Chapter 197
Chapter 197
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 197
Chapter Title: Terminator (2)
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Meanwhile in Russia, something utterly Russian was unfolding.
The specialty of Russian monarchs was "possession."
When a royal died—especially young—someone would suddenly appear, claiming to be that person and gathering followers. Fake Dmitri, fake Anastasia, and so on; the list was endless.
But this time was special.
Pyotr, who had been imprisoned for plotting treason, suddenly began claiming he was a "foreign king."
"I am Frederick of Brandenburg. Give me my army! Return my East Prussia!"
In a way, it felt less Russian and more like something out of 21st-century Korea.
The timing was that of a mountain spirit who knew exactly what entertainment meant. For Pyotr-Frederick, it was a golden opportunity—and a crisis.
All because Empress Elizabeth of All Russia, who had held him captive, now teetered on the brink of death.
The common thread between her favorite Ivan Shuvalov and the candidate lover Ivan Krutov was their involvement in Joseon diplomacy. The two men hovered by her bedside, trying to bolster her spirits.
"Your Majesty, the expedition to the East will soon return with Joseon's miracle cure-all."
The red ginseng had run out. With no more foreign remedies, St. Petersburg's doctors resorted to traditional medicine.
"Draw blood!"
"Enemas to purge the bowels!"
"Emetics to empty the stomach!"
Calling it backward superstition would be unfair. It was cutting-edge medicine, even in France, Russia's model.
King Louis XIV had endured over two thousand enemas in his life and lived to 76, earning the title Sun King. Not because he was bald.
But alas, the empress's health plummeted the moment they halted Joseon treatments and began European ones.
If there had been anyone rational in their medical circles, they might have suspected her slow progress wasn't despite the ginseng but because of the lack of European care. Instead, Joseon's reputation as a (relative) medical powerhouse only grew.
In the end, even if Joseon released Levashov's group with red ginseng now, it seemed too late for the empress.
Her final words came like a sigh.
"Ensure my father Pyotr's bloodline endures."
Elizabeth Petrovna, victor of the Seven Years' War, wouldn't last even a year after its end. Frederick would regret not prolonging the war, gnashing his teeth in the afterlife.
Amid the tolling bells, who grieved most was unclear.
All of St. Petersburg and Moscow drowned in sorrow (anyone outside those cities didn't count as human).
But the happiest was obvious: the son of the deceased.
Released from confinement, Pyotr-Frederick cherry-picked the best of both Pyotr and Frederick.
He kept Frederick's identity while refusing to pass up the Russian throne, which no true Frederick could claim.
"Cancel the Polish negotiations as soon as the coronation ends! What? What about Latvia? Give it back to Poland! It wasn't even our land. Holding it just stirs trouble with Denmark! The key is East Prussia. That's no place for Polish or Russian barbarians—it's Brandenburg land!"
Now, one had to wonder if Pyotr spouted nonsense in German because he couldn't speak Russian or because Frederick had truly possessed him.
In the end, Pyotr-Frederick suffered the consequences of neglecting a possessor's iron rule: "Never reveal your true identity."
Drunken to the gills, he gained yet another possession opportunity just days later. Not some explosive atrophy, car crash, or Noryangjin food truck mishap, at least.
With his mother-in-law vomiting blood and dying in quick succession, only the daughter-in-law remained.
Instead of regency as mother to young Pavel, Catherine declared herself empress as the legitimate heir of her husband, Peter III.
It was possible only because Peter had briefly been emperor. Catherine proclaimed Pavel—"great-grandson of Peter the Great"—as future successor, honoring Elizabeth's dying wish.
She then dove into state affairs.
Things like announcing a "brief broadcast glitch" in the Three Powers Alliance group chat as its newest member, or groundwork to install her favorite as Polish king, were beneath Joseon's notice.
What Joseon needed to watch from Catherine's homeland was one thing.
"Withdraw the army sent to China."
On the western front, Chinese reinforcements poured in relentlessly.
Britain proper was still in the dark due to distance, but Catherine judged the English pirates had failed.
She decided to recall them, preserving troops from worthless distant lands to secure her shaky throne.
For the still-healthy Catherine, coup defense trumped red ginseng.
Like any prickly mother-daughter-in-law duo, she and Elizabeth hadn't been close.
Among the men who'd served Elizabeth "day and night," many influential figures resented Catherine for openly assassinating the late emperor's son.
Most were tied to this China expedition and Joseon exchanges.
For instance, Shuvalov—Elizabeth's favorite—backed Lomonosov's Joseon expedition. Count Buturlin, sent to China, was an old flame of Elizabeth's.
