Crushing the Crimson Horse Gang, Part 3
“M-master! It’s not just one high official, it’s several of them…!”
“From the way they’re talking, it sounds like they’ve already each bought a Thousand-Charred Horses once before!”
“This feels ominous.”
With the Governor of Hebei and the high officials appearing, Seok Geum-ryong’s group surged with momentum, while Crimson Horse Gang and its leader, Gui Jong-ak, who had been all but brimming with self-satisfied confidence and urging them to buy at bargain-basement prices, went pale as death.
“Ahem! Quiet! That can’t be.”
As the ominous air spread and the unrest among his men grew, Gui Jong-ak puffed himself up and tried to clamp down on their tongues.
T
“The Thousand-Charred Horse isn’t a donkey foal. You think it’s that easy to buy?”
With a face gone red as blood, Gui Jong-ak hissed the words through clenched teeth.
Even he could tell, however, that what he had just said failed to convince anyone at all.
To be honest, the lords who had already tasted the charm of the Thousand-Charred Horse looked completely different now.
“Then, for the main item in this afternoon’s auction... fifty Thousand-Charred Horses, offered by Bukcheon-won of Seokga Manor!”
At last, the long, sleek bodies of the Thousand-Charred Horses rose onto the platform, so handsome they seemed to stretch straight into the sky.
Ooh. Oohhh!
Even seeing one horse was rare; now there were dozens of them. It was only natural that the lords of Hebei, including Governor Jo Hwang, would start salivating at the sight.
“It really is fifty horses!”
“How could anyone part with such a treasure?”
“The fifth son of Seokga Manor, was he not? Young Master Seok Geum-ryong is truly a man of means.”
Not only the three provincial governors, but even the generals from the Censorate, who could not stand to be around horses without losing their heads, and the scholars of the Hanlin Academy found themselves composing lines of poetry at the noble bearing of the Thousand-Charred Horses.
“Damn it! Damn it!”
Gui Jong-ak, who had somehow anticipated a storm over the Thousand-Charred Horses, could only grind his teeth at the unexpected spectacle.
“We’ll begin the auction!”
And so, the moment the auction opened, Gui Jong-ak, feeling the first stirrings of unease, stepped in.
“Oh! Twelve taels of gold from the two parties! Starting off with some fire, aren’t we?”
He signaled a preemptive strike and showed that he was determined to secure the Thousand-Charred Horses at all costs.
At present, Crimson Horse Gang and Gui Jong-ak had only one thing to rely on.
‘No provincial lord wants to brawl over gold with me, a mere merchant, and look cheap in public.’
That was the strategy: let the bidding catch awkwardly, then buy the horses in one sweep by offering a better price than expected before the cost could spiral out of control.
It was not a bad strategy, but it was also one that could never actually succeed.
“Hey, manager.”
“Yes, my lord?”
“You may spend every bit of the budget I have. We must buy at least twenty of the Thousand-Charred Horses.”
Governor Jo Hwang of Hebei gave the order to the man who oversaw Hebei’s finances.
In truth, his reason for coming all the way here had included the hope of maintaining good relations with Seok Geum-ryong and Seokga Manor, and perhaps even receiving a fine gift, but that was not what mattered now.
‘What would happen if I bought the Thousand-Charred Horses and presented them to His Majesty the Emperor?’
These horses had already been offered to both the provincial governors and the imperial court.
As a result, a rumor had circulated among the great officials and within the palace, one that the pleasure-seekers repeated with relish.
-It is said that His Majesty burst into thunderous laughter the very moment he received a Thousand-Charred Horse, unable to stop himself, and remained in an excellent mood for days.
He had even reportedly gone to the stables himself to stroke the horse, which was enough to suggest just how dearly he favored it.
Word spread widely that he had been so taken with the Thousand-Charred Horse that he had bestowed a grand reward upon Seokga Manor.
If he was that delighted by a mere single horse, what would happen if several were presented to him?
“Ooooh! The Hebei Governor’s side has declared twelve taels of gold, twenty in total!”
Thus the Hebei manager immediately doubled the offer and signaled with his hand, and the hall began to boil.
