Gunpowder and Sanitation (3)

I had come to observe the process of making saltpeter.

I had expected it to smell awful, since they were making gunpowder with soil soaked in excrement and urine, but the stench was even worse than I'd imagined.

“This is driving me insane, seriously.”

They hadn't even entered the saltpeter works yet, and it was already this bad...

I can’t even handle this now—what am I supposed to do?

Gapseok, who came with me, suddenly clamped his hand over his nose and mouth and started running off somewhere.

He emptied the contents of his stomach into the bushes.

If not for my yangban dignity, I wanted to puke just like him.

“I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

Now I understood perfectly why the old Chamji official had thought I was just making up an excuse to go out and have fun when I said I was coming here.

When other officials visit this place, they surely won’t be able to stay long because of the smell, so after a few gagging retches, they’ll just stamp their visit certificate and leave.

They’ll act like they’ve done their job, have a drink with a few side dishes, and slowly head back to their offices.

Still, humans are creatures of adaptation, and after standing in front of the stinking saltpeter works for a while, I gradually became numb to the smell and could manage it.

As I struggled to collect myself, I saw one of the saltpeter craftsmen walking toward me.

“Good heavens, my lord, what business brings you here?”

“I am Kim Daebung, junior secretary in the Ministry of War. I came here to see the saltpeter-making process myself and find any areas that can be improved.”

“...... Ah, so you’re the renowned junior secretary Kim, my lord.”

The saltpeter craftsman nodded as if he already knew who I was.

He must have seen me submit my memorial near Gwanghwamun, in front of Yi Bang-won holding a mace, or heard someone talking about it.

“I never imagined that Kim Jeongrang would come to this shabby place. We’re truly grateful that you came. To make saltpeter, we handle hamto—soil gathered from toilets or old kitchens. This stuff is soaked with urine and feces, so it reeks horribly. It’s already this bad near the place itself, but once you go inside, the stench becomes even harder to bear.”

“I suppose so.”

“The smell is so strong that Acting Military Supplies Clerk Kim, who oversees the saltpeter works, and the clerks only come about once a day; the rest of the time they're at the Military Supplies Office.”

I decided to crack down on Acting Military Supplies Clerk Kim and the clerks first.

I understood that the stench here is so terrible that overseeing saltpeter production is hard.

But if the work you’re supposed to do is supervising saltpeter production, shouldn’t being on-site be the bare minimum?

And if the saltpeter craftsman is saying they only come once a day... how exactly are these people even working?

“It certainly is a vicious smell.”

“Yes, I’ll explain everything in detail, so please don’t go inside. That would be best for you.”

If I had heard that somewhere else, I would have gone into full outrage mode on the spot.

'Call the person in charge here right now! Just how are you managing the saltpeter works to say something this ridiculous?!'

And then I would have caused a commotion, overturning everything in sight.

However, the stench from saltpeter production is beyond what any human can endure.

“I appreciate your concern for me. However, just as gunpowder artisans like you go around commoners’ homes, scraping up hamto and processing it into gunpowder for the country, I too came here for the sake of the nation, to find ways to improve saltpeter production. Surely I should inspect the site, shouldn’t I?”

In this world, no one wants to do rough, filthy work.

Joseon is no different.

No, here they even pay people who do rough, filthy work less than they do in other jobs because they think they can be replaced at any time.

Of course, the gunpowder artisans and gunpowder makers here are exceptions.

Joseon does have the bad system of underpaying artisans, though.

But because this is a nation pathologically obsessed with gunpowder, gunpowder artisans are still given a minor government post and a stipend for making it.

To yangban born with silver spoons in Joseon, a stipend may seem like pocket change, but that’s only because it’s small by yangban standards.

“What is your name?”

“Maeldong, sir. My name is Kim Maeldong.”

“Maeldong, thanks to you enduring the stench and making gunpowder, Joseon has been able to repel the barbaric Jurchens and the vicious, utterly merciless Japanese pirates. And today I came here, as a junior secretary of the Ministry of War, to find a way to make even more gunpowder. There’s no point in letting yourself be put off by this smell. Don’t mind it and lead the way.”

People often say, 'There is no noble or lowly work.'

But words are one thing and reality is another.

Wages differ by job, treatment differs, and the weight of the work itself differs too.

Some people move hundreds of billions of won with a single tap of a key, while others can create—or take away—thousands of jobs with just one stamp.

But the world cannot turn on the high and mighty alone.

This world only works when people with all kinds of jobs are in their proper places.

Therefore, I think every occupation is precious and should be respected.

Criminals excluded.

In that sense, Joseon’s gunpowder artisans also deserve respect.

“Yes, my lord. Please come this way.”

Maeldong led me into the inner part of the saltpeter works.

Inside, several cauldrons had been set up.

The gunpowder workers were pouring hamto into the cauldrons and boiling it furiously with water.

Hamto is soil made from decomposed organic matter—feces, urine, weeds, and even animal carcasses—so the stench is truly no joke.

