What Exactly Do You Want From Me?
What is this even supposed to be?
Pyeong-an Naru.
It literally means the Peaceful Harbor. Which made the current scene all the more absurd.
“Uuuurgh.”
“Eheeheehee.”
The place was well on its way to becoming a den of drunkards.
Hm... a bunch of absolute degenerates, wallowing in the middle of MY city...
“Well, what can we do? You're the one who built the stuff they're drinking, ma'am.”
Can't exactly kick them out, either—they're all walking revenue streams...
There has to be a way...
Hm? Wait—why not just bring it to them?
“That's it! We're starting delivery service!”
“Delivery? Now where did that come from?”
You haven't quite warmed up to the concept yet, have you?
“We set up restaurants outside the fortress, and people order—then we bring the food to them.”
“But wouldn't people place fake orders?”
...Huh. I gave medieval Europeans way too much credit, didn't I?
Hm... delivery's probably ahead of its time here.
“Alright, new idea!”
“And what is it THIS time?”
Why are you acting so put-upon? All you're doing is listening.
“Takeout! We'll sell it as takeout!”
“Takeout?”
“The food gets sold at the counter, and people carry it home themselves.”
“Who'd bother with all that hassle?”
Excuse me? You can't think of everything by Daehan standards!
“The nobles will just order their servants around, so it'll work.”
“Oh? Now that you mention it, I suppose so.”
Daehan barely uses servants, so you wouldn't know, but here the aristocracy outsources practically every errand imaginable.
Heck, they even have servants bathe them.
Ahh... I've had baths forced on me plenty of times myself, come to think of it...
“By the way, when's the Europe-exclusive chocolate arriving?”
“Should be soon?”
Europeans, it turns out, are truly spectacular sugar addicts.
Chocolate honestly tastes better only moderately sweet, you know? But over here, the unanimous request was: make it AS sweet as physically possible.
Incredible, really...
“Why is it that everyone here loves sweet things so much?”
“It's not just the sweets—they're obsessed with spices too.”
“Oh! Right. It was pretty extreme, wasn't it?”
“Their dopamine levels are just low, that's all.”
Religion plays a huge part in it. Don't do this, don't do that, or you won't get into heaven—every single day. So they end up with nothing they're actually allowed to do.
Which leaves them starving for anything resembling happiness or pleasure.
That's why they'll guzzle down alcohol while insisting it isn't liquor at all but 'medicine.' Medicine, my foot.
“What on earth is dopamine?”
“It's... a signal that makes people feel happy?”
How am I supposed to explain this? It's not happiness or pleasure itself—it's more like the go-between for them...
“Think of it as anticipation. The 'ooh, this'll feel good' feeling. The thing that pushes you to work harder for something.”
“I have no idea what you're talking about.”
“Just think of it as a cheer squad living inside your brain, egging you on to do more stuff.”
“...Yes, ma'am.”
And so, with the takeout service up and running, the fortress finally began to quiet down.
“Four fried chickens, please!”
“Coming right up. Thank you!”
Lines of servants streamed through, buying food and dashing back to the inns where their noble masters lounged.
“Four pork stir-fries!”
“Of course. One moment, please!”
Every last scrap of food sold like hotcakes.
And since the staff no longer had to deal with nightmare customers face-to-face, their complaints dropped off dramatically too.
“Wahaha! NOW this is what working should feel like!”
“Isn't it wonderful how quiet it is?”
“Oh! Lady Agassi, good day to you!”
The kids' faces had completely changed. It made me so happy to see.
Before all this, they'd suffered endlessly holding their tempers while obnoxious customers screamed in their faces.
If they hadn't, a good handful of people would already be chained to rocks at the bottom of the harbor.
So if anyone you know went to Pyeong-an Naru and never came back... you might want to check the seafloor.
Once Daehan built the harbor and money began pouring in by the mountainload, jealous eyes inevitably turned toward it.
The people of the commercial cities, whose entire livelihoods rested on trade.
With the Holy See as their only power to lean on, they began petitioning it without end.
“Your Holiness, deliver us from the heathens, we beseech you.”
Pope Julius II found the merchants' petitions a genuine headache. Their contributions made up a sizable chunk of the church's income—he could hardly ignore them.
“Was that land not lawfully ceded to them by Portugal?”
“And yet heathen feet now tread upon the soil of Europe itself! How can we allow them to defile the Lord's land?”
