Delightfully Deceitful (2023) Episode 5

Delightfully Deceitful episode 5 takes us back to when Moo-Young was young. One morning, he woke up to people banging on their door. Moo-Young tells his dad what’s happening and finds that he’s gone. The people banging on their door force their way into the house and start asking Moo-Young where his dad is. Just then, a man comes to rescue Moo-Young and tells the people at his house that if they want to talk to Moo-Young from then on, they should talk to him first.

Back to the present, Moo-Young is at Da-Jung’s comic book store (Da-Jung has a comic book store as a cover-up for her hacking activities) telling Lee Ro-Um that he wants to join her in whatever she’s doing, be it revenge or fraud. Lee Ro-Um then asks Moo-Young how she can trust him, considering he lied to her about informing the police about Ring-Go’s situation in the last episode.

Moo-Young tells Lee Ro-Um she has no choice but to trust him because she’ll need him as her lawyer when her fraudulent actions finally catch up with her.

At Park & Cue Law Firm, Park Kyu is upset because the disciplinary committee has summoned Moo-Young over his recent actions. He had turned against Choong-Sik when he gave the media a recording of him admitting to killing Lee Ro-Um’s parents. He also asked the judge to hold off on Lee Ro-Um’s defamation lawsuit.

Moo-Young remembers Ring-Go telling him when he went to see him at the hospital that he, Da-Jung, Lee Ro-Um, and another guy named Na-Sa were in school together. This is the school sponsored by Jeokmok Foundation.

At Da-Jung’s comic book store, Da-Jung and Lee Ro-Um receive an invitation to Shin Ki-Ho’s funeral. Lee Ro-Um tells Da-Jung that she has to attend Shin Ki-Ho’s funeral. She asks Da-Jung to find out as much information about Moo-Young as possible. It’s clear Lee Ro-Um won’t trust Moo-Young that easily.

At Shin Ki-Ho’s funeral, Shin Ki-Ho’s secretary approaches Lee Ro-Um and tells her that Shin Ki-Ho wanted to repay her. He then gives her an envelope with all the information she needs. This could be information on the people behind Jeokmok Foundation and the mastermind behind her parents’ murders.

We’re then taken back to Moo-Young, having his therapy session with his psychiatrist. He told her that he has stopped taking his medication to deal with the effects of his Hyper-empathy Syndrome. He also told her that he’ll now be conning people.

Elsewhere, Lee Ro-Um is looking at the contents inside the envelope Shin Ki-Ho’s secretary gave her. She then calls Ring-Go and asks him to get Na-Sa. She seemingly asks him also to get Moo-Young.

Ring-Go goes to Na-Sa’s auto repair shop, which is actually a cover for an illegal gambling place he runs. After a lot of back and forth between them, Ring-Go and Na-Sa go to meet Moo-Young. Ring-Go asks Moo-Young if he can Na-Sa get some people who’ve occupied his auto repair shop to leave.

It turns out, Na-Sa owes some loan sharks a lot of money, so they took possession of his auto repair shop until he repays his loan. However, they find Lee Ro-Um has already made the loan sharks leave the auto repair shop. Lee Ro-Um then asks Na-Sa if she could use his secret gambling place as she has found a target.

Lee Ro-Um later explains to everyone about Park Jong-Gu, a waste management tycoon whose information was in the envelope Shin Ki-Ho’s secretary gave her earlier. This means he may be one of the people behind the Jeokmok Foundation.

One of Jong-Gu’s weaknesses is gambling. And since the gambling dens around him were shut down, he hadn’t gambled in a while, making him Lee Ro-Um’s easy prey. Lee Ro-Um starts planning with the others about how they’ll lure Jong-Gu to come to gamble at Na-Sa’s secret gambling place so they can rip him off as much of his money as they can.

Lee Ro-Um then tells Moo-Young that he’ll be the one to play against Jong-Gu in the gambling place. She then tells him that he’ll use the insurance money she got from Kim Bo-Ra and her husband. Lee Ro-Um wants Moo-Young to use that money so there could be evidence against him if they ever get caught.

Lee Ro-Um later goes with Moo-Young to get the insurance money from his car, but Moo-Young stops her. Moo-Young tells Lee Ro-Um that Kim Bo-Ra and her husband still believe she’ll take their son to a school in the US. And if they found out she duped them, she’ll be in a lot of trouble.

Lee Ro-Um tells Moo-Young that Kim Bo-Ra and her husband will be so preoccupied by the murder charges against them because of Myung-Hoon’s death that they won’t have the strength to go after her for money.

Moo-Young still doesn’t allow Lee Ro-Um to take the money and tells her he’ll bring it himself when it’s time to gamble with Jong-Gu.

The next day, Lee Ro-Um meets with Yo-Han as per her probation requirements when Yo-Han tells her that his phone may be hacked and asks her if she knows a hacker. But Lee Ro-Um denies knowing any hacker.

Later, Lee Ro-Um goes with Ring-Go to Jong-Gu’s waste management offices. She’s pretending to be the daughter of a tycoon that is soon taking over her father’s company. So, she’s visiting Jong-Gu to inquire about his waste management services. Meanwhile, Ring-Go’s friends, Yoo-II and Yoo-Neung, teach Moo-Young how to play cards, the gambling game he’ll later play with Jong-Gu.

