There Is No Sejong In My Joseon [EN]: Chapter 240

“Can we trust this plan?”

“The royal relatives made a big noise about it, so we have to trust it.”

Whether the plan succeeds or not, it’s a good opportunity to suppress the momentum of the royal relatives and meritorious subjects [those who contributed greatly to the founding of the dynasty].

Lee Bang-won allowed it for that reason, but he seemed to have some lingering unease.

Regardless, it was already decided.

In the distance, meritorious subjects, led by Wanseongun Lee Cheon-woo, brought Prince Onsa-do of Namsan.

Lee Bang-won opened his mouth with a solemn expression.

“Prince Onsa-do is the last descendant of the Namsan Daeri (大里, Ohusato) royal line. I order my ministers to help him reclaim his throne, so receive the Silver Seal of the King of Namsan.”

It was just returning what had been confiscated, but it had the solemnity of a formal investiture.

However, Onsa-do wisely didn’t question why they were making such a fuss about returning what they had taken.

So far, it was as expected.

However, the next action greatly exceeded the expectations of me, and everyone else here.

“Father!”

Onsa-do prostrated himself and shouted.

‘Father?’

I wondered if the dead King of Namsan had suddenly resurrected in someone else’s ancestral shrine, but Onsa-do’s cry was directed at Lee Bang-won.

“Since the King has bestowed upon me the grace of re-creation, how can my loyalty be less than that between father and son? From now on, I will call you Father!”

“······.”

Even Lee Bang-won, the most powerful man in the world, was taken aback and lost his words.

The ministers, including me, his real son, were the same.

‘Why is he suddenly overreacting?’

This event is just a formality to promote the legitimacy of the expedition at home and abroad.

He was supposed to receive the royal seal, take the ships and mercenaries prepared in Cheonghaejin [a major naval base], and then cross over to Namsan, and that would be the end of it.

However, Onsa-do’s eyes were burning with an unknown passion.

“Why is that guy acting like that?”

I whispered to Lee Cheon-woo, who seemed to know the situation.

“Well… that is…”

Lee Cheon-woo scratched his head as if he was in trouble.

“He thought everything was ruined when he was arrested, but he seems quite moved that Joseon is actively supporting him.

At first, he cried, but later he swore countless times that he would unite Ryukyu, save the people, and repay Joseon’s great grace.”

How presumptuous.

He’s already drinking the soup when he doesn’t even know if he can reclaim Namsan.

“······Prince Namsan, please rise.”

“Yes! Father!”

Lee Bang-won, who heard the word ‘father’ again, glared at me.

‘Why are you looking at me like that?’

You should be blaming the royal relatives who put this strange idea in his head.

Lee Bang-won, looking down with an expression that seemed to say, ‘What is this guy?’, handed over the seal and immediately returned to Heejeongdang [the King’s primary office], leaving all the aftermath to me.

Well, should I just send that Prince of Namsan back to Byeokrando [a port city] as it is?

“Hyung-nim [older brother]!”

Of course not.

This clueless guy strode up to me and grabbed my hand.

“I heard that Hyung-nim has also put in a lot of effort for this younger brother. I will never forget this grace!”

Let go, you old man.

Looking at you, you seem to be five or six years older than me, what do you mean younger brother?

My younger siblings are playing in the East Palace right now.

I glared at Lee Cheon-woo next to me and awkwardly twisted my hand out.

“······As you said, Joseon and Namsan have newly formed a father-son relationship. Don’t forget this fact.”

I was speechless at the mention of ‘father,’ but if I think of it as a logic to explain the special relationship between Joseon and Namsan that will be formed in the future, it’s not something I can’t understand.

The Ryukyu Three Kingdoms have already established a suzerain-vassal relationship with the Ming Dynasty.

In this situation, if we suddenly try to act as the sovereign state of Namsan, the Ming Dynasty will scold us.

