The Cows Must Be Handled Gently
With the Harvest Festival approaching, Lee Go-nap-hap called his men to a muster.
Even at a glance, the spectacle was impressive.
All thirty-odd of his cavalry wore splendid silk war-coats, complete with leather armor and helmets to match.
Sending his entire force to Sorobirada would have been too heavy a burden even for Lee Go-nap-hap, so instead he had handpicked an elite cavalry troop and brought them along.
In truth, hauling a full hundred men would have strained the grain supply, and the village hosting them as guests would have suffered no small nuisance either.
As the price for presenting three hundred bolts of silk, along with leather armor, helmets, and a pile of assorted ornamentation, Pushan Hadaru had earned the 'honor' of attending this occasion. Lee Go-nap-hap may well have believed that merely admitting a mere peddler to such a gathering was honor enough, but to Pushan Hadaru it was a result that left a permanent sourness in his gut.
Worse still, Lee Go-nap-hap had not even deigned to praise him in person—instead, he had sent his trusted lieutenant Olanggamokya to receive him.
And that was not all. Pushan Hadaru had noticed that Lee Go-nap-hap's retinue numbered a mere thirty men rather than three hundred, but he was sensible enough not to make the mistake of pointing it out. Even so, his heart curdled, and there was nothing to be done about it.
Thirty guests was its own burden, certainly, but he could have spared himself the humiliation of groveling so shamelessly before Hwang Ga.
Pushan Hadaru thought to himself.
*Am I truly going to walk away with nothing at all?*
With that in his heart, his face naturally folded into something close to a weeping expression.
Olanggamokya noticed it at once. He was a man of few words, yet beneath that quiet exterior he was sharp-eyed and quick of mind. It was precisely why he had become Lee Go-nap-hap's confidant, just as his colleague Irongha—who flattered well and knew how to stroke a master's ego—had before him.
"Is something troubling you?"
"Pardon? Ah—no, not at all."
Pushan Hadaru started in alarm.
"Will the Dudu not be coming today?"
"He is coming. He's bringing a guest along with him, that's all."
Olanggamokya's answer did nothing to soothe Pushan Hadaru's wounded pride. Someone more important than the man handing over three hundred bolts of silk and everything besides?
Olanggamokya studied him for a long moment.
"Don't let it weigh on you. That guest is none other than Prince Ichigeo, the half-brother of the elder Onyan Isiha himself. So there's nothing to be done about it."
"I see..."
"The Dudu thinks highly of your efforts, Prince Pushan."
At those words, Pushan Hadaru's expression brightened somewhat.
Olanggamokya gave a small nod. *That figures. Now I understand why this old pig is serving up his entire storehouse.*
"When the Dudu returns, I'll put in a good word for you as well."
"Would you truly? If you would do only that much, I shall never forget this kindness!"
Pushan Hadaru was deeply moved.
Olanggamokya stared at him a while longer, then silently shook his head. *What a pathetic old pig...*
Olanggamokya held no particular affection for Pushan Hadaru. He too was, in the end, a tribal warrior, and he looked down on merchants just as heartily—useless creatures, the lot of them. But he was also, at the end of the day, a man loyal to Lee Go-nap-hap, and in that regard he shared the conviction that one had to squeeze everything squeezable out of Pushan Hadaru for his master's benefit.
Just then, one of his men whispered something in his ear.
Olanggamokya nodded and turned to Pushan Hadaru.
"I'll step away for a moment. The Dudu will be here shortly."
Pushan Hadaru bowed his head again and again. Olanggamokya returned the nod and hurried off toward Lee Go-nap-hap.
Lee Go-nap-hap was riding up alongside Onyan Ichigeo, and even from a distance his gold-hued silk war-coat blazed. Today, of all days, it made even that Ichigeo look positively plain.
"Oh—Olanggamokya."
Lee Go-nap-hap recognized him and beamed. His mood seemed excellent; he even flashed a grin at the sullen-faced Ichigeo beside him.
When Ichigeo gave a stiff nod, Lee Go-nap-hap turned to his lieutenant.
"Did you see that face on Ichigeo, the joyless wretch? Feels like ten years of indigestion just washed away."
"Dudu."
Olanggamokya lowered his voice.
"What?"
"Pushan Hadaru has arrived."
"Pushan Hadaru... ah, the old man came?"
