Plot(Wikipedia)
Best friends Kim Hyun-Jun (Lee Byung-hun) and Jin Sa-Woo (Jung Joon-ho), were training under the South Korean army's 707th Special Mission Battalion until they were scouted by NSS (National Security Service). The duo was independently scouted by the beautiful NSS agent, Choi Seung-Hee (Kim Tae-hee); the two didn't realize they have fallen for the same woman and continued to win her love. Unaware they have been scouted, the two were secretly captured and subjected through a simulated torture test and the duo passed their test to be worthy NSS agents.
After completing the test, Hyun-Jun and Sa-Woo were introduced to the director of NSS, Baek-San (Kim Yeong-cheol). Baek-San explained to them that the NSS is a secret organization tasked with preempting foreign threats and protecting the country's interests through wetwork operations, including assassination of anyone who could be a threat to South Korean (SK) national security. Since its founding in 1976, during the rule of Park Chung-hee, the agency's very existence has remained a state secret from everyone, including the President.
After entering NSS, the pair learned that Seung-Hee was their undercover scout agent. While the duo was surprised and somewhat hurt, Hyun-Jun was angered the most as he felt his heart was toyed with; during a team celebration dinner, Hyun-Jun confronted her alone and the two embraced the passion they have for one another. Afterwards, the two maintained a secret romantic relationship without the knowledge of anyone.
Hyun-Jun and Seung-Hee took the opportunity to secretly fly off to Akita-Japan for a romantic winter escape after saving the life of SK President Cho Myung-Ho (Lee Jung-gil); Baek-San seized opportunity to reveal NSS to the president to gain his support. While vacationing, the couple befriended a young teen, Yuki (who was smitten with Hyun-Jun at first sight). However, their vacation was cut short after being recalled back by NSS for a life-changing mission at Budapest: recovering the head NK nuclear scientist, Hong Seung-Ryong.
At Budapest, Sa-Woo catches up with Hyun-Jun and Seung-Hee to extract Hong Seung-Ryong back to SK; Sa-Woo learned of their romantic relationship and pretended to be happy for them. While waiting for the extraction team, Hong Seung-Ryong gave Hyun-Jun a metal cross necklace, telling him to live life as if there was a god. Unknown to him, Hyun-Jun just got the USB IRIS agent, Vic, had been searching for. Not long after, Hong Seung-Ryong was killed along with his handlers by Vic. Afterwards, Baek-San (who is secretly an IRIS agent) tricked Hyun-Jun by having him assassinate North Korean Minister Yoon.
Hyun-Jun succeeded in killing Minister Yoon, but it incurred the wrath of the NK agents. NK agents, Seon-Hwa and Chul-Young, hunted for Hyun-Jun as he escaped. Wounded, Hyun-Jun escaped capture and tried to get help, but Baek-San betrayed him by manipulating Sa-Woo to silence him. Fortunately, NK agents intervened to stop Sa-Woo and has been on the run since. Hyun-Jun later reunited with Seung-Hee and the two agreed to run away together, but that was dashed when Seung-Hee's car exploded at the train station; Hyun-Jun thought she died. In a showdown between Sa-Woo and Hyun-Jun, Hyun-Jun tried to escape by plane, but Sa-Woo shot his plane down and everyone presumed he died. Because of their failure to capture Hyun-Jun, NK agent, Seon-Hwa, was stripped of her title and jailed.
Both Hyun-jun and Seung-hee survived their ordeal. Seung-Hee left the car before the bomb exploded and Hyun-Jun was rescued by a mysterious benefactor, Jeong Hoon (a friend of Hyun Jun's deceased parents and revealed Baek-San murdered them); each believed that the other was KIA. Jeong Hoon warned Hyun-Jun of a war profiteering organization known as IRIS, a force that had long existed to create political turmoil to profit from a country's strife. Not willing to help a person that doesn't identify himself, he took advantage of his faked death and took refuge back at Akita-Japan with Yuki's family.
