life, "Elder Park" is shocked and emphatically proclaims it as an impossibility, despite just moments ago in the same scene displaying such extreme contempt for his grandson, that he was openly and jovially planning out the teen's life like he wasn't even present.
• Very Punchable Man: Both sides of the fourth wall want to punch his face in.
• Wrong Assumption: Upon learning of Yu Jisuk's plan in chapter 19, he fully expected Sang-Hyun to go Crazy Jealous Guy on the unnamed new suitor because that's what a "real man" does, and of course, his grandson is a "real man," and thus considered the Zany Scheme to be "perfect" as a direct result. Even Choi Yuri could see all the flaws in that line of thinking, not the least of which is that Sang-Hyun subscribes heavily to the I Want My Beloved to Be Happy philosophy. The story could have gone very, very badly indeed, for all involved.
• You Never Asked: When Yu Jisuk realizes that there's a possible rival to Suh-Eun in the form of Park Yua, and asks why he wasn't informed, Sang-Hyun's grandfather responds in this manner.

Choi Yuri

"The professional relationship councellor"

A famous manhwa romance comedy artist, also serving as a maid, hired by Yu Jisuk and Sang-Hyung's grandfather to hasten nuptual and coital relations between Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun, whether the two minor teens want it or not.

• Armor-Piercing Question: Her asking Yu Jisuk if he expected Sang-Hyun to come to Suh-Eun's rescue when one of the high-school teens his "perfect" plan of making her a Living MacGuffin decided to punch her in the face, in public, when she said "no" made him realize he Didn't Think This Through, but only in so much as he didn't have enough Plausible Deniability in place, and he hyped up the fact that he got his desired result.
• Believing Their Own Lies: She has been writing fictional romantic comedy for so long, she's come to believe her stories are an accurate representation of how romance actually works. As such, she's come to think that maybe Sang-Hyun is either sexually impotent or gay to rationalize why her schemes inevitably backfired.
• Color-Coded Eyes: To highlight how important she is to the plot, her eyes are purple.
• Everyone Has Standards: Even she is enraged by Yu Jisuk's scheme in chapter 19, though she doesn't call him out on it.
• Famed In-Story: She is a well-known mangaka in the setting. The only reason Sang-Hyun didn't recognize her is that his grandfather had been manipulating his life to the point that he couldn't perform the due research into his chosen field, becoming a mangaka himself. Park Yua, being a fan of Visual Novel games, oh the other hand, fully realized who she was and her preferred genre.
• Honor Before Reason: For a certain definition of "honor" at any rate. She is so determined to get back in Yu Jisuk's good graces, and prove that her "romantic comedy" theories are correct that when she's got Sang-Hyuk in her office illustrating her manga, she tries to seduce him, just to confirm if he's gay, impotent, or she just lacked sufficient intel... despite the fact that sexual harassment is a very real criminal and civil offense, even among adults, and Sang-Hyuk is also a minor.
• Ignored Epiphany: After spending numerous chapters in the "marital house" and seeing, first hand, that Suh-Eun and Sang-Hyung have a much, much better chance of hooking up when left alone to their own devices, so they can sort out their feelings for each other, than if one of hers or her "employers'" Zany Scheme is put into play, she ends chapter 38 going right back to meddling in their lives with extreme prejudice, promising Yu Jisuk "positive results."
• I Reject Your Reality: Horrifically blended with Never My Fault and Moral Myopia. She is so convinced that her "romantic scenarios" ie, Sexual Extortion is "perfect romantic comedy" that she utterly refuses to comprehend why her plans were abject disasters, and that she's lucky to merely be suspended by Yu Jisuk rather than finding herself rotting in prison. As such, she blames Sang-Hyun entirely for her "misfortune."
• Ironic Name: Her name is Yuri, yet she specializes in heterosexual romance manga.
• Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: It is universally agreed by the audience that her act of placing large doses of aphrodesiacs in Sang-Hyun's meal, that he was compelled to eat, without his knowledge or consent, is the point where she's past deserving any form of possible redemption.
• Large Ham: Every time she presents and explains her preconceived "romantic" scenarios that she thrusts upon the arranged marriage couple, she does so in a loud, flashy, and flamboyant manner, with many wild exaggerated espressions.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: When Sang Hyun serves her a meal in bed, and cleans up her studio/apartment, as she's bedridden with the flu, she accuses him of having the "skill from a Rom-Com main character."
• Living with the Villain: By Yu Jisuk's order, she starts living with the main characters in chapter 31, as Yu Suh-Eun's maid. Suh-Eun is decidedly not pleased by this development, with some very good reason. It ends, again by Yu Jisuk's order after she believes she has "enough intel" to enact a Zany Scheme that she's convinced will tie nuptual bonds between Han Sang Hyun and Yu Suh-Eun.
• Meido: She is, in fact, a highly competent maid. Her own house is a disaster purely because she wants it to be.
• My Master, Right or Wrong: She is whole-heartedly complicit with the schemes of Yu Jisuk and Sang-Hyun's grandfather, not out of any sense of loyalty, but in sheer terror of offending them.
