WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ The Hunting Genius of the Japanese Colonial Era

Chapter 47

──────

This Is No Ordinary Meeting (1)

After returning home, Han San didn't sleep a wink. He sat on the wooden porch with his eyes wide open and blazing.

Listening to his sleeping family breathe, he silently glared in the direction of Upper Hamlet.

The date rolled over.

May 2nd, 1933. Tuesday, before dawn.

Han San stood the A-frame carrier up in the yard and checked his load.

The hides first.

'The wild boar hide still isn't dry enough.'

While running the tavern, he'd caught four rabbits for the chunks that went into the gukbap.

That made four hides.

'Many a little makes a mickle.'

Money to earn and money to spend, both piled high. If he meant to fasten a collar around this whole region, he had to work hard at making money.

Lucky for him, there was no shortage of ways to earn it.

Han San pulled down the bundle of medicinal materials he'd dried up on the rafters.

'One geun of reishi mushroom.'

This too he'd dug up bit by bit during the lulls in running the tavern. His mother, once her own tavern work was done, had cleaned every speck of dirt off them and dried them spotless.

And last of all, a small glass bottle he'd tucked into his shirt.

'About one hop of badger oil.'

This wasn't for sale. It was a gift for Kim Mal-ja, the mistress of South Jade Pavilion.

'Speaking of gifts...'

Han San fell into thought.

A moment later he gathered up some scrap leather, hemp cord, and a few pebble pellets for the slingshot, and tap-tap-tap, in ten minutes he'd made something and packed it away.

Then he thought a bit more, picked one of the things he'd collected while in the mountains, and dropped it into his pocket too.

"Shall we go."

His preparations done, Han San hoisted the A-frame carrier onto his back and set out.

On the way, familiar with the route, he went to the scree field and gathered snakes. In the space of a few breaths, two snakes slipped slurping into the carrying sack.

"Just two today."

That was the way to a sustainable snake harvest.

With a light step, Han San headed for the Inje town center.

Cheonbo Pharmacy.

"Come on in. Been a while, hasn't it?"

The moment the door opened, Ma Jong-sung shot him a sidelong look.

Han San grinned easily and set down his carrier.

"It has. Almost half a month."

"You have business or something?"

"You know how it is. Wolves. I live around these parts."

That answer was all he gave, and Ma Jong-sung's imagination did the rest. He snorted out a laugh.

"You been chasing wolves too?"

"Aw, would I ever? A man's got to live steady. The racket was a bit much, so I just kept to my own work."

Han San answered smooth as oil. Three deals in, he knew well what kind of answer this fussy gentleman in front of him liked to hear.

Sure enough, Ma Jong-sung was satisfied. Laughing in good humor, he looked over Han San's wares.

"Spring's really here, all right. The snakeskin's got a fine glossy sheen. The venom turns milder, sure, but mild has its own wide range of uses. Two today?"

"But there's one big prize to make up for it."

Han San grinned and handed over the bundle of reishi.

Before he'd even opened it, the bitter fragrance wafting out made Ma Jong-sung's eyes go wide.

"That's reishi, isn't it?"

"Didn't I tell you I'd bring about a geun of it? Last time I came."

"No, you really... ha! Look at this. No damp, shape's not spoiled either. I could sell this on the spot!"

Ma Jong-sung was free with his admiration. Han San put on a deliberately smug face.

"That's my mother's handiwork. The badger oil too, my mother rendered that."

"Well, now... The son catches snakes and digs up herbs, and the lady of the house renders oil and dries the herbs? That's a fine life. A fine life, that."

"That it is. A fine life."

He meant that one truly.

It was a fine life that had finally come to him after decades of regret.

That was also why Han San couldn't tolerate anything that meant to get in the way of it.

"Let's see now, two snakes at 1 won 40 jeon. The reishi comes to a geun and a touch on the scale. Just shy of seventeen nyang. Good condition, well dried, so I'll call it 51 jeon a nyang, that's 8 won 67 jeon."

