Dawn the next day.
Before daybreak, pale dawn fog lay thick at the entrance to Galsan Village.
"Nngh... Hah!"
Rough breathing tore through the fog.
"Harder! Plant your feet firmly! Bend at the waist!"
"Big Brotherrr! I'm dyinggg!"
I stood on the ridge between the fields with my arms crossed, shouting, while a strange sight unfolded in the middle of the field.
A massive wooden plow.
Normally, an ox would wear a yoke and pull it.
But now, a person was pulling it.
A very large person, at that.
"Moooo—!"
Manseok imitated an ox's bellow as he pulled the plow.
A rope was looped around his shoulders, and he pushed forward with every muscle in his body bulging.
GRRRRIND! CRUNCH!
The plow blade bit into the ground, sending gravel flying.
The hardened wasteland screamed as it was overturned by Manseok's monstrous strength.
"Good! Our Manseok is better than an ox!"
"Big Brother! I'm hungry! I don't have any strength left!"
"Once you finish plowing this, I'll give you food! A heaping bowl of rice!"
"Really? If you're lying, I'll go on strike!"
At the mention of food, Manseok's eyes changed.
"RAAAARGH!"
With a roar, he picked up speed.
The plow pulled by a man moved faster than most oxen.
Behind him, Chilbok followed and picked out the stones.
"Good grief, what a life. I followed a noble, and look what I ended up doing. There are no end to these stones. No end at all."
Chilbok grumbled, but his hands never stopped moving.
It was a gravel field, so dozens of stones came flying up with every pass of the plow. Chilbok gathered them and piled them at the edge of the field to make a stone wall.
"Oh my, what is that?"
"Heavens... is that man pulling a plow?"
Villagers who had come out to work in the morning began gathering one by one.
They clicked their tongues or snickered, treating us like a spectacle.
"Tsk. I heard he was the noble young master who got thrown out. Looks like he's lost his mind."
"What does he think he'll accomplish by plowing that gravel field? Even if he sows seeds, they'll be nothing more than bird feed."
"That poor slave. He met the wrong master."
I heard their laughter, but I did not care.
Instead, I shouted even louder for them to hear.
"Manseok! Turn! Turn!"
"What does turn mean?!"
"Change direction! To the right!"
"Right! Understood!"
Manseok skillfully changed direction.
A plan for this 1,650-square-meter plot had already taken shape in my head.
Raised rows and furrows.
The furrows had to be dug deep for proper drainage, while the raised rows had to run north to south to receive plenty of sunlight.
The abundance of gravel meant that the land drained too well, but I could solve that with a secret method.
About two hours passed.
The field had been roughly plowed.
"Huff... Huff... Big Brother... I'm really going to die now..."
Manseok sprawled spread-eagled across the dirt.
His entire body was drenched in sweat, with steam rising from him.
Chilbok also sat down, every joint in his fingers skinned raw.
"Good work."
I took a bamboo tube from my pocket.
It held water from the marshland that I had boiled and cooled yesterday.
"Drink."
Gulp, gulp.
Manseok drained the water in one go.
"Big Brother, where's the food?"
"There's one more thing we need to do before we eat."
"What? What are we doing now?"
Chilbok made a tearful face.
I glanced toward the village, then pointed back toward the marshland.
"We need to get our treasure."
"Bleeegh!"
Chilbok dry-heaved.
"Big Brother... please... this can't be right..."
We were back in the marshland.
I held an old shovel, while Chilbok and Manseok had A-frame carriers over their shoulders.
That black soil we had found yesterday was the key.
"Hold your breath."
Calmly, I drove the shovel into the ground.
SQUELCH.
The moment I scooped up the black mud, a fierce stench of gas spread through the air.
Highly concentrated leaf mold created by centuries-old reeds, fish carcasses, and fallen leaves rotting away.
"Think of this as your livelihood and fill those carriers."
SPLAT.
I threw black soil onto the straw mat spread over Manseok's carrier.
"Ugh... it smells like shit..."
Manseok wrinkled his face, but perhaps because he was so strong, he endured without a word of complaint.
Chilbok was the problem.
Chilbok had a weak stomach. He held his nose shut as tears welled in his eyes.
"Young Master... I used to serve books in a noble household... Must I scoop shit with the hands that once held a brush...?"
"Hey, this shit is worth more than a brush. Stop complaining and fill it."
I shoveled without pause.
The heart of modern farming was soil fertility.
No matter how good the seeds were, they were useless if the soil was barren.
Goryeo's farming methods amounted to little more than spreading animal manure or ash from burned grass.
But the leaf mold in this marshland was a natural, all-purpose nutrient supplement.
It teemed with microorganisms and was rich in organic matter. It would fill the gaps in that barren gravel field.
"Let's go!"
Like manure carriers, we hauled the foul-smelling soil toward the village.
As we crossed through the village on our way to the field, people's stares stung.
No, more accurately, they covered their noses and avoided us.
"Aah! What is that smell?!"
"Those crazy bastards are carrying shit!"
"Hey, you! Go around! You stink!"
The women covered their noses with their skirts, while the children ran away shouting, "Poop carriers!"
Chilbok lowered his head in shame, but I walked proudly.
'Laugh. Laugh all you want.'
By autumn, the soil you are covering your noses to avoid will make your grain bins ashamed.
The moment we reached the field, we unloaded our carriers.
SHHHK—SPLAT.
Black soil poured over the gravel field.
We repeated the process more than ten times.
Eventually, I carried a load as well. It felt as though my shoulders would be pulled from their sockets, but I could not stop.
By the time the sun stood high overhead, the pale gravel field had been covered in black.
"Haa... Haa..."
All three of us collapsed onto the ridge between the fields, completely exhausted.