Political reasons alone demanded halting those ventures, even absent military ones.
But Lomonosov and Levashov's teams in Joseon had no recall option.
So Catherine borrowed a timeless truth: life bends to mindset.
She "exiled" them to Siberia. No army or police needed; the order self-executed. Joseon was at Siberia's eastern edge, after all.
While at it, she "dispatched" Moscow's suspicious Elizabeth loyalists (and the scant Peter faction) to "Joseon." Forgetting East Asia entirely, Catherine refocused on Europe and the Turks.
King Sho Boku threw a feast for Kim Unhaeng.
Ryukyu wasn't starving.
Sweet potatoes brought by "Sweet Potato Prince" Nohkuni 150 years ago survived even Satsuma's farmland ravages, enough for the elite.
But ancients were wiser than modern tax-cutters at welfare talks. They knew crumbling foundations toppled superstructures.
Thus, King Sho Boku readily bestowed on Kim Unhaeng the title "Potato Prince" after Nohkuni.
Kim Unhaeng had no interest in knockoff Frederick titles but thanked him anyway. Cheap sugar was thanks enough.
Then someone shattered the harmony.
As anyone could guess: an Englishman.
Hearing of the "envoy's" arrival, King Sho Boku vented freely.
"Have you ever seen such shameless curs!"
Not foolish, though. The British knew they'd torched Shuri Castle, so they sent the intact ship-of-the-line Elizabeth and frigate Seahorse.
For Ryukyu, either one meant mutual destruction.
But the king's rage had basis. He puffed his sleeves like the Liberation Fleet was his own.
"Commander of the Liberation Fleet Kim Unhaeng, sink those arrogant English tubs at once!"
Kim Unhaeng gave the king's words no more weight than a grunting servant's. Ryukyu had no Chief State Councillor.
He briefly fantasized sparking a Ryukyuan rebellion to rename the Sanshikan the Executive Office.
Ryukyu courtiers thus assumed Joseon's Commander was silently plotting to quash the king's folly with grand strategy. They waited politely.
Moments later, Kim Unhaeng snapped back, his calm demeanor turning assumption to certainty.
"Even in war, envoys aren't slain—that's ancient law. I'll go see them."
My life is collateral to the status window; I can't risk a scratch.
Clive, who last time endured Ryukyuans' murderous glares while climbing ashore at my demand, now poured out rhetoric in the meeting hall to forget that pressure.
"If Joseon mediates our talks with China, we'll be content with Taiwan and Nagasaki—no further hostilities. Isn't this Joseon's chance to claim a pillar in world order?"
Are you insane?
A local lord mediating pirate-government clashes? This isn't Europe.
I briefly itched to hurl my cup, "grill" Clive Hongmun-style, then bolt to my ship and flee to Joseon.
But that would doom my white powder—sugar or opium, irrelevant. Sugar deals weren't one-offs.
I struck their weak spot.
"So you'd abandon British captives in Joseon? I distinctly promised to release them the moment you fully withdraw from East Asia."
Not that I could actually free them.
Our military brass had gone collectively mad. I half-suspected the status window had unleashed a frenzy virus on Joseon.
Departments now vied to "lose" foreigners. Forget garrison troops; freeing nobles or scientists they craved was impossible.
But I wasn't worried. The British wouldn't withdraw from East Asia anyway.
I knew office workers' habits. No 21st-century job, but 18th-century corporate life had seasoned me.
No reason for Clive to sacrifice his credit—Nagasaki, Taiwan—for a science squadron not his fault.
Predictably, Clive stammered the obvious.
"Th-through mediation and building goodwill, hostage release is natura—"
"Cut the crap. Sitting pretty on Qing Emperor's Taiwan soil—how's that mediation or goodwill? This drags forever. I have a proposal."
"What is it?"
"Straight talk. I know your game. Stall till reinforcements, then stab China again? But will the homeland or India send more fleets?"
Clive flinched, poorly hiding it.
Sure, supply fleets with "white powder" would come, as he said last time. But mere transports—reinforcements at best for time-buying.
Their ploy: fake reports to Europe like "Taiwan, Nagasaki secured. Request combat reinforcements."
But I doubted the Company or Crown were that gullible. Indeed...
"No clear 'victory,' no dice. Taiwan and Nagasaki aren't key. It's about profit, right? You need tangible gains."
"...Sounds like you've prepared something."
"Of course."
Hard to imagine no English contact en route to Ryukyu. I'd brought the perfect gift.
"My terms first. I say nothing of Taiwan. But withdraw from Nagasaki—near Joseon. With Ryukyu now linked to us, holding Nagasaki-Taiwan's awkward, and the land profits Britain zilch?"
