Negotiating with the Jeomchang Sect
"You said it would be difficult to accept?"
"That is correct."
"Does the Sacheondang Family intend not to recognize the Jeomchang Sect's domain in Yunnan?"
Hyeonseong Jin-in's expression was calmer than expected.
It seems the Dang Family has struck some kind of bargain with the Provincial Administration. But if we simply look the other way and ignore it, that will be the end of the matter. The Provincial Administration may dislike it, of course—but they can hardly abandon the Jeomchang Sect here in Yunnan. And the Dang Family likewise: even if we ignore them, they will not march an army all the way to Yunnan to pick a fight with our sect.
Hyeonseong Jin-in's prediction, however, missed the mark completely.
"Allow me to turn the question around. If the Sacheondang Family truly renounces the monopoly rights, will you be able to handle what comes after?"
Huiyeom never once said "no" with his own mouth. He simply redirected the conversation.
"What comes after? Are you daring to threaten the great Jeomchang Sect? Do you think we fear the Sacheondang Family?"
"Ah, a misunderstanding. Of course—if it is the Jeomchang Sect, the foremost swift-sword school under heaven, you would have no reason to fear our family. Why else would you have tried to pressure a peace envoy with a sparring match on a secluded mountain path?"
"Ahem! That was the work of immature second-generation disciples who could not contain their hot blood. It was not the official position of Jeomchang. I express my regrets."
Damn it.
Hyeonseong Jin-in ground his teeth inwardly. The mess his disciples had made had come flying back and stuck right here. The juniors had already tried to intimidate the Dang Family; that could be waved off as youthful hot-bloodedness. But if they kept pressing the Dang Family even now, the Jeomchang Sect would become "those bastards who used force to bully the Sacheondang Family—the very people who first learned of Yunnan's plight, offered relief, and came seeking negotiation."
And from the way the man had already driven that dagger home, the other side knew it perfectly well.
The smiling face of Huiyeom, which until a moment ago had seemed radiant with beauty, now looked so infuriating that Hyeonseong Jin-in wanted to shred it with the secret Light-Splitting Sword Art. He barely managed to swallow the fire rising in his gut.
"Is that so? Well, let's say it is for now."
Huiyeom never quite affirmed it to the end.
Was that one word—"understood"—really so hard for you, you aggravating little—!
Whether Hyeonseong Jin-in ground his teeth or not, Huiyeom simply grinned and went on.
"At any rate, returning to the matter at hand: because of the monopoly contract between the Dang Family and the Yunnan Provincial Administration, abandoning it could make the aftermath rather difficult to manage."
"…Explain yourself."
"Yes. How this came about is as follows…"
Huiyeom spoke evenly, laying out the contract with the Provincial Administration. The substance of it ran thus: they had received the monopoly rights, and the price for those rights was the supply of relief grain. If they renounced the monopoly, they would of course stop selling that grain as well. Even from Sichuan—the province physically closest to Yunnan—it had taken a full month to haul rice this far; from Anhui it would take at least three. If they announced they were pulling the rice wagons and returning to Sichuan, the people of Yunnan would have no choice but to starve for three months. And when the grain merchants of Anhui finally arrived three months later, would they sell at a fair price? Worse still, the moment the contract collapsed, starving commoners would rise up and the Provincial Administration would be livid—could the Jeomchang Sect cover that? If, on the other hand, the Jeomchang Sect took responsibility and coolly supplied enough rice for every soul in Yunnan to last the year, then for a modest handling fee the Dang Family was prepared to renounce the monopoly.
Hyeonseong Jin-in felt his head swimming. For a martial clan of the jianghu to threaten not with the usual logic of force, but with popular sentiment and the lives of people who had nothing to do with either side—this was a first even for him.
Could the Jeomchang Sect weather the fury of Yunnan's commoners facing starvation? If they could, they would be a demonic cult, not an orthodox sect.
The board had been set so that no victory was possible, and only then had the man strolled in at his leisure. Even Master Sun Tzu, rising from his grave to shout that this was one hell of a way to fight, would have been forced to heap praise on Huiyeom's reasoning. Hyeonseong Jin-in squeezed his eyes shut.
So long as the Jeomchang Sect remained orthodox, there was one thing they could never surrender even if they gave up everything else: the outward shell of fairness and justice. Even if, behind the scenes, they resorted to every dirty trick of politics and power, they had to recite righteousness, principle, and chivalry in public—or they ceased to be an orthodox sect.
Hyeonseong Jin-in had no choice but to speak with the heart of a defeated nation signing the armistice.
"…I see. I understand the situation."
