Dragon Pearl

Min’s discoveries in the captain’s office continue the rising action and add significantly to the tension in the narrative. Up until now, Min has been fighting against the nebulous, abstract antagonists of distance and uncertainty in her quest to find Jun. However, learning about the captain’s betrayal makes him a powerful obstacle to her quest, and thus, Captain Hwan suddenly takes on a more direct role as antagonist, rather than just an incidental obstacle that Min must avoid while she is disguised as Jang. The confirmation of everything Min suspects in Chapter 23 forces her to adjust her plan and find a way to the Fourth Colony sooner rather than later. Thus, Chapter 24 shows Min’s increasing desperation, for although she knows that damaging the ship’s meridian will bring harm and bad luck to the Pale Lightning and to the people she’s grown to care about, she justifies her actions by prioritizing her quest to find Jun over her duty to maintain Sujin and Haneul’s personal safety. These chapters therefore intensify The Conflict Between Ethical and Self-Serving Actions, especially as Min finds herself relying more and more often on her Charm in order to subvert the wills of the people around her and get what she wants at all costs. Additionally, she is finally starting to realize The Damaging Effects of Lying as her actions cause literal damage to the Pale Lightning and its crew and ultimately complicate her own primary mission to find her brother. In Chapter 25, Min watches missiles turn back on the Pale Lightning, and although she feels guilty about the damage she is causing, she dismisses the potential consequences, thus using her personal goals as a way to avoid critiquing her own motivations. Thus, this section demonstrates that she still has a long way to go toward completing The Evolution of Personal Identity.

These chapters also start to develop the complexity of Min’s relationships with Sujin and Haneul in the second half of the book. In Chapter 23, for example, Min finally acknowledges the connections she has forged to both cadets when she realizes that she will miss her new friends when she leaves; however, she is still determined to escape the Pale Lightning by any means necessary because she has not yet learned to value all life as highly as she values the lives of her family members. This decision comes back to haunt her in Chapter 26 as she makes great strides forward in developing new ethical standards that contribute toward The Evolution of Personal Identity, for when she is forced to face the consequences of her actions, she chooses to perform one of her few truly selfless acts by surrendering to the captain and putting her mission in jeopardy in order to keep Sujin and Haneul from suffering. Her decision to surrender shows that the unscrupulous actions she took to escape the Pale Lightning have weighted heavily upon her conscience. She doesn’t want her actions to harm Sujin and Haneul, and her guilt keeps her from seeing the trap that the captain is laying out for her. Having realized her fox nature, his goal is to force Min to find the Dragon Pearl for him: the same mission he once compelled Jun to attempt. As it turns out, Sujin and Haneul’s supposed “prison break” is actually the next step in the captain’s plan, which will come to fruition in the final section of the book.

These chapters reference several additional aspects of Korean mythology and further enhance the author’s reimagining of ghosts within the context of Korean culture. For example, the buffeting winds on the Fourth Colony are a stronger version of the winds and chill that Min felt in Jang’s presence during earlier chapters; thus, the author uses this detail to imply that the protagonists are surrounded by a vast host of spirits, not just one. It is also important to note that unlike the rainbow hues of the gates that Min has already experienced, the gate in Chapter 26 is a stark white. In Korean mythology, the color white holds many meanings. It often symbolizes including purity and beginnings, and so the pure white of this gate foreshadows the fact that the Fourth Colony is not as dead as it is believed to be. (This idea is further highlighted by Min’s admiration for the colony’s natural flora and fauna in Chapter 30.) The color of the gate also implies that Min’s journey to the Fourth Colony will be a starting point for her, and accordingly, her subsequent adventures there prove to create new patterns in her life, patterns that include her family (including Jun’s ghost), her friendships with Sujin and Haneul, and the Fourth Colony itself. The white gate also stands against the black backdrop of space, a strategic juxtaposition that invokes the yin and yang of equally balanced opposites. Together, these colors represent the serenity of the atmosphere and an overall sense of harmony, which together provide additional foreshadowing for Min’s eventual success in returning the Fourth Colony to its former glory when she calms the winds and gives the ghosts the closure they need to finally move on.

Even upon her arrival, Min feels an instant connection to the Fourth Colony due to its striking biodiversity. Throughout the majority of the novel, the planet is said to be dead, but the rampant evidence of thriving organisms compels readers to realize that it is only “dead” because it is inhabited by ghosts, not because it is devoid of life. Min’s connection to the planet allows her to hear the whispers of the ghosts, and it is this ability that allows Jun’s ghost to find her and lead her into the confusion and shifting alliances that dominate the novel’s final chapters.