Postwar Cleanup (3)
Just as King Jeongjo's silent purge began in Hanyang, the courtyard in front of the Onseong county office in Hamgyong Province was about to burst from the shouts of yangban filled with rage and greed.
Only three days earlier, when the bandits' blades had set Onseong ablaze, these men had cowered like rats in their storage jars. The blood pooled beneath the walls hadn't even dried yet, but here they were, dressed in impeccably arranged dopos, already banding together to protect their rice bowls.
"Magistrate! What outrageous act is this? There's no precedent since the founding of the nation for investigating the assets and slaves of yangban families down to the last detail!"
"Digging into the backs of loyal families before the scars of war have even healed! If you don't stop this at once, we yangban of Hamgyong Province will submit a petition in unison and report your tyranny to His Majesty!"
Their bellowed protests were nothing but empty pretexts. Men who hadn't dared breathe in the face of the enemy's blades were now rearing up like snakes to defend their privileges the moment safety was assured.
At that moment, the firmly shut doors of the county office's main hall flew open with a bang, and Yi Si-woo slowly stepped out. In his hand was a heavy silver ingot, retrieved from gate captain O Pan-seok's quarters, still stained with fresh blood that hadn't fully dried.
Clang!
Yi Si-woo hurled the ingot mercilessly at the feet of the protesting yangban.
He nudged it with his foot and drove the point home to the yangban, who still glared at him with feigned outrage.
"Precedent? Etiquette? Petitions? You dare let such nonsense spill from your mouths right now?"
Yi Si-woo let out a hollow laugh, fixing a murderous glare on the elderly scholar at the front.
"When the bandits breached the gates and swung their swords, where were all your quotes from Confucius and Mencius? When gate captain O Pan-seok pocketed this silver to open the gates while your wives and children slept, where the hell was your precious etiquette hiding? You cowards who hid in your jars begging for your lives at the enemy's blades—now that your bellies are full, you want to lecture on the foundations of the state?"
"Wh-what insolence is this...! Magistrate, we are the roots of this county, the yangban..."
"Yangban? That title is too good for those who abandoned the people to save their own skins! While my soldiers' guts spilled out defending the walls, you were counting gold bars in your cellars. And now that the dust has settled, you invoke the law? Fine, let's do this by the law."
Yi Si-woo summoned the hojang standing nearby. The old clerk, who knew the county's taxes and ledgers inside out, felt the weight of Yi Si-woo's gaze crash down on his shoulders.
"Hojang! Bring the dusty old ledgers from the office warehouse."
The dust-covered ledgers were dumped onto the hall floor. Yi Si-woo kicked one lightly and eyed the yangban.
"These old ledgers? They're just scraps of paper! Why should I trust records you've falsified with clerks, embezzling land, hiding slaves, and patching with bribes? With the office documents lost in the chaos of war, we'll rewrite the ledgers now with true numbers!"
At Yi Si-woo's roar, the yangban trembled and retreated like aspen leaves.
"Over a hundred men who defended Onseong lie dead. Their vacancies must be filled, and their surviving families fed—from the lands you've hidden and the slaves you've omitted! Starting tomorrow, we'll scour every household register to uncover your concealed assets. Petition if you want."
Yi Si-woo stepped closer, whispering into their ears like the grim reaper himself.
"But before your petition reaches Hanyang's Money Gate, the ledgers of your families' corruption will already be beside the urgent reports I send. Think His Majesty will hesitate to strike the backers of traitors who colluded to open the gates?"
At the word "traitors," the yangban's faces drained to the color of dirt. They instinctively knew their lifelines now rested in the young magistrate's palm.
They held brushes in their hands, but Yi Si-woo held the ledgers that controlled their life and death.
"Burn the ledgers riddled with lies. From now on, every number in Onseong will be reborn under the light of true arithmetic!"
Yi Si-woo quietly commanded the hojang.
"Hojang, begin a full household census and hidden wealth survey across Onseong immediately. Record every grain of rice, every bolt of cloth, every slave head without exception. If anyone resists or falsifies the counts to deceive me, imprison them regardless of rank!"
From the crowd of commoners watching at the courtyard's edge, cheers of "Long live the king!" began to erupt one by one.
"Long live His Majesty! Long live! Long, long live!"
The most honest cry from the populace amid the ruins of war shook Onseong to its core.
Yi Si-woo gazed at the northern sky and gripped the hilt of his sword once more. At last, the first button of modern statistics and the hopo system to reshape Joseon's constitution had been fastened on this blood-soaked soil of Onseong.
With the yangban slinking away pale-faced, the courtyard filled with tense-faced clerks and rough-handed artisans.
Yi Si-woo headed to the workshop set up in one corner of the office. There, the province's famed blacksmiths, carpenters, and mathematically savvy clerks stood in line at his command. Before them lay the blueprints for the massive screw-press oil extractor Yi Si-woo had designed himself.
