[Father, as I told you before, stay away from the Murim Alliance. They’ll use you.]
It was a clean, crystal–clear sentence that left no room for misinterpretation.
Lady Jaryeong was stating it plainly.
She said not to get close to the Murim Alliance, that they would use the Commissioner of Land Affairs.
Which meant Lady Jaryeong had even foreseen the future where the Murim Alliance approached to use the Commissioner of Land Affairs.
If the Murim Alliance ever got their hands on this, there would be two predictable reactions.
Either recruit her, or eliminate her.
And the Murim Alliance must have decided on elimination. That’s why they fed her that Fourfold Compound Poison.
Of course, in my previous life, Lady Jaryeong’s direct cause of death was the Five Stars Merchant Group, but from the Murim Alliance’s point of view, there was nothing bad about that.
Either way, their goal was achieved.
But it was a bit strange.
Knowing the future is an incredible ability – one so valuable that, in most cases, you’d do anything to recruit the person.
So why did they choose to get rid of her?
Just then, I felt someone approaching.
I started to hurry back to my seat, then changed my mind and moved over to the bookshelf beside me.
Creak,
The door opened and the Commissioner of Land Affairs walked in.
“Have you taken care of your business?”
“It wasn’t anything important. Sorry for leaving you alone like this.”
“Not at all.”
I pointed toward the bookshelf and spoke.
“Ah, my apologies. The books looked interesting, so I ended up reading them before I even asked for permission.”
“It’s fine. But those books are quite advanced. It seems you’re well-versed in the classics too!”
“I just have a shallow bit of learning, that’s all.”
At my modest reply, he chuckled and said,
“You can borrow some if you want. I heard you’ve been reading a lot of books while staying here.”
“Huh? Some of these look quite precious, are you sure that’s alright?”
“They say, ‘If you read a book a hundred times, its meaning reveals itself.’ I’ve already read those books well over a hundred times.”
That saying, “If you read a book a hundred times, its meaning reveals itself,” is something a scholar named Dong Yu told those who admired his learning and wanted to become his disciples.
It means that if you read a book a hundred times, its meaning naturally becomes clear, but honestly, reading even a single book a hundred times takes incredible grit and patience.
Just the books on this shelf alone looked close to a thousand volumes, and he’d supposedly read all of them a hundred times each…
Wow, no wonder he took first place in the imperial exams.
“That’s incredible.”
I said it with genuine admiration.
“Then I’ll borrow a few later. Honestly, I’d love to take some right now, but I’m still in the middle of another book.”
“I see. What book are you reading now?”
At his question, I naturally took my seat in front of the tea table and answered,
“‘Self–Question, Self–Answer,’ written by a man named Yu Seung.”
These days that book is fairly famous in Beijing, a work where the author poses a thousand questions to himself and then answers them himself.
“So you know that book too! I went to Beijing recently and bought a copy myself, but I haven’t had the time to read it yet.”
“From what little knowledge I have, it’s quite an interesting read.”
“I see. I’ll have to make time to read it.”
As we continued chatting about this and that, I realized it was about time he got to the real topic.
“You seem to have a lot on your mind these days.”
“Do I look that way? Hahaha.”
He laughed awkwardly.
“Every time I talk to you, you see right through me like this. I must be terrible at hiding what I’m thinking.”
“Not at all. Doesn’t that just mean you’re an honest person, sir?”
“You could see it that way. But as you know, in the world of politics, that’s a pretty big weakness.”
“But who would dare scheme against you, sir?”
“True enough. Being born into a good bloodline does have that one advantage.”
He continued.
“Now that Jaryeong’s condition has clearly improved, it’s become a headache. Because there’s already an engagement.”
I understood his dilemma.
He was about to marry Lady Jaryeong into the very household suspected of trying to poison her.
But he didn’t have enough proof to just demand they break off the engagement.
And after they’d waited all this time, abruptly canceling it would hardly be courteous.
“Now that Jaryeong has recovered, I have a duty to inform her fiancé’s family.”
“That’s true.”
“But I have no idea how they’ll respond.”
Yeah, that really was a problem.
To the point that the whole matter with the Five Stars Merchant Group barely felt like a problem in comparison.
“Ah, that reminds me, how did things go with the Five Stars Merchant Group?”
“Them? Ah… Deputy Pyeong, who deceived me, was sentenced to ten years of hard labor. And this fellow Mae Yeom, who bribed Deputy Pyeong, also received ten years of hard labor.”
