Chapter 72. East Asian Welfare Center (1)
After wrapping up his business in Jeju as quickly as he could, Taesu immediately started looking into passage to Tongyeong.
Most of the fleet he had dragged out here would have to be sent back.
That was because the long-haul route stretching from Kaesong all the way to Jeju had to be maintained. For example, even Im Insun, who was presently thrilled to have landed a fat one, would have to return and sell it in Chungcheong Province, then resume the existing overland-and-sea distribution line between Ganghwa and Chungcheong.
If the blood kept circulating, the opened veins would soon close up again.
Taesu’s way of expanding business was adventurous, but his management style was sound. He invested in new ventures only with “spare resources.”
So for this trip to Gyeongsang Province as well, Taesu decided to go with the bare minimum crew.
He gathered up the most expensive goods among Jeju’s trade cargo and split them between one or two ships.
Setting aside the fact that there were so few hands on deck, Taesu wasn’t the sort of man to order others around while he sat back and lounged.
Which was why he ended up having a rather miserable time of it.
“You damned beastly bastard!”
Taesu dragged Porter’s reins along the ground.
Cha Un-hong was handling paperwork at Jeju Songbang, so the physical labor fell to Taesu.
[If you don’t learn anything, your body is the one that suffers…….]
Is that because you’re useless? Didn’t you say you’d gotten strong enough to at least handle writing for me now?
[As I said before, the customs and energies of this place differ too much from those of the mainland and the gods. It’s burdensome to possess your body again. It’s like asking a man with a fever to wrestle.]
Such a master of excuses.
[I’m telling the truth. Besides, for some reason everyone seems furious. They’re saying they couldn’t even sink the boat because it would violate the rules, and then they start threatening me like thugs. I don’t know why, but the gods here seem to hate me.]
You really don’t know why?
[Well, they’re probably just being territorial because I’m from out of town. It can’t be helped, given your lot in life as a wandering peddler.]
……
[If you ever want me to ghostwrite for you again, why not use the axe a little more and beat those fellows into submission? Maybe another foreign horde will wash ashore somewhere?]
“Ghh!”
Taesu couldn’t say any more.
Porter had suddenly dug in his heels again. Taesu’s raw strength was such that few humans could stand against it, but against a beast, it was only so much.
Porter had apparently been reluctant to leave after being left for a while at the state ranch under the care of Jeong Gukseong, the Jeju trade-post manager.
Somehow Taesu had managed to drag him to the shore, but the moment Porter saw the boat he resisted with all his might. The sea route from Gangjin to Jeju must have left a bad taste in his mouth.
In the end, Taesu committed what, in the twenty-first century, would have gotten him publicly shamed on social media as an animal abuser.
He stood on Porter’s left side and yanked him hard toward himself.
When Porter, sneering at the absurdity of a human trying to move him, threw all his weight to the right, Taesu, having waited for exactly that, immediately rammed the donkey in the flank.
It was a body blow much like Cheolsan Strike. Bang! Porter took the combined force of his own momentum and Taesu’s and toppled over.
Ignoring Porter’s shrieks and the cries of everyone around him, Taesu quickly tied his legs together. He got kicked several times in the struggle, but whether it was the adrenaline of rage or all the blood he’d been breathing in, he could still take it.
Then he lifted the donkey whole and hurled it onto the ship.
Well, even a nineteenth-century donkey only weighed around a hundred and twenty kilograms at most. For Taesu now, that wasn’t impossible.
Still, the ordinary Jeju people, who had never once seen a mountain spirit get hacked at with an axe, were deeply shocked.
“I thought the rumor that he kicked Yangseon’s mast in half was nonsense, but now I see he really could do it!”
And, as a bonus, the half-dozen or so horses docilely waiting aboard were equally horrified.
Horses were one of Jeju’s finest specialty goods.
Taesu believed that as long as the ratio of product to price was right, that was all that mattered. The fact that the horses belonged to the king was not, in his view, an obstacle to buying specialty goods.
The state ranch employee Jeong Gukseong agreed.
He had “lost” the horses he’d secretly kept without branding, saving them for just such a time.
