Please support the authors by reading Manhwas on the official websites. This is where you can read the Manhwa: Jinx  But be aware that the Manhwa is a mature Yaoi, which means, it is about homosexuality with explicit scenes. Here is the link of the table of contents about Jinx. Here is the link where you can find the table of contents of analyzed Manhwas. Here are the links, if you are interested in the first work from Mingwa, BJ Alex,  and the 2 previous essays about Jinx Kim Dan on Thin Ice and The Watery Point Of No Return

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The Poster as a Manifesto of Shadows and Smoke

When I first saw the new promotional image titled “The Return of the Emp”, I had to pause. Something in it refused to make sense — or perhaps, it made too much sense. Here stands the celebrity fighter alone, shirtless, his upper body carved out of darkness, while a faint cloud floats behind him accompanied by a hidden spotlight. Beneath him glows the number 317, a detail too deliberate to be accidental. And yet, where is the opponent? Every previous MFC poster — from Randy Booker’s green inferno (chapter 13) (chapter 40) to Baek Junmin’s red blaze (chapter 48) — had mirrored faces, two bodies, two lights. This time, there is only one. The duel has vanished. What remains looks less like a fight and more like a myth in the making. (chapter 81)

So I began to wonder, my fellow Jinx-lovers, who made this image? One might reply, of course, the marketing branch of MFC, eager to sell the comeback of their most profitable star. And yet, something doesn’t add up. Unlike the posters for Randy Booker (chapter 13) or Dominic Hill (chapter 40), this one shows no date, no place, no trace of logistics (no TV diffusion like in the States “On PPV”). Only a face, a body, a void. Why would MFC release such an abstract announcement, stripped of all practical information? Why design such a poster which makes this event look more like a secret rendez-vous?

At that point, another possibility emerged. Perhaps this is not merely MFC’s doing but Mingwa’s own design — a deliberate distortion, letting fiction expose the machinery that feeds it. The result, I believe, is an image that speaks in two voices at once: one belonging to the league’s publicity team, and the other to the storyteller who knows what must eventually rise from the smoke. But I am suspecting a third voice hiding behind MFC which I will reveal below.

But the first mystery is not the smoke or the color. It is the absence of Arnaud Gabriel, the French kickboxer (chapter 81) chosen to face the Emperor. According to Oh Daehyun, this man is fighting for the title of the hottest male athlete in the world. (chapter 81) So why is he not placed in the poster? Does he fear comparison — or has someone decided that no comparison should be allowed? Each missing element feels intentional — the kind of silence that makes the viewer uneasy, as though something essential was being hidden in plain sight. (chapter 81)

Then there is the pose — a quiet rupture in Mingwa’s visual language. Instead of the usual mirrored confrontation, the camera turns entirely toward the champion, revealing the torso and the raised fist. The MMA star faces not his rival, but the audience itself, as if daring the beholder to guess what has changed. For once, no familiar emblems frame him — no belt, no symmetry, only a body standing between light and smoke. Why this exposure now, and what does it conceal?

The light, too, behaves differently. In earlier posters, illumination came from behind (chapter 13) or within (chapter 48) — from the collision of two forces. Here, the glow seems to rise from below, slightly to the right, and yet the source remains unseen. Why there, and why invisible? What are we supposed to read in that slanted brightness — revelation or exposure, ascension or downfall?

And finally, the text itself: “The Return of the Emp.” (chapter 81) For the first time, words intrude upon the image — not just names, but a sentence, an unfinished promise. “Emp”: a fragment of Emperor, a crown cut short. (chapter 14) Why is there this abbreviation? Why does the image proclaim a return while simultaneously concealing the full title? What does it signify?

These details — the number 317, the smoke, the missing rival, the hidden light, the fractured title — weave a code of absence and expectation. They refuse to settle into one meaning, riddles disguised as design choices. From these visual clues, my previous theory seems to be corroborated: this event doesn’t announce the glorious comeback it pretends to be, but a carefully staged trap. However, there is more to it. The longer I examine the composition (chapter 81) — the fist aimed at the viewer, the smoke curling like a stage curtain, the void where the opponent should stand — the clearer it becomes that this poster already sketches the scene of the athlete’s anticipated demise. It reveals not just a fight, but where and how the next act will unfold 😲— before an audience that may not be what it seems.

The Absent Rival – Arnaud Gabriel and the Art of the Mask

Every puzzle begins with a missing face. And here, the first enigma is Arnaud Gabriel himself (chapter 81) — the man selected to stand against the Emperor, yet nowhere to be seen. Why choose him, a French fighter known less for his record than for his looks? (chapter 40) Where every previous MFC announcement balanced two visages, two auras, two lights, this one shows only the wolf. The French kickboxer has been erased before the match even begins. (chapter 81)

(chapter 81) According to Oh Daehyun, his goal is not victory but visibility — to be crowned the hottest male athlete. (chapter 81) That title alone tells us everything about his mindset. For Arnaud, competition is not victory but exhibition. His sport is not combat; it is choreography. Every gesture (the smile, the wink, the tilt of his head) (chapter 81) seems designed for the lens rather than the opponent.