“But I doubt this Mae Yeom acted purely out of personal greed.”
“I think the same. And we’ve secured evidence that the Five Stars Merchant Group supported them and profited from it.”
“That’s a relief. Then you must have handed down a heavy punishment to them as well.”
“Of course. For a merchant group, a heavy punishment means fines. We imposed a penalty of fifty thousand taels on them.”
Fifty thousand taels in silver? That’s less than I’d expected.
“Ah, fifty thousand taels in gold, that is.”
Yeah, that’s more than enough.
Even a major merchant group would practically cough up blood trying to pay that kind of fine.
Their influence would take a serious hit as well.
“You have to go that far if you want it to serve as a warning to other merchant groups, don’t you think?”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
Once the mood had loosened a bit thanks to the Five Stars Merchant Group talk, I carefully steered the conversation elsewhere.
“Um, by any chance, has anyone who worked around your daughter quit recently, or anything like that?”
“I see why you’re asking that. I’d already looked into it myself.”
As expected, he might not be an outstanding administrator, but as someone who once took first place in the civil exams, he was a wise man.
“One of Jaryeong’s maids quit about three months ago. Everyone said she was always kind, never stepped out of line, and carried out her duties perfectly.”
“Is that so?”
“So when she resigned, everyone was sorry to see her go, and on Jaryeong’s orders, they gave her a generous severance payment.”
The Commissioner of Land Affairs’ eyes gleamed.
“She was the one in charge of Jaryeong’s tea.”
“…!”
If that was the case, the chances she was acting on the Murim Alliance’s orders were extremely high.
“So we tracked the maid’s whereabouts.”
So he’d reached the same conclusion I had.
“How did it turn out?”
“There was no one in that maid’s hometown. Even her family had all disappeared.”
I couldn’t help but furrow my brow at his words.
“That’s way too suspicious. Someone with a clear conscience wouldn’t vanish the moment they returned home.”
“You’re right. Besides, there’s no way an ordinary maid would orchestrate something like this on her own.”
He went on,
“I’m certain the Hunan Commissioner of Land Affairs’ side ordered it.”
Well…
If you didn’t know the Murim Alliance was involved, that was a perfectly reasonable conclusion.
“The Hunan Commissioner of Land Affairs’ office supplied the poisoned tea, and the maid they bribed brewed it for her, completing the Fourfold Compound Poison.”
Yeah, that part was right.
From what I could see, it was highly likely that maid had been the Murim Alliance’s person from the very beginning.
Judging by the date on the prophecy, the warning about the Murim Alliance had clearly been written before Lady Jaryeong fell ill.
That maid must have seen the prophecy and reported it to the Murim Alliance.
Ah! So that’s why they decided to get rid of her.
In any case, it meant the Murim Alliance had someone planted in the Hunan Commissioner of Land Affairs’ office.
Which in turn meant that to resolve this incident, we had to investigate the Hunan Commissioner of Land Affairs’ side.
Honestly, it was something I didn’t necessarily have to get involved in. But if the opponent was the Murim Alliance, that changed everything.
This was a chance to stick it to the Murim Alliance; there was no way I was letting it slip by.
“Sir, even if we can’t fully uncover their crimes yet, shouldn’t someone be sent there?”
“That’s true.”
“You won’t be going personally, of course… so who are you planning to send?”
“I’m thinking of sending my third son and Deputy Ji Yeong.”
“Would it be possible for me to join that group?”
“You?”
I scratched my cheek, feeling a bit awkward.
“Yes. I know it sounds a bit sudden… but I like things clear and cleanly resolved. And someday, our merchant group might end up doing business with the Hunan Commissioner of Land Affairs. I’d rather know exactly who has a rotten heart so we don’t get burned later.”
“So you’re saying you want to find out who’s responsible?”
“It’s not like I have some amazing ability, but I want to see it with my own eyes and judge for myself.”
At my words, he looked pleased.
“To tell you the truth, I’d already been thinking of asking you.”
Huh? Me?
“Back on the ship, when you figured out that Deputy Pyeong was the one who stole the valuables, I was deeply impressed by your insight.”
Ah… I should’ve just kept my head down back then.
That would have made for a much prettier picture.
“Please, I’m asking you.”
And just like that, I ended up heading to Hunan.
.
.
.
The next day,
A young man visited the Commissioner of Land Affairs’ residence, and when I was summoned to his office, I was introduced to him.
“Introduce yourselves. This is my third son. And this is Deputy Merchant Lord Eun Seo-ho of the Eunhae Merchant Group.”