Lee Go-nap-hap squared his shoulders with a shrug.
"That's an honor beyond what a merchant deserves. Feed him a decent meal and send him on his way."
Nothing in his words or manner hinted at even a shred of special regard for Pushan Hadaru.
"Dudu, could you not offer the man a few hollow compliments?"
"Why?"
Lee Go-nap-hap shot back, genuinely puzzled—it was plain he couldn't imagine why he should have to.
"Dudu, he is, after all, the man who gave up three hundred bolts of silk and furnished your armor, helmets, and everything else besides."
"So what of it? He simply paid what he owed. A milk cow gives milk—must you thank the cow for it?"
Lee Go-nap-hap made a vulgar show of milking an udder between thumb and forefinger, snickering.
"Well, yes, but even a cow needs a bit of care if you want to keep milking her."
"Hm."
"Cows capable of coughing up three hundred bolts of silk don't grow on trees. Wouldn't it be wiser to shear that particular cow over and over, for years to come?"
"Come to think of it, true."
Lee Go-nap-hap conceded the point. Neither he, nor Olanggamokya, nor Pushan Hadaru himself knew that the old merchant had poured out nearly the entire pillar-and-root of his fortune to dress up this grand little army. Had they known, even the scraps of interest Olanggamokya was showing would have curdled cold.
In short, the only thing these men cared about was how best to fleece whoever was generous enough to part with three hundred bolts of silk.
"Then what should I do for him?"
"A few empty compliments would be plenty to start."
"If that's all it takes to satisfy him, fine."
Lee Go-nap-hap shrugged. In any case, he was in high spirits—he had humbled the vain, insufferable Ichigeo's pride today, and cheap magnanimity like this he could afford in endless supply.
They went to find Pushan Hadaru. Even at a distance, Pushan Hadaru had no trouble picking Lee Go-nap-hap out, wrapped as he was in premium Ming silk damask. The man was positively *glowing*.
"Most excellent, Pushan Hadaru!"
Lee Go-nap-hap was in a fine mood. Even the vain Onyan Ichigeo had gone quiet the moment he laid eyes on him, and that had left Lee Go-nap-hap thoroughly pleased with himself.
Pushan Hadaru bowed low.
"To see the Dudu so pleased, I hardly know where to put myself."
"I intend to make good use of you from now on."
"Thank you, my lord!"
That single sentence seemed to repay every loss he had suffered in this whole affair. For one shining moment, he felt as though he were walking across a bridge of clouds spun from the very three hundred bolts he had given away.
But Lee Go-nap-hap went one step further.
"You'll come with us to Anchuunbugu this time as well."
"Yes! Of course, my lord!"
Pushan Hadaru was startled all over again. *Anchuunbugu!*
Was that not the ancestral seat of the Onyan clan, the family revered by every tribe under heaven? Not a place anyone could simply ask to visit. The man even the noblest of the noble could barely obtain an audience with was Onyan Isiha himself.
"I could hardly dare—"
"None of that talk!"
Lee Go-nap-hap declared grandly.
Overwhelmed, Pushan Hadaru bowed his head again and again. In this moment, he truly felt as though his future had cracked open. If things went well, perhaps he would no longer be scorned as a mere merchant's son.
---
As the Harvest Festival drew near, Anchuunbugu bustled with preparations for the great rite.
Even those who ordinarily lived outside the village began drifting back in twos and threes. Counting only households inside Anchuunbugu itself, there were roughly seventy; with those settled in the surrounding area, the number exceeded a hundred—something over a thousand souls in all.
Even those living within the village did not spend all their days there. A great many of them lived by hunting and gathering medicinal herbs, and for a large part of the year they dwelt in cabins they kept in the mountains. The grand Harvest Festival was the occasion when all of them returned with the year's take, gave thanks to heaven and earth and the spirits, and shared the bounty with their neighbors.
"Not only the villagers, but folk from every nearby village join the rite. We go to the Sacred Forest, offer the sacrifice to heaven and earth under the direction of the elder Daeju, and then begin the hunt. It is the greatest hunt of the year—fully five hundred take part."
Old Kusinu explained.
Because this was no ordinary hunt, every able-bodied man from the surrounding villages attended without exception, regardless of age. Women were few among them. Hardship on the frontier knew no distinction between the sexes, of course, but even among the Jurchens it was customary for men to shoulder the rough work of hunting and the like.
