The Netflix K-drama The Art of Sarah keeps getting more confusing, and Episode 4 is the biggest puzzle yet. Just when you think you understand who the victim is, the show introduces another name from the past: Kim Eun-jae.
This is not a new character. It is another fake identity used by the woman everyone knows as Sarah Kim. Episode 4 digs deep into this persona through the confession of Kang Ji-hwon, played by Kim Jae-won. His story turns the entire investigation upside down and reveals a side of Sarah that no one saw coming .
Ji-hwon’s Panic and His Shocking Claim
The episode starts with a tense moment. After a skeleton is found in the reservoir, the police panic, thinking it might be Kang Ji-hwon. They rush to his apartment and find him alive, but he is clearly distressed and has cuts on his hands. He does not wait for questions. He immediately confesses to killing Sarah Kim .
This confession takes Detective Park Mu-gyeong (played by Lee Jun-hyuk) back several years. Ji-hwon explains that he was not always the Boudoir employee he is today. In the past, he worked as an escort. It was during this time that he met a woman named Kim Eun-jae .
The Story of Kim Eun-jae: A Damsel in Distress?
According to Ji-hwon, Kim Eun-jae was not a confident businesswoman. She was the complete opposite. She told him she was the wife of a violent and powerful loan shark, Hong Seong-shin (played by Jeong Jin-young). She claimed her husband abused her and kept her trapped in the marriage. She looked fragile, scared, and in desperate need of help .
Ji-hwon, who was young and in debt himself, saw himself as her savior. He fell in love with her. He believed he was rescuing a victim. Kim Eun-jae told him that the only way for them to be together was to get rid of her husband. She convinced Ji-hwon to kill Hong Seong-shin .
The plan went terribly wrong. Ji-hwon went to confront Seong-sin, but during the struggle, he did not stab the husband. Instead, he accidentally stabbed Kim Eun-jae. As she lay there, bleeding, she told him to run away and not look back .
The Other Side of the Story: Hong Seong-shin’s Truth
Ji-hwonโs story paints him as a lovesick man who was used by a clever con artist. But Detective Mu-gyeong is not easily convinced. He notices that Ji-hwonโs confession seems a bit too perfect, as if he has rehearsed it to make himself look like the victim .
The police then bring in Hong Seong-shin for questioning. His version of events is completely different. He admits he knew the woman as Du-a, another one of her many names. Seong-shin reveals that he was very sick and needed a kidney transplant. He entered into a contract marriage with Du-a. For one year, she would be his wife, and in exchange, she would donate her kidney and receive 500 million won .
Seong-sin says their relationship was cold but not abusive. In fact, he helped her. He taught her how to act like a member of high society. He helped her build the persona she needed to become a successful con artist. When Ji-hwon attacked him, it was Kim Eun-jae who stepped in to protect Seong-sin, and she got stabbed by Ji-hwon in the process .
The Clue That Breaks the Case: The Missing Scar
Both stories confirm that Kim Eun-jae is just another mask worn by the same woman. But Hong Seong-sinโs testimony gives the police the most important clue of all. He confirms that she went through with the kidney transplant after recovering from the stabbing .
This becomes the key to the entire mystery. The medical examiner checks the body that was found in the sewerโthe body believed to be Sarah Kim. The report comes back negative. There is no transplant scar on the body .
If the dead woman never had a kidney transplant, then she cannot be the same woman who was married to Hong Seong-sin. She cannot be Kim Eun-jae, Du-a, or the Sarah Kim that everyone is searching for.
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Who Is Kim Eun-jae? A Name, Not a Person
So, who is Kim Eun-jae? In the world of The Art of Sarah, she is nobody. She is simply a name that the main character used during a specific period of her life to get what she wanted .
For Ji-hwon, Kim Eun-jae was the vulnerable woman who needed saving. For Hong Seong-sin, she was the cold business partner who traded her kidney for money. The name allowed her to move between these two very different worlds.
The biggest takeaway from Episode 4 is that the woman they are hunting has worn many faces. She has been Du-a, the contract wife. She has been Kim Eun-jae, the fake abused spouse. She has been Mok Ga-hui, the department store worker who scammed buyers . And finally, she became Sarah Kim, the head of a luxury brand.
The dead body with no scar proves that Sarah Kim might still be alive. She might have used another person, perhaps the talented bag designer Kim Mi-jeong, to fake her death once again . The investigation is no longer about finding a killer. It is about finding a woman who has mastered the art of disappearing.
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With the discovery that the victim lacks a key surgical scar, the hunt for the real Sarah Kim enters a frantic new phase, proving that in this game of identity, the rules change with every passing episode on VvipTimes.