"Thank you for understanding. We cannot distribute grain for free either, you see."
"Even so, this is not a matter we can simply let pass. Seon Ji-aryong—you are clever; you must know the difficult position Jeomchang is in. Taking advantage of a neighbor's hardship for profit is not the bearing of a gentleman. If you snatch the rice bowls of the tea merchants who live by selling tea, what becomes of them? They must eat as well. And our Jeomchang Sect, charged with looking after them, finds itself in a truly awkward place. Must the Jeomchang Sect and the Dang Family—who once stood together against the demonic cults—truly turn against each other?"
At Hyeonseong Jin-in's words, Huiyeom smiled gently.
"It seems the Jin-in has somewhat misunderstood our intent."
"In what way?"
"Even in a situation where the Dang Family holds the monopoly on Yunnan tea, we can arrange matters so that Jeomchang's prestige grows stronger still, and the tea merchants under Jeomchang feel grateful."
"What do you mean by that?"
At the absurd claim, Hyeonseong Jin-in's brow faintly furrowed. Huiyeom explained.
"Jin-in. How much of Yunnan's tea fields and gardens does Jeomchang own?"
"About four-tenths."
"Correct. Yet what our Dang Family has obtained is a full ten-tenths monopoly over Yunnan tea. And the reason I have come to Jeomchang today is none other than this: to propose that we purchase only Jeomchang's tea at a premium."
"…What are you saying?"
"Yunnan has many tea merchants, and those many tea merchants have sold tea to countless merchant houses of the Central Plains. By restricting supply and pitting them against one another, they have driven the price up. But now every leaf of Yunnan tea must pass through our Dang Family, so it has become difficult to inflate the price through competition among merchant houses. That is not to say we intend to drive the price into the dirt. Colluding to jack it sky-high would be problematic as well. In a good harvest we will buy at the usual rate; in a poor one we will buy dear. At those times, however, we intend to pay a little more only to merchant houses linked to Jeomchang's main mountain, or to those of our lay disciples."
"…Surely not."
Only then did Hyeonseong Jin-in's eyes widen as he grasped what Huiyeom was driving at. Huiyeom grinned.
"Exactly. In other words, Yunnan tea farms and merchant houses that do not belong to Jeomchang will take a relative loss. And if this situation is used well, Jeomchang's influence could rise far beyond a mere four-tenths, could it not?"
"…Exquisite. Truly exquisite."
Hyeonseong Jin-in thought it over carefully. It was the same principle as when heavy rain drives up the price of umbrellas and the paper merchant who supplies the makers reaps a profit without lifting a finger.
"Jin-in. Even if the Dang Family holds the monopoly, Jeomchang has nothing to lose. Your principal income has never been the buying and selling of tea itself, but the tenant rents and lease fees from the tea fields and gardens. The real problem was the backlash from the Yunnan merchants who bought tea from the farms and sold it dear. Yet even that becomes an opportunity. If simply belonging to Jeomchang means the Dang Family will pay more for your tea, who would refuse? Tea merchants eager to enter Jeomchang's shade will multiply, and that will expand your influence over Yunnan's commercial world."
"I understand, yet one thing puzzles me. Would that not mean the Dang Family takes a one-sided loss? What is it you want?"
"Which is why we wish to make one further proposal. Caffa."
"Caffa?"
"Our Dang Family intends to cultivate a new kind of tea on Yunnan soil—a tea called Caffa. But operating a plantation in a foreign land with no local ties is, in practice, impossible. In exchange for the Dang Family accepting a certain degree of loss in order to preserve Jeomchang's face, we wish to entrust the operation of the farmland to Jeomchang."
"Speak in more detail."
"The cultivar will be brought in from the Western Regions; the farmland we will obtain through consultation with the Provincial Administration; and the tenant farmers we will recruit and pay ourselves. All Jeomchang need do is manage those tenants and protect the plantation. If Jeomchang's merchant houses or lay disciples take charge of this, the revenue generated here should more than offset whatever loss you incur."
"The way you speak, it does not sound as though you mean to farm on a small scale."
"We intend to produce Caffa on a scale exceeding that of Pu'er tea."
"Hah… Caffa is a new tea even I have scarcely heard of. Is it wise to launch something so large?"
"Have no concern. Even should losses arise, they will fall solely upon our Dang Family. We will never raise any matter that might inconvenience Jeomchang."
Not only a proposal for a new venture, but an offer to shoulder all the risk alone? While Hyeonseong Jin-in reeled, Huiyeom drove the point home.