Therefore, we had no choice but to slip away like a loach, saying that we had a relationship of father and son, not sovereign and vassal.

So, Onsa-do should just wrap it up and move on, but this guy was surprisingly persistent.

“How can I forget? If I could, I would like to serve His Majesty the King of Joseon as my real father.”

“······.”

“Come to think of it, I heard that there is an unmarried youngest daughter between His Majesty and the Queen Consort right now.

I lost my father early, and the Princess doesn’t have anyone to be her master yet, so if we form a marriage, wouldn’t we be able to fulfill the loyalty of father and son? Hyung-nim, please build a bridge for us.”

‘Is this guy crazy?’

He doesn’t have anything in his hands right now, but he’s just full of hot air and trying to woo my younger sister?

Does he even know how old she is? There’s more than a 10-year age difference between you two, right?

‘A prince of a small border country dares to covet my sister?’

Was my brother-in-law feeling like this back then?

‘No, that’s not right.’

He’s been kicked out of his own country and has nothing, and I’m the Crown Prince of Joseon, the number one country in the Great Ming.

We shouldn’t put the two on the same line.

Yes, this is definitely not a double standard.

“If I reclaim Namsan and unify Ryukyu within three years, the Princess will also… Ugh!”

“Hey, a man has a long way to go, why are you dawdling like this!”

“Military affairs value speed. Please depart quickly!”

The royal relatives, who were watching my reaction, hurriedly gagged Onsa-do and lifted him up, leaving the place.

As Onsa-do was being carried out by the royal relatives, he winked at me.

“I haven’t earned Hyung-nim’s trust yet, so I’ll step back for now. But a man proves himself with results. After reclaiming the country, I will come to welcome the Princess.”

“Sooncheon-gun! Hold him properly! He’s still babbling!”

“Aish, he keeps moving, so I can’t gag him properly.”

“Okay, one, two, three!”

Only after the royal relatives threw Onsa-do into the cart did the surroundings finally become quiet.

It was when the royal relatives, dusting off their hands, were about to turn around, saying they had worked hard.

“Lords.”

I said, looking at the royal relatives.

“Don’t you have anything to say to me?”

“Well, wouldn’t the person be the most important thing?”

“Even if the Prince of Namsan looks like that, the subordinates will be in charge of the fight anyway…”

Aigo, you old men.

===

However, the royal relatives are right.

Namsan is the smallest of the Ryukyu Three Kingdoms, which are only the size of a palm, and even then, it is a feudal state where the local magnates each rule their own territory.

‘If Onsa-do returns under the pretext of punishing the usurper, the local magnates will first gauge the dominant side and see how things go.’

I can guess that a situation similar to when we pushed Sho Ni out using So Yori-tsuna in Tsushima will occur.

In the end, once we break the usurper’s direct forces, things will proceed smoothly.

‘So, I also said okay.’

The only problem is Onsa-do himself….

“No matter how I look at it, it seems like he’s an incompetent person with only big fantasies.”

There is no problem with Onsa-do taking over Namsan.

Up to taking over.

However, Onsa-do has virtually no power within Namsan.

It has been almost 20 years since his father was usurped, and the vassals who fled with him are only about a dozen at most.

I can see that he will be ignored by the local magnates even if he somehow manages to form a court.

“So, he’s perfect as a figurehead.”

Even if Onsa-do, full of hot air, enthusiastically talks about unifying Ryukyu, we can cut him off and he will have to quietly mine sugar.

‘Let’s not worry about this issue anymore.’

After hearing the news that Onsa-do had left Byeokrando with a ship full of cannons and soldiers, I began to tackle a more important issue.

As soon as I entered the Queen’s residence with determination, a pillow flew at me.

– Thwack!

‘Too slow.’

However, I, who had been prepared in advance, dodged with amazing movement.

‘I’m glad it’s not a wooden pillow.’

“I was only trusting my eldest son, but he recklessly runs around and gets a deadly disease, and now his brother conspires with the royal relatives to sell off his younger sister?”

