Chapter 295: The Service Corps

To ensure control over this area, the marines accompanying the Second Fleet were tasked with garrisoning Jocheonpo. The main force of the Second Fleet also moved its anchorage from Seongsan to here. This location was closer to Jeju town, which was more convenient for both future refugee resettlement and for the fleet to replenish its food and water supplies.

Li Haiping unceremoniously occupied the best building in Jocheonpo: the Jocheonpo Post Station, and designated it as the “Second Fleet Headquarters.”

The garrison soldiers in Jocheonpo, with their grain supply cut off, had either fled to the mainland or surrendered to Li Haiping, naturally becoming his free slaves. The several hundred government slaves in Jocheonpo received the same treatment. Although they had all been nominally freed as commoners by a public notice from Feng Zongze, they were immediately organized into the Jocheonpo Labor Corps, specifically responsible for the construction and maintenance of the port.

The stationmaster of the Jocheonpo Post Station, Park Chang-beom, was accustomed to welcoming and seeing off guests and was also familiar with the port’s comings and goings and the tidal patterns. After the change of regime, he was kept on and became the “Engaged Official” of the Jocheonpo port area—a “title” invented by Feng Zongze for his collaborators. Before the full implementation of the Senate’s cadre system, he could act with expediency.

Strictly speaking, “Engaged Official” was not his invention. It was an official position in the Joseon Dynasty, a temporary assignment. Feng Zongze felt it was very suitable for the current jack-of-all-trades status of the collaborators.

Park Chang-beom had no psychological barriers to pledging allegiance to a new master; he even felt a sense of vengeful pleasure. He was a genuine jinshi degree holder. Although not from a yangban noble family, he was the son of a middle-class family and could have had a promising official career.

But tragically, Park Chang-beom was born in Hamgyong Province—the ancestral home of the Joseon Dynasty. However, Yi Seong-gye was very distrustful of his fellow countrymen and had always suppressed them. Therefore, officials from Hamgyong Province had little room for advancement in the Joseon Dynasty and were generally stuck in low-level positions. During the Imjin and Dingyou invasions, a number of “Korean traitors” who sided with the Japanese army emerged, and many of them were from this background.

Because of his place of origin, Park Chang-beom had been stuck in low-level positions after being appointed to office. He had been the stationmaster of Jocheonpo for five or six years. Being a minor official in this place of exile was almost no different from being an exile himself. Moreover, although the position of stationmaster offered some small perks, the work of welcoming and seeing off guests was very arduous. Being extorted, berated, and even beaten by passing high officials and their arrogant servants was also a common occurrence. Park Chang-beom had long been filled with resentment.

When the Kunren Wokou first arrived, he had put on an act of “submitting to circumstances” and “enduring humiliation to survive.” But as the three towns fell and the main fleet moved its base to Jocheonpo, Park Chang-beom immediately sold himself to them.

His betrayal was partly motivated by the consideration of greater personal gain, but it was more driven by his dissatisfaction with and hatred for the court.

Feng Zongze and Li Haiping immediately entrusted him with important responsibilities, and Park Chang-beom was extremely diligent—he even harbored some thoughts of “repaying a state scholar’s kindness.”

At this moment, he was supervising the conscripted “Service Corps” in the port area. To distinguish them from the labor corps transported from Shandong and Lin’gao, the labor teams formed from the local conscripted former government slaves and surrendered or captured government soldiers were uniformly given this designation.

The Service Corps was issued clothing and rations and used collectively, mainly for infrastructure projects such as building roads, barracks, and piers, where they served as laborers. The ongoing project was the expansion and reconstruction of the Jocheonpo port area. The Service Corps was assisting the labor corps in building a wooden pier.

“Time to eat!” As the meal signal sounded, the laborers of the Service Corps put down their tools and headed towards the dining area.

Large pots brought by the “Women’s Service Corps” were steaming with white vapor. Inside was the Service Corps’ meal: a mixed grain rice made of one-third brown rice, one-third buckwheat and barley, and one-third dried sweet potato. The side dishes were a soup of soybean paste, seaweed, and miscellaneous fish, and kimchi.

“The Chiefs feed these lowborns so well!” Park Chang-beom thought as he watched the “Service Corps” members reluctantly line up under the shouts of the Public Security Army members holding large clubs to receive their food.

The female members brought large baskets of tableware. The tableware of the common people in Korea was mostly made of wood. Those with slightly better conditions used lacquered bowls, and only the wealthy could afford copper and porcelain. Wooden tableware was not easy to clean, so Feng Zongze had ordered a centralized cleaning system for all local “service personnel.” After use, the tableware was uniformly cleaned and disinfected by the Women’s Service Corps to prevent the spread of infectious diseases.

The Service Corps members received their meals. The standard ration was 500 grams of mixed grain rice per person per meal for those engaged in extremely heavy labor, with a decreasing scale for other types of work.

Although according to nutritional standards, the diet provided to the Service Corps was too monotonous and not well-rounded, it was the first time the members had been able to consume enough calories.

