The protector

Alps view (Se-ri's POV)

Author's note: since this one, we'll have a few glimpses of Se-ri's life. Her POV about what happened in Swiss, and what will happen later. I put here a little recap, but you can find the whole story in the chapters "Flashback," "Se-ri's year," and "Bitter Swiss." Plus: these chapters will be lighter than the northern ones, because I'm having a tough period and I need to conciliate the writing, something that always distracts me, with the fact that I only have one neuron functioning. Hope you'll enjoy this 'less pain, more Seo-jin buying bags' period.

Also, a quick warning: this Se-ri is not completely canon. I used some parts from other SYJ' roles, and I put a little bit of Dan in her. Where? What? Curious to know if you'll guess it 😉 

Recap:

With her company threatened by Go, the father of her brother's former wife Sang-a who wants a sort of revenge for his daughter, Se-ri finds herself with no choice but to marry a chaebol, Gu Seo-jin (Hyde, Jekyll, me) whose company is equally in a feud with Go.

The arranged marriage proves to be a good one, the man is indeed a good husband, and they quickly become friends. So much that, when Seo-jin tells to Se-ri that his father wants an heir, the woman thinks about it for a while, but at the end she decides to say yes. She doesn't expect for Jeong Hyeok to be able to reach the south for many years yet, so that her only opportunity to become a mother is with Seo-jin. Besides, she considers he would be a good father.

Se-ri's only concern is for Jeong Hyeok who refuses to hear every kind of information about her current life, and looks every year sicker. He smells of alcohol, she finds bottles in his room, his clothes are not clean as usual ecc. She suspects that this is because of her marriage, but every time she tries to talk with him and explain her situation, the pianist refuses to hear, stopping her. Thus, she's often upset and lets him believe what he wants to believe. Also, Se-ri is upset with the Ri in general, because she knows that some NK politics have defected to south, and in her opinion the only reason why their life is so miserable now is because the Ri are not doing the same, because this means two things: the first is that she and Jeong Hyeok will have to wait for his parents' death to eventually get reunited, which means waiting a lot of years – this is the reason why she says yes to the heir: she estimates that she will no longer able to get pregnant when JH will be finally able to reach the south – and the second is that this is putting them in front of a tragic choice, because if defection means the Ri's death, even hoping for it sounds horrible. To Se-ri, all of that is happening because Cheong-ryeol is too greedy, too in love with his own power. To her eyes, the man is ruining her private life only for his power's sake, and Jeong Hyeok is doing nothing to fight it.

On the other hand, Se-ri feels safe in her marriage: Seo-jin is a big help with the company, and her private life, even if loveless, is serene for the first time in her life.

However, things are not as safe as she believes. When she discovers that the couple is trying to have an heir, Se-ri's mom warns her: Seo-jin's father despise both her and his own son. Also, he's aware of Se-ri being an illegitimate child. In the old woman's opinion, the old man would fight them to obtain the custody of the child, wanting an heir to substitute his son. She suggests Se-ri to use a birth control unbeknownst to her husband and save money in a secret fund to get ready to buy Gu's stock back because, at the moment, Se-ri only have the control of her company together with her husband, her own stocks' portfolio not being big enough to guarantee her the control of the board in case Go would corrupt the other members. Se-ri's mom also suggests her to act like a good wife, and wait for the inevitable moment when Gu will want to divorce and get another wife – a younger one - to produce the so much wanted heir. This way, he would be more prone to give her the stocks as a sort of goodbye present. The opposite option: file for a divorce herself, would put Seo-jin in the unpleasant situation of "man abandoned by his wife" who could injure his pride and lead the man to turn into an enemy.