Chapter 121
Chapter 121
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 121
Chapter Title: Breaking the Cartel (5)
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This world isn't a fairy tale or a novel.
That's why it doesn't end like they do, with all the villains wiped out and the good people living happily ever after.
The mess I'm dealing with right now is a perfect example.
Part of me wants to use this chance to sweep away every last one of those merchant bosses, but if I killed them all...
Joseon's commerce would grind to a halt in an instant.
Just like how a heart stopping even briefly means death, the fallout would deliver a devastating blow to the Joseon economy.
Even thriving companies in the modern world go under from a single delayed payment—just one day—leading to unbearable losses or outright bankruptcy. It happens all the time.
With Joseon's population nearing ten million, it wouldn't be much different.
"Ha, my heart's a tangled mess."
I'd come to the Executive Office way earlier than usual because sleep wouldn't come, so there was no one around yet.
That's why I was venting these complicated feelings out loud to myself...
When suddenly a voice came from behind.
"What's got you so troubled?"
For a split second, I thought it was a ghost.
There was still a full two hours until the regular office hours, so no one should have been here, yet I'd heard a voice.
Thank goodness, though—the voice I heard wasn't a ghost's.
It was Chief State Councillor Hwang Hee, who'd dumped over 80% of his work on me and achieved the leisure of a regimental chief warrant officer.
"What brings you here so early, Chief State Councillor?"
"My wife caught me secretly making fruit punch with a heap of her precious candy—sugar—and gave me an earful. So I figured I'd just come to work early. By the time the day's done, her anger should have cooled, right? And if we wrap up quickly, I can head home a bit sooner too."
"I see."
At my response, Hwang Hee launched into a aggrieved lament, as if he'd been waiting for it.
"Kim Scribe, you'll understand when you reach my age. Eating becomes the only real pleasure left. Yet here I am, too old to retire, slaving away at work. To forget my woes, I made some fruit punch with sugar, and she chews me out for it. Can you believe that?"
In Joseon, sugar was treated as something incredibly precious.
Especially in the early days like now, it was so rare that even the king struggled to obtain it no matter how hard he tried.
Queen Soheon, on her deathbed, expressed a craving for sugar, prompting King Sejong and King Munjong to hound their officials, yet they still couldn't get any. That's how rare it was.
But after I kickstarted trade through Jeju Island—selling off pirate loot—sugar became fairly common.
What used to require offering silver of equal weight, give or take some exaggeration, was now much easier to procure.
The price had dropped to about one seom of rice per doe of sugar.
Also, early Joseon still carried Goryeo's influence, so women had considerable rights—nothing like the notion that men were the heavens and women lowly things.
Women had inheritance rights to family property, and you couldn't just ignore your principal wife without cause. Depending on the situation, even getting an earful was fair game.
"Why are you looking at me like that? You might think I have it easy, lounging through work, but the Deputy Chief State Councillor and I are constantly racking our brains over state affairs. Yesterday, I even thought about calling in sick..."
"I haven't said a word, Chief State Councillor."
Hwang Hee looked at me and let out a sigh.
"Never mind me—what brings you here so early, Kim Scribe?"
"I heard from my father-in-law about the horrific things the market guild merchants are up to. I couldn't sleep thinking about how to handle it."
In truth, I already had a rough plan for dealing with those bastards.
The moment I heard the story, it hit me: this is how we'll do it.
That's why I'd come early to draft an outline, get approval from Jo Mal-saeng or Hwang Hee, and submit it to King Sejong.
Just like during my undercover inspector days, I planned to keep the whole thing off the official record.
"Even a blank sheet of paper is lighter when shared, as they say. No matter how talented you are, Kim Scribe, there's a limit to what one man can do alone. And the Chief State Councillor isn't about leading the charge—it's more important to listen to the other officials' grievances and opinions, then sort them out."
"Then may I seek your wisdom on this, milord?"
"Of course, speak freely."
Hwang Hee looked relieved, like a weight had lifted.
Good, so you do realize you're dumping everything on me except the truly critical stuff.
"Well, it's like this..."