And perhaps that is precisely why he was chosen. A kickboxer fights with distance. (chapter 81) His weapon is reach, not contact — the opposite of boxing, where rhythm and proximity create truth. Arnaud’s martial art allows him to attack without connection, to strike without touching — the perfect metaphor for a system built on façade. In this sense, he does not merely fight; he performs the idea of fighting. For him, combat is not confrontation but more dance, not survival but fun. It is sparring in its purest, most aesthetic form — controlled, rhythmic, pleasing to the eye. Every kick and grin seems rehearsed to delight the crowd.

His entire persona seems imported from the cinema rather than the cage. One cannot help but think of Jean-Claude Van Damme, the Belgian kickboxer and martial artist turned movie icon, whose blend of violence and grace transformed the fight into spectacle. Like Van Damme, Arnaud Gabriel stands at the crossroads between athlete and actor — between authenticity and artifice. And now, you comprehend why certain readers felt a connection between this fighter and Choi Heesung: (chapter 30) The latter had to learn fighting in order to play his role in the drama Extreme Worlds (chapter 29).

The fighter’s origin deepens this impression: France. The latter is famous for the spirit of savoir vivre — the art of living well, of savoring the moment. “Savoir vivre” is definitely part of his professional philosophy. Arnaud’s smile proclaims respect, pleasure and not perseverance or Schadenfreude. (chapter 81) He embodies a hedonism of the ring, a man who delights in admiration more than victory. Yet beneath the charm lies subtle anxiety. The beard that frames his grin functions as disguise — not to conceal aging, but to simulate experience, to appear older, to lend him a gravitas he has not earned. It is artifice masquerading as mastery.

It is funny, because in the analysis I had predicted that the match would take place in Europe. However, what my avid readers don’t know is that I was hesitating between France and Germany because of the desserts. And guess what… not only my prediction was proven correct, but also my hesitation. Why? Arnaud is a French name but its origins are Germanic. Arnaud, from arn (eagle) and wald (rule), means “he who rules like an eagle.” His name carries a certain arrogance. A creature of height and distance, he surveys from above, untouched by the chaos below. Gabriel, the angelic messenger, completes the illusion: an eagle crowned with divinity, a herald of light who never lands. Together they form the symbol of a man who rules through air — dazzling, distant, and hollow. Under this perspective, the smoke behind the champion could be interpreted as a veiled reference to Arnaud Gabriel. (chapter 81) He could attack him from behind or above. The smoke lingers behind both the title and the wolf, hinting that this elegant newcomer may have been placed as a pawn — not to challenge the champion’s skill, but to block his return to the title of Emperor. Consequently, he represents a real threat to Joo Jaekyung, while on the surface he looks harmless. That’s why for Park Namwook, Arnaud Gabriel seems to be an easy rival. No wonder why he described this encounter as a breeze (air element) (chapter 81), while in reality a “storm” is actually coming.

But in Jinx, there exists another eagle in the sky: Oh Daehyun. (chapter 8) His eagle is spreading his wings in front of his god, the sun, attempting to fly closer to the sun. According to me, Joo Jaekyung is the sun. This explains the loyalty of this purple belt fighter toward the protagonist!

Because of these parallels, I couldn’t help myself envisaging this possibility that Oh Daehyun ends up facing the other eagle. And that’s how the “novice” would get his breakthrough. (chapter 47) But that’s one possibility among others, one thing is sure. Oh Daehyun will play an important part during their stay in France.

And yet, for all this lightness, the Frenchman is nowhere to be seen. (chapter 81) His absence from the poster betrays the truth: he is not a rival but a tool. MFC’s marketing machine uses him as a prop, an emblem of beauty to bait the audience, to divert attention. The company doesn’t need his fists — only his face — and even that, now, has been erased. His omission signals that the game is fixed before it begins. Yes, the poster is implying the existence of a rigged match.

The same is true for the missing championship belt. (chapter 13) Once gleaming over the champion’s shoulder — as in the poster with Randy Booker — it has vanished. It absence in the fight against Baek Junmin revealed (chapter 48) MFC’s true intentions. The tie had long been decided in order to create a smooth transition. MFC’s goal becomes clear: to take away the belt and give it to someone else, while appearing clean. The wolf’s success represented a threat to their illegal business (gambling and money laundering). (chapter 46) People would bet on him and win… they needed him to lose and break his “lucky streak”. In other words, the organization betrayed the body they once sold. They had prepared the fall long before the injury, the surgery, or the suspension. But their plan failed. Despite every setback, the wolf remained beloved at home. People still admired him, not for the trophies, but for his kindness (chapter 62), humility and strength (chapter 62) In other words, what the champion did in the seaside town had a huge impact in his life and world. He lingered in the hearts of those he touched. He was not a fallen idol, nor a forgotten champion, but a living memory — proof that integrity leaves deeper marks than victory ever could. To conclude, his fame no longer comes from spectacle only but also from empathy and presence — from the very qualities the schemers and media system fail to grasp.

And so the game shifts. What cannot be destroyed by defeat will be targeted through image. (chapter 81) The new battlefield is the face. Under this light, Jinx-philes will grasp why the agents from the Entertainment agency were so zealous in defending the star’s reputation. If he were to lose his good looks, they would lose one of their most profitable clients. (chapter 81) They hadn’t intervened when he was suspended or stripped of brand value — back then, he was still only a fighter, not a product. The entertainment world belongs to artists, not athletes. In truth, the celebrity now stands between two worlds: the ring and the stage, the punch and the pose, the man and the myth. If the schemers cannot ruin his record, they will try to ruin his reflection.

