Chapter 109
When something major erupts, solving that problem alone does not bring everything to an end.
One must deal with all the losses and repercussions caused by the problem, and take every necessary follow-up measure to ensure that the same problem or a similar accident never happens again before it can truly be considered over.
Even if the first incident is dismissed as an unavoidable mistake, the second is no longer a mistake—it is a preventable disaster that we failed to prevent.
“To solve this problem, we ultimately have to eliminate the butcher class itself, don't we?”
Being born a butcher in Joseon makes a normal life utterly impossible.
The court cracks down on butchers, prohibiting them from slaughtering cattle or horses at all.
It also persecutes them, insisting that raising livestock while living a nomadic life is absolutely unacceptable.
Since their entire livelihood is prohibited, butchers should be absorbed into rural communities... but those communities refuse to accept them.
If they were born slaves, they would at least be accepted as the lowest members of a village community and could somehow manage to survive...
But butchers are regarded as bad people who roam around in groups committing all kinds of crimes, and are routinely shunned as filthy men who slaughter cattle.
Because of this, even when they want to settle down and live in the countryside, the farmers despise and avoid them, so they are often driven out before they can put down roots.
They say that even a Confucian scholar, armed with Confucian principles, will climb over a wall for the sake of his wife and children after going hungry for three days. What else can butchers do when they have no way to make a living?
They inevitably fall prey to the temptation of crime.
“However, living in difficult circumstances must not become a reason to commit crime.”
This is something criminals commonly say.
I was born into a miserable and impoverished environment, so I had no choice but to turn to crime.
If I had been born into a wealthy and harmonious family, would I have committed crimes?
However, this is a false claim that is not worth listening to at all.
There are an enormous number of poor people in this world, but only a tiny fraction of them commit crimes.
Do the rest refrain from committing crimes because they are missing limbs or have diminished intellectual abilities?
Of course not.
If anything, those who commit crimes are more likely to have problems with their intelligence or mental state.
There is nothing wrong with the poor people who do not commit crimes.
“But as a politician, I cannot simply leave this problem alone. So I need to start by examining why they had to commit crimes...”
They say to hate the sin but not the person who committed it.
However, I am an utterly ordinary person, and a fairly selfish one at that, so I cannot follow that teaching.
Still, I believe we should at least hate the circumstances that drive people who would not otherwise commit crimes to do so.
Only then will we have even a clue toward solving the problem.
“The biggest reason is that Joseon's people do not accept butchers as members of their own society. So what can we do to make the people accept them?”
Yi Seong-gye, Yi Bang-won, and King Sejong tried to embrace the butchers by extending Confucian benevolence to them.
However, while that method may be correct from a Confucian perspective, it is a policy that is absolutely unacceptable from an official's point of view.
It would be one thing if they were war veterans who had fought for Joseon for years on the front lines in Hamgyeong or Pyeongan Provinces, but giving them land, houses, and even wives simply because they were butchers—what kind of policy is that?
“It's like giving every gangster an apartment in Seoul and getting them jobs as regular employees at conglomerates or civil servants just to socialize them.”
If Korea had implemented a policy like that, the Blue House's servers would probably have crashed, and the building itself would have burned down.
Joseon was a premodern state, so there were no servers to crash and no one to set fire to Gyeongbokgung or the government offices.
“We need to instill in the people the notion, ‘Those bastards have suffered enough, too.’ But in the end, is that the only way?”
Almost no Koreans like workers who come over from Southeast Asia or China.
But suppose they volunteered for the South Korean military even though they had no obligation to do so, completed their service as Army sergeants, and were honorably discharged.
If they did that, Korean men would probably open their arms to welcome them, saying that such a person had more than earned the qualifications to be Korean.
Why? Because they would believe that person had suffered through the same brutal hardship as they had and therefore deserved to live in Korea.
“For Joseon's development, we need to spread rice farming, but that requires major irrigation projects... So I can put those bastards to work for about three to five years.”
If we showed the villagers those people suffering through brutal labor with their own eyes, and irrigation water began flowing smoothly thanks to them... the villagers would accept them as fellow tenant farmers under most circumstances.
After all, simply because they had been born butchers, they would have earned their ‘citizenship’ by suffering several times more hardship than the villagers themselves.
“Then let's start drafting a policy proposal...”
I began grinding ink in the sarangbang so I could write a policy report, when I heard Winter calling for me from outside the door.
“Are you still awake, my lord?”
“I have work to do, so I cannot go to bed yet. I will go to sleep once I finish this, so do not worry too much.”
Despite what I said, Winter opened the door to the sarangbang and came inside.
When she saw me grinding ink, she let out a sigh first.
“Are you not overdoing it? In the ten days since the great fire, when you have been sleeping at home, you have not slept even four hours a day... I am very worried to see you devoting yourself solely to work like this.”
“Once I finish this task, I will be able to sleep as I did before.”
I forced myself to smile, but Winter placed both hands on my shoulders and turned me toward her.
“When will this ‘work’ of yours end, exactly?”
“If things go quickly, a month—no, a fortnight.”
“Then you intend to keep pushing yourself like this for at least another fortnight.”
Anger showed on Winter's face, even though she had never once gotten angry since marrying me.
Even when I was badly injured while putting out the fire, received treatment at the palace, and returned home, she had said nothing and quietly cared for me.
