Damn, It’s Good to See You! (5)
“Where do we pile this?”
“Didn’t I tell you to move it over here!”
“Sasuk! I don’t think we can stack this any higher.”
“Then put it beside the others!”
Under Baek Sang’s command, the Mount Hua disciples worked without pause, hauling and sorting the mountain of goods. Precious gifts brought all the way from the North Sea were divided one by one and neatly stacked in the storehouse.
“Heh heh heh.”
Watching the scene unfold, the corners of Hyun Young’s mouth had already risen so high they seemed ready to touch his ears.
It was only proper to maintain some dignity in front of the disciples, but unfortunately, his facial muscles had never been very good at obeying his intentions.
“Heh. Heh heh heh.”
Just looking at the supplies piling up like a mountain made him feel full without having eaten a thing.
Baek Sang hurried over and opened one of the sacks in front of him.
“Elder. I’m not sure what this is.”
“Hmm? Let’s see…… Ah. I’ve never seen this before either…… Young Master Hwang. Do you know what this is?”
Hwang Jong-ui, who had come up from the Waeum branch of the Eunha Merchant Guild to help with the sorting, peered into the sack. Then his eyes widened.
“T-this is Snow Lotus Fruit?”
“Is it valuable?”
“Of course it is! This is a rare medicinal herb found only in the North Sea! It was already precious because there wasn’t much of it to begin with, but since trade with the North Sea was cut off, supplies have dried up completely. The price has shot through the roof!”
Hyun Young’s smile grew even warmer, even more benevolent.
“So you’re saying it’s expensive.”
Excellent. Very excellent.
Heh heh heh.
“What a strange thing. Everything from the North Sea seems to be expensive and rare.”
“That’s only natural, actually. The North Sea differs from Zhongyuan in every respect, from the environment to the ecosystem. There are dozens of goods that can only be obtained there.”
Hwang Jong-ui swallowed hard, unable to take his eyes off the sack.
“Of course, now that trade with the North Sea will resume, the prices will begin to fall little by little. But for a while yet, these are the sort of goods that can still be sold for five times the price…… no, ten times the price. Good heavens, how did you manage to select only things like this?”
“Heh heh heh.”
With an endlessly indulgent expression, Hyun Young sat beside Chung Myung and patted the head of the disciple who was stuffing his face with sweets.
“Well, it’s a little embarrassing for me to say it myself, but our Chung Myung does have a bit of a business sense.”
“Heheheheheh!”
“I don’t know whether he realized it or not, but if you’d become a merchant, I’m sure you would’ve been a huge success.”
“Eheheheheheheh!”
Jo Gul, who happened to be carrying a load past them and overheard the conversation, twisted his face in outrage.
“……Elder. These are just things the Ice Palace handed over unilaterally, though? Not a single thing was picked by that brat Chung Myung!”
At that, Hyun Young smiled brightly.
“Jo Gul.”
“Yes.”
“Be quiet. Just carry the luggage.”
“…….”
As Jo Gul pouted and went back to hauling goods, Hyun Young clicked his tongue again and again.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. For a merchant’s son, that boy is awfully small-minded!”
“Sahyung is a little like that, yes.”
“Hah! I shouldn’t even be talking!”
From Jo Gul’s point of view, it was enough to make him lose his mind.
Still, it was one thing if it was Chung Myung, but how on earth was he supposed to talk back to Hyun Young?
“If you want to succeed as a merchant, you need the same kind of broad spirit our Chung Myung has! Don’t you agree, Young Master Hwang?”
“Hah…… haha. Yes, absolutely.”
Hwang Jong-ui wiped the sweat from his brow and nodded again and again.
Come to think of it, the strange thing is that he’s not entirely wrong.
There was a saying in merchant circles.
The diligent could not beat the clever, and the clever could not beat the lucky.
It sounded absurd at first, but it was a saying that pierced straight to the heart of commerce.
To succeed in trade, you needed flawless calculations and meticulous planning. Harsh preparation and effort had to accompany every deal if you wanted it to go through—and only then could you make a serious profit.
But sometimes, all the planning in the world meant nothing, because a deal that fell into your lap by pure chance could generate greater profits than anything you had arranged yourself. When lucky breaks stacked on top of one another, the sort that only came once in a lifetime, the outcome could be truly staggering.
But……
Hwang Jong-ui’s gaze drifted toward Chung Myung, who was chewing sweets with tireless enthusiasm.
What in the world is this man made of……?