“It’s an honor to meet you. I’m Eun Seo-ho, Deputy Merchant Lord of the Eunhae Merchant Group.”
“I’m Dong Hang-su. I serve as a judicial officer in Yian Prefecture of Guizhou Province.”
A judicial officer was a rank–seven official who handled practical affairs.
“If I may ask, what kind of work do you handle…?”
“All sorts of miscellaneous tasks.”
A vague answer.
In other words, don’t ask for details.
“I’ve heard about you. They said you were the one who discovered Jaryeong’s condition was poisoning.”
“I only noticed it by chance. Your younger sister was meant to live, I suppose.”
“You could say that.”
At that moment, the Commissioner of Land Affairs spoke up.
“Tomorrow, when you go to Hunan, you’ll accompany Deputy Merchant Lord Eun.”
“Why is that?”
“He has quite a bit of insight. He’ll be helpful for this matter.”
“Well, he is good-looking, so he’ll be useful when we need women to open their mouths.”
Cold, isn’t he.
For someone whose younger sister had nearly been poisoned and who knew we were going to get to the bottom of it, he was being awfully detached.
Any normal older brother would be raging, shouting that he was going to storm over there right away.
Maybe this was exactly why, among his five sons, the Commissioner of Land Affairs had called this one.
It’s better than someone hot–blooded, sure… but this was its own kind of unsettling.
The next day.
We set out for Hunan.
Hunan’s capital city was Changsha, and it was a fair distance from Guizhou.
Since it lay to the northeast of Hunan.
Thanks to Dongting Lake and the tributaries of the Yangtze River, it’s a land with abundant water and very fertile farming.
They produce a lot of cotton, and in the hilly regions they grow tobacco and harvest honey and ramie.
Oh, and because there are plenty of musk deer, they produce a lot of musk as well.
Musk is used as an ingredient in perfumes and also as medicine, so it’s a place our merchant group visits often.
Come to think of it, from the Murim Alliance’s perspective, it’s a far more useful region than Guizhou.
Anyway, most of the border area between Guizhou and Hunan is mountainous.
Which meant the journey there would be a bit rough.
Still, there was an official road, so it wasn’t like we had to hack our way through mountain paths.
But…
When I thought about it now, that might actually have been better.
Riding in the carriage together with Young Master Hang-su was fine in itself, but it felt like I was sitting on a bed of needles.
“Come to think of it, Jaryeong told me to wish you a safe trip.”
“I see.”
“Are you and our Jaryeong meeting in private?”
“What? What do you mean by that?”
“Then why would Jaryeong ask me to pass those words on to you?”
“Isn’t it because I brought her snow? And I did have tea with her once.”
“You had tea together? Why?”
“Because your father asked me to.”
“My father did? Then why didn’t you refuse?”
“Well, that’s…”
Seriously, why was I even getting interrogated like this? And what kind of questions were these…
He was supposed to be a judicial officer handling practical affairs, but he felt more like a censor from the Inspection Bureau.
A while back, someone came to audit the Eunhae Merchant Group, and his way of speaking was exactly like this.
Cold and emotionless…
To put it bluntly, the kind of tone you’d call rude as hell.
People like this would nitpick anything they could, so being bluntly honest was the best option.
Sigh, I don’t even know anymore.
It’s not like I had anything to be scared of, anyway.
“I mean, I’m staying here comfortably thanks to your father’s kindness. How could I possibly turn down his request?”
“…Fair point.”
“And please don’t misunderstand. I don’t have any special feelings for the young lady.”
“Really?”
“She already has a fiancé. Why would I go asking for trouble? I’m someone who values my own neck above all else.”
“Well, you do give off that impression.”
“There’s just the normal liking between people, nothing more than that, so you don’t need to worry.”
I went on,
“The only reason she asked you to pass that message along is because she’s kind–hearted enough to care even about a lowly merchant like me.”
He nodded at that.
“True, Jaryeong does have a gentle heart.”
Then he narrowed his eyes again and asked,
“But once you finished delivering the snow to Jaryeong, shouldn’t you have been free to leave? So why were you still here? Could it be you wanted to see her…”
This guy, seriously…
“Your father has to pay me before I go.”
I continued,
“He commissioned me, and I completed the request, so of course I need to get paid. Who leaves without their money?”
“…Hem, hem.”
He cleared his throat and turned his head away.
He probably hadn’t expected me to answer quite that bluntly.
You could tell at a glance he was flustered.
–TL Notes–
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