It was during this time, NK intelligence found out Hyun-Jun lives and gave Seon-hwa a final chance to kill Hyun-Jun for redemption. The job failed as Seon-hwa was captured by Hyun-Jun. Seon-hwa pleaded for death since she failed and Hyun-Jun said he would grant her wish after he completes his quest. Seon-Hwa actually believed him and was eventually integrated herself with Yuki's family as well. Over time though, Seon-hwa developed a deep respect for Hyun-Jun and eventually falls in love with him. The two eventually make their way back to Korea after an unfortunate scuffle with Vic (searching and killing for that USB) that lead to Yuki and her family's death. Hyun-Jun defects and cooperates with a NK black-ops team to get his revenge on Baek-San.
Not long, Baek San and Sa-Woo (manipulated into working for IRIS) found Jeong Hoon. They used NSS resources to track and hunt him down. Before Jeong Hoon died, he activated a video feed to record his final moments for Hyun-Jun (via cell phone video) to see. The video was meant to be part evidence and also a clue for Hyun-Jun to continue his mission; the clue led him to meet President Cho Myung-Ho once again. In a private meeting, Hyun-Jun finally had a chance to explain his side of the story and that he is now a double-agent between both sides to stop a nuclear plot, by IRIS, from happening.
Around the same time, Cheol-young, discovered his own commanding officer, Gi Hoon, is part of a coup with IRIS to overthrow the current NK administration. Not only does he intend to stop the reunification of Korea, but he plans to manipulate the world's military to strategically neutralize NK for his regime and step in as the new power of NK. Because Cheol-Young never wanted war, he secretly aided Hyun-Jun and the SK president in hopes to stop Gi Hoon's scheme. However, the plan is even larger than that. IRIS intends to start a civil war and take control both sides of Korea under their unified control.
Hyun-Jun and Seon-Hwa teams up with the very black-ops team that's in charge of destroying IRIS and nuking South Korea. Because he's not trusted, Hyun-Jun helped the team infiltrate to infiltrate and attack NSS HQ to steal special equipment to complete building their nuclear bomb. However, their actions wasn't enough to earn the team's trust as they had their own agendas and the team went ahead with their plans without Hyun-Hun and Seon-Hwa.
It was between this time that Hyun-Jun finally had a proper reunion with Seung-Hee as they accidentally ran into each other during their own investigation. Seung-Hee finally learned about what happened with Hyun-Jun during his mission at Budapest and Sa-Woo's actions. It was also the first time she learned about IRIS, however, there wasn't enough time as Sa-Woo himself had come with his own NSS team. She stalled Sa-Woo and surrendered to NSS custody; Seung-Hee revealed how much she knows now and her unwillingness to forgive Sa-Woo for trying to kill his own best friend.
President Cho Myung-Ho is now impatient, as they have lost all their leads and Gi Hoon is their only hope. With the help of Cheol-Young, Gi-Hoon was arrested, but Vic arrived and killed Gi-Hoon to silence him. Because the President is aware of Sa-Woo's and Baek-San's insurrection, he had Head of National Security, Yoo Kwang Ho, perform a hostile takeover on NSS and arrested the two. Both Sa-Woo and Baek-San intentionally stalled time before finally surrendering to Yoo Kwang Ho's men.
At D-Day, the president's official announcement of reunification, Hyun-Jun and Seon-Hwa continued their search for the nuke. During this time, Cheol-Young had returned to NK and gained the trust of their leader to root-out IRIS agents within their ranks. It was through his interrogations that he reported to the duo that IRIS had targeted the Federal Building Complex, the U.S. Embassy, and the Blue House. From there, they got a good approximate location of where they could find the bomb. At the city looking for clues to where the bomb was hidden, Hyun-Jun used his memory to recall that the notes they found earlier corresponded to a particular bus route and figured it out that they placed it in a tour bus. In the meantime, NSS used a jamming device to dampen the effect of remote devices to stall time for the duo to find the nuke.
Both Hyun-Jun and Seon-Hwa successfully located the nuke behind the tour bus, but NK black-ops squad arrived to finish the fight. Seung-Hee also joined the fray and the trio had a mass gun fight in the middle of the busiest intersection in Seoul. Hyun-Jun and his group won the battle after killing the last members with several grenades. With the nuke neutralized and all enemy forces defeated, the President personally thanked Hyun-Jun in his role during the crisis and became the president's most trusted agent, much to Yoo Kwang Ho's dismay.