The grave crime of poor management could be forgiven, within reason, if he showed “virtue” with the money Taesu gave him.
Confucius himself had said nothing about the horses when the stable caught fire. Therefore, if anyone pried into it, that person was a heretic, not a Confucian—and for heretics, there was only death.
And the horses, being wiser than most people, agreed as well.
They decided not to provoke Taesu, who had just beaten a donkey half to death as a demonstration case.
That greatly reduced the risk of anyone suddenly leaping overboard or ruining the cargo and the passengers on the way. Taesu’s suffering hadn’t been for nothing, after all.
As Taesu stood there huffing and puffing, someone approached him.
It was Kim Sangro, the man who would take charge of the boats departing Jeju after Kim Sunwon, Im Insun, and the others returned.
He was another of the yeok’gogyok, the laborers assigned to boatwork.
He had plenty of experience in many places and was fluent in mainland speech. Joseon, too, had a concept of standard speech, so people in official fields did not use dialect.
And yet Taesu still couldn’t make sense of Kim Sangro’s words.
“The Dobansu’s spirit in sweeping up the Eokjinhaebok and charging straight through all directions is truly the vast, righteous qi. As Mencius once praised the ancient hero Bukkung Yu, who was slightly less than the Dobansu, that vast, righteous qi is supremely great and supremely firm, filling all between heaven and earth [saketheavenandearth]—so how could it be left behind just because this is a strange foreign land?”
A moment later, Taesu scowled.
“What are you talking about? Say it in plain language.”
“Ah, s-sorry. I heard rumors that, despite your young age, you possess learning fit to be compared with Master Chusa……”
Taesu chose not to deny it, and by keeping silent, he got called a fraud by the Mountain Spirit.
Kim Sangro hurriedly spoke in ordinary terms.
“You’re headed to Gyeongsang Province this time, but you’ll keep using ships for business in the future as well, won’t you?”
“Yes. I’ll be counting on you.”
“Not at all. That being so, might you have any intention of sending ships abroad? The state forbids it, so I can’t say this openly, but Jeju is a place where many foreigners drift ashore to begin with.”
Taesu brightened. He hadn’t expected so many people in Joseon to be this open to foreign trade.
Still, as Kim Sangro said, this was not something to shout about in public. Taesu asked carefully, “Do you know of any such place?”
“I’ve actually been to China. I came back just recently.”
China, at least, was already connected through de Thierry and Kim Dae-geon.
But Taesu wasn’t disappointed. Diversifying trade was always welcome.
“Anything there worth money? Aside from opium.”
“Ha ha. If you want profit without any upfront cost, there’s something even better than opium.”
I knew something was fishy from that point on.
There’s no such thing as a free lunch.
Besides, there’s no product with a higher value added than drugs. Among goods that can be mass-produced, that was the most expensive of all.
In other words, it wasn’t a “product” at all.
“What is it?”
“Do you know that in China they provide relief to ships that drift ashore?”
“We do that too.”
“But the benevolence of a great empire is different. If you make it to Zhejiang Province and then claim you were adrift, the money you get is far more profitable than working yourself to the bone in trade.”
“……”
“These days, the rates are three times more generous than they used to be. I myself received a full three hundred nyang just for my boat fare. They feed you chickens and ducks, lamb, and even wine till you’re stuffed, and they comfort you with cotton cloth and silver coins as well.”
“……”
At this point, I didn’t even feel like condemning welfare fraud anymore.
Choe Je-u at least had gone safely to the magistrate’s office and collected his payout.
Come to think of it, I had heard of similar cases back in my own hometown too.
I’d heard it over drinks from a Dongchang guy who moonlighted as a broker—stories about North Koreans living in South Korea.
South Korea, of course, provides welfare for defectors, but many still struggle to make ends meet.
It’s not really about adapting to capitalism or anything like that, but for the same reasons as low-income people like me who were born in South Korea: they were born without any capital to begin with.
Among them, a few especially international types allegedly flew off to Norway or Britain, claimed they had just defected from North Korea, and received welfare as political refugees. I don’t know if it was true or just bragging, but they said that if you talked well enough, they’d even give you a house.