Here, I suspect, lies the invisible hand of Baek Junmin — the man whose own face was once disfigured (chapter 52), whose envy of beauty turned into a creed. Imagine this. Now he holds the championship belt, yet no one admires him. His ruined face became the excuse for his bitterness, (chapter 52) and his rival the embodiment of everything he lost. He had to flee to Thailand to claim glory and admiration (chapter 69), only to discover that ownership without recognition is hollow. Even with the title, his name barely circulates in the media. (chapter 77) MFC can not promote him so easily, as his title could get questioned. He remains unseen — a champion without a face.

If Baek Junmin cannot be admired, he will annihilate admiration itself. (chapter 81) To him, visibility has become an offense. And this poster lets that mindset leak through. His presence is everywhere — not in the body of the opponent, but in the photograph chosen, in the smoke curling behind the champion, and in the raised fist, the same one that once struck him down. (chapter 52) In the past, his insult (chapter 74) merged anger with heat; now that very “hotness” materializes in the media and poster as smoke, an image of resentment turned into atmosphere. (chapter 81)

And yet, the smoke behind the celebrity’s silhouette may carry another, more literal association — one tied to France itself. (chapter 81)

The old blue packs of Gauloises Caporal, adorned with a winged helmet, were once the emblem of French masculinity and freedom — a breath of rebellion. “Gauloises,” meaning “Gallic,” evokes both the air of the bird (rooster/eagle) and the pride of the soldier. How fitting, then, that the French opponent, Arnaud Gabriel, should enter the narrative surrounded by air and smoke, like a man of wings rather than roots.

But here the image turns double-edged. To Baek Junmin, smoke is not freedom but submission (chapter 74): the visible trace of a man who dares to rebel. He once watched the fighter smoke a plain cigarette and sneered at him for it, precisely because he knew it was not a joint. In Junmin’s world, violation meant courage and power intoxication. He assumed that fearlessness linked to drugs would bring admiration and success. Jaekyung’s refusal to accept their drug wasn’t prudence; it was, to him, an insult — a quiet act of superiority. The wolf’s restraint exposed his indifference and own dependency, and that humiliation still burns.

Now that same symbol returns, ready to be twisted. (chapter 81) The schemers can weaponize the image of smoke — turning a mundane habit into proof of moral decay. What once marked distance from corruption could now be rebranded as relapse. Under this light, the haze on the new poster reads like the resurrection of that old resentment: smoke as proof, as provocation, as the spark that might ignite the next fall.

Worse still, the smoke doesn’t surround the fighter, it floats behind him. The poster makes the celebrity appear like vapor itself: fleeting, unsubstantial, “hot air.” The man of iron and will is reduced to mist and memory, a puff of illusion dissolving under false light. And now, we can finally grasp why the word “Emperor” remains unfinished. Emp no longer stands for empire, but for emptiness in the schemers’ eyes — the very image of a man hollowed out by rumor, stripped of body and voice, left to vanish in someone else’s smoke.

The Message Behind The Colors

At first glance, the black-and-white palette of the new poster might seem to echo the timeless harmony of yin and yang — two forces locked in mutual creation (chapter 81), night feeding day, death feeding life. Yet the longer I stared, the more this equilibrium seemed broken. Instead of flowing into each other, black and white now collide: the darkness doesn’t cradle the light, it devours it. The world becomes gray. And that’s the intention of the creators, though yin and yang will be present in the match.

My fellow Jinx-lovers might also recall that in South Korea, black and white are not symbols of elegance or neutrality — they are the colors of mourning. (chapter 74) The main lead was seen “wearing a black suit with three white strips” showing that he was the chief mourner. (chapter 74) Once you recognize this (chapter 81), the image takes on an entirely different meaning. The smoke rises not like balance restored, but like incense burning for the dead, a soul leaving a body. This inversion transforms the poster into something closer to a memorial portrait.

And then there is the light purple haze — a color that at first might seem aesthetic, even noble. Yet in this context, it suggests something bleeding, rotting, fermenting, like wine left too long in the glass. It blurs the boundary between beauty and decay, pleasure and loss. In religious iconography, purple once stood for power and resurrection; here it becomes the color of corruption — the slow decomposition of glory. This could be seen as a clue that the authors of this poster are aware of the athlete’s past drinking. (chapter 54) The wolf is wrapped not in triumph, but in the faint perfume of something dying beautifully. He is shown before his decomposition, which reminds us of his father’s fate: (chapter 73)

(chapter 74) The dense, rising smoke recalls the funeral altar we once saw during Joo Jaewoon’s death scene — white blossoms, a dark frame, and a half-erased face. The emperor’s comeback has been reframed as his own commemoration: a legend embalmed in monochrome.

