HANA SEONG

[ PERSONALITY ] DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH

Hana is, in summary, an insecure 20 something year old trying to find her place in life, aiming to undergo her own metamorphosis from a hermit to a magpie. Raised in a privileged household Hana struggles even in just the most basic essentials of life, making her quite the messy individual. She can’t cook, can barely clean her apartment, and has thoughts of self-doubt pretty much daily. Even still, she keeps on going. Despite her smoke alarm going off the third time this week, she’ll attempt to cook again and eat whatever monstrosity she made. You can’t be good at anything in the first try right?

She’s an artist after all, failing is part of the journey, just a small hitch in her story. Some might call her delusional or immature, but she calls herself an idealist, maybe even a rebel? Success is a welcome outcome but what she truly wants is freedom and that’s what she gets with music. Eclectic, creative, and authentic, are words she uses to describe not just her creations but also herself.

Unfortunately, Hana is socially lacking. She doesn’t have any friends or any meaningful relationships. She struggles to form connections or just talk in general. She’s apprehensive and typically withdrawn. Her upbringing also makes her question if every gift, every compliment thrown her way has some sort of dubious intention. Otherwise, she’s also just naturally shy.

On stage though a completely new person emerges, she feels like she gets possessed. Her passion and drive shows through every chord she plays and every lyric she sings. Her normally unwelcoming apathetic face turns to that of gleeful joy. She has a long way to go but that’s fine, she’s not the type to quit anyways.

[ BACKGROUND ]  THE BIRD HAS LEFT THE NEST

[TLDR: Rich girl from an elite family (Chaebol). She likes to produce music and doesn’t care about anything else.  Her family falls from grace after one of her brothers committed a pretty heinous crime. They try to force her into an arranged marriage with another rich family for their benefit but she runs away to Yue Song and escapes. She’s sure they’re still looking for her though.]

The Seong family is quite an influential one, some might even say a pillar of Korean society, part of the so-called “Chaebol” The main tenant of their business specializing in tech. From phones, to fridges, probably military weapons and many many more, the Seong family is a rising star, aiming to become ubiquitous.

Hana is one of their prized possessions, their little princess, their caged little songbird.  Their only daughter, the youngest out of 6 children.

Suffice to say they were loaded, part of the top 2% and it shows in how Hana was raised,  she never really had much interest in this lifestyle though. She loved all kinds of music and especially making it, so her rather generous allowance was spent on music lessons and equipment.

Through the years, the persona Kkachi was born, inspired by the magpies that would porch on her windowsill every spring. Electric guitar in hand, she garnered herself a small following with her eclectic experimental forays in Psychedelic rock.

She views this persona as her true self, away from the fake pleasantries and the political backstabbing associated with the lavish background she hails from. This thing she had built was her home, but still there’s only so much her small fan base can do. She was still chronically lonely.

She still yearned for a sense of camaraderie as she dreamt of one day starting her own band, one that would push the Korean indie music scene to evolve.

That has to  wait though as it didn’t take long for her family to get into hot water when one of her brothers, the third son, Hajoon, got involved with a rather heinous crime, driving their company stocks and reputation down and inviting law enforcement to their door.

Hana was distraught and rightly disgusted. She agreed with the mass consensus that Hajoon should be put behind bars, but her parents didn’t share the same opinion.

The Chaebol after all are known for their secret background dealings so another family came to the rescue, the Cheon. They proposed a bargain, they would pull some strings and allow Hajoon to be pronounced not guilty in the court of law. The catch? They had to marry their only daughter Hana to the Cheon’s eldest son, a man twice her age.

Hana obviously didn’t like that and got into a heated argument with her family, her brothers backing her up. Still, as the saying goes “One should not bite the hand that feeds.”

Her parents’ minds were set on this deal. So as the chaos roared within her family, with help from her brothers, they orchestrated a last minute plan. Her brothers booked her a ticket, found her an apartment her parents wouldn’t dare look at, and helped her move to Yue Song to start anew, from scratch with only the few equipment she was able to stow away and what remained of her allowance. Her family is still on a desperate search for her but she’s been cut off the family fortune, effectively disowned. As much as her brothers want to help her, sending her money might make it easier for the Seong and Cheon families to track her down.

Hana lives in fear everyday that her family’s men would find her and drag her back but in some way she’s free at last.

Nowadays she works as a part timer in convenience stores and as a Live audio engineer at night in various clubs and bars.  Her inexperience has gotten her fired in many other part time jobs but she still tries her best. She doesn’t wanna starve after all.

It’s been a difficult adjustment but she doesn’t regret her  decision in any way.

She’ll prove her family wrong, one way or another.