Unnamed Baby Prince

He was the unnamed son of King Jin Won and Jang Rei.

## Appearance

He and his fraternal twin sister inherited their mother's hair color, while he also inherited her eye color.

## Personality

He was seemingly quiet unlike his twin sister who smiles and laughs a lot as described by Jang Rok Ha. The only times he smiled were when Yoo Dan Ah sang the *Butterfly* lullaby to him, much to his mother's disappointment. Hence, Rei frequently requested Dan Ah to sing the lullaby for the prince.

## History

Prior to his birth, Won and Hyun Bin made a bet regarding her child's gender. If the child is a boy, the king shall select her as the bride for the royal wedding. Otherwise, if it is a girl, she shall grant him the land she inherited, amounting to at least one-third of Seo Seo. Hyun Bin bet for the child to be a prince, while Won chose it to be a princess.

## Plot

### Bridal Selection Arc

As Hyun Bin gives birth to fraternal twins, neither she nor the king won their bet in guessing their child's gender. Nonetheless, Won decided to make her the third bridal candidate for the royal wedding, since he was out of choices after he could not find his favored candidate.

### Persecution Arc

During the bridal candidacy, the baby prince was sleeping peacefully when one of Hyun Bin's servants later found him dead. As a result, the palace gates were closed, and the traffic in and out of the palace was severely restricted, and the security around tripled. Investigations also discovered traces of poison at the scene as the cause of the prince's death.

His death took a toll on Hyun Bin, causing her to sink into depression. Aside from her son's death, extracts of the narcotic dream flower in her tea caused her to experience hallucinations, including hearing her baby's cry and carrying her son in her arms. For a long time, Hyun Bin would leave her quarters every night, following the cry that she had been hallucinating. Yoo Ja Gyeom took this to his advantage and had someone take the baby prince's blanket to the palace lake, supposedly for Hyun Bin to follow it and drown in the process. In the end, Yoo Dan Ah was able to save her during this instance.

Her repeated patterns of unusual behavior caused the ministers and servants to brand her as crazy and mentally unstable, deeming her to be unfit for the bridal selection. Yi Won defended her, claiming that it is natural for a mother to grieve her son's death and opted to include her in the bridal selection. After some time, however, his ministers' persistence to exclude her in the bridal selection and to evict her in the palace forced the king to revoke his initial decision of making her his queen consort.

In the midst of the investigation, many pieces of evidence pointed to Dan Ah as the one behind the poisoning of the baby prince, including the blanket hidden in her quarters and planted flowers near her chambers. This resulted to her indictment and severe interrogation by the king himself. Dan Ah's maidservant, Nabi, made a deal with Hyun Bin: Nabi would give Hyun Bin the maid who poisoned her son and assure her safety before she divulges the truth, while Nabi would surrender herself as the perpetrator to save Dan Ah from further torture.

The maid was finally brought in as witness and confessed Hwang Se Ryeon as the mastermind behind the baby prince's poisoning. Se Ryeon and her father were then persecuted and quartered to death. Meanwhile, per Hyun Bin's order, Gwak Ji Ryeon brought the perpetrator to the place where the plague patients were quarantined.

## Trivia

* The Yi family had various cases of having twins. The baby prince had a twin sister, his paternal grandfather had a twin brother, and his father's half-brothers are twins.

## References

1. ↑ *Twelve Nights* webtoon, chapter 48
2. ↑ *Twelve Nights* webtoon, chapter 50
3. ↑ *Twelve Nights* webtoon, chapter 20
4. ↑ *Twelve Nights* webtoon, chapter 46
5. ↑ *Twelve Nights* webtoon, chapter 60