Still, these Joseon people had more audacity than those people from that Joseon, because they were pulling this stunt in little rowboats with no engine at all.
Looking at the fact that Kim Sangro even called it a “rate,” it seemed to be a thoroughly institutionalized trick.
“But never, under any circumstances, say you’re from Jeju. The officials in the various countries around here have often slaughtered shipwrecked people and stripped them clean before wiping their hands of it, so everyone tries to kill any Jeju person on sight. Especially Annam—they’re grinding their teeth because they believe their prince was killed in Jeju.”
I looked around me. The Jeju summer scenery, which I had just moments ago thought so innocent and beautiful, suddenly began to look very different.
“If you get past that, then even if they inwardly know you’re lying about being shipwrecked, they’ll still let it slide. After all, if they punish foreigners, the officials have all sorts of bothersome procedures to go through.”
“……Then what about our side? What if you come back to Joseon and get caught?”
“Why, then it’s public execution. Even about ten years ago, there was a fellow named Goh Hanrok whose head was cut off.”
“Don’t even dream about it and start loading the cargo.”
Incredible. Such simple-minded Joseon bastards.
They weren’t trying to cheat me; they were explaining everything honestly and still letting it slide. No wonder he had so much sailing experience.
But Kim Sangro still didn’t know when to quit, apparently eager to get slapped.
He spoke the same way my hometown broker friend had once tried to talk me into joining his business.
“Oh, that’s only because the fool was stupid. If he went four times, like a harvest, every three or four years like clockwork, of course people would get suspicious. If you do it right, even the ghosts won’t know.”
Even I didn’t know that. I wonder if the Dragon Kings knew?
“In truth, it was only because the ships were foreign back then that people were startled. As for Japanese or Chinese people, they come so often now that some places don’t even report it to the mainland court anymore—that’s Jeju for you.”
I clenched my fist. I was about to smash his face in, just like that broker bastard.
[You’re in the middle of secretly trading on Seogeomdo, and now you’re getting angry about this? I truly can’t make sense of your principles.]
But it was Kim Sangro’s next words, not the Mountain Spirit’s nonsense, that stopped my fist.
“The court only cares about taking the expensive local goods from here and doesn’t care whether we starve or get killed by bandits. We have to live somehow.”
I didn’t think that made it right.
But compared with people like this, just how righteous was the government, really?
While I hesitated for a moment, a loud shout suddenly rang out.
People were running toward us from afar, waving their arms wildly.
“A Japanese ship has run aground!”
The cry was short, and in Jeju dialect, so I couldn’t make it out very well. Kim Sangro translated it for me, then added in a suggestive tone, “How fortunate. Why don’t you go have a look? China can wait—we can discuss that more slowly, since the direction is different this time. But Japan is right next to Gyeongsang Province, isn’t it? I’m telling you this as your true Dobansu, laying my business capital out without concealment: it’s a little complicated, but there’s a way to make relief work for Japan too.”
I had the strange feeling that relations between the three East Asian kingdoms in this era were awfully good.
Setting welfare fraud aside, something more important occurred to me.
Come to think of it, I had no trade ties with Japan. This could be a good opportunity.
“Let’s go take a look first. There might be a fight.”
“Of course! If the Dobansu is present, those men are as good as captured already. As for the rest, please leave it to me……”
Could you not talk as if I was obviously going to go fight for you? I’m glad Un-hong isn’t here to hear this.
As Kim Sangro had said, Jeju rarely even bothers to report such things unless they’re a real threat like a Western ship.
It’s simply too much trouble.
More than half of the recorded drifting vessels in East Asia during this period come to Joseon.
And most of those run aground in Jeolla Province, especially on Jeju.
If they report it, then in Joseon’s exacting bureaucratic system someone is sure to come investigate, or at the very least issue follow-up orders. Since there are no telephones, that means a human being has to come in person.
In other words, a mainland official. If you don’t give him even a box of mandarins, he’s bound to make a scene about how shabby Jeju hospitality is.
