Stirring Up Trouble in the Ming Dynasty (8)

Wangpal, the kingpin of the slums, first swept his gaze over the clothes Hwang Su-shin and the interpreter were wearing.

By carefully examining exactly what that man was wearing and how he carried himself, he could roughly tell whether he was someone safe to mess with or someone who would cause trouble if you crossed him.

Their clothes, made of extremely lavish top-grade brocade silk and embroidered with gold thread, made it obvious at a glance that they were obscenely wealthy, and from their confident posture and easy smiles...

'These are not people you can mess with lightly.'

"Why are you looking for a shipbuilder?"

At his words, the interpreter, who had once run up a huge debt to Hwang Su-shin, answered with complete confidence.

"Do you think the imperial family, the ministers, the scholar-gentry (the Ming term for yangban), or the rich are going to stop using precious imported goods just because a sea ban has been declared? Leave the sea ban be; luxury goods are luxury goods."

Even if you're running a brothel, only the place that serves random riffraff gets caught and dragged off; if you're serving the truly high-born, you don't get caught by crackdowns that easily.

The reason is very simple.

It's intolerable when lowly scum run wild, but when the high and mighty indulge themselves, it becomes an extremely refined pastime...