Survival Guide for the Reincarnated - Chapter 10

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 10

“Since we’re on the topic, how are things with the mine?”

“…Well, it’s the same. The warriors from Yang-ryeong are occupying it and interfering… I think it’ll probably get worse.”

“It sounds like the mining of Han-reung Jade Crystal is being delayed.”

“We’d be lucky if it were just delayed. We haven’t been able to mine at all from the beginning. Since Ya Woon-sang, who used to regularly bring us Han-reung Jade Crystal, is dead, the damage to Blue Cloud Trading Company as well as other trading companies and residents will probably grow even greater.”

The conclusion was simple.

There was a lot of work to do.

When I looked at Manager Seong without saying anything, he smiled awkwardly.

“…Well, that order you gave me earlier… I’ll go carry it out.”

Manager Seong turned around and started walking, then stopped in place.

“And I’ve moved all the items that were gathered in the courtyard to the warehouse.”

“That must have been hard work.”

“That much isn’t really… hard work.”

“Then since you worked hard, do one more thing.”

I took out the ledger I had kept in my jacket and tossed it lightly.

Manager Seong caught it with a puzzled expression.

An expression that said why are you giving me this.

“The people who were exploited in Seol-ap all this time should be written in there. Some are dead and some are alive, so sort them out and return their belongings.”

“…All of that much?”

“Not everything, exclude the spirit pills and training resources.”

“…Why…?”

“Wasn’t this something that happened because I turned a blind eye?”

“…”

“This started because of me, so if I don’t take responsibility, how would I be any different from Ya Woon-sang?”

“…I understand. I’ll distinguish between the living and the dead and compensate them as much as possible.”

“If it’s not enough, use my personal funds too.”

“…I understand, Young Master.”

I nodded and looked up at the sky again.

It was truly beautiful.

Since I’ll be very busy starting tomorrow, I plan to enjoy this leisure time for a moment.

* * *

The man wearing four strings around his waist, Won Sam, the branch manager of the Yang-ryeong branch of the Beggar Sect, shouted angrily.

“Seol Woon-hwi! That bastard son of a bitch!”

Deputy branch manager Jeong Gae-san, who was beside him, was startled and quickly added.

“That… Branch Manager… ‘bastard’ is a bit much… It’s Seol Jung-cheon. That Seol Jung-cheon.”

If Seol Woon-hwi was a bastard’s son, then who would that bastard be?

As Jeong Gae-san said, it was Seol Jung-cheon.

Branch manager Won Sam, feeling embarrassed, coughed and quickly changed his words.

“They say the tiger father begets tiger sons, but under the white tiger, a real mongrel pup has appeared.”

Mongrel pup was… not bad.

At least it was better than insulting Seol Jung-cheon.

“He’s a bastard son, right?”

“Yes. He’s a bastard son.”

“So that’s why he’s like that.”

“Pardon?”

“That bastard son just realized it late. That he has Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace behind him, so he can run around like a madman and it’ll be fine. What a damn… no, what a vermin-like bastard.”

“…”

“That mongrel pup is really, damn, living it up. A bastard worse than a dog, a damn son of a bitch who wouldn’t be satisfied even if torn apart and killed.”

Frankly speaking, whether Yang-ryeong and Seol-ap fought or not, he wasn’t interested in such things.

If they wanted to fight, what could he do about it?

But touching people from the Beggar Sect was a big problem.

Arrogant bastard.

To Won Sam, who was exploding with anger like this, Jeong Gae-san handed him a cloth he had in his jacket. Although it was covered with grime, it was still needed.

Won Sam took it and wiped off the food scraps stuck to his face.

“Why is that Bing Seol Geom Heun bastard taking out his anger on me, damn it, damn it.”

“Throwing what he was eating was a bit too much. Even though we’re beggars, we’re past the point of eating other people’s leftovers.”

“Is that really what you should be saying right now?”

“…I’m sorry.”