What most merchants might encounter once or twice in their entire lives was, for this person, no different from the rhythm of daily existence. To be a little exaggerated, he seemed like the sort who could sling a bundle over his shoulder and wander off in any direction, only to return home carrying a dragon’s pearl.
No matter how much luck is said to come from heaven……
Wasn’t this a bit much for a single person?
“Grrrgh! Why is this thing so heavy!”
“Elder! Where should we put the cold iron?”
Just as Hyun Young was about to answer, Chung Myung spoke in a bored voice.
“Stack that separately. We’re selling it to the Tang Family.”
“Where?”
“Just pile it up over there.”
“All right. Put it up front! Over here!”
“Yes!”
At Baek Sang’s command, the disciples started hurling the cold iron into heaps.
Hwang Jong-ui, who watched it all, was already drenched in a cold sweat at the nape of his neck.
They’re stacking Ten Thousand Year Cold Iron like scrap metal……
One shard of this stuff could change a man’s fate. That was what Ten Thousand Year Cold Iron was. And yet here, sacks full of it were being treated like junk someone had picked up off the road.
For Hwang Jong-ui, who remembered the Mount Hua of the past, there was no better phrase than “the sea becoming mulberry fields.”
“Heh heh heh. The Ice Palace Lord really went to great lengths for us. So this means it’s all a gift and we don’t need to pay anything separately?”
“Yes. That’s what they said.”
“Kuhhhhhh. The Ice Palace’s spirit reaches the heavens!”
Hyun Young laughed heartily and thumped Chung Myung’s back.
“Agh! I told you, that hurts!”
“You adorable little rascal!”
Looking at Chung Myung’s petulant squirming as if it were some delightful performance, Hyun Young turned to Hwang Jong-ui and asked, “What do you think, Young Master? Can you get rid of all these goods?”
“If a merchant can’t sell what’s already in hand, then he doesn’t deserve to call himself a merchant. I’ll sell the lot within ten days!”
“Oh? Then the commission…….”
“Hahaha! Commission? Between us? What are you talking about?”
“Still, the merchants will be doing the hard work. Surely I can’t ask them to do it for free.”
“Elder. If you put it that way, I’m hurt. Mount Hua and the Eunha Merchant Guild are hardly strangers, so how could we talk about profit between us?”
At Hwang Jong-ui’s words, Hyun Young smiled with obvious delight. Then Hwang Jong-ui edged a little closer, glanced at Hyun Young and Chung Myung, and whispered quietly,
“In exchange, though this may be awkward to say…… if you could help a little so that the Eunha Merchant Guild can take the lead in the trade with the North Sea……”
He let his words trail off, looked around to make sure no one was listening, then pulled out a bundle of promissory notes from his sleeve and, like a bolt of lightning, slipped them into Hyun Young’s chest.
“Huh?”
But no matter how swift he was, there was no escaping Chung Myung’s eyes!
Just as Chung Myung was about to frown, another bundle of promissory notes burrowed into his own chest.
The man’s skill at pulling out promissory notes and stuffing them into people was so incredible that even a member of the Tang Family would have clicked his tongue in admiration.
And then, in that instant—
Whoooosh!
A chilling frost poured out from Chung Myung’s eyes.
“What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
Seeing those freezing eyes, Hwang Jong-ui flinched, realizing his mistake. Cold sweat burst out in an instant and ran down his spine.
T-this…… I suppose even Dojang Chung Myung is a Daoist after all.
Trying to buy him off with money had been the mistake……
Then Chung Myung whispered, very softly, “That bundle you just gave him looked bigger than mine.”
“…….”
“Haah, that’s disappointing. Really disappointing. Even when I was getting cut by the North Sea wind, it didn’t chill my heart like this.”
“…….”
Without a word, Hwang Jong-ui took out one more bundle of promissory notes and shoved them into Chung Myung’s chest.
Only then did Chung Myung’s face, frozen as hard as ice, melt as gently as snow under sunlight.
“Kuhhhhh! Zhongyuan really is warm. Ahhh. So warm.”
“…….”
This bastard is not a Daoist.
This bastard is……
“Hahahahahaha!”
Hyun Young burst out laughing and pounded Hwang Jong-ui’s shoulder.
“Khurkhm. We’re hardly strangers, so why bother saying such things? Of course the trade with the North Sea should be handled by the Eunha Merchant Guild!”
“Hehe. Exactly. We are the Eunha Merchant Guild, after all.”
Having won over the two pillars of Mount Hua’s finances in an instant, Hwang Jong-ui’s eyes gleamed.
It’s a monopoly!
Monopoly.
