The Working People of the Dang Family
Before the first pale streak of dawn could even touch the sky, a boy of striking beauty rounded the corner of the wall, a sesame-oil lamp held high against the pitch-black dark.
The gate guards, who had been rubbing sleep from their eyes while waiting for the shift change, snapped to attention at once and offered a sharp salute.
"Good morning, Young Master!"
"You've been working hard on duty. Here—today's pass."
"Yes, thank you… Confirmed. But you really don't have to do this every single morning… There's not a man among us who doesn't know the Young Master's face…"
At the guard's words, the boy—Hwi-yeom—laughed lightly.
"Someone could always show up wearing my face with a skin mask. Security is cheapest when you keep it tight. Keep up the good work."
White breath trailing behind him, Hwi-yeom strode off into the darkness.
His destination was the place that had become the busiest spot in the entire Dang Family: the Innovation Hall.
Only after the Young Master's figure had vanished completely did one of the guards yawn and mutter,
"Aigoo… Now that the Young Master's gone past, it must be around the end of the hour of Yin—four or five in the morning. He never misses a single day. Truly incredible."
"Blood really does tell. Not just anyone can be Young Master."
"It's not only the early rising. Planning all that work, overseeing it, reviewing it, closing the books, and writing the reports on top of everything…"
"He's basically superhuman."
"Anyone watching would think he lives seventy-two hours in a single day."
"Last time I looked, that new male secretary he hired? The fellow manages the schedule in fifteen-minute blocks."
"Ah, the one who brings the lunchbox at the start of the hour of Chen! Lee Jinmyeong, was it?"
The bored guards were still blooming into full gossip when, from far off, came the sound of someone panting hard.
They barely had time to straighten their postures before a man came sprinting up, gulping air, then flashed them a wide, gum-baring grin.
"Here's my pass! Open the gate! Quickly! Hurry!"
"Yes, sir… Confirmed. Please go in."
"Much obliged! May your day explode with joy! Eu-heuh-heuh! Heuh-heuh-heuh!"
Dang Un-hwa tore past them in a rush of cold wind.
Watching that slightly unhinged smile disappear, the guards fell silent for a beat, then spoke.
"…The Laughing Explosive Demon just went by, so it must be the start of the hour of Mao—five or six."
Ever since he had witnessed the explosive-poison tests, Dang Un-hwa had fallen completely for explosives. From that day on he poured every scrap of passion into explosive-poison experiments.
Seeing him cackle maniacally while throwing himself into the work, the people of the Dang Family had begun calling him the Laughing Explosive Demon.
One of the guards shivered as if the man's madness itself were chilling.
"'Explode with joy'—what kind of blessing is that? Is it a blessing or a curse…?"
"Leave him be. He's still better than he used to be."
Boom… rumble…
Not long after Dang Un-hwa vanished inside, faint explosions began echoing from deep within the research wing of the Innovation Hall. The guards clicked their tongues.
"Tsk-tsk. Blasting experiments at this hour? There's a limit to how much you can inconvenience people."
"And this is the delayed schedule. The Family Head himself ordered him to push it back after everyone complained. He used to clock in right alongside the Young Master."
"Seriously—when they say 'start experiments after the hour of Mao,' normal people think 'after sunrise.' Who the hell sprints over the instant Mao begins just to blow things up?"
"Exactly my point."
"Gah?!"
A voice right behind them made one guard leap half out of his skin. He spun around to find a haggard old man who looked as if he had just crawled out of a grave, staring at them with sunken, bloodshot eyes.
"Some warriors you are, leaving your backs this open."
"C-Chief Blacksmith Han… What I just said was—"
Chief Blacksmith Han Cheol pulled a pass from his robes with an air of pure irritation and thrust it forward.
"I've got more work than I can handle, so I won't bother reporting idle talk—but keep it up and one day you'll get hurt."
"Ahahaha… Thank you… Wait?"
The guard checked the pass against the ledger and scratched his head.
"Chief, you only clocked out two shichen—four hours—ago. You can't possibly be coming back already. Did you leave something behind?"
"Leave something behind, my ass. There's work, so I came. Hwaaaah. Tch. The Young Master?"
"He arrived at his usual time, sir."
"…Must be the youth. Completely different stamina. How does he never miss that hour, not even once?"
