The dawn air was cold.
Before the sun had risen, bluish darkness lay over the marshland.
Red flames danced in the temporary outdoor kitchen beside the shack.
"WHOOSH! CRACKLE, CRACKLE!"
Firewood burned fiercely inside the hearth.
A pillar of white steam rose from the enormous cauldron.
"Ugh... it's hot. So hot."
Manseok sweated heavily as he pushed more firewood inside.
The chill of dawn was powerless before the hearth.
"Control the fire carefully. If it's too strong, the rice will burn. If it's too weak, it'll be undercooked."
I guarded the cauldron's lid, focusing all my attention.
Five sacks of rice, four hundred kilograms, which we had washed and soaked yesterday.
We could not steam all of it at once, so we had set up two cauldrons and were steaming it in three batches.
"Big Brother, the smell... the smell is killing me."
Chilbok wandered around the cauldrons, sniffing.
The rich smell of rice.
It was a deep, powerful aroma.
It was strong enough to overwhelm even the musty scent of earth in the marshland.
"This is the smell of firm steamed rice."
I grasped the lid's handle.
The rice had steamed long enough.
"I'm opening it! Move aside!"
WHOOSH!
The moment I lifted the lid, a massive steam bomb exploded.
The world before us turned white.
Once some of the steam cleared, the rice grains filling the cauldron were revealed.
This was not the moist rice we usually ate. Though glossy, it was not sticky. Each firm grain was separate from the others.
"Scoop it out!"
Manseok and Chilbok rushed over, using enormous wooden spatulas to transfer the rice onto straw mats spread across the yard.
SHHHK, SHHHK.
Mountains of white rice formed.
"Big Brother... just one bite. Only one."
Manseok looked at me pleadingly.
Unable to refuse, I nodded.
"Taste it. But don't spit it out and say it tastes bad."
Manseok put a handful of hot rice into his mouth.
"Hot! Hot! Mmph... Chew, chew..."
His expression turned strange.
"Huh...? It's firm. It has a bite to it, but... it's not very sweet, and it gets stuck in my throat."
"Of course it does. Firm steamed rice isn't made for people to eat."
I spread the rice wide with a spatula as I explained.
"The yeast that makes alcohol burrows into the rice grains and sucks up the nutrients. But if the rice is too soft, it clumps together like rice cakes, and the yeast can't breathe. It needs to be firm like this so the yeast can burrow through the gaps."
"Ah... food for yeast."
"Right. So don't covet it. We need to cool it, so fan it instead."
We picked up large fans and cooled the rice.
This process was important.
If we mixed fermentation starter into hot rice, the yeast would be killed by the heat.
On the other hand, if it cooled too much, fermentation would begin slowly and give contaminating microbes time to multiply.
The golden time was when the rice was lukewarm, just a little cooler than body temperature.
About an hour passed.
When I touched the rice grains, there was just the right amount of warmth left.
"Good. Chilbok, bring the fermentation starter."
"Yes, Big Brother!"
Chilbok carefully carried over my treasure jar, the Great Peace Fermentation Starter.
When he opened the lid, a savory, tangy, fragrant aroma spread through the air.
The smell of well-activated fermentation starter.
"Now comes the real skill."
With a solemn expression, I stood on the straw mat.
"You washed your hands, right?"
"Yes! I scrubbed them hard under running water!"
"All right, I'm sprinkling it."
I evenly scattered the fermentation-starter powder over the firm steamed rice.
It looked like snow falling.
Then I poured in clear water that had been boiled and cooled beforehand.
"Knead it!"
SPLAT. SPLAT.
The three of us began kneading the rice, fermentation starter, and water.
It could not simply be mixed.
We had to knead it with care, like a massage, so that every grain of rice was coated with the fermentation starter.
"Ugh... this feels weird. It's neither porridge nor rice."
Manseok shuddered at the sticky texture.
"Become delicious... become expensive... become money..."
Chilbok kneaded while chanting a spell.
A work song born of capitalism.
After about thirty minutes of kneading, the ingredients had mixed perfectly into a thick dough.
This was the starter mash.
"Put it in."
We divided the starter mash into the five large jars we had prepared.
We filled each jar only to about seventy percent.
Once fermentation began, it would bubble and rise, increasing in volume, so we had to leave empty space.
We covered the openings with clean cotton cloth and tied them tightly with straw rope.
"Move them!"
"Heave!"
Manseok lifted one jar with ease. It had to weigh at least eighty kilograms.
We carried the jars to the semi-underground aging room we had dug yesterday.
A cool energy from beneath the earth could be felt there.
We set the five jars side by side and placed straw covers over them.
That was to retain warmth and moisture.
"Sleep well, our little piles of money."
I shut the aging room door and packed dirt into its gaps.