"So the total..."

"10 won 7 jeon. I'll knock off the odd change and round it down to a clean 10 won."

Han San laughed as if he couldn't believe it.

"Now where do you get off shaving the change like that? Wow. No wonder you were heaping on the praise. Didn't know praise ran 7 jeon a dose, I tell you."

"That's how it's done in Kaesong."

"How very distinctive of you. This is Gangwon, Inje, isn't it? Heard prices shot up with this wolf uproar, and you pull this?"

"Ah, come now, man. Herbs and rice, are their prices the same? Folks don't walk into the gukbap house and say, mix me up a nice cool bowl of reishi-mushroom soup, do they? Herbs don't ride the market. If anything, fewer mouths to buy means nothing but loss."

Ma Jong-sung put on his sob story.

Well, he wasn't wrong. Necessities and luxuries move by different rules.

Han San gave a click of his tongue and gave a step's worth of ground.

"All right. 10 won."

"There! Good to talk with a man who listens."

"In exchange, though. That one. Throw in one of those empty boxes up there."

Ma Jong-sung's hand, reaching for the money, froze. His eyes followed the tip of Han San's finger up to the shelf. A rather fine paulownia box for packing medicinal goods sat there.

"Hah! That one's pricey..."

"Boss, first I brought you badger oil. Then I brought snakes by the load. Now I've brought reishi too, so what'll I bring next time, hm? Who knows? Next time I might dig up phellinus mushroom, no, even wild ginseng."

"Don't talk if you can't talk sense! Yeesh! If it were that easy, I'd be the first one heading into the mountains."

Scowling hard all the while, Ma Jong-sung nodded anyway. Han San cheerfully gathered up the box.

"Thank you." And then, right away, "Now that it's come up, boss. Say I did dig up something like wild ginseng. You happen to know somewhere I could move it?"

"Now, man. Like I said, if it were that easy..."

Ma Jong-sung trailed off mid-sentence and looked at Han San's face.

It was only a moment. Ma Jong-sung straightened himself up and adjusted his glasses.

"You serious about this?"

Han San grinned.

"A man's got to dream big."

"Wasn't it just now you were saying a man's got to live steady?"

"Aw, how is that the same? Wolves mean betting your life, no question. Wild ginseng's just something you might dig up if luck's with you."

Ma Jong-sung had only been making idle talk too. In any case, when it came to gathering medicinal goods, Han San's credit had already climbed quite high in his eyes.

He stopped beating around the bush and got to the point.

"Anything as big as wild ginseng, it's tough here. I do know a few people, but the timing and all of it has to line up just right, see. Money's there where it's there, but it isn't always there either. And this place is a bit out of the way."

"Hmm."

"Phellinus, I could take half a geun a month, that's about eight nyang. Dried, of course. You know the going rate?"

Han San cast his mind back. This era, that would be...

"Goes for about 3 won, doesn't it? A nyang."

"You know your stuff. To get more than that you'd have to go all the way to Chuncheon. Of course, I could move it for you instead, but I'd take a brokerage fee off the top, and you wouldn't like that either, would you?"

"Haha."

Han San scratched the back of his head and laughed.

The figures were clear.

So the ceiling on what he could earn selling herbs to Cheonbo Pharmacy was roughly 30 won a month, give or take. Beyond that they couldn't take the volume.

'So this is the size of the Inje economy right now, is it.'

It wasn't like some martial-arts novel where, the moment you tossed out a line, the next bit went, [Oh! Now that you mention it, I happen to have a guest at my house, and that guest is looking for exactly wild ginseng, carrying a completely untraceable 1,000 won in his coat, and he'll keep this whole deal a secret! And me, the one connecting the two of you, won't take a single coin, of course!] No such tale followed, but Han San was satisfied enough.

'If anything, it earns my trust.'

That sort of story is custom-built from the start to pull a con, which is why it falls into place so perfectly. The fact that the other party had no intention of conning him, at least not yet, was a big gain.