What makes this echo even more haunting is the photograph chosen for Joo Jaewoon’s funeral — his portrait as a boxer. One part of his face is covered. Moreover, his burial fused the professional and the personal, erasing the line between athlete and man. When his father died, he vanished both as a sportsman and as a person — an identity consumed by a role. And now, the poster of “The Return of the Emp” seems to repeat the same logic. The fighter clenching his MFC-branded fist mirrors that old photograph. It’s as if the marketing team were unconsciously recreating the father’s memorial, predicting the son’s fall. The image proclaims not revival, but elimination in advance — the death of the fighter, and with him, the man.

And that, I believe, is precisely what Baek Junmin desires. Unlike the champion, Junmin never lived the disciplined life of a true athlete; he was a thug from the very beginning, fighting not for mastery, but for longing and recognition. He has always been a man of the shadows (chapter 73), hiding behind his hyungs, the mobsters who granted him borrowed strength and false belonging. Joo Jaekyung, by contrast, was raised in the ring — the gym shaped him as both a professional and a person.

But here is the difference between the two “altars”: the smoke in the poster is placed not in front of the picture (chapter 74), but behind and it is going in the opposite direction: (chapter 81) Mingwa is announcing the failure of the trap. In other words, the athlete is about to earn his stage name “The Emperor” for good! Observe that so far, this stage name was only announced once and it was never written. Under this light, it becomes comprehensible why the fighter’s name is placed at the bottom. They are trying to erase his name, while he is about to become a real legend: the Emperor!

But let’s return our attention to The Shotgun and his relationship with the wolf! (chapter 49) If you have read my previous essay, you’ll remember that I connected the arc of chapters 80 to 89 to the theme of jealousy. Baek Junmin embodies that poison completely. His words — “ (chapter 49) “kid”, “coward,” “chicken” (chapter 74)— reveal not confidence but a profound inferiority complex. Obsessed with the Emperor, he wants to destroy the man he cannot become.

Yet in that obsession, Baek Junmin has frozen in time. His envy, greed, and resentment prevent him from truly living. He remains trapped in the past, mirroring the ghost of Joo Jaewoon, whose death also fused ambition and ruin. (chapter 73) Both men are haunted by the same delusion: that to win, one must erase the other.

That’s why the poster’s mourning tone resonates so powerfully — because it visualizes Junmin’s fantasy: to see the Emperor vanish, not only as a fighter, but as a man. And when he realizes that the wolf is not dying but living — that he has found peace, love, and laughter again — his envy will not fade. It will ignite.

And yet, the author behind this illustration — whoever designed it within the MFC hierarchy — does not realize how prophetic it becomes under Mingwa’s hand. (chapter 81) For what they intended as a visual obituary might instead signal transformation: the end of a man defined by violence and the birth of one reborn through empathy. Yes, the title of the match could be read like this: The return of Empathy. One might argue that this took place before. However, so far, none of the members from Team Black noticed it. In fact, the athlete stopped doc Dan from treating other members of Team Black. (chapter 79) And the hamster followed the wolf’s request. This explicates why Potato is wearing a knee support brace — a sign that he is now tending to his own injuries without the doctor’s assistance. (chapter 81) It is a subtle but telling detail: the physical separation mirrors the emotional boundary now forming within the team. The healer’s hands have been withdrawn. So the emperor’s empathy is incomplete, hence he is only EMP. It extends only toward his chosen one — the doctor — and not yet to the others around him. True empathy, however, cannot be selective; it must reach beyond intimacy to encompass even those who do not stand at the center of affection.

Potato’s knee brace exposes the current limit of the wolf’s compassion: he protects Kim Dan but neglects the rest. Yet the injured knee also foreshadows the coming fight. Arnaud Gabriel, the “eagle,” is a kickboxer — his power rests on his legs, his rhythm, his ability to stay aloft through movement. By highlighting Potato’s injury, the author discreetly reveals the eagle’s own weakness: the knee, the joint that bridges grace and collapse. Without his legs, the eagle cannot kick or dance — he becomes a chicken, earthbound and ridiculous. And how was the main lead described in the past? (chapter 1) He was a beast of destruction, someone who made sure to crush his opponents without mercy (chapter 15) Unstoppable in his rage, he moved like a man possessed — bloodthirsty, unrelenting, fighting not for glory but for survival. Each strike was a declaration: I will not die.

The French MMA scene, by contrast, stands for the opposite ethos — for entertainment, glamour, and spectacle, not mortal struggle. For the eagle, the ring is a stage; for the wolf, it has always been an arena. Thus, if the champion were to injure Arnaud Gabriel seriously, the audience’s outrage would be immediate. He would be condemned not as a fighter but as a monster. (chapter 81) Yet, this does not make the eagle harmless. He embodies dream and danger alike — beauty that glides above the earth, but also talons sharp enough to wound.

In my eyes, Arnaud Gabriel personifies both illusion and seduction, much like the cloud — an image that leads us back to Kim Dan himself. (chapter 38) The doctor, too, has always been associated with clouds: soft, elusive, shifting with emotion. Thus I deduce that their paths will inevitably cross, dream and danger meeting in vapor and light. But more importantly, I perceive the smoke as a reference to the rising of doc Dan as physical therapist. (chapter 81) So far, his efforts were never noticed. Park Namwook’s gratitude was rather a lip service than a true recognition, because after the debacle, he was ready to hire a new physical therapist. And according to me, the schemers are all expecting the arrival of a diminished “MMA fighter” reaching the end of his career. That’s why the light is directed at the cloud/smoke! The one behind him is his hidden support.