It’s definitely not because, like the old Jeju magistrate Igi-bin, they needed to loot the Ryukyuan prince’s magic staff and bury it in the white sand, and therefore didn’t report it.
It really wasn’t.
But the Japanese men now standing surrounded by Joseon people with a half-broken ship behind them looked as if they wanted to scream that they didn’t have any magic items, thank you very much.
The most frightened of them was a child of about twelve, who looked as if it was his first time ever on a boat.
“There are too many people!”
Then the young swordsman who seemed to be the leader and the boy’s guardian said fiercely, “We have broken no principle. What is there to fear? It is true that the outer Goryeo people of Jeju have long robbed ships that pass through, but they cannot attack us without cause either.”
That was certainly true.
But the swordsman was mistaken about one thing.
Just as a topknot by itself was proof of some half-human alien species, their own absurd chonmage topknots were already the “cause.”
The reason even officials in Jeju could come out and loot a Japanese ship was simple.
Japanese people were, by default, pirates.
They had no right to feel wronged. Did someone threaten them to go start the Sampo Wae War, the Eulmyo Disturbance, the Imjin War, and all the rest? Especially during the Eulmyo Disturbance, Jeju itself had nearly been reduced to ruin.
Granted, there may occasionally have been a few who turned over a new leaf, but when a goblin enters a human fortress, people usually don’t stop to consider whether that goblin has repented; they just kill it first.
It was a shame that Ryukyu, which insisted it was a different tribe altogether, got caught up in this. In truth, prejudice and hard-won experience are only distinguishable by their results.
And Joseon people were adept at turning the former into the latter.
“Th-then why are those Joseon men carrying clubs and kitchen knives?”
“Looks like they came out from work! Naori, stop babbling and get back inside!”
Sakamoto Ryoma, who in the future would go on to form the Kaiyentai, a smuggling and transport force much like the one Taesu was building now and make a major contribution to the Meiji Restoration, turned his head in confusion.
“Inside where? Back into that broken ship?”
Katsu Kaishu, the swordsman now using the name Rintaro and future first Minister of the Navy of the Empire of Japan, had no answer.
Rare among nineteenth-century samurai, Katsu Kaishu was a master of swordsmanship. And in his eyes stood a giant who looked like someone who would have made a name for himself back in the Warring States period.
The man wore no sword.
But that axe was no ordinary thing.
Even the prized blade Katsu Kaishu carried now, Suishinshi Masahide, could feel threatened by it.
Author’s Note
1. Kim Sangro is a real historical figure, and it is true both that he claimed to be from Hainan after drifting to China and that he received that kind of treatment.
The Qing practice of welfare fraud that Kim Sangro describes had existed since at least the seventeenth century and became especially rampant in the nineteenth. Like Goh Hanrok, Kim Sangro was suspected but not executed.
2. “Eokjinhaebok” is a collective term used in Joseon for natural objects that were objects of worship. In order, it refers to a forbidding mountain, a strategic pass, the sea, and a sacred river. “Charging straight through” means to gallop forward, the same “janggu” found in the word “seungseungjanggud.”
3. Even in Goryeo, many Japanese ships were robbed in Jeju, and it is true that Jeju magistrate Igi-bin robbed a Ryukyuan ship as well, but the story that a prince was killed there is thought to have become mixed up with a Vietnamese prince through later distortion.
The exact truth here is also unclear, but the Vietnamese seem to have believed it. There are records of Vietnamese trying to kill a drifting Jeju person in revenge, or of a Joseon man being rescued at sea and then, when he burst into tears upon seeing Hallasan far off in the distance, being recognized as a Jeju man and thrown back into the sea from a boat. What is interesting is that they distinguished between Goryeo people and outer Goryeo people.
4. The remark that Jeju no longer reports foreign ships appears during the reign of King Jeongjo.
5. Sakamoto Ryoma later becomes a disciple of Katsu Kaishu.
Suishinshi Masahide was one of the two famous swords Katsu Kaishu possessed. It seems to have been received while he was still attached to the shogunate, but in the novel it has been adapted so that he already has it at this point. The other one, Kotetsu, was granted later after the fall of Edo Castle.