The Realm of the Gods (1)
Standing before the long gate, Taesu declared the first step of his grand design for a united Bobusang.
“With the consent of everyone here, we’ll abolish the Chaimbang.”
The reason a second-ranking branch had been necessary in the first place, apart from the main headquarters at Kaesong’s Chaimbang, was simple.
Kaesong lay north of Seoul, the biggest consumer city in the country.
Even a Bobusang from the Three Southern Provinces could unload everything at Songpa Market no matter how far he traveled. If he had already turned his goods into cash in the capital region, the sensible thing was to return south, where the market was familiar, and sell them there.
That was why a branch on a par with the headquarters—another second branch—had been needed in southern Gyeonggi.
Which meant the Kimryangjang branch itself was still important.
The “Chaimbang” Taesu intended to eliminate was not the Kimryangjang branch itself, but the warped structure known as the Chaimbang.
So Taesu decided to give the Kimryangjang branch a different status instead.
“Henceforth, the vice-leader of the Kimryangjang branch shall be chosen by a majority vote of all the branches in Gyeonggi, excluding Songdo and Ganghwa.”
The Kimryangjang branch would no longer be merely the “nation’s second branch.” It would become the Grand Branch of Gyeonggi.
And not just Gyeonggi.
Instead of splitting the headquarters in two, weakening its focus for no reason while failing to control the provinces at all, each province across the nation would be given an official head, like a provincial governor serving under the king.
Only that head would be allowed to report to the Chaimbang and receive orders from it.
In other words, all the branches in Gyeonggi would now have to listen carefully to the words of the Kimryangjang branch, which until now they had not exactly treated with much respect.
At the very least, if they wanted more of Park Axe’s leather shoes.
From now on, the Chaimbang would deal with Gyeonggi’s affairs only through the Kimryangjang branch.
Creating authority where none existed did not necessarily require some elaborate conspiracy.
When you wanted to raise authority but had no material to work with, you could simply eliminate the authority of everyone else who had once been equal to you; that alone could elevate the center. Authority, too, was a resource, and scarcity applied to it.
It was the same logic behind the early state’s dispatch of local magistrates across the country, and later the Sejong-era law banning subjects from filing criminal suits against officials—a sweeping confiscation of judicial power from the people.
* * *
In Joseon, each provincial governor was given the title of baek, just like a feudal marquis.
That was why the governor of Gyeonggi was called the Gyeobaek.
Knowing that origin story, Cha Un-hong also gave Kimryangjang’s new vice-leader a splendid name.
“Then the first Gibanseo—chosen by the men of Kimryangjang, the Gyeobang, the premier branch of Gyeonggi—shall be Lee Chunhwa, who served twenty-seven years as a public official and has long experience, and who earlier stood up to that cruel magistrate and kept to the proper path.”
Applause rolled through the crowd.
Im In-son, who had just been reminded of the alternate title for the governor of Chungcheong, the Hobaek, felt his heart leap at the thought of becoming a Hobanseo.
The person Taesu had originally intended to “recommend” as Gibanseo was, in fact, Yi Seong-nyeo.
There were surely many people who had suffered under Kim Seong-hwa, but if Taesu had to name one in particular who wanted revenge, it would have been Yi Seong-nyeo. That suited his values perfectly.
But before even getting to the matter of the Joseon widow’s reputation, from which no Bobusang could truly escape, Yi Seong-nyeo herself turned down the recommendation.
“I may be close with the merchants here, but I’ve only been out on the road for less than five years. Someone with longer service and a fuller grasp of the work ought to take the post.”
Unless Yi Seong-nyeo had been out there swinging an axe at French troops like Taesu, it would have been hard to overcome simple seniority.
So Lee Chunhwa, now Gibanseo, decided that the first business of the new branch would be dealing with Kim Seong-hwa’s remnants.
Since the gate was right there, there was no need to prepare anything else.
The people of Kimryangjang praised the vice-leader’s efficient handling of affairs. Before long, the sound of blows and the wailing of the beaten filled the air.
Even as that was happening, the reform kept moving forward.
“With this Kimryangjang Gibanseo as the first among them, the vice-leaders of the eight provincial branches will become members of the Paldo Dojung that the Dobansu will establish in Songdo.”
Cha Un-hong introduced the function of the Paldo Dojung—the highest council of the Bobusang nationwide.
“Through it, the Dojung may vote on proposals, or put forward new ones, including the election of the next Dobansu.”
The people were astonished by the sheer power of that authority.
Yet it carried a more important implication.
The Bobusang, which until now had aimed for direct democracy, was shifting to a representative system.
That was not necessarily regression.
Looking at the practices that had produced a democratically elected vice-leader like Kim Seong-hwa, or a Dobansu selected through a process roughly equivalent to “gather up a bunch of idle layabouts,” direct democracy was not automatically a wonderful thing.