Chief Han tilted his face to the sky in a long-suffering groan, shook his head, and trudged inside.
"I'm going in. Keep at it. And tell every blacksmith who shows up later than me that they're already dead."
"Y-yes, sir! Take care!"
Boom…
At the distant explosion, the sleep-drunk chief's face twisted violently.
"Son of a—being the Family Head's little brother doesn't give him the right to keep blasting next door all damn day. My ears are going to give out. Hwaaaah…"
Watching the chief stagger away half-asleep, the guards stuck out their tongues.
"Chief Han's something else too. Pulling all-nighters like it's nothing. What's he making these days?"
"I heard the Young Master handed the blacksmiths some kind of blueprint at the Innovation Hall. What was it called again? A steam engine? The whole Metallurgy Department's gone crazy trying to build it."
Not long ago Hwi-yeom had ordered the blacksmiths to construct a model of Heron's steam ball.
Heron's steam ball was a primitive device from ancient Greece: a cauldron fitted with a lid and two hollow metal tubes rising from it, connected at their upper ends to a hollow metal sphere that had two angled nozzles. Heat the water, and the steam raced up the tubes into the sphere and shot out the nozzles, spinning the sphere like a pinwheel.
With that simple demonstration Hwi-yeom had proclaimed, "Boiling water can produce force that moves objects! If we can harness this rotational power as a drive source, we can replace human and animal labor!" The blacksmiths had been utterly captivated by the possibility.
Then Hwi-yeom had clasped the excited chiefs' hands and handed them their next assignment: "Within the next full moon, deliver equipment that transfers this steam power to a drive shaft and stirs cement paste."
From that moment on, Chief Han and every blacksmith under him had been working overtime nearly every night.
"The blacksmiths sure have it rough."
"Still, they're treated well enough. Performance bonuses are fat."
"Speaking of bonuses, you can't leave out the carpenters… Speak of the tiger and here he comes."
Through the slowly brightening gloom came a yellow-faced, gaunt old man, swaying as he walked.
He looked ready to collapse at any second, yet his eyes burned with a fierce, venomous light. It was none other than Master Carpenter Gwak Do.
He thrust his pass at the guards and asked,
"Has that bastard Han gone in already?"
"Yes, about one meal's time ago."
"Tch. Full of poison, that one. What about my boys?"
"Uh… none of the carpenters from the Construction Department have shown yet. You're the first, Master Carpenter."
"These little shits dare show up later than me?!"
Gwak Do's eyes blazed; he growled with a killing aura that would have made a Peak master step back.
"This won't do. I'll have to gather those brats and thrash them with the cane… Work is drowning us and they sleep their fill, then stroll in whenever they feel like it? Aiiing—!!!"
"Um, Master Carpenter, sir… Don't the carpenters usually report straight to the construction sites?"
"Site work is site work! The homework the Young Master handed down has a deadline breathing down our necks!"
"Damn kids these days…" Clicking his tongue, the Master Carpenter stomped inside. The junior guard watched his back and asked,
"Senior, what kind of assignment did the Young Master give the carpenters this time?"
"Huuu… What was it? You know that pulley winch and that heavy-lifting machine the Young Master designed last time? He ordered an improved version."
"Those things don't just fall out of the sky…"
"Apparently he explained the rough structure and principles. You set up a sturdy iron-reinforced beam high up, fix a wooden rack with teeth on it, then run a spider-like hoist that grips those teeth with gears and travels left and right. It uses multiple movable pulleys and keeps the force acting only vertically, so it can move far heavier loads than ordinary winches or lifters limited by the weight of their own supports."
What Hwi-yeom had ordered from the carpenters was a monorail crane.
Without electricity it would be operated by ropes and pulleys, yet even so it would prove extraordinarily efficient in workshops and production halls.
"On top of that there are lathes for clamping iron pieces, turning handles to hold them, then cutting and drilling; presses that flatten still-hot steel into plates, bend it, or shear it… The carpenters already have work stacked solid through next year."
"Senior, are you sure you're in the Guard Corps and not the cutting-wind unit? How do you know all this?"
"My body's been a bit weak lately, so I've been dropping by the Medicine Hall for tonics. Lately the place is packed with people coming for strengthening medicines. They sit around waiting for their prescriptions and just pour out their complaints. If you keep your mouth shut, every kind of story drifts your way."