What a blissful word that was.
For anyone dealing in logistics and trade, the dream was exclusive supply. There were so many advantages to monopoly that it would take all day to list them, but the most important was simple: you could set the quantities and prices on your own terms.
If you managed the supply well and controlled the price, making an enormous profit was effortless.
And exclusive trade with the North Sea, no less!
For anyone in Zhongyuan who knew anything about trade, this was exactly the sort of deal that would make their eyes bulge and send them running. The profit was guaranteed to be enormous.
Of course, most of that profit would go to Mount Hua, and they would merely pick up the scraps that fell from the table, but if the cake itself was the size of a mountain, surely the crumbs would still form a desert!
This will let the Eunha Merchant Guild soar again!
Hwang Jong-ui was once more reminded of just how extraordinary Hwang Mun-yak’s foresight had been when he first built ties with Mount Hua.
“Then let’s sort the goods properly and…….”
It happened then.
Rrrrip!
The bottom of one of the sacks slung over a disciple’s shoulder tore open. Blue jewels poured out in a cascade.
Hwang Jong-ui’s eyes nearly popped from their sockets.
“T-tha……!”
“Careful. Those are expensive.”
“Ice, i-ice crystals……!”
What in the world—these lunatics were carrying Ice Crystals in sacks like someone hauling potatoes.
But whether Hwang Jong-ui was shocked or not, Hyun Young simply asked Chung Myung with a blasé expression, “Are you going to sell those Ice Crystals too?”
“No. We’ve got another use for them.”
“Hmm, I see. Then we’ll use them ourselves.”
Hwang Jong-ui forcibly shut his mouth, which had dropped open in disbelief. Then he tore his gaze away from the casually stacked Ice Crystals. If he kept looking any longer, he felt like his lifespan would be shortened.
And then, just then, the storehouse door flew open.
“Elder! Chung Myung!”
“Hm?”
Baek Cheon stepped inside with a reluctant look and said, “You’d better come out. We have a guest.”
“A guest?”
Chung Myung tilted his head and stood up.
A guest at Mount Hua?
“What kind of idle bastard climbs all the way up here for no reason?”
“……You’ll see when you get there.”
“Tch.”
Grumbling, Chung Myung trudged out of the storehouse.
“…….”
“…….”
Eyes met in the air.
A Daoist who didn’t look like a Daoist.
A bandit who didn’t look like a bandit.
“……Well…….”
After staring wordlessly at each other for a while, the first to speak was the bandit in a pure white crane robe.
“……Damned if I’m not glad to see you!”
“Ahem.”
At that, the mighty Chung Myung cleared his throat.
“What, did you think if you just waited around, I’d never get around to giving it to you? You came all the way here yourself just because you’ve got something else you want to squeeze out of me?”
“……You’d get around to giving it to me?”
At Chung Myung’s bored tone, the bandit in the crane robe tilted his head.
“That’s a little different from what I heard. Someone else told me they’d send it right away if I went back, and then who was it that just went swanning off to the North Sea instead?”
“You came, didn’t you? So what’s the problem?”
“……I really do hope that’s enough, Dojang. I really do!”
Chung Myung clicked his tongue and shook his head.
“You’ve got some guts. What kind of backbone does a bandit need to come all the way up here?”
“When I’m about to die, do you think I’ve got the luxury of worrying about that? My yin and a half-severed meridians have already turned into the Three Yin Severed Meridians! These days I wake up in the middle of the night because I’m cold!”
The man in the crane robe.
Im So-byeong, the Green Forest King, threw his head back in exasperation and shuddered violently.
“I’ve lived long enough to see a person swindle bandits! That’s just not right!”
“Swindle? This is just a matter of things getting a little tangled!”
“……The brothers standing behind the Dojang don’t seem to think so.”
“…….”
Chung Myung glanced back at Baek Cheon and the others behind him, then gave a loud, awkward cough. After that, he pointed toward the inside and said, “Well, now that you’re here, come on in first.”
“……Give me something warm to drink, would you? What kind of mountain is this, anyway? It’s awful. Good grief…… this is why people are supposed to live on flat ground.”
“That’s something a bandit says?”
“Are bandits not people?”
As the two bickered and headed inside, the Mount Hua disciples muttered softly among themselves.
“But, Sasuk.”
“Hm?”
“Is it really all right for a bandit to just walk into Mount Hua?”
“…….”
Baek Cheon smiled faintly.
“At this point, why bother asking?”
“……Fair enough, I suppose.”
With a collective sigh, they all shook their heads and followed them inside.
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