A Hundred Boxes
“A h-hundred boxes? Are you serious?”
Hayun stammered out the question.
“I am. All of them.”
Lady Choi's eyes were resolute.
“You said it yourself, didn't you? There were only a hundred boxes.”
“Yes, that's true, but……”
“Then buying them all is the right thing to do. Before the other lords get their hands on any.”
What Lady Choi feared was the prospect of others possessing the very same items she owned.
People whose wealth knew no bounds inevitably sought out the special and the rare.
And when that pursuit reached its ultimate end, they would chase after the one thing in the world of which there was only a single specimen.
Even if it meant the very tribute goods presented to the King.
Lady Choi's eyes glinted with greed.
“Can you send me a hundred boxes every year at the holidays, going forward?”
“Every single year?”
“Why? Is that not possible?”
“N-no, it's certainly possible, it's just……”
The longer the conversation went on, the more her mind went white.
As always, the rich were simply impossible to comprehend.
A hundred boxes……
A hundred wooden chests would come to a staggering two thousand nyang.
And if she secured a standing order for a hundred boxes every year, it was hard even to imagine how much profit would pile up over the years.
Even though the production costs, corvina included, ran to nearly ten nyang per box, the margins remaining were enormous beyond reckoning.
Jackpot!
She wanted to scream out loud right then and there.
Hayun forced the urge down and kept up her performance.
“Understood. Normally I'd divide the stock among several buyers, but if that's your wish, madam, I have no choice. Everything I have is yours.”
“Well thought.”
Lady Choi gazed at the wooden chest with a look of satisfaction.
Hayun added one more thing.
“In exchange, a quantity that large will take some time.”
“How long?”
Hayun hurriedly ran the numbers.
The wooden chests took two weeks to complete, and assembling and arranging the contents inside took just as long again.
On top of that, transporting a hundred boxes was impossible alone.
She would need other people's help.
Having finished her calculations, Hayun spoke.
“At least a month, I'd say.”
“Then that is how it shall be.”
Lady Choi readily agreed.
The deadline hardly mattered to her anyway. Even the hundred boxes she was buying now weren't needed right away—they were gifts to be distributed at the coming holidays.
At this quality, they would make presents every bit as fine as premium red ginseng.
With the rare holiday gifts secured thanks to Hayun, Lady Choi's face was full of contentment.
“Thank you, madam.”
Thus Hayun completed the transaction without a hitch and made her way out of Min Seungji's residence.
“Whew―”
The moment she stepped outside, the long breath she'd been holding escaped her.
“A hundred boxes……”
Her legs wobbled and her heart pounded.
Leaning against one of the walls, she finally began to calm down a little.
“Get a hold of yourself, Im Hayun. You've pulled off bigger things than this.”
True, two thousand nyang was a fortune, but measured against the advertising campaigns worth tens of billions of won that Hayun had steered in her past life, it was a modest sum.
And yet she had landed this contract with not a single coin of capital to her name.
Here, in the Joseon Dynasty.
A shiver ran through her entire body at the thought.
“Hehehe. With this, the other haengsu won't dare make a peep.”
With her heart considerably lighter, Hayun headed back to Mansang.
One month later. The Mansang guild meeting.
The haengsu were gathered in the spacious main hall.
It was an ordinary scene, but today the air weighed heavy. Every face was set hard, and not a single soul could bring themselves to speak first.
“Good day, everyone.”
Daebang Im Sang-ok entered and greeted them just as he always did.
“……We pay our respects, Daebang.”
The haengsu answered reluctantly, their voices barely above a dying whisper.
Today was the day the guild would review the corvina sales figures for the past month.
Im Sang-ok took his seat at the head of the room and came straight to the point.
“So. How do our sales stand?”
Gulp!
The haengsu fidgeted, hesitating to speak.
Some pretended not to notice, staring off at distant mountains.
“Um, well, I……”
Then, as one of them reluctantly opened his mouth, the others began to reel off their figures in a reluctant chorus.
“I sold a mere 120 dureum. My apologies.”
“I only managed 110 dureum. I'm ashamed.”
“140 dureum here—and barely, at that.”
“I sold 130. I'm sorry I couldn't do better.”
Nearly all of them had fallen short of the target of 200 dureum per person.
Truthfully, those numbers already represented far more sales than usual.
But with the corvina price expected to crash next month, every one of those figures stung bitterly.
The thought of the warehouses still packed to the rafters with corvina brought sighs pouring out of them.
At best they might break even; at worst, heavy losses loomed.
“You've all worked hard.”
But Im Sang-ok did not rebuke them. Instead, he nodded as though offering comfort.
Having climbed from the lowest junior haengsu all the way to the seat of Daebang, he understood the struggles of subordinates better than anyone.
Im Sang-ok continued with a composed expression.
“Any haengsu who hasn't reported yet? Speak freely.”
“I'm at 120 dureum.”
“120 as well.”
“Barely made 140.”
None of them had anything worth bragging about, so everyone rushed to declare their sales figures.
The haengsu with the weakest results, in particular, hurried to finish their reports before anyone's attention could turn to them.