It's not even Jerusalem, is it? It's that far-off land out west? By that logic, they should be demanding a crusade to conquer every inch of the planet.
“I shall raise the matter at the Council.”
“We are most grateful, Your Holiness.”
“May the blessing of the Lord be with you...”
“Amen...”
Once the merchant had gone, the Pope convened the Council. An affair of this magnitude would likely demand nothing short of war—far too grave a decision for one man to make alone.
And so the Council began.
“The merchants of Venice desire the expulsion of the heathens.”
“Heathens? Then expel them. Is that not sufficient?”
They sit there wearing the robes of clergy, but every last one of them sold themselves to money long ago.
The corruption stank to high heaven—plainly, openly.
One glance at the gilded ornamentation and carved statues filling the Holy See said everything.
So of course they'd shield the deep-pocketed merchants. It was only natural.
“The problem is that the land was lawfully acquired.”
“Hmm...”
“Had it been leased from Portugal or some such arrangement, that would be another matter...”
Pretense always matters. Because even the victor can end up reviled if the cause smells wrong.
Worse still, if they seized the harbor and deported the heathens now, everyone except the merchants might well turn against the Church.
“What course would you counsel?”
“Hmm...”
It would give them pause, of course. The Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula had only just concluded—Portugal had handed the land over of its own free will.
“Do the heathens discriminate against or persecute Christians?”
“Reports say nothing of the kind.”
“Hah...”
So there went any pretext of 'protecting and aiding our Christian brethren.'
“Then how might we approach them for the sake of missionary work?”
“Missions?”
“Are we not commanded to spread the Gospel to new lands and new peoples?”
The more believers, the more churches. The more churches, the more taxes. There it is.
“If the heathens become people of God, then this whole affair ceases to be a problem at all, does it not?”
“Precisely.”
And so missionaries were selected, and delegates dispatched to Pyeong-an Naru itself.
At long last, an envoy arrived to negotiate the official dispatch of missionaries to Pyeong-an Naru.
“Good heavens... a city so clean, so quiet?”
His first impression was of a city almost unbearably peaceful and bright.
“You are the one called Ha-eun, I take it?”
“Yep. In your terms, I'd be the governor of this place.”
“I have come from the Church.”
Here to collect tithes, is he?
“The Church? We've got zero Catholics here.”
Or did he just come to ask for money?
“Which is precisely why I have come.”
“Huh?”
“To bring the guidance of the Holy Spirit to you ignorant and benighted souls.”
What did he just say?... Buddy, if you talk like that where I'm from, you'll get beaten to death.
“Missionaries have come plenty of times before, you know. Every one of them failed and went home. And you're trying again?”
“There have been missionaries here before?”
“Loads of them. Absolutely tons.”
Sometimes privately, on their own coin. And if I hadn't taken them in, they'd have straight-up died out there. Coming at me with that attitude, I still took them in.
And every single one flopped. What can you do when nobody believes a word you say?
They do okay in the remote villages, I suppose. Though last I heard, they didn't even crack one percent.
“There are missionaries here right now, actually. They just can't break one percent.”
“Ah... so there ARE missionaries here?”
“Yep. Quite a few.”
No idea whether the ones who headed deep into the frontier are alive or dead, mind you.
But they keep trickling in, so at least one or two must be kicking around somewhere.
“I never heard word of a church existing in Daehan—how can there be so few believers?”
“Yep. Practically none. They try debating our priests and lose every single time.”
All that 'doctrine this, canon that' fluff—punch a few holes in it and the whole thing falls apart.
Our own priests, who'd only studied the Bible as a foreign text, ran circles around them.
“So I directed them toward the neighboring countries instead of our own.”
“You sent them to other nations?”
Yep. Figured if they stayed in Daehan, they'd genuinely get beaten to death. They begged me to save them, so I shipped them elsewhere.
“Sent plenty to China, Japan, Joseon—places like that.”
“I have never heard of churches in those lands either...”
“Ever sent a ship to find out?”
“...No...”
What is wrong with this guy? You're supposed to gather intelligence, ask around? Find out what the missionaries need and send support?
“Shouldn't you at least investigate what your missionaries are actually doing out there before coming here?”
“As long as the tithes arrive, all is...”
What is this? 'Collect the money and call it a day'? Those poor missionary kids are out there desperate, and THIS is what they get?
“Look—I'll send whatever support you want, in any amount. But if your people go there and get beaten to death, don't come crying to me.”