I spilled everything Kim Man-deok had told me about the market guild merchants' atrocities.
Those so-called grand merchants of the guilds were buying up all the land in newly developing areas of Hanyang, stuffing them with their relatives to monopolize the capital's commerce.
If that happened, developing Hanyang would just enrich those merchants, and in the worst case, they'd control commerce across all eight provinces of Joseon.
Worse, within decades, the Joseon court could end up tiptoeing around Hanyang's grand merchants.
Hwang Hee furrowed his brow as he took it all in.
Then the worst curse in common use in Joseon slipped from his lips.
"Those Goryeo-haunted sons of bitches... Rebel scum who deserve their skulls crushed under iron flails and drawn and quartered on the spot."
I'd heard Yi Bang-won called Goryeo-haunted scum, and now it seemed that phrase had stuck as an insult in Joseon.
If even Chief State Councillor Hwang Hee used it.
"That's not all. The real outrage is something else."
"Something worse than this?"
"The biggest rice dealer in the grain shops, a guy named Kim Jang-seok, pooled money from the other grain merchants and cornered the entire rice supply coming into Hanyang through Incheon."
"...... You're saying they cornered rice, of all things?"
Cornering the market—plainly put, they'd colluded to buy up every last grain.
Until they sold, no rice would reach Hanyang. Whatever price they demanded became the going rate.
Rice normally went for two bolts of cotton cloth per seom; with their hoarding, they'd demand four or five, and everyone would have no choice but to pay up through gritted teeth.
"That's exactly what the Goryeo nobility did. Monopolized everything for themselves and gave the people just enough not to starve. In the end, all the land in Goryeo became theirs. Just like the grain merchants, the other guild merchants are up to similar schemes."
"Yes, milord."
"Part of me wants to petition His Highness to charge them all as rebels and punish them severely. But that would cause irreversible damage."
Hwang Hee let out a deep sigh and groaned.
"It'd be like burning down the whole house to catch one rat. Worse, Joseon's laws don't even cover punishing them."
"We could punish them anyway, even without specific laws, but it's best not to set that precedent."
In a 21st-century rule-of-law state, even if everyone agrees it's a crime, without precedent or a grounding statute, they're acquitted.
The judge grinds their teeth declaring innocence, and the legislature scrambles to pass a new law.
But in Joseon, they could hit them with contempt of court and punish harshly anyway.
'Everyone knows that's bad, but they do it regardless.'
"I think we should sternly warn everyone except that grain dealer and let it go."
"Yes, I agree."
"The people hold food as sacred as the heavens—tampering with it is no different from rebellion."
That much was fine.
But as long as the market guild organization existed, there was no guarantee this wouldn't happen again.
A thoroughly closed, hereditary group could never be healthy.
"How about using this chance to dissolve the market guild organization altogether? Then have the state manage commerce directly."
"...... We'd be short on managers."
"Recommend a few literate merchants from the guilds to His Highness for special appointments, giving them a chance to serve king and country. And increase the number selected in the Great Examinations."
"...... The Literary Exam is already held once a year, selecting a hundred each time."
"We need even more. For Joseon's eternal glory."
Hwang Hee nodded and gave me a sly grin.
"Convince the Minister of Finance yourself, Kim Scribe."
"How could a lowly scribe like me..."
"...... Then you'll just have to become a senior official. Perfect—I'll petition His Highness to create a Rank 3 post in the Executive Office. That solves everything. Yes, I've been annoyed by you in that blue robe for a while now. This is ideal."
"I'll go talk to him myself."
"See? If you'd been this agreeable from the start, how nice it would be? No need to wear out my mouth."
Back when I was head of the inspection office, I thought I could pull it off, but here in the Executive Office, I'm just a bottom-rung bureaucrat...
Asking me to convince the Minister of Finance.
"I'll petition His Highness directly with what we discussed, requesting complete secrecy. Now, how exactly should we proceed?"
I laid out for Hwang Hee how to resolve this without any backlash.
And right before leaving the office, I got his verbal approval.
So I promptly summoned those so-called grand merchants of the guilds to my house.