The Deluge of San Policarpo
Spain was the first nation to conquer the New World. It was also the country that first introduced tobacco and tomatoes to Europe. Among the crops from the New World, the chili pepper was embraced with such passion that by the 17th century, it was already being cultivated as two distinct varieties: the spicy pimentón and the sweet pepper.
However, the potato—the most famous New World crop in the 21st century—was thoroughly shunned in Spain. It was known as a poisonous plant that could kill you if eaten incorrectly, and at best, it was considered an ornamental plant grown for its flowers. The idea of eating its tubers was unthinkable.
Even though the natives of the New World used it as a staple food, the primary reason the potato was rejected was that it was a "crop that grows underground"—a form that felt rootless and absent from the Bible. Furthermore, most of the Spanish landscape was too hot and dry for potatoes to thrive.
Unlike the improved potatoes of the 21st century, I tried planting the raw, ancient potatoes of the 17th century, trusting in their wild vitality. But even though potatoes don't require much water, they still need a consistent, albeit small, amount of moisture to grow, so my attempts were doomed to fail.
The Páramo plateau in Spain is a brutal environment where there is no rain in the summer and temperatures frequently drop below freezing in the winter. It was impossible for potatoes to survive here.
As a native of Gangwon-do from the 21st century, I was filled with a yearly desire to plant potatoes—the "base currency" of Gangwon-do. I tried planting them in the high plateau areas nearby, but the barren land, where the dried-out limestone layer was exposed, had absolutely no water-retention capacity, unlike the clay-rich lowlands.
That is why, for the past several years, whenever winter arrived, I sowed the insanely resilient lupine beans in the plateau near the farm. This was the strength that allowed us to survive the 25-year Great Drought; the surviving lupine beans formed colonies among themselves, slowly improving the devastated vegetation and soil.
"Whoops!"
"Watch your step, Capitán. Hehe."
I was climbing the valley toward the plateau with my lupine beans again this year when I slipped on a patch of ice. Even though one of the Tercio brothers caught me, I couldn't hold my balance and ended up buried deep in a snowdrift beside the path. After that struggle, I reached the plateau and discovered a desperate truth.
"We're screwed!"
"What is it, Capitán?"
"Please! God! It has to be cold this year! It cannot be warm! Please!"
Looking at the plateau from the valley, it was a kingdom of snow. I was overcome with an unpleasant sense of déjà vu as I saw the plateau plains filled with more snow than during the flood of '24.
"Let's go down, quickly. I feel like we have to do something."
I tucked the lupine seeds I had brought back into my chest and hurried down the valley path.
In the farming villages of Valladolid, there is a saying: Año de nieves, año de bienes—a year of snow is a year of prosperity.
It is the "common sense" of this era that as the white snow melts, it keeps the fickle Pisuerga River and the small streams that dry up in summer lush and flowing all year round, and that the humid air rising from the river makes the wheat fields healthy even without irrigation.
The rain in November and the heavy snowfall in December, at the end of the 25-year Great Drought, were offering the farmers well-founded hope. In line with the Church's interpretation that God had finally lifted His anger and was preparing a great harvest, the surviving farmers sowed all their seeds without hesitation, praying for a bumper crop next year. Songs of hope echoed through the cities and villages as they welcomed a white Christmas.
Valladolid is a city located in a basin between limestone plateaus, table-like formations called Páramo. Because the terrain is thickly deposited with rich, sticky clay washed down from the plateau, they had been double-cropping wheat every year for centuries, overcoming the side effects and managing to secure a minimum harvest.
The lush riverside vegetable gardens are supplied with water through an irrigation system called a Noria, which has been in use since the Middle Ages, providing fresh vegetables and fruits to the citizens of Valladolid, the high city of the Empire.
Although wheat production had dropped significantly during the recent drought because the water level had fallen too low to turn the Noria, it was at least enough to provide minimal food for the 20,000 citizens of Valladolid.
"......It's raining at this time of year, and at night?"
January and February are close to the coldest time of year in Spain. It should be a time of biting winds, but after days of torrential rain, the river was visibly rising. And as I faced the sudden winter downpour that began at night, I intuited a great catastrophe.
"Hey! Quixote! Wake everyone up! Tercio brothers! Secretary! Everyone, get up!"
I woke everyone up and had them carry torches. I loaded the twice-baked bread and leather bags filled with wine—which was closer to vinegar—that I had prepared in advance onto the backs of the cows, horses, and donkeys, and finally organized the village. I trusted the granary, which had been built with a thick foundation of one meter underground and one meter above ground on the highest hill in the village, to hold our most precious wheat and seeds. I shut the door tight and sealed it by piling earth up to the top of the doorframe.
'Damn it. I believe in you! Masters of the Stonemason's Guild.'
Trusting the words of the Stonemason's Guild, who claimed they had poured more devotion into this granary than a cathedral, I shouted to the people gathered in the village square.
"From now on, take only people, food, and the absolute essentials! And hold onto the cows and animals tightly as we climb!"
"W-what is happening, Captain?"
I ignored the farmers expressing their doubts and led them forward.
"I take responsibility! Now! One step for safety! Two steps for priority!"
-Rumble!
Piercing through the rain with lightning striking, we climbed the valley toward the nearest plateau. The valley stream was already swelling, and I gripped the 'Don Quixote' seeds I had tucked in my chest and said,
"Safety!"
"Priority!"
As I led the chant, the people followed. I grabbed the youngest child in the village and shouted,
"Louder!"
"Safety!"
"Priority!"