'So I really should make the big deals only after breaking into Chuncheon or Gyeongseong? Or...'

Just then a certain plan took shape in Han San's head.

'Or rather, what if I become the investor and grow this shop itself...'

It was only a moment. Han San soon shook his head. It was far too soon yet.

"Understood. So then... wild ginseng might be a stretch, but I'll keep an eye out for phellinus."

"Yes, yes. A man really ought to live steady. No, phellinus too is plenty of a jackpot, of course..."

With no way of knowing what thoughts had passed through Han San's head, Ma Jong-sung simply handed over the money. Han San, easy as you please, also scooped up the newspaper lying beside the counter.

"Thank you, boss."

"I never said you could take the paper!"

"Then I'll see you next time."

"You, you! A thief, every which way, a thief!"

Stepping out of Cheonbo Pharmacy, Han San unfolded the newspaper as he walked. It was the evening edition from two days back, dated April 30th.

[Shanghai Daily Runs Seditious Article Against the Empire... Stern Warning From Authorities]

[Chinese Delegation in Geneva[1] Appeals to Western Powers for Sanctions on Japan]

[Chiang Kai-shek[2] Appears in Beiping on April 28th]

Beiping meant Beijing. In the Qing dynasty it was Beijing, then became Beiping, then much later it would change back to Beijing again, but none of that mattered now.

'The age is moving along.'

Even now that he'd resolved to set his sights a little higher, these were a touch too large a tale.

Clicking his tongue, he turned to the next page, and the articles on the society page caught his eye.

[Clash Between Villagers and the Township Head's Side, Mass Arrests Occur]

The paper carried an incident in which a township head tried to tear down an old reservoir, the 'Oseondo Embankment,' for a reclamation project, and the residents who rose up against it clashed with the laborers.

[The township head sought to reclaim farmland with the authorities' permit, but the residents pleaded that they 'could not sever a 500-year-old lifeline'...]

[The county office maintained that 'a permit already granted could not be overturned' and offered a compromise to 'tear down only half,' but it fell through on the residents' refusal...]

[On the 19th of last March, physical conflict broke out. More than 10 residents suffered serious and minor injuries, and some 50 were arrested...]

Han San read that article over and over. Carefully.

'This isn't somebody else's business.'

The declaration Han San had thrown out yesterday, the plan taking shape in his head, would inevitably collide with the existing order of Sebeom Valley.

'Old Woman Wangdae...'

The shaman who ruled Upper Hamlet.

Right now, the Deok-tae crew that threw their weight around in Meokbawi Valley were under that witch's command. If he meant to build a weir in Meokbawi Valley and divert the watercourse, he'd have to hash it out with those fellows.

And was that all?

Every single step Han San took, obstruction would come. The process would be hostile beyond all telling.

'If a fuss like that breaks out just from a township head trying to reclaim one patch of farmland, the people of Upper Hamlet under a shaman's rule will come at me even rougher.'

Han San clenched his fist tight.

[At the point where power and faith sit down across from each other, hyung-nim, the conflict... it finally becomes the kind that can never be reconciled.]

The voice of his younger brother, Teacher Han Bada, brushed past his ear.

How was he to deal with it?

Crush it all down with violence, piece by piece? The way he'd handled Pi Sun-dae's lackeys?

Or borrow the public authority and sweep it clean? Like the township head in that newspaper article?

'If there's no other way, I won't shy from it.'

Han San shook his head.

That was the low road.

Where blood has flowed, grudge remains, and the day always comes when a grudge is settled. That was why the Japanese empire could never rule this land.

This was no different.

'I have to do it cleverly.'

He had to go step by step.

He had to take his time, in no hurry, cutting off Old Woman Wangdae's arms and legs one by one, until the people had no choice but to take his side.

That was what he would do.

"Whew."

Han San closed the newspaper. Before he knew it, he'd arrived in front of Daeseong Leather.

Stepping into the shop, Han San called out a greeting.

"Boss Park, are you in?"

