At long last, Jae-kyung learns the complete truth of Chae Kyung-tae’s death from classmate Noh Gyu-min. The fire had been accidental — Jong-soo had knocked down both Kyung-tae and the oil canister — but after Tae-jin had ushered the gang out, leaving the unconscious Kyung-tae in the burning house, Jong-soo had returned to retrieve his fallen name tag. Kyung-tae had still been breathing then, and when he’d regained consciousness briefly to beg Jong-soo for help, Jong-soo had instead clobbered him to death in order to hide his crime.
Flashback to a summer vacation, when the Audiophile club went on a trip to the beach. While Yoon-jin secretly listens in from her tent, Jae-kyung hears from Joon-seo that Jong-soo’s gang had merely paced about outside instead of rushing in to save Kyung-tae. When Joon-seo hadn’t reported the incident despite promising to, Jae-kyung went ahead and did it himself, resulting in his school suspension.
Back in the present, Jong-soo discovers Tae-jin’s distribution of the lemon meth pills behind his back. Furious at the double-crossing, he beats both Tae-jin and Sang-eui up, but Sang-eui manages to catch him off guard with a hammer. The pair make a run for it, and Tae-jin smashes Sang-eui’s phone, instructing him to delete any recordings he has and escape abroad within the next twelve hours.
The next day, Tae-jin orders a search and seizure of the freezer storage, deliberately exposing the drug lab. Then he offers Chairman Won a deal — if he permits him to take Jong-soo into custody, he’ll allow KH Group to get off scot-free. Will he choose his son, or his company? Chairman Won looks pained, but he ultimately chooses the latter, dealing a horrible blow to Jong-soo.
In the midst of the operation to capture Jin-wook, part of Chang-soo’s black box footage is finally recovered — and it clearly shows Chang-soo rolling down the window and swerving off the road without any provocation. Dismayed and disappointed, Jae-kyung cuffs the chastened Chang-soo’s wrists.
The show must go on, and team leader JUNG YEON-JOO (Yoon Sa-bong) goes undercover in the guise of a fellow stowaway. Except their cover has been blown, and Jin-wook makes a run for it, boarding a boat at another nearby port. With no other option, Jae-kyung wraps a rope around his trembling hand to steady it, then shoots Jin-wook. His bullet finds his mark, but right then, police officers show up and arrest Jae-kyung for taking drugs.
Calling out their inadmissible methods — they ran tests on a strand of hair pilfered from Jae-kyung’s locker — Yeon-joo pulls Jae-kyung aside to hear his side of the story. Despite her insistence on believing that he hadn’t taken drugs of his own free will, Jae-kyung confesses the truth of his addiction, and she entreats him to lie that he’d only been exposed to drugs recently during the undercover operation.
Before Jae-kyung is summoned for his investigation, he asks Chang-soo for his motive. Chang-soo had been sick of the endless cycle — capturing drug addicts only for more drug addicts to surface — and so he’d struck a deal with Boss Yoon to manage the drug scene. Yet Jae-kyung counters that they can’t take shortcuts. Toiling day and night, even when there is no end in sight, is the very nature of their job; it is their duty to fulfill.
During the interrogation, Chang-soo shocks everyone by confessing to drugging Jae-kyung. Submitting the deleted CCTV footage of Jae-kyung passing out in the office and Chang-soo feeding him the stolen lemon meth pill, Chang-soo lies that he’d gotten Jae-kyung addicted to throw him off his scent, so his dealings with Boss Yoon wouldn’t be discovered. “Jae-kyung has done nothing wrong,” Chang-soo insists, avoiding Jae-kyung’s gaze, even as Jae-kyung pleads that it’s not true.
Thanks to Chang-soo’s testimony, Jae-kyung’s case is wrapped up as an accidental addiction in the line of duty. He’s given a break from work to receive treatment, but Jae-kyung requests for just three more days — he must see Joon-seo’s case through to the end. The composite sketch of Yoon-ho’s murderer comes out resembling Chi-hyun, and Jae-kyung cuffs him at Yoon-ho’s funeral — where Chi-hyun is the only friend in attendance.
As for Yoon-jin, she receives a tip-off from Sang-eui with photos of the city mayor cozying up to bar hostesses. When she asks how he obtained the images, he dismisses her, claiming it’s more important to avenge Joon-seo by blocking the Pilo-dong redevelopment. To that, Yoon-jin calls out his “friendship” to Joon-seo for what it really is — an obsession. She’ll write the article, but it’s not for his sake — it’s because she can’t stand people who lick the boots of the rich, all while ineffectually cursing them out behind their backs. Just like Sang-eui.
Throwing all caution to the wind, Sang-eui orchestrates a confrontation with Tae-jin, calling Jae-kyung over as well. Gloating over finally wresting control of the Pilo-dong project, Tae-jin locks all their phones in a safe to circumvent any recordings, then smugly goads them into asking any questions they have. After all, Tae-jin’s already won; nothing can bring him down now.