Our entire bodies smelled like a sewer, but to my eyes, it was a more beautiful sight than any silk.
A field covered in black soil.
Only now had it become a real field.
"Now... let's eat."
"Food!"
Manseok sprang to his feet. He looked like a zombie.
We roughly washed our hands and feet in the stream, then grilled the snakehead meat and cattail roots we had saved from yesterday.
On top of that, Chilbok brought out three barley rice balls he had quietly obtained while I was causing a scene in front of the Village Chief's house.
"Thank you for the meal!"
Manseok stuffed an entire rice ball into his mouth.
I bit into one as well with my dirt-covered hands.
The barley rice was rough, but it tasted like honey. A meal after labor never betrays you.
"Big Brother, are we done now?"
Chilbok asked as he picked grains of rice from the corner of his mouth and ate them.
"No. The most important part remains."
I took out two pouches that I had kept deep inside my clothes.
The culmination of the past ten years, more precious than my life itself.
One was [Great Peace No. 1 (Rice)].
The other was [Great Peace No. 3 (Radish)].
"What are those?"
"Seeds."
"Seeds? Aren't those just rice seeds?"
Chilbok peered inside.
"They're different. Very different."
I picked up a single grain of rice and held it to the sunlight.
It was smaller and harder than an ordinary rice seed. Its husk was darker as well.
The first thing I did after entering this body was collect seeds.
I traveled throughout the clan estate, searching for mutants that grew noticeably faster than the others or produced unusually large grains.
Then, in my vegetable patch, I applied Mendel's laws of inheritance and crossbred them again and again.
Varieties with short stalks that would not fall over in a typhoon.
Varieties with strong disease resistance.
And most importantly, varieties that grew at a crazily fast rate.
This Great Peace No. 1 could be harvested in ninety to one hundred days, while ordinary rice took one hundred fifty days.
On top of that, it absorbed fertilizer efficiently, so once it met the leaf mold we had just spread, it would grow explosively.
"Chilbok, Manseok. Listen carefully."
I looked at them with a serious expression.
"These aren't just seeds. They're your emancipation papers, your tiled-roof houses, and your meat side dishes."
Gulp.
Manseok swallowed at the mention of meat side dishes.
"Big Brother, are we planting them in that shit field?"
"That's right. We're planting them now."
We entered the field again.
I divided it in half.
I decided to plant radishes in the upper 660 square meters, where the drainage was good and there was more gravel.
In the lower 990 square meters, where the ground sat a little lower and retained more moisture, I would plant rice.
Rice normally had to be planted in paddies, but this variety also had the qualities of upland rice. As long as it was watered well, it could grow in a field.
"Three seeds per hole. Don't plant them too deep. About one knuckle deep."
I demonstrated.
Manseok and Chilbok followed suit.
TAP, TAP.
Seeds fell into the black soil.
As I covered them with dirt, I chanted a spell in my mind.
'Grow. Grow like crazy.'
'Grow so much the world falls over in surprise.'
Sowing did not finish until late afternoon.
It felt as though my lower back would snap.
"Ugh... my back..."
Chilbok pushed himself upright with his hands on the ground.
That was when it happened.
A loud commotion came from the village.
"Hey! You smelly bastards!"
When I turned around, three men who looked like local thugs swaggered toward us.
They held bottles of rice wine, and their faces were red. They had apparently been drinking since noon.
"I heard you leased land from the old Village Chief? Pretty arrogant, starting work without even offering us a welcome greeting."
The man in the middle spat on the ground.
"This land is our turf... no, our territory. If you want to farm here, you have to pay taxes, right?"
I almost laughed.
There were always punks like this wherever you went. Men who tried to throw their weight around on their own turf.
"Big Brother, what do we do?"
Chilbok hid behind me in fear.
But Manseok...
"Big Brother."
Manseok stood, brushing the soil from his hands.
He was a full head taller than the thugs.
"Those guys are about to step on our seeds."
Manseok's eyes turned vicious. The expression I had taught him earlier—imagining someone stealing his meat—came naturally now.
The thugs hesitated.
They had not noticed while he was sitting down, but once he stood, it was like seeing a bear rise to its feet.
"W-What is that guy? Why is he so huge?"
I slowly walked forward.
"A welcome greeting? Fine."
I tapped the scabbard at my waist.
The sword was rusty, but it was a nobleman's sidearm.
"But I'm in a bad mood right now. I've been hauling shit all day. I might smell a little. Is that all right?"
As I took a step closer, the pungent leaf-mold stench pouring off my body washed over them.
"Urgh! Hey, don't come closer! You stink!"
The thugs covered their noses and backed away.
"Why? Didn't you say you were collecting taxes? Want me to pay you in person?"
I grinned and stepped closer. Behind me, Manseok roared as he lifted the plow overhead.
"RAAAARGH!"
"Gah!"
"T-They're crazy! The shit fumes got to their heads!"
The thugs screamed and ran away.
It looked like the alcohol had sobered them up at once.
"Heh heh heh."
I clutched my stomach and laughed.
Only then did Chilbok relax and laugh along with me.
"Big Brother, you really drove them away!"
"See? There's nothing to be afraid of."
I looked at the backs of the fleeing thugs, then at the seeds planted beneath our feet, and muttered.
"Now comes the time to wait."
The sky was turning red.
The black field, stretching across 1,650 square meters, glistened in the sunset.
The sweat and stench we had shed today would become a green miracle in a few days.
I was certain of it.
"Let's go home. Time to wash up and sleep."
"Yes, Big Brother!"
Patting one another on the shoulders, we headed for our collapsing shack.
Our steps were heavy, but our hearts felt light as feathers.
Those bastards could not possibly imagine what would happen in that field tomorrow morning.