"Listen well. Onseong's fate now hangs on this single blueprint. Roast the beans, feed them into this machine, turn the screw shaft to press—and pure oil will pour out. Use it to lubricate the meshing gears and pulleys. This is the power that prevents metal from wearing against metal: born from this bean oil."
Yi Si-woo tapped each blacksmith's shoulder as they stood dumbfounded, continuing.
"You blacksmiths will now machine standardized parts per my blueprints. Male and female screws must be interchangeable. A screw from this forge must fit perfectly in that one's machine. Skill isn't a family secret. It must be shared, and standards set. Understood?"
No sooner had Yi Si-woo finished than an elderly master blacksmith shook his head and stepped forward.
"My lord, that's utterly unreasonable! Each blacksmith's touch is different, the forge fire's heat varies every time—how could another's work match mine precisely? Unless ghosts wail, such precision is impossible!"
The surrounding blacksmiths murmured in agreement.
"He's right, my lord. Machining metal is far more delicate than pottery—how can one man's work mesh seamlessly with another's?"
Yi Si-woo replied with unyielding eyes.
"Don't declare it impossible. You think it can't be done because you've lacked standards, not skill. Our finger joints differ, breeding error! From now on, trust not your fingertips, but the markings on the steel rulers I'll distribute. Metal is honest. Machined to exact measure, parts from ten blacksmiths will turn identically in ten machines. I'll make it so."
"M-Magistrate... you mean even the thread depth must match? Though it's not our lifelong way... we'll trust your wisdom and try machining the metal!"
In one corner of the courtyard, freshly harvested mareongseo (potatoes) and beans steamed in cauldrons from early dawn. To a starving populace ravaged by famine and war, the potatoes were a blessing in themselves.
Yi Si-woo picked up a well-cooked mareongseo (potato) and declared.
"Steam half the beans and feed the people till they're full. Use the lees as fodder, the oil-extracted dregs as fertilizer back to the fields. Store the mareongseo (potatoes) coolly—they'll be Onseong's staple this winter. Only full bellies give the strength to wield hammers."
Yi Si-woo's gaze turned to the oil dregs and refining byproducts.
"Mix the oil dregs with wood ash lye and boil. Solidify it into seokgeom (soap) that cleanses body grime and grease. Plague starts in filth—everyone must maintain hygiene with this soap. Even inedible scraps become shields for this county."
The commoners marveled at the solid soap lumps, touching them curiously. The strange concoction of ash lye and oil worked wonders at Yi Si-woo's instruction: soot- and blood-stained hands turned white, and faces holding mareongseo (potatoes) glowed with life.
The refined bean oil's power showed immediately too. Used in torches and lamps, smoke lessened while brightness doubled. Onseong's nights lit like day, and lubricated cranes lifted massive stones effortlessly.
But innovation wasn't smooth.
Boom!
A sudden roar filled the workshop with screams. The iron shaft of Yi Si-woo's screw-press had snapped explosively under the pressure. Shrapnel grazed a blacksmith's shoulder, black bean oil splattering everywhere.
"What happened? Everyone back!"
Yi Si-woo rushed to the scene. The master blacksmith pointed at the broken shaft, veins bulging.
"See, my lord! Iron isn't flexible like wood—it breaks under such force! Our ancestors' mortar method is far safer. This isn't for human hands!"
"The screw threads must be misaligned!" another blacksmith yelled, wiping black oil. "The male screw from another forge doesn't match my female—force skewed to one side! How can humans machine metal to machine-like uniformity every breath? We've lived by fingertip feel—now no tolerance for hair's-breadth error? Are we to become ghosts?!"
Doubt and fear spread through the workshop. Yi Si-woo gripped the broken screw shaft's jagged end, slick with oil. Failure's acrid scent hung heavy, but his eyes sharpened fiercer.
"Don't give up! The shaft broke not from weak steel, but inconsistent properties! Mismatched screws from lack of gauges, not skill! I'll distribute standardized steel gauges tomorrow. We start over!"
"Magistrate... you truly believe these iron lumps will turn?"
"I'll make them turn. No—I'll fill all Joseon with this sound."
Late into the night, under bright bean-oil lamps, Yi Si-woo revised blueprints and gazed out the window. The walls rose stronger in stone; hammer strikes echoed from the workshop. Setting down his brush, he murmured.
"This is just the beginning. In two years, this place will be a fortress of ceaseless steel and machine clamor—Joseon's industrialization hub. Two years... I'll remake this county into Joseon's future completely."
Before Yi Si-woo's eyes unfolded not 18th-century backward Joseon, but the dawn of modernity: smoke-belching factory chimneys, precision gears meshing, blazing forth from Onseong.