Revealing that the redevelopment area is where Kyung-tae used to live and disclosing how Jong-soo murdered Kyung-tae, Jae-kyung corners Tae-jin with the inconsistency of Joon-seo’s shoes. With that, Tae-jin nonchalantly admits to the murder, without the slightest shred of remorse. Joon-seo suddenly wanted to reveal their scheme, just when Tae-jin’s plans were finally coming to fruition, so how could he let him live? An accomplice tranquilized Joon-seo before pushing him off the ninth floor while the rest were in the elevator, thereby creating an alibi for Tae-jin.
Tae-jin is so far removed from empathy and human decency that it’s actually unsettling; he demeans Joon-seo for obeying his every order, then scoffs that Joon-seo ought to be grateful for the opportunities he gave him. How dare Joon-seo attempt to rebel? Unable to bear it any longer, Jae-kyung yells Tae-jin’s name, prompting Tae-jin to turn around — and a gunshot rings out. Ahh, it’s Chekhov’s gun! With Jae-kyung’s stolen pistol, Sang-eui has shot Tae-jin point blank, ending his life instantly. Tae-jin has died at the hands of the person he looked down upon the most.
One month later, Jae-kyung visits the unrepentant Sang-eui in prison. “The revenge that you carried out in Joon-seo’s name?” Jae-kyung says. “Perhaps he may not have wanted it at all.” In response, Sang-eui tells Jae-kyung not to come visit anymore. “When I listen to the words you speak to me, I end up feeling guilty, as if I’ve let Joon-seo down. Even though I have no reason to feel that way.” Before he leaves, Sang-eui tells Jae-kyung the first half of the password that he overheard from Tae-jin — it’s Ji-yeon’s birthday. Tae-jin truly thought that little of Joon-seo.
Joon-seo’s autopsy results point to Chairman Won’s chief secretary, but the arrest seems a little too easy, as if the confession had been premeditated. Jae-kyung confronts Chairman Won, switching off his phone and smartwatch to prove he isn’t recording their conversation. The haughty chairman admits that Joon-seo had informed him of Tae-jin’s drug business and Jong-soo’s murder of Kyung-tae, but he sniffs haughtily that he’d played no part in Tae-jin’s plan.
Except Chairman Won slips up, mentioning that Tae-jin left Joon-seo’s shoes on the ninth floor to disguise it as a suicide. Jae-kyung immediately zeroes in on the discrepancy, piling the pressure on, and Chairman Won cracks. Erupting in a rage, Chairman Won admits to embellishing Tae-jin’s murder scheme, in order to protect the Keumhyung empire at all costs. But what can Jae-kyung do about it, without any evidence? To Chairman Won’s horror, Jae-kyung reveals a hidden voice recorder tucked inside his blazer. Without the chief secretary around, no one had conducted a thorough body search before letting Jae-kyung in. Chairman Won has brought about his own downfall.
Two weeks later, Keumhyung is crumbling down, while the Won father and son are sent to jail. Jae-kyung has been receiving treatment for his addiction, and he’s well on the road to recovery. At last, he and Yoon-jin receive Joon-seo’s insurance money, which they generously share with Yoon-ho’s widow, the student Hyun-woo’s family, and Ji-yeon. The latter may come as a surprise given all she’s done, but our leads extend an olive branch to her, and perhaps it’s in the spirit of what the kind and forgiving Joon-seo would have wanted.
While helping Ji-yeon move house, our Audiophile trio discover an old tape from their summer trip. Tears of nostalgia and grief well up in their eyes as they watch the footage, in which Yoon-jin asked Joon-seo what his dream was. His answer was simple: he just liked spending time with his Audiophile friends. Oh, my heart.
The trio visit the beach again, reminiscing their memories. Musing upon their high school bonds, Jae-kyung shares some wise words about friendship. If you become too fixated on it, you will end up leaving scars on each other, and once money and greed enter the picture, friendships fall apart. Turning a blind eye to one another’s misdeeds and scratching one another’s backs isn’t friendship any longer, but a mere connection.
As for our trio, they’re sure that their bond — newly reforged by Joon-seo — will forever remain a pure, innocent friendship. (Which effectively dashes poor Joo-song’s dreams of romance with Yoon-jin, LOL.) Then Joo-song recalls that they’d designated the day of the beach trip as their “friendship day” — and Joon-seo had remembered it, even years later. A significant date which forms a four-digit number? Cue lightbulb moment.
Right then and there, Jae-kyung enters Tae-jin’s half of the password, and Joo-song enters Joon-seo’s half. It’s the very last password attempt left before the account is locked forever, and — they’re in. Cue a hilarious mix of exhilaration and panic, as the friends scream excitedly over the sudden windfall while Jae-kyung yells that they need to relinquish the illegal profits to the national treasury, ha. Some things never change.
Source: Drama beans
It was a nice finale. Everything turned out well for our leads and Ji sung’s acting was top notch. He definitely carried the whole show from start to finish.
My rating: 8/10