The gunpowder workers who do this are really something.

“If you keep boiling hamto and water in a cauldron, the saltpeter inside the hamto dissolves into the water. Keep boiling it, then strain out the hamto and continue purifying the water in which the saltpeter has dissolved, and that’s how you make saltpeter.”

“The process itself is simpler than I thought.”

“The process may be simple, but collecting the hamto is really hard. We have to gather 60 seom of hamto just to get 100 geun of saltpeter... and since hamto isn’t something you can use just by scooping up any old dirt, we have to go all over Hanseong and nearby Yangjuhyeon and everywhere else to collect soil.”

Joseon’s annual gunpowder production is around 2,500 to 4,000 geun.

Of that, around 1,000 geun is made in Hanyang, and gathering hamto is truly no ordinary job...

“Maeldong, you keep talking about hamto, hamto... but I think hamto is, in the end, soil formed from the accumulated essence of excrement.”

Maeldong tilted his head at my words.

He must have been baffled because I was saying something different from what he had known all his life making gunpowder.

But since I’m a yangban official, he can’t exactly ask, 'What kind of dog-shit nonsense is that?'

“You yourself said hamto is soil soaked with urine and feces, didn’t you? Then wouldn’t it be enough to gather the very source of that—urine and feces themselves—and let them ferment down to extract saltpeter?”

To be blunt, hamto—or rather, soil—isn’t needed at all in saltpeter production.

If you add useless impurities like soil, extracting saltpeter only becomes more troublesome.

“Listening to you, my lord, I don't think you're completely wrong.”

“Then how about trying it this way?”

I explained the method, which would literally be called a saltpeter bed, to Maeldong in plain terms.

Mix feces, straw, willow ash, and humus gathered from the mountains together, and make a rectangular compost heap.

Once the heap is made, sprinkle it with urine to keep it sufficiently moist.

Then, when you see white crystals bloom on the heap, put it in a cauldron and boil it to refine the saltpeter solution.

“...... Will this method really work?”

“If it does, the soil-collecting crews won’t have to suffer running all over the place to gather hamto anymore. And His Majesty will bestow a great reward upon all of you.”

“Then I will test it exactly as you’ve ordered, my lord.”

“As for the detailed steps, Acting Military Supplies Clerk Kim will come and explain them one by one while supervising.”

After saying that, I went straight to the Military Supplies Office.

Then I went to find Kim, who was serving as Acting Military Supplies Clerk.

“Clerk Kim.”

“Yes, Junior Secretary...”

“Lately you haven’t felt like working, have you? Today I went to the saltpeter works, and our Acting Military Supplies Clerk, who should have been stationed there, was nowhere to be seen.”

“...... I’m sorry, please forgive me.”

Cold sweat was pouring down Kim’s face.

“Wouldn’t it be unpleasant if I went straight to the Director of the Military Supplies Office and told him about this situation?”

In the military, too, you have to complete certain posts to get promoted, and to become a senior-ranking official you generally have to serve in the appointed office.

The Director of the Military Supplies Office is also one of the required stepping-stones to becoming a senior-ranking official.

In other words, if something goes wrong while serving as Director of the Military Supplies Office and you end up dismissed or stripped of rank, then all the effort and hardship you spent aiming for a senior post goes up in smoke.

So, would the Military Supplies Office director really spare Kim, the man who’d be the root cause of such a horrific disaster?

“Or I could just submit a memorial to the Minister of War or the Chief State Councilor saying gunpowder production seems likely to be disrupted.”

Gunpowder production is directly tied to Joseon’s national defense.

So if even the slightest problem arises here, the entire national defense of Joseon could be shaken.

Of course, since the gunpowder artisans are doing their work well, inspection wouldn’t really cause any trouble... but during that inspection period, there would be 'useless overtime.'

The Chief State Councilor, Hwang Hui, would chew out the culprit so badly that death might seem preferable.

And Kim, the man responsible, would just become a living corpse.

“...... Just kill me, my lord.”

“I’m about to try a new gunpowder formula. This is the book that contains the method...”

I whispered the incantation that would pump some fighting spirit into Acting Military Supplies Clerk Kim.

“If you make even the slightest mistake, I don’t know what I might do.”

I could feel Kim’s body trembling.

I cast the final spell that would make this guy work as if he were prepared to die here.

“I’m prepared to throw away promotions and high office alike if it means correcting even one wrong thing. I stopped fearing being stripped of office or exile long ago.”

In Joseon, even a minister could not get out of the new-official initiation rites.

And yet I’ve been exempt from them at every office I’ve gone to, and even my father-in-law, who came in as nothing more than a low-ranking ninth-rank official, got through them just by treating everyone to a meal.

Why is that? Because when I go on a rampage, no one knows what kind of catastrophe might happen.

Kim, the Acting Military Supplies Clerk, would know that very well.

So when I had, rather than threatening, asked for cooperation by saying we should all blow up together...

“If I fail, I’ll throw myself into the Han River right then and there!”

Three months later, the court was turned upside down.