Korean Whodunit
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Tutorial · Free · ~20 min

Learn to Read Korean in 20 Minutes

한글 기초 — The Korean alphabet, taught through the vocabulary you’ll need for every case.

Here’s the secret nobody tells you: Hangul is one of the easiest writing systems on Earth. It was designed in 1443 by King Sejong specifically so ordinary people could learn it fast — the saying at the time was that “a wise man can learn it in a morning.” You don’t memorize thousands of characters. You learn about 24 letters, and rules for stacking them into syllable blocks. That’s it.

By the end of this page you’ll be able to sound out real evidence from Case 1.

Step 1 — The Basic Consonants

Each consonant is a letter, just like English. A few key ones:

g/k
like g in go
n
like n in no
d/t
like d in do
r/l
between r and l
m
like m in me
b/p
like b in be
s
like s in see
ng / silent
silent at start
j
like j in jam
h
like h in he

Step 2 — The Basic Vowels

Vowels are vertical or horizontal strokes. They never appear alone — they attach to a consonant (using silent ㅇ if there’s no consonant sound):

a
father
eo
sun
o
go
u
moon
eu
brr sound
i
see
ㅐ / ㅔ
ae / e
bed
ya
yard
yeo
y+eo
ㅛ / ㅠ
yo / yu
yoyo / you

Step 3 — Stack Letters into Syllable Blocks

Korean doesn’t write letters in a line — it stacks them into square blocks, one block per syllable. Consonant + vowel, with an optional final consonant underneath:

ㄱ + ㅏ = ga
ㅇ + ㅛ = yo
ㅂ + ㅏ + ㅇ = bang
ㅅ + ㅏ = sa

That’s the entire system. Read block by block, left to right.

Step 4 — Read Real Evidence

These words all appear in Case 1: The Red-Stained Script. Sound them out block by block:

가요
ga-yo
I’m going (polite)
기다려
gi-da-ryeo
wait! (casual)
사건
sa-geon
case / incident
증거
jeung-geo
evidence
대본
dae-bon
script
빨간
ppal-gan
red
Now read the actual burner text
지금 가요. 방에서 기다려.
ji-geum ga-yo. bang-e-seo gi-da-ryeo. — “I’m coming now. Wait in the room.”
You just read the message that cracks Case 1. Notice anything odd about how polite it starts… and how it ends? That contradiction is the whole game.

You Can Read Korean. Now Use It.

You don’t need more drills — you need a reason to read. In the free case, every Korean word is clickable, your notebook saves what you learn, and your linguistics partner explains the grammar behind every lie.

Crack Your First Case →

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