Peace had finally come and Hyun-Jun felt at peace and slept off his stress for 33 hrs. Afterwards, Hyun-Jun took the time to bid farewell to Seon-Hwa. Even though Hyun-Jun got presidential permission to allow Seon-Hwa live in SK, she couldn't handle the pain as she didn't have Hyun-Jun's heart. However, Hyun-Jun at least embraced her and thanked for going all the way for him during his most difficult times. When Seon-Hwa returned to NK, she requested to lead a civilian life and become possibly a farmer or teacher for the future, but Cheol-Young wanted her to recover and think things over before making such a major change in career. However, she would later return to SK with the Cheol-Young when she realized Seung-Hee's profile was within the IRIS database and wanted to warn Hyun-Jun of the potential danger.
Hyun-Jun later headed off to Jeju Island to spend some quality time with Seung-Hee and recover from his PTSD. It was there that Seung-Hee mysteriously disappeared for several days. Hyun-Jun couldn't prioritize looking for her as he was just called back to Seoul due to the IRIS jailbreak with Sa-Woo and Baek-San. She would later confess that she met with Baek-San as he tried to recruit her into IRIS. She explained that her father was the founder of NSS and when he died, Baek-San helped her family survive and was a father-figure in her life; she didn't want to talk about it due to strong personal conflicts within herself, but Hyun-Jun sympathized and forgave her.
While with a security detail to see off Secretary Jung, Vic car-bombed and killed the secretary; Hyun-Jun identified Vic and successfully hunted him down to his condo. It was there that Hyun-Jun severely beaten Vic for killing Yuki and her family. Hyun-Jun showed mercy to have him arrested, but Vic tried to shoot him and Hyun-Jun killed him in self-defense; he got vengeance for Yuki.
In the hunt to track and arrest Baek-San, evidence left behind by Vic clued that he's hiding within a private golf club house. Hyun-Jun infiltrated and attacked the golf club house to arrest Baek-San and Sa-Woo, but Sa-Woo had already escaped. Baek-San remained to buy them time while the surviving IRIS team completed their mission: to prevent the reunification of Korea. When Hyun-Jun and Baek-San finally meet, Hyun-Jun demanded Baek-San to ask for forgiveness, but Baek-San couldn't help laugh at the matter. Hyun-Jun was highly tempted to shoot him, but he let him live to be arrested by NSS agents.
Later, Sa-Woo and IRIS agents attacked a local mall. They intend to blackmail both sides of the Korean government to release their IRIS agents and to make SK's president announce their political stand to not unit Korea as one. Hyun-Jun became the negotiator for the president and for the hostages' release, but he was really there to appeal to Sa-Woo's conscience. Because the IRIS agents had conflicting commands with Sa-Woo, Hyun-Jun and Sa-Woo were forced to team up again and kill all the IRIS agents. During the fight, Sa-Woo was badly injured and dying. Before he died, he was with Hyun-Jun and Seung-Hee in his final moments. He apologized and was forgiven before he passed away. With all things hindering the reunification process gone, the peace talks resumed.
At the reunification summit, the president personally requested Hyun-Jun to be at his side; it was also at this time that NSS agents realized they've been duped. The bodies that were thought to be IRIS agents at the mall crisis was actually the hostages. The true IRIS agents escaped during the hostage crisis as civilians and has now infiltrated the summit to kill the politicians at the summit. They killed several of the security guards and replaced them with their own men in a surprise attack. Unfortunately, it failed with Seung-Hee's interference. She herself disguised as a fellow sniper and killed the IRIS snipers. This created mass panic as IRIS agents make their stand against all security forces. Ultimately, the SK president and NK forces survived the assault and Hyun-Jun saved the day again.
With everything finally over, both Hyun-Jun and Seung-Hee left NSS to lead a civilian life. While Seung-Hee waited at a lighthouse for Hyun-Jun, he was driving to meet her with a wedding ring; he was going to propose to her. However, during the car ride, Hyun-Jun was shot to death in the head by an IRIS agent. As Seung-Hee waited for Hyun-Jun, he is tearfully convulsing while seeing her at a distance. In the aftermath, Hyun-Jun’s life and death were later classified, Baek-San was sent to a “black prison,” and IRIS receded for three years until they regained their strength to take on the world once again.
Download Part 1 Of TV Series
Download Part 2 Of TV Series