11 timestamped notes explaining the Korean cultural context in this episode — customs, idioms, food, honorifics, and history, at the moment each appears on screen. These notes discuss events across the whole episode. To see them revealed scene-by-scene as you watch, use the episode page to find an airing.
양기 (yanggi) is the vital life-force in traditional East Asian thought — the warm, active energy that sustains the living. In Korean folk beliefs about the spirit world, a ghost-hunter or shaman can possess an unusually powerful store of it, which is exactly what makes them dangerous to hungry spirits. Offering half of one's yanggi to a ghost is an extraordinarily high price, signalling genuine desperation.
저승 (Jeoseung) is the realm of the dead in Korean folk religion, broadly equivalent to the underworld or the other side. It sits in contrast to 이승 (this world, the world of the living). Telling a ghost it can 'go to Jeoseung' is offering it a proper passage to rest — both a mercy and a threat.
옹주 (Ongju) is the title for a royal princess born of a royal concubine rather than the queen. 무당 (mudang) are Korea's traditional female shamans, who communicate with spirits and perform rituals called 굿 (gut). Being called a mudang is a stinging insult for royalty — it implies she carries 'low' spiritual contamination utterly at odds with her noble rank.
동궁 (Donggung, literally 'East Palace') is the residential compound reserved for the crown prince inside the royal palace complex. Because the crown prince is the nation's future, any series of disasters or deaths there is read as a terrible omen for the dynasty's survival — hence the courtiers' alarm about the 'foundation of the kingdom' shaking.
세자빈 (Seja-bin) is the official consort of the crown prince. The queen dowager mentions entering the palace at age eleven, which reflects the historical Joseon practice of selecting noblewomen as royal brides while they were still children, after which they lived their entire lives within the palace walls.
후궁 (Hugung) were the king's secondary consorts, ranked below the queen. A child born of a 궁녀 (court lady-in-waiting) who caught the king's favour occupied the lowest rung of royal birth. In Joseon society, this origin was a permanent source of stigma — rivals could weaponise it to question whether such a person was truly fit to rule, no matter how high they rose.
대비전 (Daebijeon) is the palace hall where the 대비 (Daebi), or queen dowager, resides. The queen dowager holds the highest ceremonial rank among women in the palace, above even the reigning queen. A ghost appearing in her quarters is therefore the most alarming possible location — it threatens the symbolic heart of the royal family's senior generation.
Sealing the restless dead inside a clay jar (단지) is a documented practice in Korean shamanistic tradition. The jar is buried with rituals that trap the ghost's 원한 (wonhan — deep resentment and grudge), preventing it from roaming and causing harm. Breaking the seal releases that bottled-up resentment back into the world.
원귀 (Wongwi) is a specific kind of Korean ghost — someone who died with such overwhelming 원한 (won-han, unresolved grievance) that they cannot move on to 저승. They are distinct from ordinary wandering spirits because their resentment actively drives them to harm the living until that grievance is acknowledged or resolved.
극락왕생 (Geungnak-wangsaeng) is a Buddhist phrase meaning 'to be reborn in paradise' — the Pure Land (극락) where the soul rests in peace. It's a standard blessing spoken at funerals and memorial rites in Korea, blending Buddhist belief with native ancestor veneration. Hearing it here signals that the ghost-hunter intends a proper, compassionate send-off rather than a violent exorcism.
승은 (Seungeun) literally means 'receiving royal grace' and refers specifically to a 궁녀 (court lady) who was summoned to sleep with the king. A 승은상궁 was a senior court lady who had been so favoured. If she bore a royal child she could be elevated to 후궁 status, but if she was discarded or wronged, the shame and bitterness could be immense — exactly the kind of 원한 that creates the most dangerous of spirits.