"Hah…"
The junior guard stared blankly, picturing the scene, then said,
"But if everyone's that busy, isn't it good for our Dang Family?"
"Exactly. That's why they curse about being worked to death and still brim with drive. And the Young Master wrings every last drop out of people like a dry dishcloth, but he rewards just as thoroughly. Remember the blacksmith who developed the manual water pump? Name entered in the patent register, fat prize money, and I hear once the pumps sell on the open market he'll get a share of the profits too."
"Heeeh… That sounds nice. Maybe I should quit being a warrior and learn a trade…"
"Waaaaaah!!"
A sudden scream made both guards jump. They spun around to see dozens of people sprinting toward them, silhouetted against the rising morning sun.
Faces ashen with panic, the runners were blacksmiths from the Metallurgy Department and carpenters from the Construction Department.
"H-hey, Du-chil! Chief Han hasn't—?"
"He went in before the middle of the hour of Mao—before six."
"Damn it all! H-here's my pass!"
"H-hey, Du-chil! What about the Master Carpenter…?"
"End of Mao—around half past six to seven?"
"We're finished!!"
Late for work behind their chiefs, the blacksmiths and carpenters fled inside in pure terror.
It was hard to blame them for laziness; it was only the beginning of the hour of Chen—barely seven in the morning. Still early by any ordinary measure.
Once the craftsmen had vanished, the senior guard smirked at his junior's pale face.
"What was that? Want to try being a craftsman? I can recommend you. Fancy starting as an apprentice somewhere?"
"…I'm happy being a warrior."
Guard Corps warriors, night duty aside, only had to report by the hour of Chen.
Just then a neat-looking scholar carrying a bamboo satchel came swaying up, presented his pass, and greeted them.
"Hard at work, gentlemen."
"Ah, Secretary Lee. Thank you for bringing breakfast every morning."
Lee Jinmyeong rubbed his pitch-black eye sockets and gave a thin smile. It was the smile of a man who had already transcended suffering.
"Hahaha… Yes. Take care."
He staggered inside like a lost ghost searching for a place to die.
The junior asked again,
"That fellow comes in late—why does he look so exhausted?"
"Tsk. You really don't know anything. You think that bamboo satchel Secretary Lee carries is all lunchboxes?"
"Isn't it?"
The senior clicked his tongue in pure frustration.
"With a bag that size, does he look like he's eating a multi-tier lunch set at dawn? Inside are one or two rice balls for food. The rest is documents."
"What? I thought the two of them just ate breakfast together… Documents?"
"Yesterday's consolidated daily business report for the whole enterprise, plus a summary of today's schedule. The Young Master says even the time it takes to use chopsticks is a waste, so he eats rice balls while reading the reports and fires questions at Secretary Lee nonstop. By the time breakfast ends, yesterday and today are completely organized in his head, and he gets up and heads to the next workplace."
"But the Young Master usually retires to his chambers between the hour of Zi—eleven at night to one in the morning. When does Secretary Lee even prepare yesterday's report?"
"Doesn't Secretary Lee's face already answer that?"
"…"
"…"
They fell silent for a moment. The junior spoke first.
"Come to think of it, lately the administrative staff from the Inner Hall haven't been able to go home for days at a stretch. I heard they compile hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly reports and deliver them to Secretary Lee… You don't think…"
"If he just carried the stack as-is, he wouldn't be turning into a mummy. Those are raw materials. Reviewing and reorganizing them is Secretary Lee's job."
"…"
"…"
"Joining the Guard Corps was the best decision of my life."
"Same here. Let's stay loyal…"
While the two men solemnly reaffirmed their career satisfaction, Dang Un-sang, Family Head of the Dang Clan, arrived at the Patriarch's Hall in a bright mood—only to clench his teeth at the mountain of documents piled on his desk.
They were the meticulously prepared settlement reports, business proposals, project plans, corrective measures, and pointed critiques of every flaw in the family, all based on Secretary Lee's briefings and penned by Hwi-yeom himself.
Dang Un-sang ground his teeth and glared at the paper mountain, but the documents did not melt under his gaze.
"He's my son, but how the hell does this little bastard never take a single day off?!"
Even the Family Head of the Dang Clan could not escape Hwi-yeom's clutches.