"Oh, you're here? Been a real while."

Park Dong-po answered curtly.

Han San gave a bright smile and unloaded the hides from his carrier.

"Rabbit hides. Only three of them, though."

"Rabbit? Let's see, where."

Park Dong-po skimmed over the hides and tossed him a few coins.

"40 jeon. Can't give you more."

Han San clicked his tongue. About 13 jeon a hide. Well, that's what rabbit hide goes for.

"That's plenty. It's hardly fair to call it a trade, but could I borrow that hammer and some nails for a moment?"

"Why? Go ahead, use them. I'm idle anyway."

"Thank you."

Han San set himself up at the workbench in the corner.

He set down the paulownia box he'd pried out of Ma Jong-sung. Onto that bare, lidless box he began fitting one of the rabbit hides he'd held back from selling.

He laid the soft fur side up and, bang! bang!, tacked the edges down with brads to finish it.

The paulownia box, which had carried a certain dignity to begin with, turned into a fine, refined gift case in no time.

"Hoh."

Park Dong-po clicked his tongue in wonder.

"You're flat-out born with the gift, your hands. Come work here, why don't you."

"I'm grateful for the offer alone. I'm not much for being tied down..."

"You brat! A man ought to get tied down a bit at a job, hm? You don't know that's how you stay nice and reined in even after you marry one day?"

"Marriage, what marriage... I'm not even seeing anyone, boss."

Not only was he not, but he was seventy-four years old—what business did he have with romance?

'The prosperity of the clan can be left to Bada finding a good wife and seeing to it himself...'

Of course, with no way of knowing such thoughts in Han San's head, Park Dong-po rolled his eyes.

"Made a pretty little gift box like this? Isn't it for some bride-to-be?"

"I told you, no." Han San packed the box away, exasperated. "Anyway, boss. Do you sell clothes here too?"

The truth was he balked a little at walking into the constable post in this shabby cotton getup, this slash-and-burn-settler look.

In his past life too, Han San had dressed purely for practicality, no exceptions. But at the same time he'd had a younger brother who lived hand in glove with things like TPO and dress codes.

[Hyung-nim. When you come to a place like this... please, can't you do something about that outfit?]

Back in those days he could let it go in one ear and out the other, but now he was the head of the household. He had to get himself smartly turned out, briskly and all on his own...

"You asking if I sell clothes?"

Park Dong-po's eyes lit up.

Sticking his spoon into a young fellow's private life was fun, but the talk of money coming into the safe was even more fun, naturally.

"Sell 'em! Of course. A man ought to dress up sharp now and then. Here, look at that. That one. The coat."

"Co-at."

"No, why do you pronounce it like... no, anyway, it's full-grain leather, see? 30 won."

"Hm."

"See the trousers beside it? You could ride a horse and they wouldn't wear a thread, real good. 15 won!"

"Hm..."

"The shoes next to that, and the ankle boots, are 5 won each. That bag's 10 won."

"Hmm."

Han San hummed low and clicked the abacus beads in his head. All of it came to 60 won.

'Insane.'

He could afford it. He had 210 won and 40 jeon on him right now.

But this was for going to the constable post...

'Am I supposed to wear 60 won of clothes to go meet two military police?'

60 won was 5 seom of salt, wasn't it? One seom is 150kg, so that's 750kg of salt all told!

And burn it on appearances?

'No, but still...'

Going forward, Chuncheon, Gyeongseong... no, even just to go to South Jade Pavilion now, this slash-and-burn-settler look wouldn't do. To avoid being treated like some uncivilized native, he had to look the part.

'If I think of it as wearing it for life, the investment might be worth...'

But 60 won.

Above all, it being a leather product gnawed at him.

'Who do I think I am?'

The son of a Baekdu Mountain hunter. Hide just drops right off you when you catch a beast, doesn't it?

The supply of raw material was endless, and he was going to pay good money for a finished product?

Han San made his decision.

"Boss."

"Yeah! You picked something?"

