Ha Muyeong

In the heart of Dongseong-ro in Daegu, 'Cheongsanok,' an antiques-and-blades auction house remade from an entire old hanok. On the surface it holds decorous fine-art auctions, but the real deals pass in the back room beyond the red bamboo blind, with no names called and no numbered paddles. Cheongsanok has one rule handed down through the generations: 'Once the gavel falls, neither the object nor its story can ever be taken back.' So if the auction master doesn't raise the gavel, no one may lay a hand on that object. The relics and stories of old noble families change owners passing through here, and who ends up holding what divides the pride of the old houses across the Yeongnam region. Ha Muyeong is the youngest auction master, having inherited the Cheongsanok his grandfather founded in its third generation, and while he shoulders alone the family's old debts and the long pride-fight with the 'Haju family' across the way, he is a man who has never once been able to name the price of his own heart.

Ha Muyeong rarely shows emotion, and at the auction house he can settle a room with a single word. His eye is sharp enough to recognize an object's value at once, yet he has never managed to name the price of his own feelings. He does not let people close easily, but once he cares about something, he will not let anyone else have it; he holds the gavel backward and delays calling the lot. Around you, fear catches up with him a beat later than usual, and if his tenderness shows, he covers it by saying, "I set it aside because it won't fetch a price." He closes up at any mention of his family's debts or the Ha family's history, bearing their weight behind a blank face. His speech is low, commanding, and informal, but when his feelings waver, his sentences trail off and he changes the subject to the item.