Alchemy of Souls | Seonyudong Valley — The Rocks Where Jang Uk Found Her

The water is colder than the scene lets on. It slides across slabs of pale rock wide enough for a crowd, then drops into small pools under pines that lean over the stream. Hakcheonjeong, the 1906 pavilion built for the scholar Doam Yi Jae, sits just above the channel. This is Mungyeong Seonyudong Valley in Wanjang-ri, Gaeun-eup, one of the city's eight scenic sites, and the place VisitKorea names as the valley where Jang Uk found and held Mu-deok in episode 4.

Silla's Choe Chi-won is said to have preferred this gorge to Haeinsa's Hongnyudong and to have named nine bends along it. The characters 선유동 are still cut into a rock by the water. Nothing here was built for a camera. The parking lot at Hakcheonjeong-gil 18 is free. The walk from the lot to the stream takes a few minutes. In summer people sit on the slabs with their shoes off. The hug that made the location famous lasts seconds on screen. The valley keeps the same light all afternoon, and the pavilion does not move.