Waaah!
The moment the afternoon auction began, a price better than the highest winning bid of the morning auction’s Sabaek Horses appeared, and chaos erupted.
Though they were priced at nearly the same level, the declaration that he would buy all fifty of them was astonishing enough on its own.
Gasp!
The other governors, too, were stunned by Governor Jo Hwang’s bold display.
To be sure, these three were close personally, but they were also competitors who had to climb to higher positions, and so they never laid all their true feelings bare.
“Hmmm.”
As the Hebei Governor surged ahead in a solo charge, the Governor of Shaanxi also fell into thought.
If Jo Hwang was buying the horses in order to present them to the Emperor and earn favor, then the Governor of Shaanxi had a slightly different motive.
‘What if I bought all the Thousand-Charred Horses and formed an elite cavalry?’
Perhaps it was the frivolous hobby of a wealthy official, but what man had no interest in cavalry?
On top of that, Shaanxi was plagued by disputes among numerous major sects, so the state and the authorities had to look strong; naturally, he had a strong appetite for a Thousand-Charred Horse cavalry detachment.
“Hrk! Two more times! The Governor of Shaanxi has called twenty taels of gold for two portions of the Thousand-Charred Horse!”
By now, even the auctioneer was flustered and had gone pale.
Had there ever been an auction at a horse market where two consecutive doubling bids were made the instant the afternoon session began?
Unlike other auctions, where prices moved in a comparatively realistic range, this was virtually unheard of at the Xi’an Horse Market, something with no precedent at all.
“What? Forty taels of gold?!”
Instead of taking the initiative, Gui Jong-ak, the lord of Crimson Horse Gang, was left dumbfounded by the sight of his own momentum being crushed before it had even begun.
He had never dreamed things would rocket upward like this.
‘Something’s wrong!’
Only then did Gui Jong-ak instinctively realize that something had gone badly amiss, and though he wanted nothing more than to overturn the entire auction, his opponents were none other than the luminaries among the provincial governors.
And with men from the Hanlin Academy and the Censorate present as well, how could he dare act recklessly?
“Hohoho, you all certainly have your eyes on the Thousand-Charred Horses.”
At this point, even the Governor of Shanxi, who had not entered the fray alone, could not stay silent.
To be honest, he too had a deep interest in the Thousand-Charred Horses.
The reason was not, like the Hebei Governor, to present them to the imperial family, nor, like the Governor of Shaanxi, to organize an elite cavalry unit.
He simply loved horses to the point of obsession.
“Another doubling bid! The Governor of Shanxi has offered eighty taels of gold for two portions!”
Among the three, that meant pure, unadulterated enthusiasm bordering on madness.
The Governor of Shanxi had resolved to empty his treasury if necessary and buy every single one of the Thousand-Charred Horses.
“E-eighty…”
“Hey, you!”
“He’s insane. Hahaha.”
With eighty taels for two portions on the board, now all the high officials and the other governors alike could only stare in speechless shock.
At this point, Seok Geum-ryong’s group was nearly dancing with joy, the place practically turned into a festival. Yet even at a moment like this, Seok Geum-ryong remained calm.
The auction is not over until it is over.
When everyone suggested that the horses should all be sold for eighty taels of gold, he did not make any rash move and instead held his breath, waiting.
And in the end, the Thousand-Charred Horses...
“If not now, then when would I ever see fifty Thousand-Charred Horses again? One hundred taels of gold for two portions! I’ll take the whole lot neatly, for one hundred.”
To everyone’s surprise, Governor Jo Hwang of Hebei’s final bid won the day in dazzling fashion.
Thus the final victor was the Hebei Governor, but he did not claim the Thousand-Charred Horses for himself alone.
“I only need twenty horses. Why don’t the two of you take the rest at the same price?”
Jo Hwang made a wise compromise and showed real foresight by proposing a solution to the other governors.
“Good!”
“Thank you!”
And so the remaining governors divided the rest between them, fifteen horses each, and brought their happy convoy to a close.
Strictly speaking, the final winner was not the Hebei Governor at all, but Seok Geum-ryong.