"The Provincial Administration's decision has already been handed down. It would be hard to reverse now, and to go against the people's will would make the choice difficult for you. Yet if you accept my proposal, Jeomchang's standing among the common folk will rise even higher—just as the Provincial Administration's has. And if the new Caffa enterprise prospers, the Dang Family may well earn greater profits than before. If you wish, Caffa produced on plantations managed by Jeomchang can be offered first for bid to merchant houses under your banner. Then the better the Caffa business fares, the more Jeomchang profits as well, does it not? The Dang Family yields a little tea revenue to preserve Jeomchang's face, and in return gains revenue from a new crop. Is that not a fine arrangement for both sides?"
The talk was almost too sweet, and for all Hyeonseong Jin-in's careful weighing, he could find no real loss to Jeomchang. Yet that very fact made him curious.
"What concrete benefit does the Dang Family gain? I may be speaking out of turn, but in the end the Dang Family will be paying nearly the same price for Yunnan tea as before. Even with the monopoly, the margin may not be so great."
Of course, if they sold it far more dearly elsewhere in the Central Plains they could profit—but Yunnan was not the only tea-producing region, and prices that high might simply push buyers toward other provinces' leaves.
"You went so far as to secure monopoly rights from the Provincial Administration. Can you truly be satisfied with this much?"
"In exchange we gain the cooperation of the Jeomchang Sect, do we not? If the new plantations are well managed, the losses will at least be covered. And I am confident the Caffa enterprise will succeed."
At this point Hyeonseong Jin-in began to interpret everything in his own favor.
Come to think of it, even if the Dang Family obtained monopoly rights from the Provincial Administration, they could never handle Yunnan tea as they pleased without Jeomchang's leave. That is why they have come seeking our permission through negotiation. And the Dang Family paying full price for Yunnan tea is not truly a loss either. Yunnan tea has always sold the moment it is placed on the markets of the Central Plains, has it not?
Seen that way, the Dang Family's stance made sense.
Huiyeom, of course, was thinking something similar yet entirely different.
Yunnan tea has always been a business that leaves a profit even when bought at full price. The only regret is leaving a little less on the table for a monopoly. And the real money will not come from monopolizing Pu'er—it will come from large-scale coffee plantations!
What Huiyeom envisioned was the classic Southeast Asian plantation farm model: operating coffee on a massive scale. The Dang Family was already short-handed; dispatching people to another province to run farms would be hideously inefficient in both manpower and wages. The Jeomchang Sect—already influential among the locals and possessing the martial force to protect a plantation—was the ideal choice to subcontract the plantation work.
In the world Huiyeom had once lived in, plantation farms had only appeared once the armies of European imperial powers began planting their flags in Southeast Asian colonies, had they not?
Playing American GI in a Vietnam War against Yunnan Viet Cong would be idiocy. Just tell them, "You grow it," slap the Sacheondang brand on it, and sell it OEM-style. Far more efficient.
It was an extraordinarily efficient scheme. What made the deception so brilliant was that Huiyeom's talk of buying tea at a premium made it sound as though the Dang Family were accepting a certain disadvantage in the name of mutual prosperity. But what was the reality?
By purchasing Yunnan tea at the going rate, they could put the warriors of Jeomchang—the most powerful private armed force in Yunnan—to work as plantation guards.
Ordinarily, asking another sect to manage your plantation for you would be absurd. But like this? Hand the operation to Jeomchang's lay disciples and they will station those outstanding warriors for you of their own accord.
And this plantation would become the only coffee plantation in the Central Plains. Its profits would be deliciously shared between the Dang Family and the Yunnan Provincial Administration. As long as that sweet profit continued to flow, the Provincial Administration of Yunnan would have no choice but to side with the Dang Family thereafter.
Above all, the coffee that would begin in Yunnan and spread across the Central Plains would, Huiyeom was certain, soon overtake Yunnan's entire tea industry. Even in the twenty-first century one could name any number of famous coffee brands; how many "tea" brands sprang to mind? The coffee plantation venture was bound to be a smash hit, and Huiyeom was confident he could make it one. The concessions he was offering the Jeomchang Sect were nothing more than baiting a shrimp on a hook to catch a whale.
Hyeonseong Jin-in, who could not possibly know what lay in Huiyeom's heart, broke into a broad smile.
"Is that truly so?"
"Yes. Shall we discuss the details?"
"Excellent! Come, the tea has gone cold and the sweets are gone. Let us change the tea and speak of deeper matters!"
"Yes—hahaha."
"Ahahaha!"
Hyeonseong Jin-in was happy. But Huiyeom was happier still.
And so, without ever realizing it, the Jeomchang Sect accepted the post of security detail for the coffee plantations owned by the Sacheondang Family.