And if the match truly takes place, I believe the champion’s way to ruin the schemers’ plan will not be through annihilation but transformation. He has to become himself an ARTIST!! [I will elaborate more about this aspect below] This time, victory will not depend on blood, but on how he fights — by returning to his origins, to boxing, to the simplicity of rhythm and breath, to the era when his smile was genuine. By having fun… In that sense, Joo Jaekyung may no longer be fighting for MFC but as the living embodiment of his own gym — Team Black reborn as the Emperor’s court.

But before we reach that possibility, another layer of meaning unfolds through Team Black itself. (chapter 81) The team’s black-and-white uniform (chapter 81) echoes the same mourning duality: black in the center, white on the sides — precisely like the arrangement of smoke behind the poster’s title. Yet when the team steps into the airport, the palette explodes into the full five Korean colors (오방색):

• Black (north, water): Kim Dan, wearing the Team Black jacket — still faithful, yet marked and exposed.
• White (west, metal): Park Namwook, disciplined but cold. (chapter 81)
• Blue (east, wood): Joo Jaekyung, vitality and growth, standing quietly at the center.
• Red (south, fire): Potato, radiating warmth and impulsive energy.
• Green (center, earth): Yosep, grounding the group in human normalcy.

Only Oh Daehyun’s clothing remains unseen, though his blond hair shines like yellow, the missing balance of the circle. Taken together, they form a living flag of South Korea, suggesting that for the first time, Team Black stands united not by uniform, but by spirit.

This silent unity contrasts sharply with their earlier appearance during the Baek Junmin match, when they were clothed alike but divided in heart and mind. (chapter 49) What looked like teamwork was mere coordination. Now, the visual disarray hides emotional harmony — the perfect yin-yang inversion of their past selves.

The poster may wear the colors of death, but the airport scene (chapter 81) quietly answers it with the colors of life, diversity, and rebirth. Behind the mourning veil, something in this team has already begun to live again.

As you could see, I detected parallels between the match in the States and the one in France. Everything is pointing out the existence of another trap. (chapter 81) People started wondering about the doctor’s jacket. Why is he the only one wearing it? It is clear that this cloth truly belongs to the physical therapist, because the sportsman’s has always been too big for the “hamster”. (chapter 36) One could think, the other members are not wearing it, for they don’t want to be associated with the champion. He has been stigmatized as a thug or a child losing his temper, the consequences of Park Namwook’s badmouthing. However, observe that even the star is not wearing it. (chapter 81) It, was if they didn’t want to be recognized.

I think, there exists another explanation. Don’t forget that the jacket had different logos on the back: (chapter 36) What once symbolized sponsorship and solidarity has quietly disappeared. The explanation seems obvious at first: the loss of commercial partners following scandal and suspension. (chapter 54) Yet the deeper implication is far more unsettling. The jacket was more than a uniform; it was a contract, a visible bond between fighter and system. Its absence signals abandonment. The champion may still fight under the MFC banner, but the federation no longer claims him with pride. He is now a free agent trapped in an invisible cage — tolerated, not trusted. He questioned MFC and their competence (see chapter 67 and 69).

And what about the doctor? His jacket, now a solitary relic, must have arrived after his departure and given to him after his return. The Team Black jacket makes him a walking target. By still carrying the brand, he becomes the visible trace of a world that wishes to erase itself. He wears proof of loyalty in a landscape where faithfulness has become liability. If the upcoming match is indeed a trap, his uniform can mark him as bait or as a disguise! (chapter 37) He could be mistaken for the owner of the gym or a person involved in the scheme. And this leads me to my next observation: the champion’s picture and posture!

The Body That Faces the Crowd – From Defiance to Dialogue

If the smoke and the black-and-white palette whisper of death, the body posture roars of defiance. On the poster, the MMA fighter stands half-turned toward us, left fist raised, the logo MFC glinting on his glove like a brand or a curse. The light strikes him from below and from the right, revealing one side while leaving the other in shadow — a visual echo of his divided self: the professional mask and the wounded man beneath.

The position of that raised fist is crucial. It does not challenge the opponent — there is none in sight. It challenges the beholder. The blow is aimed outward, toward the audience, toward a world that has mocked, condemned, or abandoned him. The poster transforms the traditional stance of the victor into something closer to revolt. The “comeback” it advertises is not a return to sport, but a return against the crowd. Despite his handsomeness, he seems to have a bad personality (provoking, insulting, challenging the audience). They made him look like a bad guy: ruthless, arrogant and rebellious. As you can see, they are attempting again to ruin his fame and name.

Light purple bleeds through the smoke, carrying an undertone of resentment — bruised flesh, fermented wine, or the slow rot of disillusion. It’s the color of pride wounded yet unyielding, the hue of someone who refuses to forgive the world for its betrayal. In this light, the athlete seems less a man celebrating triumph than a revenant demanding recognition.

This reversal also tells us something about the system around him. In earlier matches, such as the one in the United States, both fighters were cheered, embraced as performers in a shared spectacle. Here, the scene will be different. No shared ovation, no brotherly arm around the shoulder, as with Dominique Hill. The poster prepares us for isolation, for a battle where the crowd itself becomes the enemy.