• Only in It for the Money: She is cooking up the vast majority of the schemes trying to trick, entrap, or outright force the two arranged marriage teens into nuptuals or coitus because she's being given a large "Investment" by Yu Jisuk.
• Opaque Nerd Glasses: When outside of her "maid" attire and in her "animator" attire, she has large, round and opaque glasses that obscure her eyes.
• The Peter Principle: Her fame as a romance mangaka, and her presumed skill as a maid has convinced Yu Jisuk and Sang-Hyun's grandfather that she's the ideal professional relationship counsellor. As has been shown repeatedly, simply being able to write fictional though believable accounts of modern romance, and setting up such secnarios on a drawing board does not equate to actual success in engineering actual relationships. Then again, an actual licensed and ethical professional counsellor who looks at the circumstances of the marital relations between Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun, then hears the designs of their grandparents would probably tell the both of them where they can shove it. If not outright contact child protective services.
• Promoted to Love Interest: Invoked and lampshaded. Not only does she start to have feelings for Sang Hyun after he treats her very, very kindly in chapter 30, but her boss Yu Jisuk orders her into "the marital house" as his granddaughter's maid in the final page of the chapter.
• Rape by Proxy: She certainly had this in mind as part of the "first date" that Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun had. There can be no other interpretation for her scenario of putting two minor teens of opposite genders in a room overnight, where There Is Only One Bed, forbidding either of them to leave, or even order room service, rigging the fire-sprinklers to ruin one or both of their clothes, while there are no replacements or even full-body towels, having nothing to do in said room but watch porn, and on top of everything else, drugging the teens with large doses of aphrodesiacs without their knowledge or consent. How she possibly imagined this was going to go well boggles the mind.
• The Scapegoat: For the author. If the story runs afoul of a rom-com cliche, she can be blamed entirely for it.
• Sexual Extortion: It was her idea to have Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun compelled to go on a date together or else suddenly lose their monthly income, just as their bills were coming due.
• She Cleans Up Nicely: When she actually does care about her appearance, she's physically quite attractive indeed.
• Tampering with Food and Drink: By her own admission, she spiked Sang-Hyun's meal with large doses of aphrodesiacs in chapter 11, hoping to compell him to sexually assault Suh-Eun, if not outright rape her.
• They Just Dont Get It: No matter how often her schemes blow up in her face, she utterly refuses to comprehend that she's clearly not in a To Love Ru style romance comedy, and as such, simply can't come up with other types of "romantic advice" for Yu Jisuk or Sang-Hyun's grandfather, no matter how hard she tries.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Once she moves into the "marital house" as a maid, she pointedly stops trying to force Suh-Eun and Sang Hyun together and instead looks out for their genuine happiness and well-being, whether they hook up or not. (Though she still prefers if they do.)
• Trash of the Titans: When Sang-Hyun is forced to work with her to make ends meet, he finds that her "design studio" is a complete disaster.
• Unkempt Beauty: Her "casual" clothes are sweats that fit very poorly. If one doesn't take her personality into account, she could be physically attractive.
• When She Smiles: Chapter 30. When Sang Hyun gets her to smile genuinely, and without malice, the audience comments went wild. Have a look for yourself.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: She's convinced herself that she's in To Love Ru, and the romantic schemes like those used by Momo or Nemesis will make Sang-Hyun and Suh-Eun more romantically involved with each other. She is quite wrong, and her plans always backfire spectacularly as a result.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: She uses this ploy to exploit Sang Hyun's Dulcinea Effect character flaw. She insists that if the "marital house" doesn't accept her "employment" as a maid, she'd be forced to sleep in the streets right outside the house by Yu Jisuk. Sang Hyun falls for it hook, line, and sinker.

So Yeon's father.

A "retired" Yakuza boss.

Yes, Han Sang-Hyun actually won that fight.

• Entertainingly Wrong: On two fronts. First he though Sang-Hyun was an imaginary friend his daughter made up to deal with the isolation brought about by her sickness as a child. When he finally meets Sang-Hyung in person, he thought the boy was trying to woo his daughter for purely selfish reasons, when in fact his daughter is the one trying to woo Sang-Hyun.
• Graceful Loser: Implied. Though his reaction to losing to Sang-Hyun is not shown, he clearly doesn't cause problems after being beaten, albeit under very generous conditions, in the duel he demanded.
• Knight Templar Parent: The very definition. He took an immediate dislike to the thought of Sang-Hyun wooing his daughter.
• Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: Combined with Engagement Challenge. He decides to "test" Sang-Hyun's worthiness to date his daughter by forcing the boy into a duel. If Sang-Hyun loses, So Yeon marries her Arranged Marriage fiance, no objections.
• Unskilled, but Strong: He admits that he doesn't know Kendo, but he can put craters in the pressure treated lumber of the floor with his bamboo sword.
• Villain Respect: He takes back his insults that Sang-Hyun is all talk when the boy manages to block his sword swings.