“Tsk, that bastard sect leader of Ju-ryeong Sword Gate had to go into seclusion at this particular time…”

The current sect leader of Ju-ryeong Sword Gate was a master of Five Energy Harmonizing Origin.

He entered seclusion about a year ago and still hasn’t come out.

It might extend for years at most, but the important thing was that during that period, Bing Seol Geom Heun was the one exercising the actual power of Ju-ryeong Sword Gate.

Ahem.

Jeong Gae-san cleared his throat and spoke.

“Looking at the situation, it seems Bing Seol Geom Heun will visit Seol-ap today. Shouldn’t we do something?”

“We have to do something. A Sam Gyeol-gae of the Beggar Sect died, so we can’t just sit still.”

“What will you do?”

“What do you mean what? Isn’t that person conveniently near Yang-ryeong?”

“That person means…”

“Yes, that person. That person who serves as deputy commander of Geom-ap Castle.”

Geom-ap Castle was a massive city that managed all the small cities in the vicinity, including Yang-ryeong.

The commander there was a Chil Gyeol-gae, and the deputy commander was a Yuk Gyeol-gae.

Yuk Gyeol-gae Cheon Su-gang.

He swallowed his saliva.

“…Are you really going to… call that person?”

“We have to call him. Right now that bastard son is looking down on the Beggar Sect, so we need to warn him to know his place before he lies down, don’t we?”

“…That’s… true.”

“And let’s take this opportunity to extract something from Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace if there’s anything to extract.”

Jeong Gae-san didn’t particularly try to stop him or anything. He wasn’t someone who would listen even if stopped anyway. Above all, he was someone who valued authority very much, so if the aforementioned Cheon Su-gang came and told him to lick off those food scraps on his face, Won Sam would lick them off without a moment’s hesitation.

He was completely corrupted by greed, so he definitely saw this as an opportunity.

He clicked his tongue inwardly.

He didn’t know what kind of result this would bring.

* * *

Seol-ap was a small city.

Actually, it was a bit much to call it a city, and a bit much to call it a village either – it was somewhere in between.

On the other hand, Yang-ryeong next to it was a city.

When dividing administrative districts: province (ju), prefecture (gun), county (hyeon).

They divided it into these three categories, and all five countries in the current Murim followed this system.

Officials were dispatched starting from the county level, and below counties they placed towns (jin), villages (ri), and hamlets (chon).

In the neighboring Yang-je Kingdom and the distant Wol-gye Kingdom, there were fortress cities (seong) above provinces, but there were only four of them combined between the two countries, and it could be said to be a characteristic unique to those two countries.

Seol-ap is a land that doesn’t belong to any nation.

It’s simply called ‘Seol-ap’ because it’s solely the land of the Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace.

But if we had to categorize it, Seol-ap could roughly be divided into village units.

Seol-ap Village.

And the neighboring Yang-ryeong is Yang-ryeong County.

While the size of the territories differs, the important thing wasn’t the difference in quantity. It was the difference in quality.

The strongest expert in Seol-ap is only at the Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown level.

But Yang-ryeong County has experts at the Five Energy Harmonizing Origin level. And there are more than five experts at the Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown level.

Still, there was a clear reason why Yang-ryeong County hadn’t devoured Seol-ap.

Because this place, Seol-ap, and I who am in this Seol-ap, are of the Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace bloodline.

Devouring Seol-ap would be the same as touching the Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace. What madman would dare touch the Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace?

They don’t have the guts to touch the giant of the north.

But keeping them in check is a different story.

The Ten Thousand Year Snow Palace doesn’t say anything about keeping them in check.

Because it’s a legitimate fight.

Because it’s a dispute with justification.

The situation here was simple.

First, there are two mines in Seol-ap and Yang-ryeong.

Those are the Cheong-ryeong Mine and the Seol-han Mine.

The Cheong-ryeong Mine is Seol-ap’s mine.