Blocking outside air. It was to induce anaerobic fermentation.
"Big Brother."
After the work was over, Chilbok, covered in dirt, asked me a question.
"Does it truly take only seven days? I heard normal alcohol is called hundred-day wine because it takes one hundred days..."
Chilbok was still half doubtful.
Making alcohol in seven days sounded closer to a miracle or a scam by the standards of the time.
I grinned.
"Want to make a bet?"
"Pardon?"
"If we open the jars in seven days and it isn't alcohol—or if it turns into vinegar—I'll give you all four and a half sacks of our remaining rice. I'll spend the rest of my life as your kitchen maid, cooking for you."
"Gasp! Really?"
Manseok's eyes went wide. His Big Brother would become a kitchen maid.
"But if it succeeds..."
I grabbed both of their shoulders.
"You'll be my slaves for life. No, my employees. You won't be able to run away."
"Fine! We'll bet four sacks of rice!"
They were excited. They thought success was impossible.
But they did not know.
Inside my fermentation starter were fast-fermenting yeasts selected by modern science.
***
Three days later.
Chilbok, who had been inspecting the field early in the morning, came running over in terror.
"B-Big Brother! We have a huge problem!"
"Why? Did someone attack us?"
"No! Underground... a monster sound is coming from underground!"
"A monster?"
I snickered and headed for the aging room.
Before I had even reached the entrance, I could hear it.
SHHHHH—
Bubble, bubble, POP! POP!
It sounded like a rainstorm and boiling water at the same time.
The ground was rumbling.
"Do you hear it?"
"Yes! I think something is fighting inside the jars!"
"They are fighting, all right. It's the yeast eating sugar."
Starch conversion and alcoholic fermentation were occurring at the same time, and explosively.
When fermentation was vigorous, the temperature inside the jars could rise above thirty degrees.
The jars would be warm.
But a bigger issue than the sound was the smell.
The scent leaking from the vent of the aging room was extraordinary.
The original smell of rice was gone. Now it smelled exactly like alcohol.
A thick, sweet aroma so potent it could make one's head spin.
The ester scents of ripe apples and pears filled the marshland.
"Krah... I feel like I'll get drunk just by smelling it."
Manseok's face reddened.
"We have a problem."
I frowned.
"The smell is too good."
"Pardon?"
"Everyone in the village is going to hear about it."
My prediction was right.
By the afternoon, villagers working in their fields were glancing toward our shack one by one.
"What is that smell? It smells like flowers..."
"No, that's alcohol. Very strong alcohol."
"Who's brewing alcohol during a famine? Do they have rice rotting away?"
I heard the villagers whispering.
The older men who loved alcohol, especially, flared their nostrils and approached the fence.
"Hey! Is Young Master Choi San home?"
Old Man Park from next door stuck his head out.
"Ah, yes. What is it, sir?"
I went outside calmly.
"There's an incredible smell coming from your house... Are you brewing alcohol?"
Old Man Park's eyes gleamed greedily.
He clearly wanted to get a drink.
"Alcohol? That's absurd. I'm making vinegar."
"Vinegar? Vinegar smells this good?"
"It's fruit vinegar. It's not ready yet, so if you drink it, you'll get a stomachache. The toxins are still strong, and you'll have diarrhea until it pours out of you."
"H-Huh... The toxins are strong?"
At the mention of stomach trouble, Old Man Park smacked his lips regretfully and returned home.
But he did not seem completely convinced.
The villagers' gazes had changed.
'There's something in that house.'
"Manseok."
"Yes, Big Brother."
"Starting today, sleep in front of the aging room."
"Pardon? The mosquitoes will bite me."
"If the alcohol is stolen, we'll starve to death. If you protect it, all the alcohol lees are yours."
"Loyalty! I'll kill every mosquito! I won't let even one rat come near!"
Manseok guarded the aging room with a club.
Thanks to his massive build and fierce face, several shadows that came to investigate at night fled in terror.
***
The long-awaited seventh day.
A morning thick with dawn fog.
Chilbok, Manseok, and I stood before the aging room with solemn expressions.
The sounds had died down.
The rain-like noise that had been loud for days had stopped, and silence remained.
It was the signal that fermentation had ended.
"Big Brother, has it really worked? If it failed, we get the four sacks of rice, right?"
Chilbok still could not let go of his greed for the rice.
"We'll know once we open it. Get ready."
I brought clean dippers and a bamboo strainer I had prepared beforehand.
"Unseal it!"
Manseok removed the dirt and boards covering the aging room.
Then he untied the sealed rope on the first jar.
Thump. Thump.
The moment he pulled off the cloth.
WHOOSH!
The fragrance that had been compressed inside burst forth.
It felt as though we were standing in the middle of an orchard.