The schemers are expecting an angry and resentful man, while in verity this is a projection from the Shotgun. But because MFC is placed twice, it exposes the company’s greed and possessiveness. With the logo on the glove, they insinuate that they are the one deciding when Joo Jaekyung will fight or not. He is their puppet, and they decide when to discard him.

And perhaps that is the deepest irony. Team Black, still unaware that the previous match had been rigged — blind to the partial commentary, the biased jury, the manipulated outcome — walks toward a trap thinking it’s a stage. Neither the champion nor his coach nor his companion suspects that this time, the audience’s hostility has been engineered. The raised fist is both prophecy and warning: he will fight alone, not just in the ring, but against perception itself. Yet, he will supported by the “vapor”.

What the schemers read as fury, however, may become the seed of transformation. The same gesture that once meant aggression could turn, under a new light, into assertion — not of anger, but of presence. If the previous posters framed the fighter as spectacle, this one shows him claiming his body back from those who profited from it. I would even go so far to say that the athlete will end up challenging the authority MFC and even sue them. (chapter 81) And that’s how he could make history. He will be remembered as the Emperor, the one who put an end to crimes!

317 — The Date That Isn’t There

After the smoke, the colors and the picture, the next enigma lies in what the poster refuses to specify: no date, no location, no time. Every previous MFC announcement was anchored in visibility — April X, Saturday, on PPV , June — a fixed promise to the public. Here, all coordinates vanish.

That erasure extends beyond the poster. When Team Black lands abroad, the airport — once a stage for flashbulbs and microphones — stands eerily still. (chapter 81) That erasure extends beyond the poster. Behind Potato and Kim Dan drift a few gray silhouettes, barely human, half-formed shadows of what should have been journalists or fans. They look less like people than ghosts of publicity, residues of a crowd that never came. No banners, no reporters’ questions, (chapter 36) no cheering spectators — nothing recalls the hero’s welcomes of earlier arcs.

And yet, paradoxically, this match was an invitation from the CEO himself, supposedly a prestigious opportunity. The absence of press coverage therefore exposes a contradiction: the greater the supposed honor, the deeper the concealment. No one outside the organization has been informed; the public is deliberately kept in the dark. What pretends to be a triumphant comeback is, in truth, a private operation, an exclusive fight designed for a restricted audience. (chapter 81) Thus I deduce that the athlete won’t fight in a huge arena, but in front of a small circle, where people might smoke. A new version of this scene (chapter 74) but with a different public.

Still, one element gives the illusion of authenticity: the number 317. It appears on the poster like a seal of legitimacy — the next official bout in MFC’s timeline. And that is precisely the brilliance of the trap. The number suggests continuity, reassuring the team that everything follows protocol. The wolf and his court walk straight into the ambush because the system’s familiar numbering masks the rupture beneath.

In this silence, the gray figures become a visual metaphor for the event’s nature: visible enough to seem real, but hollow when touched. The “return of the Emperor” is not a broadcast — it’s a ghost match, orchestrated for unseen eyes, similar to the high-rollers who once financed Baek Junmin’s underground bouts for “commoners”. (chapter 47) Thus, 317 functions like a counterfeit signature — convincing enough to deceive even those inside the organization. What looks like promotion turns out to be execution by design, a fight that exists on paper but not on record. Hence no one is waiting for them at the airport.

At first glance, 317 might seem to follow the ordinary sequence of MFC events, yet the attentive reader will recall the last recorded bout — MFC 298 (chapter 54), the match where the Emperor faced Baek Junmin. That small arithmetic gap hides something extraordinary: eighteen events have supposedly taken place since then, in barely three months. Such acceleration borders on absurdity. It feels less like a sports calendar than a purge — as if the federation were rushing to overwrite history, to bury the memory of its fallen champion beneath a flood of new numbers.

The more I pondered this, the more the number 317 began to sound not like continuity, but conspiracy. The digits 3, 1, and 7 echo two pivotal moments in the narrative: chapter 16 (1+6= 7), where the doctor was almost raped (chapter 16), the moment Heo Manwook thought that the “hamster” was working as an escort due to the name “Team Black”. (chapter 16) So because of the jacket Team Black, doc Dan could be mistaken for a prostitute. Naturally, Jinx-lovers will remember the great fight between Heo Manwook and his minions, when the athlete saved his fated partner. Back then, no one discovered his great action. (Chapter 17) And how did the loan shark describe their world? Fake… he even called him a princeling, because he stands for the glamor and artificiality of MFC. He is the cover for the underground fights, drugs and money laundering. This connection reinforces my interpretation that the future match is « fake » and as such rigged. Then in chapter 37, the hamster met a Korean disguised as a MFC manager. (chapter 37) Both episodes revolve around misunderstandings, silence and deception. In this light, 317 fuses these numbers into a single cipher of repetition: history threatening to repeat itself.

The absence of any date or place only amplifies the unease. “The Return of the Emp” seems less like a public comeback than a covert operation. A fight that exists everywhere and nowhere. Its secrecy betrays its true nature — not an open competition, but a private spectacle designed for those already in the know.

