The Six Chickens Take Flight (1)
Before paying his respects to the Queen Dowager Insun, Yi Yeon dashed around Gyeongbokgung Palace. Shin Rip followed closely behind him. Thanks to years of steady height-training, he had shot up like a bamboo stalk, and now he was pushing his limits with running to build both strength and stamina. "My high-school PE teacher used to say that youth's endurance lasts a lifetime."
Yi Yeon wiped the sweat from his brow with a brand-new white towel from Kim Yang-bo, then gulped down the ginseng-infused water in one go. "Damn! There are more problems than I can count right now." He missed the soft, plush towel he used to have. After a quick wash, he finished his greeting to Queen Insun and stepped back outside. He looked up at the sky, and the clear autumn blue above him felt impossibly high. "Good harvest...!" Yesterday at the grand council he had heard that the entire country was blessed with a bumper crop and rice prices had fallen. The reason? So much rain in spring. "I can't build a dam yet, but I can make reservoirs." This was the era when food and clothing came first, and rice farming ruled everything, so Yi Yeon decided to fix the irrigation system too. "That means cement." Making cement wasn't easy either. You needed the same scorching temperatures you'd see when melting iron. "Since I can't build a steam engine right away, I'll start with bellows powered by oxen. Or maybe water wheels."
Yi Yeon admired the ingenuity of the court officials who had built the artificial hatching facility on Inghwado. He had sketched the design himself and given them detailed instructions, yet their speed still amazed him. Of course he had hired the best artisans money could buy, but without that kind of raw intelligence it would have been impossible. "To think I would actually employ people like that..." How shameful. So Yi Yeon decided to put them to real work. "Just look at Gyeongbokgung. The artisans of Joseon really were extraordinary." The palace had been built around Geunjeongjeon, the hall that decided all state affairs. Above it sat the king's workroom and Gangnyeongjeon, the sacred space. Below, along the wide courtyard, lay Geunjeongmun, Heungnyemun, Gwanghwamun, and the street of the Six Ministries. On the left stood the Jeongjeon, where ministers could freely give their opinions. King Sejong had built the Zaseondang for the crown prince on the right side of Geunjeongjeon, which everyone simply called the Donggungjeon. Because the rising sun was the crown prince, and because it stood to the east of Geunjeongjeon, that was the name. "The auto-clockwork calendar is on another planet." Yi Yeon had seen Stephen's invention himself, but only at Changdeokgung, not Gyeongbokgung. It was the one Sejong had ordered Jang Yeong-sil to make; it broke during Jungjong's time and was repaired, yet still worked perfectly. But the man in charge of repairs, Park Serong, was already gone to the other world, so Yi Yeon could never learn the principles. Besides, there were simply too many tasks to chase down old documents. "We need to organize from the ground up." So he divided the officials on Inghwado by specialty and set up a proper structure. "One person doing everything is far less efficient than dividing labor."
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Fifth day of the tenth month, 1567 (Year of his accession)
As autumn reached its peak, the entire Gyeongbokgung Palace glowed in blazing red and golden maple leaves. "Your Majesty, as the saying goes, only after a sovereign has learned from a worthy teacher can he rise to found a kingdom. Even though Hwang Gae had retired for health reasons, no one in this land is his equal. If Your Majesty shows him the deepest respect and treats him as a teacher, he will surely return." "No need." Yi Yeon cut the royal secretary Heo Yeop's plea off in one clean stroke. Heo Yeop's mouth opened and closed in surprise, then Yi Yeon asked, "I heard Your Highness has a very clever daughter. Is that true?" "I have three daughters, Your Majesty. I do not know which one you mean." "The rumors about a child prodigy are everywhere..." Only then did Heo Yeop understand. "She is five years old, but not yet old enough to be called that." "I have one favor to ask." "A favor, Your Majesty? I cannot possibly fulfill it." "Hrmm..." Yi Yeon turned his gaze toward the queen dowager. The faint nod he received made him straighten his posture. "It is not that I ask for an official wife. Because the Queen Dowager has lost her son, she needs a companion. If you could send her your daughter, I would be grateful." "What?!" Yi Yeon gave the stunned Heo Yeop the brightest smile he could manage. Queen Insun, King Myeongjong's consort, had once carried a crown prince but lost him. Now that Yi Yeon himself was acting as her son, and she was only thirty-six, she still had no child to raise. So she was willing to take in any girl and raise her as her own. Yi Yeon had heard about the child prodigy Heo Nanseolheon from Heo Yeop and, after long deliberation, decided to bring her here. "It is better to live with the love of the Queen Dowager than to die miserably." "Sending a young girl will be difficult, but I ask it of you." "I obey, Your Majesty." When the king expressed his sincere desire, Heo Yeop had no choice. After the grand council, Yi Yeon did not return to Gangnyeongjeon but headed straight for the Donggungjeon. When he reached the front of the palace, he turned to Sangsun and said, "Wait here." "Yes, Your Majesty." Sangsun answered without objection, the way he always did now. It had not been that way before. He used to beg to follow, citing danger. But once Yi Yeon made Shin Rip his bodyguard and placed the Seja-eugwi-sa around the Donggungjeon at all times, Sangsun stopped trying. As Yi Yeon entered the palace, the guards and Kim Yang-bo rose in greeting. "We greet Your Majesty." Yi Yeon returned the salutes