“Even after selling the Thousand-Charred Horses and subtracting the auction house fee, it comes to more than four thousand taels of gold!”
“A jackpot! A mega-jackpot, an ultra-super-mega-jackpot!”
“Hahaha! Hahahahahaha!”
Even Yeo Gwang-rae, who was stingy with laughter, broke into a broad smile and delighted in this mad windfall.
“Phew. That’s a relief.”
Even the cautious Seok Geum-ryong finally smiled brightly as he tucked the draft certificate, worth a thousand taels of gold per sheet, deep inside his robes.
“Congratulations, Young Master Seok Geum-ryong. You have written a new chapter in the history of this Xi’an Horse Market.”
As soon as the auction came to a triumphant close, the owner of the Xi’an Horse Market himself appeared and bowed respectfully with a cupped-fist salute.
In the end, thanks to Seok Geum-ryong, the Xi’an Horse Market and auction house had also made an unprecedented fortune, and on his very first visit he rose to the rank of major honored guest, no less important than the lord of Crimson Horse Gang.
“Grrrgh!”
Meanwhile, Crimson Horse Gang and Gui Jong-ak, who had so boldly mocked Seok Geum-ryong and offered to buy the horses for a pittance, were pounding the ground in bitter regret.
They had never, even in their dreams, imagined the situation would turn so completely around.
There was one more thing, too.
Whoosh.
Only after securing a complete victory did Seok Geum-ryong deliberately seek out Gui Jong-ak.
He approached him and withdrew something from his sleeve.
It was a lump of silver.
“W-what is this?”
Suddenly presented with silver, Gui Jong-ak looked startled and raised his head.
“When your heart feels heavy and hollow, chicken broth is best.”
“What?”
“This is a little extra. Even if it was only once at the start, you still placed a bid in this Thousand-Charred Horse auction, did you not? On your way back to Crimson Horse Gang, you should treat yourself to some chicken soup.”
“You... you...!”
With that perfect revenge, Gui Jong-ak ground his teeth and reached for Seok Geum-ryong’s collar, but his own men rushed to stop him instead.
“Lord! You can’t make a scene here!”
“If you resort to violence, you’ll be banned for years!”
If Crimson Horse Gang, which dealt in horses, were to be banned from the greatest horse market in the Central Plains, it would not merely be humiliating beyond humiliation; it would mean ruin severe enough to force them to shut their doors for a time.
So his men did everything they could to restrain him and force him back.
“Ah, right. I nearly forgot to mention this.”
As Gui Jong-ak retreated, Seok Geum-ryong drove the final nail in.
“I plan to use the funds from selling the Thousand-Charred Horses to do horse trading in Hebei. I expect we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, so let’s greet one another with smiles.”
Seok Geum-ryong was right.
What had happened today was, at most, a single blow returned in kind.
As the words implied, they would inevitably meet often in the future and keep clashing.
Smirk.
Seok Geum-ryong smiled brightly, while Gui Jong-ak continued backing away in a miserable face.
There was no doubt about it: this was Seok Geum-ryong’s perfect victory.
* * *
“Hahahahah!”
“Young Master! This is unbelievable. It’s a complete success!”
“We made more than four thousand taels of gold!”
From the Scholar in Blue, Gong Sang-pil, who was rarely reckless, to the servant Jang Sam and the Shadowless One Shin Dan-woo, at least for this one day, all of them were jumping in the air with wild joy.
Not only had they sold the Thousand-Charred Horses for more than their worth in a single morning, but...
-You said you would be trying your hand at horse trading from now on, did you not?
We will take responsibility for supplying quality steeds at good prices right here at the Xi’an Horse Market.
He had also formed a proper connection with Zhang Biao, the man in charge of the Xi’an Horse Market, and things were moving forward at a gallop.
But while everyone else was laughing, Seok Geum-ryong was not.
Because the road home to Seokga Manor, carrying such an enormous sum of money, was bound to be as harsh and arduous as the journey that had brought the Thousand-Charred Horses here in the first place.
“The trade is not over yet.”