And who are “those”? The answer leads us back to the high rollers. (chapter 47) In the past, they participated in the underground matches of Gangwon Province, where Baek Junmin reigned as a local legend — a thug made myth through blood and rumor. (chapter 47) There, they would even cheat with weapons to ensure the right outcome (chapter 46), as they didn’t want to lose money. And what did Park Namwook say in episode 46? (chapter 46) But now, the same hunger for spectacle has simply migrated upward. What once belonged to the alleys has climbed into the penthouses. The illegal thrill of the poor has become the curated decadence of the rich. And they were invited to witness the death of the “emperor”, someone who tried to escape from his origins. Thus I deduced that this is only a match that the high rollers (I suppose, mostly people from the Occident, though expect some from South Korea) know about.

Baek Junmin’s smoky basements have found their mirror in Arnaud Gabriel’s illuminated arenas. One fed the working man’s fantasy of domination, the other gratifies the elite’s appetite for risk (chapter 81) — both sustained by the same voyeuristic instinct to watch another man fall. That’s why he doesn’t need to be seen in the poster. His source of income comes from sponsors in the end. They come from the elite.

And this time, the high rollers know precisely what they’re buying. They have been definitely briefed: the celebrity has had shoulder surgery, suffers from headaches, drinks, and dismissed his own physical therapist. He avoided the gym for a while. He is someone who gets easily triggered, and once he is furious, he makes mistakes. They are not ignorant; they are investors in ruin, betting on a man already wounded. The match is not entertainment but a calculated execution disguised as sport. (chapter 46) Hence the French kickboxer can see his art as entertainment and fun, for he is facing a so-called injured opponent. To conclude, they have ascended into a new form of decadence. The same pattern persists, merely transposed to another altitude. Baek Junmin’s world of illegal betting has found its reflection in Arnaud Gabriel’s world of sponsored violence. One feeds the poor man’s fantasy of power; the other, the rich man’s craving for risk. At the same time, the Korean thug had connections to high rollers too, but mostly Korean people. And the CEO is the link between these extreme two worlds. In other words, this match is bringing up the corruption to the surface. However, they are not expecting “change” and as such coincidence. Consequently, I am assuming that their plan will fail. And if they bet against the champion, imagine their reactions, when the opposite happens. They might feel deceived and betrayed. They could even lose, if someone else takes his place and he acts as the director of the gym. And who agreed to this match? Park Namwook… He wanted a match at any cost thinking that this would revive his boy’s “reputation” and fame. And now, you comprehend why no advisor was sent to develop a strategy against Arnaud Gabriel, the angel of death from the CEO!! Both sides are underestimating and deceiving each other. In this case, Park Namwook’s blindness and ignorance becomes a virtue. The enemy is left in the dark.

Thus, 317 becomes the code of collusion — the bridge between the basement and the penthouse, between the mud of Gangwon and the marble of Paris. A number that hides a shared agenda: the silent elimination of the Emperor. And now, you are wondering how the main leads can escape from this trap! If he wins and its victory reaches the ears of the public audience, the schemers will definitely attempt to accuse him of selecting a wrong fighter. If he loses, he will be “disfigured” and forgotten. Don’t forget that according to me, the French kickboxer will aim at his face and shoulders, his weaknesses. By losing his second title, Joo Jaekyung won’t be able to appear in the covers or social media! Another possibility is that he lets someone else fight in the ring due to circumstances, yet I have my doubts about this. You will discover soon why. But if my theory is correct and the champion shines in that fight so that the downfall doesn’t happen, the VIP audience might get upset against the CEO. The latter deceived them in order to earn a lot of money! They have been tricked by his lies and bet against the athlete. And the high rollers could decide to switch sides and question the new champion’s victory. One might think, a tie could be a possibility, but the poster is suggesting otherwise: it is a rigged game at the athlete’s expense. There’s another way that the wolf can succeed: it is to become an artist!! But what does it mean exactly?

Be Water, my friend

The heading is an important quote from the famous martial arts fighter Bruce Lee:

“Here is natural instinct, here is control. You are to combine the two in harmony. If you have one to the extreme, you’ll be very unscientific, if you have another to the extreme, you’ll become all of the sudden a mechanical man, no longer a human being. So it is a successful combination of both. The word Superstar really turned me off because the word Star man is an illusion. It’s something what the public calls you, you should look upon oneself as an actor. All type of knowledge ultimately means self knowledge. Therefore they ask me to teach them not so much how to defend themselves, rather they want to express themselves through movement, be it anger, be it determination, or what so ever… to me, martial arts means expressing yourself. And it is very difficult to do… to express oneself honestly … not lying to oneself That my friend is very hard to do. you have to train, you have to keep your reflexes so that when you want it is there. When you want to move, you’re moving. And when you move, you’re determined to move all the time you are keeping the continuity going, bending, stretching … to this, the journalist said, you seem like a ballet dancer. Bruce Lee: To Them, running water never grows stale so you just got to keep flowing.