The sheer quantity of the food not only made the former government slaves and soldiers, who had long been in a state of chronic hunger, grateful, but even a minor official like Park Chang-beom, who usually did not have to worry about food, found it “too lavish.”

“The Chiefs are so generous. Aren’t they afraid of eating themselves into poverty?” Park Chang-beom was once very worried—because much of the grain came from the government granaries. It was now winter, and even if this year had been favorable, the first harvest would not be until summer. Jeju Island itself was not self-sufficient in grain. Without external food supplies, they would soon face a famine. At that time, the Chiefs would probably have to hoist their sails and flee.

However, after seeing the fleets of ships that arrived from the sea from time to time, unloading countless wooden barrels, hemp sacks, straw bags, and boxes, he was no longer worried. The continuous stream of supplies also strengthened his determination to pledge allegiance to the “Chiefs.” They took away very little but brought in a large amount of goods. They were also building ports and houses, and raising troops… All these measures seemed to indicate that they intended to stay on Jeju for a long time.

Park Chang-beom did not have the extravagant hope of the naturalized citizen cadres that the “Kunren bandits” would one day “sit on the dragon throne” and he would become a founding minister. His expectations were much smaller. He only hoped that the rule of this band of Kunren here would be long-lasting, and that he would have a better life than as a frustrated Joseon stationmaster.

“Master, your bento box.” His own servant brought his lunch. For now, the order to free “private slaves” had not been issued. But Park Chang-beom didn’t have many slaves at home—he couldn’t afford them.

The “bento box” had become popular from the Chiefs. A lunchbox containing brown rice and vegetables, it was convenient for eating anywhere. Park Chang-beom didn’t actually need to eat a bento; his home was in Jocheonpo, and he could have gone home to eat or had his servant bring him food in a food container. But the preferences of the leaders often become the fashion. Park Chang-beom also started eating bento.

While eating the bento box brought by his servant, Park Chang-beom watched the laborers working in the harbor. He had rarely seen such a large-scale construction project—there were at least three or four thousand laborers on the site. What were the Chiefs building a port here for with such great effort? Could it be that they also wanted to emulate the Prime Minister of old, invade Korea, and conduct an “eight-province land survey”?

As his mind was wandering, he suddenly saw the flag on the beacon tower being raised, signaling “ship approaching.” He immediately put down his lunchbox and looked out to sea.

As soon as the approaching ships came into Park Chang-beom’s sight, he breathed a sigh of relief. They were the Chiefs’ cargo ships. These large vessels with tall masts would enter and leave Jocheonpo in fleets of three or five every ten to fifteen days, unloading a large amount of cargo and sometimes bringing some personnel.

On the deck of the flagship of the fleet entering Jocheonpo stood a man.

He was between thirty and forty years old, his face weathered, making it difficult to guess his exact age. He was wearing a genuine green M65 jacket. If anyone got close to him, they could smell the lingering scent of horse manure.

This man was none other than the Senate’s “horse maniac”—Nick.

Nick, who had felt constrained at both the Gaoshanling and Changhua pastures, had finally found an opportunity to fully display his talents. The occupation of Jeju not only gave the Senate its first pasture with a suitable climate but also a large number of horses in one fell swoop.

Without any hesitation, as Nick was preparing to apply for an inspection trip to Jeju Island, a transfer order from the Organization Department was already on his desk: proceed immediately to Jeju Island to carry out work.

Nick did not delay for a moment. After packing a simple luggage, he handed over his work to the Agriculture Committee, especially giving Yang Baogui numerous instructions. The horse breeding program he and Yang Baogui had started was at a critical stage. If it weren’t for the tens of thousands of horses on Jeju Island, he would have been reluctant to leave at this time.

“Sheng Bao, you stay here and lead the junior apprentices and herdsmen. You must strictly follow the regulations and manuals I’ve established!” he instructed his several apprentices. The Sheng Bao and Lai Bao brothers were his first apprentices and were already capable of working independently.

“Lai Bao will go on a business trip with me,” he said. “Go back and pack, then get your equipment.”

He also selected four herdsmen from among the workers to serve as assistants. Although everyone’s luggage was simple, they brought twenty standard military logistics boxes of tools and materials, filled with various tools, equipment, and medicines needed for horse breeding.

The group first took a boat from Lin’gao to Hong Kong, then met up with personnel from the cavalry and transport corps training detachments and the General Logistics Department’s animal power section in Hong Kong, forming the “Jeju Island Animal Power Work Group” to travel to Jeju Island together.

Nick gazed at the verdant island gradually appearing before his eyes, his mind already planning how to carry out his work there. As a horse enthusiast, he had visited the horse farms on Jeju Island in another time more than once and had a good understanding of the local pasture conditions, climate, and the state of the horses.

The Mount Halla area on the island was a very high-quality pasture, and the climate was also quite suitable for horse breeding. If combined with advanced pasture cultivation and intensive farming, it would be no problem to raise more than a hundred thousand horses.