“I am worried that you will collapse from pushing yourself this hard.”
“I'm fine. I'm still young, so I won't collapse just from overdoing it this much.”
“People who collapse or fall seriously ill from overwork always say that.”
“That may be true, but I'm fine. I told you, I'm really not tired.”
In truth, ever since the Great Fire, the guilt of knowing that I could have saved more people but failed to do so has continued to weigh heavily on my shoulders.
I have difficulty falling asleep, and even when I finally do, I wake up easily.
So I keep immersing myself in work until I am too sleepy to endure any longer, then sleep for two or three hours as though collapsing before reporting for duty and repeating the cycle.
“No one can avoid being tired after sleeping that little for more than ten days...”
Tears welled up in Winter's beautiful eyes, then began to fall one after another.
“On the day the fire grew so large, when you stepped to the very front to put it out even though no one ordered you to, I did not stop you. To be honest, I thought several times that I wanted you to evacuate safely with me toward Noryangjin, but what could I do? The man I love is someone who throws away all personal desires and simply throws his body into danger for the sake of the people. So I swallowed my heart-rending pain and worry deep inside and prayed only that you would return safely.”
If Winter went off to do something dangerous, I would... No, that's not it.
When she was nearing childbirth, I would probably be unable to remain in my right mind.
I would do everything in my power to maintain hygiene and help her give birth safely.
The problem was that even if I raised hygiene standards to an insane degree, the maternal mortality rate during childbirth would still exceed one percent...
Even in modern society, where the proportion of mothers who die during childbirth is only 0.001 percent, husbands pace around anxiously... and here it would be one percent.
‘I would never be able to keep my senses.’
Well, in Joseon, the mortality rate for childbirth would be at least seven percent, and probably over ten percent on average. There is a reason people set out a bowl of water and pray for a safe delivery.
But what about Winter?
Watching her husband throw himself into a place engulfed in roaring flames must have torn her heart apart.
“After the fire had all been extinguished, a Seonjeongwan official came to find me at the palace and told me that sparks had landed on the official robes you had been wearing, mud had gotten on them, and they had been torn in places until they were rags. He also said you had suffered burns all over your body and were in critical condition, so the royal physician himself was treating you...”
Winter suddenly threw herself into my arms and began pounding my chest with her fists.
Rather than tapping lightly, she struck me with dull thuds, as though finally setting down the burden that had been crushing her heart.
It hurt a lot.
But compared to the pain she had felt, it was nothing.
"I went to the temple that Prince Hyoryeong had introduced me to and prayed every day until you woke up. I prayed, 'If Guanyin Bodhisattva truly exists, please, please save my husband, who tried to offer his life for the sake of all living beings.'"
...... I had nothing to say, even if I had ten mouths.
"I had been praying for several days when word came from the palace. They said there was nothing wrong with your physical condition and that you had regained consciousness. I was happy to hear you were safe, but I also thought that when you came home, I would demand an explanation and get angry. Why had you done something so dangerous as to risk your life? Wasn't it terribly reckless?..."
Winter buried her head in my chest and began sobbing aloud.
"But when you came home and I saw the guilt written all over your face, I could not bring myself to say anything. I even felt that something terrible might happen if I blamed you too. You were already carrying such a heavy burden, and I could not add to it... So I forced myself to smile. I forced a smile and told you that you had done well. That you had done a good job, and that I was proud of you. All the pain and anguish I had suffered no longer mattered. You were not hurt and had come back alive, and that was enough for me."
"I'm sorry. From now on..."
Winter cut me off.
"You did nothing wrong, my lord. Even I think it is selfish, but if you had followed me instead of caring for the people, I probably would have been disappointed in you. I believe the man I love is someone who will gladly throw himself into danger for the people at any time. But, but still... From now on, please value your own body, too. How am I supposed to live out the rest of my life if you die?"
Hearing her words, I thought about it, too.
About what it would be like if Winter died.
I truly hated even imagining it. Just thinking about it made me feel as though the sky were collapsing and the earth were sinking.
"And while I was praying at the temple, there were quite a few disaster refugees being sheltered there. When they learned I was your wife, they all came to find me. They thanked me. Whenever I performed the three thousand prostrations, some of them prostrated alongside me, praying for your safety. When I asked why, they said that although they had lost one son in this fire, they were doing it because they were so grateful that, thanks to you, the lives of their other children and wives had been saved. Every one of the refugees was grateful to you... So now, please do not let what happened weigh on your heart so much, and sleep peacefully. And stay strong."
"Really? They didn't resent me or anything for not being able to save all their family members?"
"The people who started the fire are the ones at fault. What wrong did you do, my lord? On the contrary, they all praised you in unison as a great man who stepped forward to save their homes and lives. But if you collapse from focusing only on your work as if you intend to burn your life away like this... How guilty and heartbroken will they feel?"
"I suppose so..."
Only now did I feel a little lighter.
Then the fatigue in my body came rushing over me like a flood.
I gave up on writing the report and went to my room, where I lay down on the bed.
I fell asleep as though collapsing, unable to resist the encroaching fatigue for even a single second.
Before I fell asleep, I think these were the last words I heard.
"We couldn't be born on the same day and at the same hour, but when we die, let's go together. Winter cannot live without you, my lord."