After reading his definition about Martial Arts, it becomes clear that the pool scenes are not just there for the doctor’s sake, they’re the curriculum. In water, the champion rehearses the very balance Bruce Lee describes—moving without forcing (chapter 81), breathing without bracing, learning that flow is strength. The author placed the swimming lessons here so we’d see him practice calm under pressure before he performs it in the ring. But observe that when he is in the swimming pool, he is expressing more and more his emotions. (chapter 81) At the same time, he is also incited to control his pulsions and body. (chapter 81) In other words, during the swimming lessons, he was encouraged to find the right balance between instincts and control, which Bruce Lee recommended. It is no coincidence that he referred to the philosophy of yin and yang!

Bruce Lee warns: “If you have anger toward others, they control you.” That’s been the wolf’s trap from chapter 14 onward—rage as a leash. (chapter 36) The pool inverts it. Laps replace lunges; rhythm and love replace revenge and hatred. Anger loses its grip because water refuses to hold it. And now, you can grasp why the athlete was calm during the meeting: (chapter 81) His fear and anger were no longer controlling his heart and mind. “One of the best lessons you can learn in life is to remain calm.” The swimmer learns it; the fighter must now prove it. Thanks to doc Dan, the athlete was incited not only to accept himself, but also to get self-knowledge.

Across from him stands the eagle: instinct without control —aerodynamic, moving based on the circumstances. Arnaud Gabriel fights based on the reaction of his opponent. He is air: elegant, distant, untouched. But the problem is that he has no strategy at all (“the unscientific”), as he is dependent on the air, his opponent. This gives another explanation why the Entertainment agency offered no advisors to the athlete. (chapter 81) Arnaud Gabriel is totally unpredictable which makes him dangerous but also weak. So what happens when the athlete uses a totally different strategy? The eagle will get caught by surprise. Thus in the past, we have to envision that the wolf was the mechanical man, iron and fire, surviving by destruction. Bruce Lee’s middle path—instinct guided by awareness—is the only way out of this binary. That’s why the story moves him from steel to steam, from panic to presence.

“Life itself is your teacher (chapter 62), and you are in a state of constant learning. (chapter 80) The seaside town and doc Dan taught him kindness, the pool teaches him composure and precision, the poster’s smoke teaches him restraint: you don’t swat at vapor; you breathe and move through it. “It is far better to be alone than to be in bad company”—so he steps out of the schemers’ frame. “When you accept yourself, the whole world accepts you”—so he stops fighting the audience and starts speaking to one person who matters, then to many. In my opinion, Joo Jaekyung will use this bout to express his feelings for Doc Dan (“to me, martial arts means expressing yourself“) and the birthday card (chapter 81) with the key chain represents now his motivation. Thus he resembles more and more to the physical therapist. 8chapter 81) Under this new light, it becomes comprehensible why the athlete has not confessed his feelings yet. In my eyes, the confession will be strongly connected to the imminent match. In other words, by spending time with the physical therapist, the Emperor regained his voice and body. He can now express himself in the ring, making sure to catch doc Dan’s gaze and admiration. And now, you comprehend why I mentioned that Joo Jaekyung will come to see this fight as a source of strength and inspiration: it will be more about love and recognition from his loved one than the money or hatred from the audience.

Practically, this means the bout must look less like slaughter and more like sparring—measured pressure, controlled power, no needless cruelty. That choice does two things at once: it denies the high-rollers their blood-script and leaves the kickboxer no “reason” to obey orders to ruin a face or a shoulder. Arnaud only embodies instinct — rhythm without reflection, showmanship without soul. So he is not guided by negative emotions. Be water becomes case law: adapt, absorb, answer—without being owned by anger.

So air meets water: (chapter 81) spectacle meets expression. The eagle can only descend to strike; water rises, falls, returns. And since Bruce Lee’s punch turn into water , I came to imagine that the athlete might strike him like “water”, hard enough to make him lose the balance and defeat him, but not too strong to damage his knee for good.

If he carries the pool into the cage, the “emp” on the poster will cease to read as emptiness. It will resolve into empathy—calm under fire, feeling without being ruled by it. And the smoke behind him? Not a death shroud, but iron turning to steam—a body once forged in rage, now speaking in flow. And now, look at the other tattoo on his left arm: it is a cloud or steam! (chapter 17) And once the cloud (doc Dan) meets the steam (chapter 81), they can be together as a couple. To conclude, though this poster was created as an epitaph, the reality is that it announces the emergence of Joo Jaekyung, the dragon! Kim Dan is the one who is turning the athlete Joo Jaekyung into an actor, the emperor! Even if his career as MMA fighter ends, he can still work as an actor or as the owner of his gym. He will never be forgotten as an athlete like his father or Hwang Byungchul. His name Emperor will remain forever in the memory of people and maybe because of his “fight” with MFC and thugs. At the same time, it displays the increasing conflict between Team Black and MFC. The fist could be seen as directed at MFC. The Emperor represents a menace for the CEO in the end. One thing is sure: since Baek Junmin chose the nickname “The Shotgun”, it becomes clear that he has become the negative version of his rival: he is now the mechanical man (control without any natural instinct). He lost his balance and can no longer rely on others. What he fails to realize is that by bringing more and more people in the schemes, he is actually endangering the whole organisation MFC! Furthermore, contrary to the past, the athlete will pay attention to his fated partner in France, so a meeting between Arnaud Gabriel and Kim Dan will definitely reach the athlete’s eyes and ears.

This is the longer interview of Bruce Lee:

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