“Where on earth is such a thing written? It is the duty of the state to protect them!”
Excuse me? You're entrusting them to us? At least pay a protection fee before saying stuff like that?
“Why should we?”
“Because—well—naturally—huh?”
Doesn't that sound weird even to YOU right now?
“They'd be walking into dangerous territory. Obviously someone has to protect them.”
“Then may we send an army?”
Well. Fine by me? You're outright asking me to smash you to pieces.
“Huh? You want to go to war?”
“N-no...”
“Then what?”
“Good heavens...”
Sending knights disguised as missionaries wouldn't work either. Send anyone half-decent and the moment they pick a fight, our priest boys will give them a knuckle sandwich.
“We don't persecute your church or anything of the sort. So what exactly brings you knocking on my door for the third time?”
“...”
Too embarrassing to say it out loud?
“Did the merchants perhaps say something?”
“Ahem...”
So it IS the merchants. Not the Middle Eastern crowd, though.
“European merchants?”
“...”
“Mediterranean?”
“Ahem, ahem...”
“Venice?”
“Ahem...”
There it is. Venice.
“How about this—go back and wait a few months or so. I'll make it so Venice can't utter a single word.”
“What are you planning to do?”
“I don't forgive people who covet what's mine.”
Haha. Guess I'll just erase the land called Venice off the map. I let their provocations slide once before, and this is the thanks I get.
These people truly have no idea how frightening the world can be.
“Y-you don't mean... war?”
“They threw the first punch. I'm simply obliged to show them what that earns them.”
I don't walk away from fights that come to my doorstep.
“You must not!”
“Why not? If you pick a fight, you should walk in prepared to take a beating. That's just common sense.”
“Do you not comprehend how many people will die?!”
“No Daehan citizens will die.”
Just you lot. In truly impressive numbers.
“Fine. Since you're here anyway, carry a message back: I'll be paying Venice a personal visit in a few years. It's not far from the Holy See, after all.”
“Desist! The wrath of God shall descend upon you!”
These people? Invoking God's name to my FACE?
Not that I'd know the voice of God myself—I got punished a thousand times over already, so who am I to say...
“If that wrath comes, I'll be the one receiving it.”
“What?”
“The punishment. I'll take it myself.”
Whatever punishment is on offer, I've collected it about a thousand times already, memory or no memory.
As far as I understand it, all my sins have been forgiven anyway?
“Wh-what arrogance! The pride of Lucifer himself!”
No, seriously—I'm the one offering to take the punishment, not you. Why are YOU carrying on like it's your hide on the line?
“So what punishment exactly are you threatening me with?”
“You shall be judged through the Inquisition!”
“I'm not a Christian. How exactly do you put me on trial?”
“...”
THIS is the problem with these people. Heresy trial this, heresy trial that—but someone who never believed in the first place doesn't fall under any of it.
Their inquisitions judge apostates—people who fake belief while doing something else on the side.
Someone like me, who follows an entirely different faith from the start? Nothing they can do.
Best they can manage is: convert.
“Convert, then.”
There it is. Called it.
“Me? I don't believe in any religion.”
“Spoken like a true heathen!”
“I don't believe in religion and I live just fine. So what's the problem?”
“Salvation comes only through faith in Jesus Christ, by the grace of God!”
Wow... this conversation is going absolutely nowhere.
“So I'm asking—I'm already living well. What exactly changes if I believe?”
“C-convert, I say!”
Good grief. What's even the point of talking? I'll handle it my way—just go home.
“I have spoken! You are beyond reason!”
Wouldn't it be so much nicer if we just said 'you believe your thing, I'll believe mine' and got along?
They've got nothing to offer as proof, and yet here they are, kicking up this fuss...
Exhausting.
And when the envoy went home and blabbed, our harbor became 'a den of decadence,' 'cursed by the devil,' and whatever else—absolute pandemonium.
“...Huh? Now what's all this?”
“Why are there MORE people?”
“My thoughts exactly...”
The place is technically on a half-lockdown. So what does everyone do about it?
They sail to Lisbon, disembark, take a carriage up to stand around gawking in front of my harbor, then ride back and sail home.
And meanwhile, every merchant with goods to sell docks their ships at Lisbon and hauls everything away from there.
Overnight, Lisbon's transport industry is booming.
So I accidentally pulled off the greatest viral marketing campaign in history, huh?
What am I even supposed to do about that?