516.the king asked quietly,
When the energy of the banquet subsided, the king asked quietly,
"Seongjin, you understand military affairs well.
Wokou raiders and the Red Turbans rise every year.
How should the army be reorganized?"
Seongjin lowered his posture and replied,
"Your Majesty governs the court. I am a man of arms.
My eyes are fixed on the battlefield."
The king narrowed his eyes.
"Eyes that have seen the battlefield do not conceal reality.
At times, your words are clearer than those of the generals of the court."
Several ministers stiffened.
The very shape of a warrior's words resting upon state direction made them uneasy.
After a brief pause, the king asked again,
"…And what of the land issue?"
The powerful officials nearby inhaled sharply.
The disease of Goryeo lay precisely with them.
The music of the banquet seemed pressed down into silence.
Seongjin drew a deep breath.
"Your Majesty, I am not one who has governed agricultural policy.
Yet I know this much: when the people starve, the army weakens,
and when the army weakens, the state trembles."
The king smiled.
"That answer is enough."
The ministers exchanged glances.
Seongjin had already struck the core—
land was the illness of the state.
He did not know how to cure it,
but he knew where the disease lay.
The Queen Consort Noguk asked again,
"What did you see in the Jiangnan campaign?
If the Yuan dynasty is to endure, what must be changed?"
Seongjin hesitated briefly, then answered,
"…If Yuan is to endure, it must govern the people with benevolence.
In Jiangnan, two harvests a year place the people one layer farther from starvation.
Even in war, there is room to endure."
He continued,
"But we are different.
If half of a single harvest is taken, the people's lives collapse.
When the people collapse, the pillars of the state shake.
Rather than imitate Jiangnan, Your Majesty must first examine the nature of our land."
The king and the queen exchanged a glance.
Seongjin stepped back.
From here on, it was clearly the realm of governance.
The king spoke once more.
"You said you would not speak of politics.
Yet what you have said is already the politics of the state.
The strength of a warrior lies not only at the blade's edge,
but also in the eyes that see truth."
Seongjin bowed deeply.
"Your Majesty, I have no intention of assuming governance.
If commanded, I will only report what I know of the battlefield and the people."
The king nodded, satisfied.
The lights of the Palgwanhoe flared again.
Seongjin quietly returned to his seat.
That night, the palace overflowed with music and lanterns.
Civil and military officials, envoys from every province,
gathered to honor the generals and ascetics returned from war.
The king summoned Seongjin to the center once more and praised his achievements.
"Without your merit, what would have become of the Jiangnan expedition?"
"Your Majesty is too generous.
I merely fulfilled my duty as a soldier."
The civil officials exchanged glances.
The queen raised her cup and smiled.
"General, can you tell us—
what you saw and heard in Jiangnan,
the path by which that land might rise again?"
Seongjin lowered his body.
"When enemies rise, it is my task to draw the blade.
To speak of the nation's greater course lies beyond my station."
He recalled the age when warriors ruled the state—
an age that could only be called lawless.
Once order was broken, it did not easily return.
The deepening of land monopolies was a shadow of that era.
The king understood that Seongjin's silence was not evasion.
Seongjin already knew that words alone could not change the world at once.
He also knew that many present would suffer from such words.
As the music swelled, the king approached quietly.
"Walk with me."
Behind the main hall, under moonlight, the pond shimmered gently.
Upon reaching the cloud bridge, the sounds of the banquet faded.
The king's low breathing was close.
"General Park."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
The king's voice sank.
"Why did you set the tenant tax at one or two tenths?
You instructed Cheoeun to do so, did you not?"
Only then did Seongjin realize that Cheoeun was the king's informant.
He inclined his head lightly.
"I thought that if I ate a little less, all would be better.
Moreover, the lands granted as reward were already several times more
than what my family truly required."
Seongjin's words and actions were all reported to the palace.
He could guess who had done so.
The king knew there was no malice in him,
and held that knowledge in silence.
"So that is why."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"And the reason?"
Seongjin paused to steady his breath.
These words would be a blade to some, salvation to others.
"Your Majesty.
If the world takes half, and I do the same,
then I am no different from the villains of this age.
I considered it plainly.
For owners and cultivators to endure together,
the cultivator must retain enough to live.
When the burden is too heavy,
even the diligent cannot bear it."
He paused, then continued.
"For a year or two, taking more may bring joy.
But such a relationship cannot last.
Before long, the cultivators leave.
Those who leave become wanderers, refugees.
They are arrested as criminals—
yet the fault is not theirs.
I only wished to try otherwise within the household I manage.
At least upon my land, I hoped none would starve.
I wished them to eat according to their labor.
If I used a little less, enjoyed a little less,
I believed it would benefit all."
The reasoning was not perfectly ordered.
The causality was not polished.
But it was honest.
The king accepted the truth within it.
Just as rent cannot be raised endlessly,
tenant tax has its limits if relationships are to endure.
When people leave, the bond breaks.
Others may be brought in.
But if they too cannot endure and leave,
the problem lies with the rate.
Knowing that emptiness, the king remained silent for a long time.
"What if this were extended across the realm?"
Only then did Seongjin look away from the king,
gesturing toward the distant banquet,
where red lanterns swayed.
"Those gathered there.
The families behind them.
The lands they hold.
The power resting upon them.
All will oppose it.
Goryeo itself will erupt.
Some will rise in revolt.
Others will begin to plot against Your Majesty."
The king's shoulders sank quietly.
He already knew the answer.
That was why he had delayed.
Knowing—yet unable to act.
The king's voice dropped further.
"Even so, if it is not corrected,
this land will walk the same path as Yuan.
Did you not see it in the Central Plains?
When a state collapses from within,
external enemies are merely the final push."
Seongjin nodded slowly.
"I saw it.
Yuan had already collapsed from within.
The Central Plains and the north alone could not sustain it;
it depended heavily on Jiangnan's production.
Now that a Jiangnan empire stands apart,
without fundamental reform it cannot endure.
There, I saw that lowering burdens was the only path to survival."
The king asked,
"And what of us?"
It was a question about the nature of the world itself.
Words were chosen carefully—
too many interests were at stake.
After a long silence, Seongjin replied softly,
"I only hope we do not become so."
The king closed his eyes.
Seongjin said no more.
He was a soldier,
and he knew that further words would only weigh heavier upon the king's shoulders.