After walking for a long time through the downpour, we reached a small plateau about 30 meters higher than the village. It was too far to go to the 200-meter-class plateau, but because it was a small plateau, the valley water was less than at other plateaus, making it easier to climb.
"Men, start a fire, and wives, get the water on the stove. Brothers, please manage this area!"
"Hey! Bring the firewood!"
Under the shouts of the Tercio brothers, who had now increased to five, the farmers scurried about. In the makeshift hut we had prepared two weeks in advance, there was a pile of dry firewood we had barely managed to secure. Struggling to build a fire before their bodies, soaked in the cold winter rain, lost all heat, they finally managed to light it through the rain. We herded the cows, horses, and donkeys under the roof of the temporary hut, which was less than 30 pyeong, and people and beasts alike huddled together, staring at the single bonfire.
As I watched them light the wood and put water on the copper cauldron we had struggled to carry from the village, I saw the river below the plateau turning into a sea. The muddy water, mixed with melted snow and silt, was sweeping away everything in its path—people and animals alike.
There is an old saying that among watching a fight, a fire, and a flood, you only get to see a flood once in your life. The terrifying torrent of muddy water sounded like a dragon roaring.
"Huh?"
I was watching the water blankly when I discovered something on the valley path we had climbed. At first, I thought it was a blanket that had been swept down, but looking closely, I saw it was a person.
"Hey! Wake up!"
I followed the valley down, dragged her—limp as waterlogged cotton—out of the water, and climbed back up. Wearing a chemise made of soft, fine linen that reached her ankles, she was as pale as a corpse. I lifted her cold, lifeless body like a sack of flour and walked up the valley step by step, and before I knew it, the Tercios who had followed me were helping me carry her.
"Bring more firewood here!"
While the Tercios were building the fire, I laid her down in the hut I had built by raising the ground and erecting walls to store food. She remained unconscious, but when I pressed my ear to her chest, I could hear her heart beating—faintly, thump-thump.
It was dangerous, but a makeshift stove was soon built inside the hut, and a bonfire was lit. I called the farmers' daughters and wives who had come up with us and had them take off her clothes and wipe her wet body with dry cloths.
"Capitán! Capitán! Something's wrong!"
I had just breathed a sigh of relief and was counting the number of other farmers and Tercios when one of the farmers' daughters in the food storage hut ran over and called me.
"What's wrong?"
"S-she! The lady isn't breathing!"
"What!?"
At those words, I rushed into the hut.
There, the women were surrounding the naked woman, rubbing her limbs and slapping her cheeks, not knowing what to do.
"Oh, damn it..."
Should I try CPR? I'm not confident! Damn it, why did God send a useless farmer like me to this era? If He had sent a genius medical student or a 50-year veteran professor, they wouldn't be struggling to farm in this piece-of-shit land, but living as a "god of medicine!"
"What do we do! What do we do!"
When one woman burst into tears, I got annoyed as everyone started crying and making a racket.
"I get it, so everyone get out for a moment. Tercio! Strictly forbid anyone from entering this area for the next day!"
"Yes! Capitán!"
As I shouted, ordering the women out, the Tercios responded with disciplined postures, growling and controlling even the people who tried to look this way.
In the empty hut, left behind by the crying farmers' daughters, only the woman with skin as white as lavender and the crackling bonfire revealed their presence under the sound of the pouring rain.
After first scraping out the mud from her mouth, I attempted CPR, but something felt blocked. I tried to recall my memories of serving in the Korean military decades ago, and when I felt something catch, I grabbed the limp, corpse-like woman from behind.
And when I gave a sharp, forceful thrust using the Heimlich maneuver, she spat out a mouthful of water and mud. Only then did her breathing return, and once I saw that, the woman's naked body came into view.
"If this were Korea, I'd already be in jail just for this."
I first wiped the filth off the woman's body, covered her with a cloth dried by the fire, and repeatedly dried the wet cloths. After about two hours of this, her body temperature had returned to some degree, so I called two of the farmers' daughters to nurse her in my place.
Under the makeshift hut in the pouring rain, Taliya and Aventador got along without fighting. I fell asleep standing up, feeling the warmth of the two horses.
The torrential rain that had lasted all night stopped, and by the afternoon, the sun rose as if it had never rained at all. However, the flooding below the plateau had not yet subsided.
King Philip IV sent relief funds to Valladolid, but due to the corruption of bureaucrats and administrative paralysis, very little actually reached the farmers. They fought over a handful of salt, ate rotten meat, and died, and later, Valladolid became a forgotten, abandoned city that even lost the glory of having been the capital of the Empire.
Countless people died across Spain, and tens of thousands of refugees lost their homes. Stone bridges that would take decades to build one by one were all smashed, completely paralyzing the already difficult transportation in the Spanish interior. Wheat harvests were halved overall, and in some areas, it wasn't a 10 percent drop, but regions where only 10 percent of the harvest remained appeared one after another. With relief supplies unable to be transported due to collapsed bridges, people starved to death in droves.
Later, people would call the Great Flood of 1626: Riada de San Policarpo—the year God abandoned Spain.
Author's Note
Finally, the climax of 17th-century Spanish misery. The great catastrophe that remained in history, "The Despair of San Policarpo," has arrived. After this true dragon-level misery, Spain's surplus grain production capacity truly became zero, losing its supply capability, and they had to spend all the silver brought from the New World on grain imports. As a result, the Tercio, which had maintained its dignity as the absolute invincible force until the Siege of Breda, was destroyed.
Of course, in Juan Manuel's worldview, the Dutch front was never opened, but...