Jong-Gu finally meets Lee Ro-Um. Earlier, Da-Jung told Lee Ro-Um that Jong-Gu likes young women and is a male chauvinist. So, Lee Ro-Um dressed seductively to catch his attention and kept making chauvinistic comments about women throughout her conversations with Jong-Gu also to catch his attention.

During Lee Ro-Um’s conversations with Jong-Gu, she kept mentioning that she has a lawyer friend who loves gambling. She then mentions that her lawyer friend has found a gambling den, which excites Jong-Gu.

Elsewhere, Yo-Han calls Moo-Young and asks to meet him for a drink. They meet, and Yo-Han asks Moo-Young why he decided to become a lawyer. He then tells him about his dad became bankrupt and ran off, leaving him in the hands of his debtors. Fortunately, his dad’s friend, who was a lawyer, came and rescued him from the angry debtors and helped him deal with them. Moo-Young then asks Yo-Han why he decided to become a probation officer, but he avoids the question and leaves.

Lee Ro-Um meets with Jong-Gu continuously for a while. One day, after meeting with Jong-Gu Ring-Go asks Lee Ro-Um if she thinks they’ll live a normal life once they’re done executing their revenge against the people behind Jeokmok Foundation. Lee Ro-Um tells Ring-Go he can go ahead and live a normal life.

Later, as Lee Ro-Um is walking on a particular street, she sees some people promoting an organization, Navis Well-Being. The organization’s CEO, Jang Kyung-Ja, catches Lee Ro-Um’s attention. She goes to Da-Jung’s comic book store and tells Da-Jung that Yo-Han knows his phone was hacked.

Lee Ro-Um then asks Da-Jung if she’s found anything on Moo-Young, but, Da-Jung tells her she needs a few more days to dig out information on him. She then tells Lee Ro-Um that Choong-Sik called Moo-Young and asked to meet him.

As Lee Ro-Um is heading back to her studio apartment, Moo-Young meets her and asks her out to dinner. At the restaurant, Moo-Young tells Lee Ro-Um that he was once an audience member on her TV show when they were both young. But Lee Ro-Um doesn’t seem surprised by it. Moo-Young then points out that he’s noticed that she and Da-Jung love noodles.

We’re then taken back to when Ring-Go told Moo-Young about their experiences at Jeokmok Foundation. This foundation pretended to be a normal school, but they were grooming children to be criminals according to their special abilities. Ring-Go told Moo-Young the challenges they went through while at Jeokmok Foundation and how it has affected them now when they’re adults.

Elsewhere, Moo-Young’s psychiatrist is talking to someone about moving Moo-Young to the next treatment step for his Hyper-empathy Syndrome.

Moo-Young goes to meet Choong-Sik in prison. Choong-Sik tells Moo-Young that he wants to expose the truth about what really happened the night Lee Ro-Um’s parents were killed. Choong-Sik tells Moo-Young that Shin Ki-Ho, who was also one of Lee Ro-Um’s parents’ killers, asked him to take the fall for the murders.

Shin Ki-Ho promised Choong-Sik to repay his loan and send him money while in prison. But, as Moo-Young predicted, Shin Ki-Ho stopped sending Choong-Sik money.

Choong-Sik then tells Moo-Young that a third person helped them kill Lee Ro-Um’s parents, but he never saw his face. “The president” was the one who ordered Lee Ro-Um’s parents to be killed. To Choong-Sik’s disappointment, Moo-Young refuses to help him get out of prison.

Later, Moo-Young asks Woo Young-Ki to find out who “the president” is. He also goes to ask Ring-Go, but he tells him that no one knows who this guy is.

Jong-Gu finally goes to Na-Sa’s secret gambling den, just as Lee Ro-Um wanted. He goes there for a few days, and he becomes hooked. The day finally arrives when Jong-Gu plays with Lee Ro-Um’s “lawyer friend” Moo-Young. Their plan is to cheat during the game and dupe Jong-Gu out of a big sum of money.

Everything goes as planned until Na-Sa realizes the police have come to arrest the people at the gambling place. He notifies Moo-Young and Lee Ro-Um. Lee Ro-Um offers to go check on the people at the gambling den while he checks on Na-Sa, who is in another room, helping them cheat on the game.

Instead, Lee Ro-Um locks everyone inside and leaves. The episode ends with Moo-Young remembering Lee Ro-Um insisting that they use the insurance money to gamble so there could be evidence against him if they get caught. Back to the present, Lee Ro-Um tells Moo-Young to turn himself in.

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The Episode Review

It’s obvious that Lee Ro-Um had a plan against Moo-Young when he said he wanted to join in her fraudulent activities. Let’s see how Moo-Young will save himself and the others now that Lee Ro-Um has thrown them under the bus!

We now have a more clear idea of what Lee Ro-Um went through at the Jeokmok Foundation that has made her want to seek revenge this badly. But who is “the president”? Is he the person who sent Lee Ro-Um the photos of her dead parents? Also, who is Jang Kyung-Ja, and why is Lee Ro-Um so interested in her?

Perhaps the next episode will answer our questions.