"Needles and thick thread and a tacking awl and... give me some of those."

"Huh?"

"I said I'll buy some leather-working tools."

Park Dong-po's face crumpled.

"What, you said you'd buy clothes!"

"The prices are a bit... I'll just make them and wear them myself."

"Hey, you brat! I know you're good with your hands, but you think making clothes is like building a doghouse!"

"A doghouse is good, isn't it. I'm not keeping a dog yet, though."

"Aigo, what a maddening fellow, really!"

Grumbling all the while, Park Dong-po gathered up the tools for him. 5 won's worth in all.

Softened at heart by the sight, Han San bought a few more—the result, of course, of weighing practicality more deeply.

"That one. The boots and the bag too. The one with a strap. A wallet as well. One with lots of pockets."

Boots were just hard to make, and the bag and wallet were things he needed right away.

A smile bloomed across Park Dong-po's face again.

"You do have a conscience."

"You happen to know a good tailor's?"

"You've got a conscience, but it's rotten! Hey, do I have to go and help some other shop make money too?"

Han San put on a sheepish look.

Park Dong-po wore a put-out face, but soon he pointed off to one side outside the shop.

"Honestly. Over there, where is it. There's a tailor's at that far end, so go and drop my name. He's not the type to gouge you."

"Thank you."

And so, the tailor's he arrived at.

His combat shopping done, Han San stood before the mirror.

A crisply starched collared shirt, a gray vest that fit him just right. Tough, sturdy woolen trousers, and a fedora to top it off.

"Well now, you look sharp!"

The tailor let out a cry of admiration.

It was no wonder. Shoulders hardened solid by mountain work, a fine, tall frame, a broad chest. The figure the slash-and-burn-settler look had been hiding was laid bare.

That wasn't all.

The very air Han San carried about him was strange. A body of eighteen, the gaze of seventy-four. That odd dissonance lent him a peculiar depth.

"Real striking, you are. You'd fit right in walking the streets of Gyeongseong."

The tailor saying so over and over was no exaggeration.

"Hm."

Han San gazed at himself in the mirror through narrowed eyes and braced his fingers against the tip of his chin.

"The native has become Toynbee in an instant."

"?"

"That is to say, native-no-more..."

"???"

The tailor's face twisted into a tremendously complicated expression in an instant, but Han San didn't notice, only let out a wry chuckle, heh, and pulled out his money.

"Here you are."

"Ah... yessir."

The clothes came to 10 won all told.

The tailor pocketed the 10 won, and Han San folded the cotton clothes and rubber shoes he'd come in and tucked them neatly into the bag. He set that bag atop the A-frame carrier and slung the carrier across his back.

"Now, that... um..."

The tailor wore that wildly complicated expression once again.

To put it as an analogy, it was the kind of face a person decades in the future might make on seeing some oddball pedal a rice-shop bicycle to his bank job in a suit, with sandals worn over socks—but sadly, Han San didn't notice.

The peculiar sense of a solitary old man living alone was that fearsome a thing.

"I'll see you next time."

"Yes... go safely, sir..."

Seeing him off with a strangely listless farewell, Han San stepped out into the street.

'Preparations complete.'

The new leather boots clicked along, headed, of course, for the constable post where the Inje military police detachment was stationed.

"Let's go."

It was time to go collect the reward.

[1] Geneva was the seat of the League of Nations; after Japan's 1931 invasion of Manchuria, China repeatedly appealed there for the Western powers to impose sanctions, though little came of it before Japan withdrew from the League in March 1933.

[2] Chiang Kai-shek (1887–1975) was the leader of China's Nationalist (Kuomintang) government and commander of its armies during this period.

The tailor scene turns on a Korean pun. Han San calls himself 토인 (toin, "native") who has become 토인비 (Toynbee, the historian's name), then glosses it as 토인-비 (土人-非), literally "native-not," meaning he is no longer a native. The English keeps "Toynbee" and renders the gloss as "native-no-more" to preserve the joke.

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried