I Became a Fallen Noble of Goguryeo

Chapter 42: Three Will Come (1)

At my words, Go Daewon and Yeon Taejo looked puzzled.

“According to Monk Uiyeon’s information, the current Northern Zhou Emperor Yuwen Yong has only properly seized imperial power for at most a year. In this situation, waging war would be difficult.”

But Yuwen Yong did it.

The basis? I had seen it in the future.

But if I said that, I would be taken for nothing more than a fortune-teller, and no good would come of it. The time when fortune-tellers participated in state affairs had already ended back in the reign of King Yuri in Goguryeo.

One could see this from the anecdote of the fortune-teller called “Chunam.”

Chunam was a state-recognized fortune-teller not long from now, during the reign of King Yeongyang (that was Go Daewon), and when the king asked, “Why does the river flow backward?” he answered with the absurd claim, “It is because the king rides in the superior position. The yang energy has been suppressed by yin energy.”

King Yeongyang, suddenly insulted, executed Chunam, and it was said that Chunam later reincarnated as Kim Yushin to destroy Goguryeo, though one could take it or leave it.

What mattered in this tale was not Chunam’s supposed psychic power or King Yeongyang’s favored position, but the role of fortune-tellers.

“In this era, fortune-tellers were no longer people who could state their true opinion, but those who had to give the answer the king desired.”

I wanted to become an official who could speak with conviction, not a fortune-teller who catered to the king’s whims. So I had to answer well.

What was the difference between prophecy and prediction?

Reference.

“For now, Yuwen Yong was most dangerous when he seemed quiet.”

The most famous tale about the current Northern Zhou emperor Yuwen Yong was .

He was born of a concubine, and the fourth son at that.

By rights, he should never have become emperor.

The only reason Yuwen Yong could rise to the throne was due to the coup of Grand Chancellor Yuwen Hu. The record of Yuwen Hu, a collateral royal, was dazzling.

He killed Emperor Xian of Western Wei, made Yuwen Jue emperor and opened Northern Zhou, and when Yuwen Jue tried to keep him in check, he mercilessly killed him, then set the second emperor Yuwen Yu as a puppet.

Not long after, he poisoned that second emperor as well, saying, “He is too clever to use as a puppet,” and enthroned Yuwen Yong, a son of a concubine, as the third emperor.

Yuwen Hu had killed no fewer than three emperors, all of whom he had served. Even in the grotesque history of the Central Plains, there were few such powerful ministers.

But the problem was that the third emperor, Yuwen Yong, was even smarter than the second.

For thirteen years, Yuwen Yong pretended to be a fool, biding his time and building his strength… until he finally smashed the back of Yuwen Hu’s head with a jade tablet and seized power.

That had been only two years ago.

I stressed this point.

“Two years ago, Northern Qi’s ruler foolishly killed the brilliant minister Guk Ryulgwang, and one year ago, Northern Zhou’s Yuwen Yong, who had been feigning foolishness, killed the powerful minister Yuwen Hu. The difference will be great. And if Northern Zhou destroys Northern Qi—”

I swallowed hard and said.

“Yuwen Yong will probably attack Goguryeo.”

“Attack… Goguryeo?”

They all looked at me as though I were insane.

“Why on earth would he suddenly attack Goguryeo?”

“A new hegemon always displays power once around them. For the same reason, Wang Mang’s Xin dynasty and Cao Pi’s Cao Wei both fought wars with Goguryeo.”

“But Former Qin and Northern Wei didn’t do that.”

“That is why I bet thirty roots of ginseng. If it were certain to happen, the wager would make no sense.”

I declared proudly before Go Daewon and Yeon Taejo.

Of course, I did not think my words would directly influence state policy.

Succeeding in governance by listening to a student’s words happened only in comics.

Even if Yeon Taejo or Go Daewon themselves said it, it would not sway national policy.

But what I looked to was forty years later—the Sui dynasty—and those two would be the Grand King and Prime Minister then.

And those gathered at the Gukjagam would become the major generals of that time.

So it was no loss to gain some credit early. At this, Go Daewon nodded.

“Good. Thirty roots of ginseng. Then I will wager two golden earrings.”

“With things going like this, it would be awkward to stay quiet, right? I will wager something from the Yeon ga Ironworks. Anything you want.”

For now… this was enough.

Though we realized that Northern Qi was tottering, the daily lives of the Gukjagam students did not change much.

But our mindset had changed.

Of course, not many thought as far as a full-scale war between Goguryeo and Northern Zhou as I did, but everyone knew that something was happening.

No one dozed off or acted stubborn as before.

We swung our swords more diligently.

We read our books more briskly.

“…Now, out of Senior Yeon Taejo’s drafted spearmen, two of the six have died. They are no longer combat capable.”

We also played Goryeo Myosan fiercely.

“Argh! Great King Gwanggaeto, forgive me!”

Yeon Taejo clutched a miniature in his hand. A miniature of Great King Gwanggaeto forged of wrought iron. A special product of the Yeon ga Ironworks, they said.

Its quality was such that, if buried in the earth now and discovered 1,500 years later, it might immediately be designated a national treasure and placed in the National Museum.

That alone showed how obsessed Yeon Taejo was with this “Goryeo Myosan.”

“Well, it wasn’t just Yeon Taejo, though.”

Even when students played mock battles together, half of them would roll dice before starting… and as this continued, it even gained some real practicality.

Furthermore, writing in Mekgeul spread by word of mouth, and these days Gukjagam students often wrote things in Mekgeul.

Someday, when these men became the heads of Goguryeo, perhaps Mekgeul would naturally spread as the common script, I thought, letting my happy delusions spin every day.

Thus the world grew more complicated this year.

I met three important people.

“It has been a while, Lord Ondal. It seems you have driven away the fox spirit well.”

The first person I met was Monk Uiyeon, who had returned from Northern Qi.

He placed his palms together as he looked at me, but his face had grown quite haggard in the time we had not seen each other.

“You have lost much weight. Life outside must have been rather harsh.”

“That is part of it… but lately, I have had no appetite.”

“Shall I give you some hidden jerky?”

“No, no. I no longer eat meat. The… latest Buddhism forbids meat now.”

Ah, I understood roughly.

It seemed the Buddhist edict prohibiting meat and liquor, the Danjumun, had finally landed in Goguryeo.

‘…That must be tough for him.’

I recalled how Uiyeon once downed meat soup in a single gulp and chased it with rice wine for dessert.

For a man who loved meat and liquor so much to give it up, no wonder he had lost his appetite and grown thin.

If he had not known, it would be one thing… but with the new monastic rules updated, how could he ignore them?

“I do have some dried pine-sap rice cakes…”

“That would be fine. Please give me some.”

I handed him the dried cakes.

Uiyeon chewed them, but his eyes refused to leave the jerky.

Was he a miser, or what?

“How went your endeavors there?”

“Though I returned early, I learned what Elder Wang Godeok had spoken of. Moreover, I also obtained the original Buddhist scriptures from Tianzhu, where the Buddha himself was said to have preached.”

“The original… you say?”

“Yes. And the way to read them as well.”

“May I perhaps see them?”

“Of course. I came here to store the scriptures of Tianzhu in the Gukjagam.”

Uiyeon opened the original book from Tianzhu.

I could not understand the script, of course, but there was something faintly recognizable.

“These are numbers.”

“Oh, you recognized them immediately!”

They looked a little different from the Arabic numerals I knew.

But what mattered here was not the shape of the characters.

It was the way of writing them.

Was it not remarkable that ‘一萬二千三百四十五’ could be written as 12,345?

‘And it even has zero.’

In East Asian mathematics, the concept of zero was weak.

I said to Uiyeon.

“If we use this Tianzhu numerals system, it would greatly help in learning and applying mathematics. I especially like this concept of zero.”

“That… might be so. Especially when using the charts and tables Lord Ondal created. I must tell Monk Hyeja about this.”

“Ah, and please look at this as well.”

I brought out a tool before Uiyeon.

He let out a hum.

“There are many beads on this string, like Go stones.”

“It is a board with beads, called an abacus. A tool used to count quickly.”

It was something Wang Godeok had made and sent to me.

Uiyeon was the perfect person to show it to.

“Would you call out a number? Anything at all.”

“One hundred and eight?”

“Please add more. You can multiply or add.”

“Multiply by sixty, add thirty-six, multiply by eight.”

“Fifty-two thousand one hundred twenty-eight.”

“Oh ho.”

Monk Uiyeon spoke.

“You calculated that with this?”

“Yes. With the abacus. Shall I teach you how to use it?”

“No. I learned just by watching. Like this, correct?”

Uiyeon repeated exactly what I had done, stroke for stroke.

Perhaps this was what one needed to be a scholar-monk.

“Truly, you always develop fascinating things. This too looks quite useful.”

“Yes. That is why I ask you to spread it.”

“Of course.”

Uiyeon nodded readily.

“Let us meet again, benefactor. The cake was delicious.”

At the Jeja Council, a conclusion was finally reached regarding the Northern Zhou vs. Northern Qi vs. Southern Chen situation.

“For now, it is reconnaissance.”

To prepare for everything, they would first assess the situation.

It was the most orthodox conclusion.

Once this was decided, the officials became endlessly busy.

In particular, Balgochu Ga Go Baeknyeon, son of the current Supreme Chancellor Go Heul and serving as Fourth-Rank Grand Envoy in charge of Goguryeo’s diplomacy, hardly slept at all.

“Find a way to send envoys to Northern Zhou!”

“How? That is a landlocked country! We share no border, whether by land or sea!”

“Is there no way through Northern Qi or Southern Chen?”

“Ha! As if those two would grant passage for envoys going to their enemy!”

“If you will only say it cannot be done, why do you sit in that seat? Use the Khitan if you must!”

They searched for routes to somehow dispatch envoys to Northern Zhou.

They also sent tribute again to far-off Southern Chen for the first time in three years, and busied themselves greatly.

Furthermore, they could not neglect preparations against the south.

Silla and Baekje were both enemies, and though Gaya had already perished completely, there was still one more country in the south.

Yamato, that is, Wa.

Usually, people believed Baekje and Wa were allies from beginning to end… but it was not so simple.

The Battle of Doksan Fortress thirty years ago was a good example.

When the Silla–Baekje Alliance attacked Anra (Ara Gaya), Anra quickly asked Goguryeo for help.

At that time, Goguryeo’s main forces had gone north with Go Heul to stop the Turks, but Goguryeo was not a nation to refuse an oncoming war.

So it hastily assembled garrisons from the Dongye region and smashed them straight into Baekje’s rear at Doksan Fortress.

And during this Battle of Doksan Fortress, Wa, surprisingly, hinted at siding not with Baekje but with Goguryeo and Anra.

For Gaya was also an important partner of Wa.

To put Wa’s diplomatic strategy at that time in one phrase—it was “two-timing.”

Unlike 21st-century Japan, Wa then was but a small local country in terms of power and population.

Thus, it enjoyed setting both feet between Baekje and Gaya, sucking up the honey, seeking benefits as a third party.

But then, Partner A Baekje, who should have remained steady, suddenly fought with Silla, Wa’s mortal enemy, and the two together crushed Partner B Gaya.

From Wa’s perspective, it was a headache.

If Gaya perished, Wa could no longer play both sides.

And if Gaya fell, where would they import iron?

So Wa wished to help keep Anra alive, even if it meant supporting Goguryeo, but… to speak bluntly, the alliance never even began.

“At Dokseong Fortress… they say Goguryeo lost?”

“What? Weren’t they the strongest of the Three Kingdoms? This… this is the strongest?”

Before any alliance could even be considered, Goguryeo was utterly smashed.

Even in the midst of it, the capture of Goguryeo prisoners revealed that Wa had been secretly communicating with Goguryeo.

At this, King Seong of Baekje grew furious.

‘What is this? You mean to ally with Goguryeo?’

‘N-no….’

‘I sent you high monks, engineers, even princes and the crown prince for the sake of friendship, and this is how you stab me in the back?’

‘No, we never did such a thing. It seems the Anra Wa-shinkan acted on their own.’

The King of Wa, under King Seong’s rebuke, could only insist that it was “independent actions of the Anra Wa-shinkan, unrelated to me.”

Thus, after Anra, Geumgwan (Geumgwan Gaya), and Banna (Daegaya), all the Gaya states collapsed, and Wa suddenly found diplomacy boring.

Having once played exhilarating two-sided diplomacy between Baekje and Gaya, hopping here and there with dopamine bursts, Wa was now reduced to one-on-one diplomacy with Baekje alone.

At least, thanks to the breakdown between Baekje and Silla, Wa could restore ties with Baekje, which was fortunate for them… but Wa had no taste for such pure devotion.

They wished to quickly recruit a new second partner to escape this dull situation.

Silla? Impossible.

Wa hated Silla as much as Goguryeo hated Baekje.

Forty years ago, Silla had incited Iwai, the ruler of Tsukushi (a small state in Kyushu), to attack Yamato.

That had been a proxy war between Silla and Baekje fought in the islands.

Had Iwai’s Rebellion succeeded, Wa would have become Silla’s ally instead of Baekje’s.

Wa had not forgotten this grudge, so if they were to ally, Goguryeo made far more sense than Silla.

Moreover, Goguryeo too recognized Wa’s importance in checking Silla and Baekje, so it was only natural that diplomatic lines between them gradually solidified.

‘Indeed, this must be around the time when Goguryeo’s Damjing and Hyeja crossed over to Wa….’

Thus Goguryeo pressed a full-scale diplomatic offensive toward Turks, Northern Zhou, Northern Qi, Southern Chen, Silla, and Wa, along with neighboring tribes like the Khitan and Malgal, and even the mysterious state of Dumakru.

In effect, Goguryeo was engaging in diplomacy with the entire East Asian world of the era… and without telephones or the internet, diplomacy inevitably consumed vast amounts of wealth.

What proved of great help here was my ginseng.

Even in this age, Korea’s wild ginseng was famous.

Not only in the Central Plains, but even the Turks and Wa recognized Korean ginseng.

Go Yangseong substituted my ginseng for wild ginseng.

Since ginseng had only recently appeared, they mistook it for extraordinarily large and robust wild ginseng.

Six-year ginseng transformed into hundred-year wild ginseng.

Go Yangseong used this to the fullest, scattering the ginseng I made across the lands to drive forward diplomacy.

…So it was written in the letter Boknyeo had sent me.

Though Goguryeo wavered, my value rose ever higher.

Whether I should rejoice or resent it was unclear… but I chose to rejoice.

That autumn.

At the Gukjagam, my value once again shot straight upward.

“…So much harvest came out?”

“Does that manure spreading really help?”

The farming results had arrived.

As expected, they were two to three times greater than before.

“Can you teach me that method?”

“You mean the way to make fertilizer?”

“Yes. It would be useful in my homeland as well…”

More students grew interested.

It was not simply because I “farmed well.”

I had farmed well from the start.

Rather, it was that I was recognized as someone “worth befriending,” and this coincided with Goguryeo’s rising war atmosphere, where food was most crucial.

“Father, there is a good method to store food… ah, is this how to write it?”

For the first time in a while, they struggled with Idu instead of Mekgeul, sending letters to their parents.

It was around then that my second encounter occurred.

“Ondal, someone has come to see you.”

“Who?”

“They say it is your family?”

My family consisted only of my mother and Boknyeo, but neither had reason to come to the Gukjagam.

Wondering, I went out, and suddenly an old man with a thick beard rushed at me.

“…Ondal! You are Ondal, are you not!”

“Who?”

“I am your great-uncle Nak Sangtae! Your mother, Nak Geum-hwa, is my niece. Ah, at last I see you! I should have come long ago…!”

Ah.

It was that so-called “family” who never showed his face when we suffered.

1,2,3,4,5

6,7,8,9,0

This is the form of ninth-century Indian numerals.

I did not know about copyright, so I simply wrote them myself.

Regarding the Wa-shinkan, in the original records it was written as “Japanese Bu.”

It was a notorious institution once tied to the theory of “Japanese rule over southern Korea.”

To say first, even Japan no longer accepts this theory.

At the 2005 Korea–Japan Joint History Forum, it was concluded: “No matter how you look at it, this is nonsense.”

Even within Japan it is treated as pseudo-history.

From the start, the expression “Japanese Bu” was an anachronism, for Yamato’s official name then was Wa, and the ruler’s title was Daewang.

Our familiar terms “Japan” and “Tennō” only emerged in the seventh century.

Thus, historians generally use “Wa-shinkan,” referring to lodgings for Wa envoys, or “Anra Wa-shinkan,” named after Anra (modern Haman, South Gyeongsang Province), where it was located.

Indeed, the Wa-shinkan was established not by Wa but by King Seong.

It was much like building a Wa embassy within Baekje, or a trade post like Busan in the Joseon era.

So, when King Seong rebuked Wa upon seeing Wa–Goguryeo closeness, and the King of Wa insisted, “It was those Wa-shinkan acting on their own,” it was true.

Whether the Wa-shinkan acted outside royal control, or whether the king denied responsibility out of fear of King Seong, either way the southern rule theory does not hold.

Even more, the source of these claims was the , compiled by the Yamato court.

That such a flimsy theory arose despite such clear evidence is remarkable indeed.