(KBS)

The season finale of the runway hit drama "Descendants of the Sun" was watched by 38.8 percent of viewers in South Korea, data showed Friday.

The result was just 1.2 percentage points shy of the much anticipated 40 percent mark. Reaching it would have made the show the first weeknight series to do so in the country since "Moon Embracing the Sun" in 2012.

In Seoul, where the show has been more popular, 44.2 percent of viewers tuned in Thursday night, data by Nielsen Korea showed.

In the 16th and final episode, Dr. Kang Mo-yeon (Song Hye-kyo) reunites with Army Capt. Yoo Si-jin (Song Joong-ki), who went missing a year ago and had been presumed dead, in Uruk, the fictional war-torn country where they worked as a volunteer doctor and the captain of the South Korean special forces, respectively.

"You should come find me in your next life," Kang says at the end, to which Yoo replies, "I promise."

Meanwhile, two episodes of both MBC's "Goodbye, Mr. Black" and SBS's "Please Come Back, Mister" were aired on Thursday after each missed an episode due to South Korea's general elections on Wednesday. They had shared the same time slot as "Descendants of the Sun."

They both ended in single digits -- at 3.8 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively. (Yonhap)