It’s clearly within our territory, and Seol-ap is the owner.

But the Seol-han Mine is a different story.

It’s located in the border area between Seol-ap and Yang-ryeong, and nominally should be under ‘joint management,’ but that wasn’t happening.

Up to this point, I would have just accepted it.

I could just go and demand half the shares of the Seol-han Mine, or through proper negotiations, establish joint management according to existing agreements.

But it’s been 6 years.

For these 6 years, since I came as the Branch Office leader of Seol-ap, Ya Woon-sang has been the deputy leader, and while the Branch Members have changed several times, the deputy leader position hasn’t changed for even a moment.

For 6 years, the Cheong-ryeong Mine within Seol-ap territory has been practically controlled by Yang-ryeong’s sects.

The Seol-han Mine is also under Yang-ryeong’s control.

It would be fair to say we’ve become complete pushovers, beyond just being robbed blind.

I intend to resolve this.

I arrived at the Cheong-ryeong Mine with the Branch Members.

The Cheong-ryeong Mine was still in the process of being excavated, but those managing them were very unfamiliar.

Anyone could see they weren’t Seol-ap’s warriors.

I walked toward them, and those who spotted me furrowed their brows deeply.

I spoke briefly.

“Explanation.”

Cheon Pung, who was behind me, quickly stepped forward and rapidly opened his mouth.

“Those are Yang-ryeong’s warriors. Judging by the clothes they’re wearing, they’re warriors from the Jang Sword Gate.”

“Yet they’re controlling things.”

“Yes. Recently, Han-reung Jade Crystals mixed with impurities have been circulated, so they’re doing this under the pretext of quality control being necessary.”

“Quality control…”

“And that reason keeps changing. Sometimes there was intelligence about materials being smuggled out so they were investigating, sometimes they were controlling for management supervision to facilitate smooth material exchange between the two regions… it’s quite varied.”

“Since I’m from a puppet background, I don’t remember well, but was it always like this?”

“…Yes. It was.”

After thinking for a moment, I asked.

“They’re still mining the mountain, so who gets the Han-reung Jade Crystals that come out of there?”

“…They go to Yang-ryeong.”

“So it’s Seol-ap’s mine, but Yang-ryeong manages it, Yang-ryeong mines it, Yang-ryeong takes it to sell, and Yang-ryeong gets the profits too.”

Cheon Pung kept his mouth shut with an embarrassed expression.

Honestly, I understand everything without him saying more.

What was written in the ledger was truly beyond imagination.

The one who designed this entire situation was Ya Woon-sang and Yang-ryeong’s sects.

Giving and receiving bribes.

Sharing profits too.

Ya Woon-sang would have probably achieved great success if he had been a merchant instead of a warrior.

I raised my head to look at the men who were making bewildered expressions in front of me.

“Are you people from the Jang Sword Gate?”

“…That’s right.”

“You’re doing management supervision here?”

“That’s right.”

“Why?”

“Well, because it’s always been that way.”

“Always… Does this look like Yang-ryeong County to you?”

“…Look here. We are warriors of the Jang Sword Gate. And right now we’re investigating because there’s intelligence that Han-reung Jade Crystals mixed with impurities have been circulated, so come back tomorrow.”

“This is Seol-ap’s mine, but is it right to tell the owner to come back tomorrow?”

“Huh… What are you talking about? This mine belongs to Yang-ryeong.”

“Based on the map, this mine rightfully belongs to Seol-ap, and the first discoverer, the one who planted the flag, all of them were people from Seol-ap, yet you’re spouting nonsense.”

“…”

“Yang-ryeong’s mine? Can you take responsibility for your words?”

The Jang Sword Gate warrior who was thinking about something makes a strange smile.

“…Ah, now I understand.”

“Understand what?”

“Just like Ya Woon-sang did, it seems you want some ore… I’ll report to my superiors to arrange a new negotiation meeting soon.”

It was absurd.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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