A fantastic bouquet of sweet peach, pear, and apple aromas mingled with the sharp scent of alcohol.
"Wow..."
Chilbok and Manseok's mouths fell open.
I held up a torch and shone it inside the jar.
The rice grains had completely broken down and either sunk or floated to the top.
And between them...
A golden lake appeared.
A clear, transparent golden liquid without a trace of cloudiness.
It was clear rice wine floating cleanly at the top.
"Look at that color... Did we really make this from marsh water?"
"It's art..."
With trembling hands, I dipped in a ladle.
Carefully, I scooped up the clear rice wine from the top.
Slosh.
The alcohol in the ladle gleamed like a jewel in the morning sunlight.
"We have to taste it."
I brought the ladle to my lips.
The fragrance brushing my nose alone was enough to make me feel drunk.
Gulp.
I swallowed a mouthful.
"......!"
The first taste was sweet.
A thick honey-like sweetness coated my tongue.
Next came a fresh acidity that stimulated the sides of my tongue.
And finally, a heavy impact surged up through my throat.
Fwoooosh—
My esophagus grew hot, and it felt like a fire had been lit in my stomach.
The alcohol content was roughly between eighteen and twenty percent.
It was stronger than modern soju, yet it had none of the unpleasant alcohol smell.
It went down as smoothly as silk.
"Ha ha... Ha ha ha!"
Laughter burst out of me.
Success.
A tremendous success.
"Big Brother! Me too! I'm getting dizzy just standing here!"
Manseok begged, stamping his feet.
"Here, take it. Those four sacks of rice are gone."
When I handed him the ladle, Manseok accepted it with both hands.
Gulp, gulp.
"Kyaaaaaah!!"
He let out a wild cry.
It was loud enough to startle the birds from the marshland into flight.
"Big Brother! This is insane! It's not alcohol—it's honey water mixed with fire! It clears out my insides!"
Chilbok took a sip as well, and his eyes quickly unfocused.
"Heh heh... Big Brother... I'm flying... This pleasant buzz feels incredible..."
Chilbok was weak with alcohol, so his tongue was already twisting after a single cup.
"This will sell. It will absolutely sell."
I was certain.
To Goryeo people accustomed only to sour, stuffy cloudy rice wine, this clean, powerful clear rice wine would be a culture shock.
"Let's get to work. Separate the clear rice wine and cloudy rice wine."
We placed bamboo strainers into the jars.
Only the clear alcohol seeped through the gaps in the strainers.
We scooped it out with ladles and put it into separately prepared jars.
This was our cash-cow product: clear rice wine.
Then we mixed a little water into the remaining sediment, strained it through a sieve, and made a milky white alcohol.
This was cloudy rice wine, a milky rice brew.
"Big Brother, what about this residue?"
Manseok looked at the alcohol lees regretfully.
"That's money too. Feed it to pigs, and the meat will taste better. Or boil it into a hangover brew."
"It'd be a waste to give it to pigs... Can't I eat it?"
"Do what you want. But if you get drunk and can't work, you don't get food."
After a full half-day of work, the five sacks of rice had become the following:
Clear Rice Wine: Ten casks (about 180 liters).
Cloudy Rice Wine: Ten casks (about 180 liters).
"Big Brother."
Chilbok, his face burning from the smell of alcohol, asked me a question.
"What is this called? It needs a name if we're going to sell it. We can't call it Choi San's Alcohol."
I looked at the jar of clear rice wine shimmering with gold.
Ten years of waiting. The sorrow of being cast out. And the hope that had bloomed in this marshland.
May those who drank this alcohol forget their worries and find peace.
And may it become the funds that opened an age of great peace for me.
"Great Peace Wine."
"Great Peace Wine?"
"That's right. The alcohol that brings peace under heaven."
"Oh... it sounds impressive! The name has value!"
Manseok raised a large bowl of cloudy rice wine and proposed a toast.
"For Peace Under Heaven!"
"Cheers!"
CLINK!
The sound of our ladles striking each other rang out clearly.
A night in the marshland.
The smell of ripening alcohol mingled with the laughter of three men.
I stroked the jar of clear rice wine and thought.
The preparations were complete now.
Tomorrow, this golden liquid would bring in real gold.
"Chilbok."
"Yes, Big Brother."
"Go to town early tomorrow morning and buy bottles. The finest ones. One hundred."
"One hundred?"
"It's an investment. Clothes make the man, and alcohol also has to be in a fine bottle if we're going to command a high price."
I looked up at the night sky.
The stars shone especially bright.
"And the day after tomorrow... we're going to the wharf."
"The wharf? Isn't that where merchant magnates from Gaegyeong swarm?"
"That's right. We need to catch whales, not minnows."
My eyes gleamed.
With one cup of this alcohol, I could place Goryeo's commercial world beneath my feet.