Other Characters

Sang-Hyun's mother.

Yes, son. Just do what granfather wants. I want to see my grandson, you know.

She only appears in a brief one-shot panel flashback in chapter 1.

• Eyes Always Shut: Supposedly. Her one appearance has her eyes shut.
• Flat Character: She's Sang-Hyun's mother, and that's all we really know about her.
• I Want Grandkids: She immediately goes into this mode when Sang-Hyun complains about being forced to marry a girl he's never met.
• No Name Given: Her name is never mentioned.
• Oneshot Character: She only appears once in chapter 1 as Sang-Hyun is about to enter the "Marriage interview" with Suh-Eun.
• Rose-Haired Sweetie: Subverted. She's got the same hair color that Sang-Hyun has, and appears to be a good, loving mother at first glance, but she only provided token resistance to the arranged marriage, at best, and it's later found out that she didn't even wait to hear how the marriage interview went before packing up his stuff and shipping him off to the house where he and Suh-Eun would be forced to live together.

The first suitor.

I'm Not done talking to you!

This unnamed teen from Sang-Hyun's school is the first to take Yu Jisuk up on the challenge to "become a husband candidate" for YU Suh-Eun. He pointedly does not take "no" for an answer.

• Curtains Match the Windows: His eyes and hair are the same shade of dirty blond.
• Entitled to Have You: To Suh-Eun. He flat-out insists that she's "his" no matter how many times she rejects him, or how harshly.
• Gold Digger: He admits that he's chasing Suh-Eun purely because it's his "chance to marry into a rich family." He's the first in this regard, but clearly not the last.
• Know When to Fold 'Em: When Sang-Hyun is able to intercept his punch and points out that he almost punched Suh-Eun in the face, in front of the whole school, he suddenly realized he had an urgent appointment elsewhere.
• No Name Given: His name is never revealed.
• No Sense of Personal Space: He has physically grabbed Suh-Eun at least twice, in an overly familiar manner. The second time on-screen was clearly an assault, and she responded in kind, by throwing him.
• Not Good with Rejection: His response to being rejected by Suh-Eun, publicly, and being told that he's really not worth her time, because he's not an actor hired by her grandfather, is to grab her and try to drag her away, and when she resists, trying to punch her in the face.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He's got no pedigree, no important family name to back him up, and no significant personal wealth, yet he acts as if everyone, including Suh-Eun is beneath him on a personal level. He's even introduced pushing Sang-Hyun aside while commenting along the lines of "the bit characters should step aside." Suh-Eun is not impressed.

Heir to the Jung-Sung group.

An un-named guest at Ji Yisuk's business party. He's got way more ego than sense.

This is him at his most charming.

• Disproportionate Retribution: In response to Suh-Eun telling him she's not interested, and seeing Hyan-Sung pick up a dish to feed himself, a very, very minor faux-pass at a catered event, he goes completely postal, repeatedly attempting to assault both of them.
• Make It Look Like an Accident: He repeatedly tries to assault Yu Suh-Eun and Han Hyan-Sung during the event while making them look clumsy.
• Mugging the Monster: He takes an immediate dislike to Suh-Eun's attempt to brush him off, even grabbing her at one point. He completely failed to realize that she's the heir of Yu Jisuk, whose company completely dwarfs his, and could crush him like a bug. What's more, if Hyan Sung hadn't pulled her away, Suh Eun would have broken his wrist for grabbing her without permission.
• Never My Fault: Combined with Implausible Deniability. He repeatedly tries to say his attacks on Suh-Eun and Hyan-Sung are their doing... until he gets the hotel's security cameras pointed out to him, making him realize he had urgent business elsewhere.
• Nice to the Waiter: Averted. He's downright nasty to the wait staff catering the event.
• Serial Escalation: When his childish, puerile "pranks" fail to have their intended effect, he escalates the frequency and severity until he dumps an entire table of "champagne fountain" wine glasses on Hyan-Sung and Suh-Eun.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He's very, very wrapped up in being he heir to the Jung-Sung group. So much so that he uses his title as a club when he feels "disrespected." Then he goes and antagonizes the heir of Yu Jisuk...
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: To the unnamed teen that tried to punch Suh Eun in the face way back in chapter 19.