Birth Of Beauty

2

Now that they're on the same page about their goals, Tae-hee becomes something of an all-around life coach for Sa-ra as he directs her workouts and shapes her, into an irresistible woman. She doesn't lose her love of food, but she follows his directions faithfully, as best she can.

Their vague plan to get revenge is given a swift kick in the pants when the announcement is made public of wedding plans for the cheating couple. With three weeks till the wedding, this both speeds up their deadline and gives them a specific goal to shoot for: stop the wedding.

strong interest in helping Sa-ra ruin the wedding, and things make more sense when Sa-ra finds out that he has a past with Chae-yeon. He's touchy about it and refuses to talk, but we can see that they go back to childhood and he's clearly not over her.

We don't know much about Tae-hee's past, which is played purposely vaguely, partly for suspense reasons and partly for comedy. I laughed out loud when he admits he's not a real doctor (casting all of Episode 1 into an entirely different light) until he clarifies that his brother was the Change doctor, and he just orchestrated the surgery instead of performing them. Later he also admits that the apartment they're living in isn't his but his brother's, necessitating a hasty flight in the night. So generally speaking we're in the dark as to what he does or who he is, though an offhand comment about him being a chaebol seems like it might be true.

The chaebol hint explains a few things, from the amount of free time he seems to have on his hands to the way he can afford to help Sa-ra with these expensive plans-and I don't mean just the surgeries. For instance, they decide to make their first approach to the target at a charity function hosted by Kang-joon's company (he's president of a broadcast station), where Sa-ra can dazzle him with her looks and pique his interest.

function ends with less progress made than they'd like since Chae-yeon's on hand to whisk Kang-joon away. Kang-joon doesn't seem to have a roving eye, and he seems quite in love with Chae-yeon, so Sa-ra's looks enough aren't enough to attract his attention.

So Tae-hee concocts a second encounter to put Sa-ra in Kang-joon's path sans the fiancee, and off they go to bump into him while fishing.

When mere attempts at flirting aren't enough, they have to resort to Plan B, which requires them to buy something at the charity auction to secure Kang-joon's attention. A hundred million won is hardly anything the average person has lying around, but somehow Tae-hee just waves it off as a necessary expense.

Kang-joon politely helps Sa-ra cast a line, but it isn't until she slips up and lets her inner Geum-ran out that he takes notice of her beyond that. For instance, she recognizes his bracelet as belonging to his grandmother, whom she'd taken care of for the past seven years. Hearing that Grandma recently died, Sa-ra wells up with tears-and when she accidentally sends the bracelet flying into the water, she dashes into the lake without thinking and dives in to retrieve it.

Tae-hee watches in chagrin, trying to telepathically instruct her to stop flailing and adhere to her feminine goddess image, but to his surprise the effect isn't negative. These surprising and conflicting sides of Sa-ra make Kang-joon wonder who she is, as he can't make sense of her. He does find one thing in common with them all, though, which is warmth. And that warmth intrigues him enough that he asks to meet her again.

to have gotten exactly what they wanted, and Tae-hee sees their goal in sight. All they have to do now is catch him red-handed in the act of two-timing his fiancee (with Sa-ra) and exposing his cheating past, ruining his reputation and bringing disgrace on his head.

They celebrate to themselves, but this has two unintended side effects: (1) Tae-hee starts to feel a surprise attraction to Sa-ra (2) Sa-ra starts to think she might not want revenge after all. Ever a softy at heart, Sa-ra thinks of the way Kang-joon looked at her at the lake and decides she wants to win him back, rather than destroy him. She insists that she'd sworn to love one man forever, and could swear he still thinks of her (as Geum-ran). She even wants to be accepted back into his (hateful) family as daughter-in-law, and decides that she'd like to marry him again.

aghast, but since ultimately the end result is the same for him, he goes along with the revised plan, Operation: Marry Kang-joon. Tae-hee secures them a new house in the same neighborhood as Kang-joon's family, giving her easy access to the in-laws as she introduces herself as the new neighbor.

Thus they manufacture a fresh new round of run-ins with Kang-joon's family members, winning them over one by one.

And wouldn't you know it, with the multiple encounters with Sa-ra fresh on his mind and his family newly in love with her, Kang-joon finds himself starting to ignore the fiancée. One night he calls Sa-ra and asks to meet outside, just as Chae-yeon arrives to witness their suspiciously friendly encounter. Her intuition sets off warning bells, while her fiancé grins dopily at the new girl, not knowing it's his wife. Serves you all right.