As the reporting wore on, only two people had yet to reveal their numbers: Song Do-hyeon and Hayun.
Zap!
Their eyes crossed in midair, each keenly aware of the other.
What are you doing? Say it already.
Hah. It seems you have nothing to announce either.
After a moment of traded glares, the one who raised a hand first was Song Do-hyeon.
“Oh, Haengsu Song. Go ahead.”
The heir presumptive to Mansang.
When Song Do-hyeon's turn came, everyone fell silent and strained to hear his every word.
“And how many did you sell, Haengsu Song?”
At Im Sang-ok's question, Song Do-hyeon answered with easy confidence.
“800 dureum.”
“E-eight hundred dureum?”
The moment the words left his mouth, the hall erupted.
“Magnificent!”
“That's Haengsu Song for you!”
“Whew! Eight times what I sold! Incredible! Incredible!”
Every eye fixed on Song Do-hyeon in open awe.
In a season when the average couldn't even reach 200 dureum, he had single-handedly achieved several men's worth of sales.
It was a truly astonishing performance.
A victorious smile spread across Song Do-hyeon's lips. He looked at Hayun with a triumphant expression.
Well? That's the difference between you and me.
But Hayun showed no reaction at all.
No disappointment.
No awe.
She simply waited in silence for her own turn.
“Fine work, Haengsu Song.”
Im Sang-ok nodded with a satisfied look. Then he asked,
“Anyone else who hasn't spoken?”
“I'll speak.”
The final turn, at last.
Hayun's hand shot up.
“Oh, Haengsu Im. You were still here, then.”
Every gaze in the room swung to Hayun.
It was a markedly different look from the one they'd given Song Do-hyeon. Where expectation might have been, there was only distrust.
But Im Sang-ok asked with his same gentle smile.
“So how many did you sell, Haengsu Im? It's your first time—don't feel pressed, speak comfortably.”
“Well, you see……”
Hayun paused briefly before answering.
“I sold a hundred dureum.”
“A hundred dureum…… not bad for a first attempt.”
Im Sang-ok stroked his beard, his expression impossible to read.
It was no small number.
But neither could it be called outstanding.
The lowest figure so far had been 110 dureum, which made Hayun dead last on results alone.
Considering it was her first real foray, achieved without a single coin of capital, it wasn't bad.
But remembering all her grand talk, the number a hundred fell short of expectations—that much was true too.
The other haengsu, none of whom could possibly miss the opening, began to speak up.
“Pfft. A mere hundred dureum, and she was so confident?”
“She held her own, sure, but next to all that big talk, it's nothing, isn't it?”
“Not even in the same league as Haengsu Song.”
“Looks like this work just doesn't suit her. Why not quit and go back to running her tavern, hm? Hahahaha!”
Jeers burst out from every direction.
To be fair, Hayun bore some of the blame.
A newcomer ought to have groveled flat on the ground, yet instead she'd snubbed her seniors and not shown her face once for a whole month—these reactions were hardly surprising.
For the entire past month, Hayun had spoken to no one except Yun Jeopjang.
Forget greetings—she seemed endlessly busy, darting around all day.
So much so that she rarely even appeared at the shared meals where everyone gathered.
Some wondered what on earth she was up to, but no one thought deeply about it.
It would all be wasted effort anyway.
Meanless striving, nothing more.
And now the results were right before their eyes.
The results of being last in sales.
How could laughter not come spilling out?
And yet, amid everyone mocking Hayun, the one who should have been the most pleased of all—Song Do-hyeon—wore a face gone stiff as stone.
She sold a hundred dureum?
A place where he'd run into Hayun recently flashed through his mind.
At the time he'd thought nothing of it, but nearby stood the residence of Min Seungji—the finest noble household in all of Uiju.
Hayun had unmistakably been hurrying in that direction.
Carrying a bundle whose contents he couldn't make out.
Try as he might, there was nowhere else that could have bought a hundred dureum of corvina from her.
The thought unsettled Song Do-hyeon.
No, surely not?
The very instant that ominous premonition flashed through his mind—
“There is one more thing I must report.”
“What is it?”
Hayun suddenly spoke up.
“The corvina I sold went for twenty nyang per dureum.”
“What did you say?”
Hayun's announcement set the hall ablaze all over again.
“Twenty nyang for a single dureum of corvina?”
“Is she out of her mind?”
“Selling a five-nyang good for twenty—who does that?”
“Is she not just an outright swindler?”
“Who on earth would buy corvina at that price?”
Fierce protests erupted at the outrageous profiteering.
Even for a merchant, there were lines one must not cross.
This was unmistakably over the line.
Taking a fourfold profit—even after leaving margin for the buyer—did not accord with the law of Mansang.
And for Im Sang-ok, who prized righteousness above all, it was all the harder to tolerate.
Bare, unconcealed disappointment surfaced on his face as he looked at Hayun.
“Is that truly the truth of it?”
His voice, unlike before, was grave. It was less a question than a reprimand.
“Haengsu Im, why did you sell corvina at such a price? Confess the reason to me, fully and without omission.”
Im Sang-ok regarded Hayun with an expression of utmost gravity.