Nagasaki's Japan trade gateway perk vanished with Kyushu's ruin. Trade needs hinterlands. Clive replied grudgingly.
"May I review Joseon's terms before responding?"
I snorted, summoning Eoji. He effortlessly hefted a dirt-clod-laden sapling like a radish, heavy as it was.
Ryukyuans, bored by English, gawked at his strength.
Clive looked stunned too—likely at the tree's identity, not Eoji's power.
Colonel Draper asked incredulously.
"So, you promised to withdraw all Nagasaki ground forces and vow no military action against Joseon or Ryukyu?"
"Yes. As the Joseon commander said, dispersing troops to Nagasaki is pure risk, no gain. What's our loss?"
"Negotiations aren't just profit-loss. What they gave... this... this..."
Too astonishing for words. Clive helpfully added.
"Tea tree."
"Right. Tea tree. How do we know it's real? And frankly, I'm a black tea man. Teas vary; green tea trees are worthless. Japan has plenty. We need black tea trees!"
Clive relaxed. He wasn't the sole ignoramus; Draper echoed what he'd blathered to Kim Unhaeng.
"I thought so too. But the Joseon commander explained: age green tea leaves for black. No such thing as a 'black tea tree' originally."
Draper flushed, yelling.
"How do we trust that?"
"Kim Unhaeng attached proof from botanist Daniel Solander in Joseon. Carl Linnaeus's disciple—ring a bell? You won't claim Joseon forged Swedish and Latin academic reports in no time."
Draper fell silent. Nearby, curiously watching Admiral Tidman asked.
"Tea trees are absolute export bans. How'd the Joseon commander have one?"
Generally, curbing outflows beats inflows. More escapees than breached prisons.
Yet China blocked tea trees till mid-19th century despite failing on opium. They knew what paid.
"Snuck amid war chaos, or native to Joseon? Doesn't matter. Admiral, your call? I brought the best deal."
If Britain balked, no more trees from Kim Unhaeng. One sapling wouldn't propagate or prove viable.
Half this war was for tea. The British committed.
They ordered Nagasaki withdrawal, hunkered in Taiwan awaiting reinforcements once the tree arrived.
This effectively terminated both fronts.
Russia—Catherine's order undelivered—still clashed Qianlong's swift cavalry at Tianshan, but that too would end soon.
Having coerced Solander's report via Huijing Divine Needle Thrust, verified it with skill language prowess, and traded Joseon's small-leaf low-grade tea tree (black tea fodder to them) to end the war, Kim Unhaeng leisurely prepped return.
The bloodbath of Im-o Year now reached its close.
Author's Note
1. Fake Dmitri (Ivan IV's son) and fake Anastasia (last Romanov princess) are most famous, but fake Peter IIIs existed too, plus fake Tarakanova claiming Elizabeth's daughter. Russian court teemed with impostors—even with intact corpses and graves.
2. Ivan Shuvalov sent the Russian expedition east in chapter 185; Ivan Krutov got red ginseng from Hong Daeyong in China.
3. European medicine boiled down to "everything inside the body is bad." Pre-blood circulation knowledge, they believed stagnant humors caused illness. Enemas, bloodletting, emetics were standard for nearly all diseases. George Washington, Kim Unhaeng's age, died from bloodletting.
4. Real Peter III met tragedy too. Just six months after Elizabeth's death—having wrecked Russia—he was couped, imprisoned, and "mysteriously" died by wife Catherine.
5. East Asian sweet potatoes: smuggled from Philippines by Chinese dealer Jin Jinlong to China in 1594, Nohkuni to Ryukyu in 1604. He earned "Sweet Potato Prince" title, his heirs ennobled. Satsuma invaded Ryukyu 1609; potatoes reached Japan then. Spread faster than thought across East Asia. Joseon got them 150 years later, 1763.
6. "Potato King" Kartoffel Fritz literally "Potato Frederick" or "Potato German." "Fritz" nicknames Friedrich/Frederic, collectively for Germans—like calling Chinese silk merchants "Silk Vendor Wang."
7. No true "black tea trees," but large-leaf varieties suit black tea processing. Joseon lacks those. Small-leaf isn't incapable of black tea or inferior—just tastes different from "true" black tea palate. (Kim Unhaeng and British unaware.) 19th-century Assam discovery failed commercialization by Company due to variety/tech issues, so they stole 20,000 from Yunnan. Side note: Sri Lanka (Ceylon), famed tea land now, was coffee hotspot then—turned to tea post-disaster.