The Bobusang’s direct democracy was, at best, the level of an ancient Greek neighborhood meeting.
Turning that into an organized system of delegation and concentration could, depending on your mood, be called not a step backward but progress.
And the Bobusang of Kimryangjang and Wonhongju Yukgun Sangmusa were currently in the right mood to support Taesu.
“If we don’t clamp down on maniacs like Kim Seong-hwa, more of them will just keep popping up.”
“Until now, because the Dobansu was a yangban, everyone handled their own affairs. But now the Dobansu is Park Axe, a merchant of real standing—who’s going to talk back?”
The goods Taesu had brought to southern Gyeonggi were a Sputnik shock to the craft industries of the age. Europe still made most things, including guns, by hand.
Steam engines, giant warships, and mighty cannons did not actually impress the Bobusang all that much.
How exactly were they supposed to carry such things, and to whom were they supposed to sell them? Sure, they could fleece King Gojong and charge him an outrageous price, but even Gojong, genius of embezzlement that he was, had limits.
In terms of the overall market, shoes, pipes, gloves, needles, scissors, and the like dwarfed them all. Even if you added up every great defense contractor in the twenty-first century, they still wouldn’t be able to beat a single Walmart.
In the long run, southern Gyeonggi might be able to reclaim the logistics hub position that had been stolen by the capital region after the Shinhae trade liberalization.
Kimryangjang was not a conquered loser.
It was an ally that would gain the most by recognizing the scale of the Dobansu’s ambitions and cooperating first.
* * *
The first force to propose an alliance to Taesu, however, had not actually been Kimryangjang.
Im In-son of the Chungcheong-based Wonhongju Yukgun Sangmusa, who had endured with almost superhuman patience, caught Taesu the moment the crowd began to disperse.
“No, didn’t you say you’d sell those marvelous goods to us too? If you unload everything in Kimryangjang, what are we supposed to take back with us?”
Taesu answered calmly.
“Of course I’ll set aside goods for the Wonhongju Yukgun Sangmusa as well.”
“Really? It doesn’t look like there’s anything left in the carts at all…”
“That’s only if you mean the things we’re carrying with us.”
“Ah, so you had a convoy follow behind?”
Im In-son, who had assumed Taesu had rushed here because of Kim Seong-hwa, tilted his head.
He had not seen any such convoy. Roads in Joseon were what they were; if there had been one, he would have noticed it somewhere along the way, or at the very least heard about it at an inn.
Taesu shook his head.
“No. Hongju was a seaside town, wasn’t it?”
It certainly was. In the original history, the Erigon commanded by Admiral Cecil, who had not yet been throttled or booted in the ass, had come there directly.
Im In-son drew in a sharp breath.
“Don’t tell me—!”
That was exactly it.
“I had the seamen I knew from my Ganghwa days bring the goods by ship.”
Just as Taesu had first thought when he brought only Cha Un-hong with him, he could not directly command all of Songdo Chaimbang’s human resources.
But the Ganghwa Bobusang First Fleet that Taesu had established when seizing the Goerido metal industrial complex, along with Fleet Admiral Kim Sun-won, were his personal assets. There was no problem.
In terms of efficiency for hauling cargo, ships and foot travel weren’t even in the same league.
“Once the Chungcheong branch is formed and you’re elected Hobanseo, let’s discuss opening up some of the Wonhongju Yukgun Sangmusa branches on the coast as well.”
Of course, in Chungcheong too, goods that had been unsellable because of the inquisition could now be easily carried into Gyeonggi.
Taesu intended to overturn even the Bobusang’s basic identity as land merchants.
* * *
Im In-son, however, did not simply marvel at the ideas of a modern man.
For the entire journey south from Kimryangjang to Hongju in Chungcheong Province, the worry he repeated over and over was the kind any Joseon man would naturally have.
“Who doesn’t know that ships are faster? But don’t you understand why we travel on foot to do business? Because unless you’re a major merchant prince, using ships doesn’t turn a profit!”
Yi Seong-nyeo, too, voiced her hesitation.
“Not just the cost of hiring the ship and paying the sailors—the coast off Hongju is a place where even boatmen who’ve barely dried the birth water from their backs end up as drowned ghosts by the dozen. Why would you do something so dangerous?”
The words of these two, born and raised in Chungcheong, were worth listening to.
Cha Un-hong, who had naturally known from the start about Taesu’s fleet departure, also seemed newly troubled.
“Sure, unless you’re one of those big merchant houses like the Han River merchants making dozens of huge ships bigger than warships… The boats from Ganghwa are only fishing boats at best.”
Still, the three of them could draw a measure of reassurance from Taesu’s unshaken expression.
Park Axe must have some plan.
But if they had known what was really in Taesu’s mind, a person like Cha Un-hong would have bitten him right then and there.
Taesu himself was worried too.
The only difference was that he knew one additional reason for the danger.