I knew this would happen.

Since it happened in the palace, there was no way it wouldn’t be passed on to Queen Wongyeong through the maids.

I calmly opened my mouth.

“It’s a misunderstanding, Mother.”

“I don’t even know where Namsan is located. Aigo······.”

“There! Is! Absolutely! No! Way! How can I arbitrarily marry off my sister without my parents’ permission?”

I emphasized with force.

I am the first to refuse Onsa-do from entering our family.

“I heard that Chief State Councilor Nam Jae has a grandson, and it seems like Father is planning to marry her off to him. Don’t worry.”

Knowing this would happen, I had subtly asked Lee Bang-won about his intentions before coming.

Nam Jae is originally a senior minister, and his family is also prestigious, so he would be a perfect match.

I finally breathed a sigh of relief after reassuring my mother.

‘As expected, my younger sisters should marry into prestigious families and firmly support me from behind.’

I can’t send them far away.

===

“Why are you out here? Why don’t you go inside?”

Onsa-do was facing the sea breeze at the bow of the ship.

“I feel like I’m about to reach my homeland, so I can’t stay inside.”

Onsa-do imagined himself arriving in his homeland, sweeping away the rebels, and ascending to the throne, and he couldn’t sit still in the cabin.

Once he arrives in Namsan beyond that sea, it feels like he can start working right away.

“The soldiers recruited from Byeokrando seem to be fierce and ferocious. It seems that the King of Joseon has put a lot of thought into it.”

Onsa-do agreed with his friend Ma-ae’s words.

“Yes, that’s right. It seems better than us hiring mercenaries directly.”

Ma-ae was from the Ba (馬) clan, a prominent family in Ryukyu, and was the son of a vassal who had fled to Joseon with the King of Namsan.

The two, who had been comfortably talking to each other as friends in Gaeseong [the capital], were now in a strict lord-vassal relationship, so Ma-ae also raised his honorifics.

“It’s all thanks to the great grace of the great country.”

Like most Ryukyuans returning with Onsa-do, Ma-ae had come to Joseon as a child to study, so he was fluent in Korean and had received a Confucian education.

The process of Sadaejuui (事大主義, serving the great) [a Confucian principle of respecting and learning from larger, more powerful nations] installed by Confucianism was bound to be ingrained in his brain.

With the addition of the emotion of the grace of re-creation, Onsa-do and the Namsan people were feeling similar emotions to the Joseon court that had received the grace of Emperor Wanli.

“I, too, have met a sacred king and washed away the shame of the Jongmyo Shrine [royal ancestral shrine] and re-established the severed throne, so I cannot but be sincere in my admiration. I wanted to take the Princess as my consort and truly serve His Majesty the King of Joseon like a father······.”

“If you regain the throne and fulfill the loyalty of father and son, wouldn’t there be another opportunity to discuss it someday?”

“I must do so. After conquering the entire Ryukyu within three years, I will send envoys and gifts to express my intention to marry.”

Onsa-do made a loud noise.

In his head, he already had a plan to overcome the storm-like chaos.

First, use mercenaries to defeat the usurper.

After informing that the rightful King of Namsan has returned, he will raise the dignity of the royal family and kneel all the Aji (按司) [local lords or chieftains], that is, the local magnates, under his feet.

Of course, all those who resist will be weeded out.

And then, in conjunction with Buksan, he will attack Zhongshan. Zhongshan, which is being attacked from the north and south, will not be able to withstand it for long.

Once Zhongshan is absorbed, it is the same as occupying 2/3 of Ryukyu, so a 1-on-1 with Buksan is not a concern.

And he will be revered as the king who ended the chaos and unified Ryukyu for generations to come.

Of course, Joseon and Cheonghaejin did not pay any attention to his plan at all.

They just need to secure land to get sugar.

With each harboring their own ulterior motives, the ship sailed to Namsan.

End