"Tung Jugang and his friends will be joining too, I trust?"
"Ah, Jugang and his brothers?"
Old Kusinu smiled.
"Not all of them. Apparently the southern border of Anchuunbugu has been acting strangely of late. Since Bushuku died, no open bandits trouble the people anymore, but the Jugang brothers see something suspicious in it all. The young ones say even the plants and beasts of the forest are uneasy."
Hong-wi nodded. After the presentation of gifts, everyone except himself, Ho-in, and Cha Gyeong-yeon had returned to Hwangseongpyeong. Iharachi had vouched that Utai and the other former men of Bushuku who had surrendered were trustworthy, and Hong-wi had been content to leave them in Iharachi's hands.
"Do not worry yourself! Jugang and his brothers are fine hunters and fine warriors. With them absent this time, the year's hunt may be a little leaner than usual, but Jugang himself will attend."
"It's a shame. I had hoped to meet them."
Hong-wi smiled too. He could not claim to have known Tung Jugang long, but he had seemed a fine warrior and a dependable man. That was a feeling one man took from another, man to man—and anyone who kept company like brothers with such a man was surely worth knowing.
"You'll have your chance. You've been invited to the mountain camp at Soeburimal, have you not?"
"I have."
"If Jugang went so far as to say that much, then he thinks highly of you, my lord."
Hong-wi smiled faintly. The chase of the wild stallion they had shared was a memory he treasured as his own.
Just then, the note of a horn rang out.
"There they come now! Folk from the nearby villages, arriving to join tomorrow's hunt. Let us go and see."
Kusinu led Hong-wi up to the watchtower at the village gate and pointed out the arrivals with his finger.
"Look there. Those are folk from Hairan village—renowned every one of them as fine beaters. And those coming behind them are from Busoheo village; they're masters of the spear. Wild boar, deer—why, there's nothing from bear to tiger they cannot take with a spear."
Hong-wi nodded, watching the arrivals stream in. Most came on foot.
"Fewer men on horseback than I expected. I was under the impression the Jurchens mostly rode."
"That's what the Joseon folk all say."
Kusinu chuckled.
"It's true enough that our people love their horses. But those Mongols to the north look on us as farming folk. And we're not all alike, either. The Haeshi Guard brothers live like the Mongols—riding, herding cattle and sheep. Those along the Amnok, Tuman, and Pa Jeo Rivers farm a great deal. Those on the eastern coast take to boats and fish, while others wander, living by hunting and digging herbs. As for us—half our year is spent farming, half hunting."
"I see."
"The elder Daeju prizes the life of the honest farmer—tilling the land in peace and eating from his own labor. The hunt is merely a secondary means. But here, a man cannot live by farming alone."
"The soil is poor, and farming tools are scarce."
"Exactly."
Old Kusinu agreed. The tribes could not smelt their own iron and were forever short of it, so nearly every scrap of iron they managed to obtain went into weapons. Farm implements were almost always lacking, to the point of digging the earth with wooden sticks. No wonder the plowing was botched—and so even the yield of their already barren fields could never be fully drawn out.
"That is why the elder was so delighted with the gift you brought, Lord Temusi'i. Farm tools, and even oxen for the fields!"
"You flatter me."
Hong-wi demurred, but Kusinu's praise was by no means excessive. Five plowing oxen alone would raise Anchuunbugu's agricultural output two- or threefold. Where one ox could plow as much as a dozen able-bodied men, an ox could turn the fields for days without rest, while the men collapsed after half a day.
Fine horses the tribes had in plenty, but oxen for farming were precious beyond measure. Even in Joseon, a plow ox was worth a small fortune. In the first year of Hong-wi's reign, the Royal Chief Scribe Park Jung-son had reported that in a typical Joseon village, barely one or two households owned an ox at all, and whether a village had a single ox or not decided rich from poor. How much more so for the tribes, who lived harder than Joseon. Even Lee Man-ju, the great power of Jianzhou, owned fewer than thirty oxen—which said everything.
"Someday I'll bring you not only farm implements but useful farming treatises from Joseon, as another gift."
"Oh-ho, farming books. The elder will be delighted."
Kusinu laughed.
Just then, something strange caught Hong-wi's eye.