The Mountain Spirit said with pompous arrogance, [Hah. The idiots of the mortal world are making quite a racket over nothing. Tell them to stop fretting and hurry to the Hongju branch to fetch the goods that will actually pay for their trouble.]
Taesu couldn’t, in good conscience, pass along advice he himself didn’t understand.
It really is okay, right? Come to think of it, Kim Sun-won didn’t say anything about rough seas either.
[After all you’ve seen of his skill at handling a ship, and you still don’t know? He didn’t complain because he believed he could manage it.]
So you’re telling me to trust only Kim Sun-won?
[No. Trust me.]
Yeah, as if. You said you’re on bad terms with the Dragon King, didn’t you?
[Tricking fools who think they can take out their liver and stuff it back in again is child’s play. Once the proper offerings are made, there is always a way. Do as I say and nothing more.]
Gods were dead. They could all go die, for all he cared.
And yet Taesu had no other choice.
Though he told them not to worry, the sight of his companions truly not worrying at all made him feel guilty the entire way to Hongju.
As Taesu merely watched the porters in silence, the group reached the sea off Hongju.
Taesu said they should break out some of the newly abundant cash and put together a generous drinking table.
Im In-son, who had briefly separated from the group, returned from the Hongju branch with the trade payment—and with that very “drinking table.”
What followed was an affair so spectacular that Taesu was glad, at the very least, he had not brought the others—especially Choi Yang-up—to see it.
At the sea off Hongju, famous as the Bermuda Triangle of Joseon transport ships, a Sea God Rite was carried out with great pomp and vigor.
A pig’s head, snacks, dried fish, and clear rice wine were laid out in grand style.
Colorful ribbons tied to a tree fluttered in the wind, striking the forehead of the General Sea God statue. Since this was a seaside village, the materials happened to be on hand.
Cha Un-hong and Im In-son looked at each other.
“W-what in the world is this? Was the Dobansu once a shaman?”
“I did hear he once lived as a wandering un and su…”
“What kind of absurd nonsense is this, monk or shaman? Is that Guan Yu? It is Guan Yu, right?”
With the blue dragon blade in hand and that great beard, he was more or less Guan Yu.
Whether because he had drowned Wu Zhen’s Seven Armies or for some other reason, Guan Yu surprisingly picked up a lot of side jobs as a sea god.
He was a widely worshiped sea deity all across the Yellow Sea region, honored in both China and Joseon. That was why Im Gyeong-eop, whose fame trailed behind a foreign general-god, got demoted to the lower category of the god of anchovies.
Cha Un-hong racked her modern knowledge for a rational explanation.
“T-this is, well, that is to say… Before the envoys depart from Dongnae, don’t they also pray for the country’s safety?”
“When are you even talking about—the era of the envoys? Still, I suppose it’s the same thing: a rite before a hard sea journey, meant to comfort the boatmen. So I guess we can just eat?”
“That must be it. Maybe the branch head prepared this to put our minds at ease since we were worried.”
Having agreed on that story, the two of them reassured the members of the Wonhongju Yukgun Sangmusa.
The “rational explanation” was that the ship was unquestionably coming, and that this event of Park Axe’s was simply a ceremonial comfort for the comrades.
Besides, Joseon always held Sea God rites even when launching domestic transport ships. Park Axe’s leadership, harmonizing tradition with necessity, left people in admiration.
The explanation was so persuasive that even Im In-son and Cha Un-hong ended up believing their own words.
Everyone except Taesu ate and drank happily, forgetting their worries.
Yet all the while, there was someone looking at the Sea God rite from a completely different angle than Cha Un-hong or Im In-son.
If she had not met Taesu, she would have been the most powerful shaman in Joseon—the one whom King Gojong would have bestowed with the title of True Shaman King, and who would have ruled the country by sheer force of spirit.
The true, royal-backed “daughter of Guan Yu,” with a legitimacy far firmer than that of some Guan Yinping reborn as a shapeless pretty girl in a random Japanese game.
Yi Seong-nyeo.
Yi Seong-nyeo, staring at Taesu as he smashed the Guan Yu statue with the wooden blue dragon blade it held, her face set in what looked like anger, fell deep in thought.
She arrived at an intuition wholly unrelated to the reasoning of Cha Un-hong or Im In-son.
The ship will arrive safely, no matter what.
Her thought was correct.
Author’s Note
1. The True Shaman King was a shaman who called herself the “daughter of Guan Yu,” and after the Imo Incident she won the favor of King Gojong and Queen Myeongseong by foretelling Min Myeongseong’s return. She wielded power even ministers could not touch, along with a princely title, though the details of her later life are unclear.
The character Yi Seong-nyeo in this novel, as well as her place of origin and her former status as a widow, are all based on legends connected to the True Shaman King. There is no record of her being a Bobusang, though she is said to have associated with peddler groups in works such as Gaekju.
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