and asked Kim Yang-bo, "Is everyone here?" "Yes, Your Majesty." Kim Yang-bo, who used to live alone because there was no place for him, was now Yi Yeon's closest confidant. He shared the quarters with the guards in the Gaefang and performed his duties exactly as ordered, never a word of complaint. Yi Yeon smiled, found the man rather charming, and stepped inside the Zaseondang. "We greet Your Majesty." -Thud! The carefully chosen officials slammed their foreheads against the floor in perfect unison. Yi Yeon almost wanted to stop them, but he let them be. It was their way of showing the loyalty they felt for the king who had sheltered them when the palace cast them out. He placed large cushions on the floor to keep their foreheads from hurting. "Lift your heads!" At his command they rose as one. "Education has been excellent." Yi Yeon did not interfere with every movement. All he had to do was give Kim Yang-bo an order and it was corrected. It was faster and more effective. "You have all worked hard." "We are unworthy, Your Majesty." -Thud! Yi Yeon continued without missing a beat. "From now on, your progress as a nation will be decided by what you do. Remember that and give your best to the tasks before you. Do you understand?" "Yes, Your Majesty." Ever since they succeeded in artificial hatching on Inghwado, Yi Yeon had grown even busier. To organize and place people efficiently, he had to plan everything down to the smallest detail, and many nights were spent burning the midnight oil. "It's like I went back to my third-year high-school days." Yet he never felt tired. His young body helped, but the ginseng he drank every morning was the real reason. Yi Yeon studied each official carefully. "They all have fire in their eyes." Kim Yang-bo, acting on his orders, had picked the six most clever and skillful from the officials on Inghwado. He divided them into groups of eleven and assigned each to its proper field. The six best of those sat right in front of Yi Yeon now. "We need to build a gathering place as soon as possible." Gyeongbokgung was enormous, but most of it belonged to the royal family. The empty Donggungjeon was only a temporary solution, and it was far too small to hold everyone at once. "Gathering them all at once for education would be easier. Where should we go?" Changdeokgung and Changgyeonggung on the east came to mind, but Yi Yeon shook his head. "Too far." He could not simply expand the Donggungjeon grounds either. Of course he could, but explaining it one by one would be a headache. "We have no choice. We'll use the site of the former Cheongwadae." The land between Cheongwadae and Gyeongbokgung was said to have been set aside by King Sukjong of Goryeo as a separate palace. When Joseon chose Hanseong as capital, they planned to build Gyeongbokgung there too, but the land was too narrow so they moved south. The site was never truly vacant. In the early Joseon days it belonged to the founding meritorious subjects. During Sejong's time, before the Donggungjeon was built, the army had camped there. Under Sejo it had been used for archery practice. After Queen Munjeong, however, it was simply left empty, a dark shadow of power abuse where she had exiled and executed officials. "Maybe we can turn the whole place into a training ground?" But it was too close to Gyeongbokgung; the sound of gunfire would carry. "No, we stick to the original plan. Only for education and development." Deciding, Yi Yeon spoke firmly. "From now on you will each serve as the head of your own covenant. Listen to me well and manage your members with care. Do you understand?" "Yes, Your Majesty. We will remember." -Thud! Yi Yeon struggled to name the organization. "At first I could call it Team, but..." He decided on something familiar instead. That single choice would later make everyone use the character for "covenant" to mean the character for "chicken." The members of the Six Chickens Yi Yeon organized raised chickens and came from lowly backgrounds, yet their organization would soar through the skies and lay the foundation of Joseon. "First, I will hear the report from the Ironforge Covenant." The head of the Ironforge Covenant slammed his forehead on the floor with a thud and spoke. "As Your Majesty commanded, we are searching for the gold vein with the Second Brother in Mapo." The second brother had left the poultry business and was now looking for gold at the place where Golden Apartments once stood. The covenant head pulled a folded cloth from his sleeve and carefully unfolded it. "Here is the gold nugget we found at the site." "You found it already?" "Yes, Your Majesty. We located the vein far more easily than expected." "Well done." "We are unworthy, Your Majesty." -Thud! The vein buried under Mapo Golden Apartments contained 14.5 grams of gold per ton, nearly five times the 3 grams per ton that made mining profitable. It was on par with the Mu-geuk Gold Mine in Uisong, one of the richest in the peninsula. Yet no one had developed it because environmental issues and the fact that apartments brought in more money. Seeing the vein turn up so quickly, Yi Yeon immediately moved to the next task. "Yang-bo." "Yes, Your Majesty." "Give this business directive to the Ironforge Covenant head." "Yes, Your Majesty." The head again slammed his forehead and received the sealed document with care. "From now on, what you must find is not the gold vein but the money vein. Do you understand?" "Yes, Your Majesty." Ministers would have asked why. The covenant members asked nothing; they simply obeyed. Yi Yeon found it convenient, yet it also frustrated him. Since he could not fix it right away, he let it go. "That does not mean you should ignore gold or silver veins. There is always a money vein beside them. Investigate carefully. Do you understand?" "Yes, Your Majesty." Yi Yeon called the next official. "Iron Covenant head, report." "Yes, Your Majesty." -Thud! * * *