Chapter 359: Kim Yuk-sun

Kim Yuk-sun was wiping the machine in the sluice house. The so-called machine was just an iron handwheel screw gate, used to control the water level in the dam. This was a common water conservancy facility in Lingao, but on Jeju Island, it was “high-tech.” Because Kim Yuk-sun was young and had a talent for hands-on work—Nangong Wudi had once seen him make a slingshot that was no less impressive than his own rosewood slingshot made with a full set of woodworking machinery—he was assigned to work here. The plan was to send him to Lingao for study after the situation stabilized.

Kim Yuk-sun was very happy to be assigned to such a position, feeling it was a great trust. He spent his free time wiping the machine with a rag, keeping the entire sluice house clean.

Kim O-sun saw her brother cleaning and also helped wipe the dust with a rag.

“Sister, what brings you here?” Yuk-sun was puzzled. His sister rarely came to the stables. He knew his sister was now an “official” and was very busy with all sorts of things. The stables were mostly for manual labor, and women were generally not used, so his sister rarely came.

“I came to deliver the labor service corps for their shift.”

“Is this also under your management, sister? You’re really becoming a bigger and bigger official,” Yuk-sun joked.

“The situation is a bit unstable recently. Father asked me to come and check on things—the stables are outside the city.”

She had just relayed the order to strengthen the alert to the White Horse Battalion personnel stationed at the stables. According to the latest instructions, the “enemy” was likely to carry out sabotage activities in the next few days.

Kim Yuk-sun laughed. “What’s there to worry about?” He pushed open the window and pointed outside. “Not to mention we’re right next to the city, even if we weren’t, it wouldn’t matter. There are several hundred soldiers stationed at these stables. Who would be so blind as to come here to die?”

After landing, the transport corps and cavalry training teams were stationed at the stables outside the city. As the number of horses they received continued to increase, the men and horses became too numerous to accommodate, so they opened up two more horse farms elsewhere outside the city and moved some of the men and horses there.

But even so, there were still over a hundred Fubo Army soldiers at the number one horse farm. Although most of them were trainees, they had at least received three months of basic infantry training and were all equipped with rifles. Attacking the horse farm would be suicide.

“You can’t say that. The situation is a bit chaotic right now, and some people are trying to cause trouble in secret. This place is more than half a li from the main camp, and it’s surrounded by open country.”

“No problem. The Japanese… no, the Japanese patrol passes by here every half hour,” Kim Yuk-sun said nonchalantly. “…Look, here they come.”

On the dirt road outside the sluice gate, a squad of Japanese Public Security Army soldiers rode past on horseback. Their tachi swords were slung across their saddles, and the soldiers wore jingasa helmets and cavalry greatcoats, looking very imposing.

In the past, the people of Jeju Island would have been scared out of their wits and fled at the sight of such figures. But now, the brother and sister found them to be a very comforting sight. These were the people who protected their safety, the fangs and claws of the Chiefs, their own kind.

“You still need to be careful,” Kim O-sun said, looking at the large iron wheel. “This is the sluice gate. The Chiefs say it’s a very important machine…”

“Of course. If this sluice gate were to collapse, all the water stored in the dam would be lost, and the water troughs in the stables below wouldn’t be supplied. It would be difficult for the horses to drink,” Kim Yuk-sun said, pointing to the bow and arrows and machete hanging on the wall. “I have to be on guard. I’m not bragging, but if three or five people came, they wouldn’t be able to move this sluice gate an inch!”

“I know you’re capable.” Kim O-sun looked at her brother’s gradually strengthening body. Now that he ate his fill at every meal, her brother’s once somewhat frail body was beginning to become strong.

She pushed open the window and looked around. She saw that on the other side of the sluice gate was a dike, blocking the river, and on the other side of the river was a place surrounded by a fence. Although dusk was gathering, she could see several newly built tower-like things inside, round like large barrels.

“What’s that?”

“It’s the new fodder yard,” Kim Yuk-sun said. “But there isn’t much grass in there yet. The Chief said it will be used after the grass from the fields is harvested. For now, it’s just a pile of hay we’ve cut.”

“Grass has to be planted?”

“Yes,” Kim Yuk-sun nodded. “Chief Nick said that raising horses is a great science…”

He began to talk enthusiastically about what he had learned recently. Seeing that his sister was very interested in the large iron wheel in the room, he went on to talk about the many new terms he had just learned: screw, universal joint, lever… These were all new things that he was very interested in, and he was always pestering the “little teachers” to explain them to him.

He then took out a small waterwheel model from a basket as if presenting a treasure. The sluice house was practically “bare-walled,” with only a rough bench. Kim Yuk-sun had hung a basket on the wall for storage. The waterwheel was made for him by a student from the Fangcaodi teaching group. It was a teaching aid that used a waterwheel to drive a fan to demonstrate the work of water power.

“Look, sister,” he said, placing the small waterwheel in the channel. The waterwheel began to turn, driving the fan to spin rapidly.

“This is fun.” Kim O-sun also watched the exquisite wooden model with great interest.

The Chiefs were very knowledgeable in everything they did. Seeing her brother still standing in the channel, watching the waterwheel with great interest, she said, “You sit down and rest for a while. Stop playing—the water is still cold now.”

“This isn’t a toy, it’s ‘energy’! This is the ‘power’ of water, and there’s the ‘power’ of wind, the ‘power’ of fire—those ships in Chaotianpu that don’t need oars or sails and belch black smoke when they run, that’s the combined power of water and fire…”

Kim O-sun nodded. She didn’t quite understand everything her brother was saying, nor did she really want to. But seeing her brother’s incessant chatter and enthusiastic demeanor, he was like a different person from the chaotic and wild child of before, who only knew how to play with slingshots, hunt rabbits, and catch fish.

“Energy or power, you’d better get out of that channel right now!”

“It’s nothing, just a small job. There’s nothing to do here all day but guard the sluice gate. I’m going to get sick from boredom,” Kim Yuk-sun said nonchalantly. “I can only read more books.”

“You can read and write now?” Kim O-sun was very surprised and happy. Their family had been low-caste baekjeong for generations. In the Joseon era, it was a great crime for low-caste people to learn to read and write.

“Yes, I go to night school every day when I’m not on the night shift. There are a few little teachers there who are very knowledgeable. They don’t just teach reading. They know so much,” Kim Yuk-sun said with envy. “They are from the Great Song, after all!”

The first batch of the “Education Department Detachment,” composed of high school students from the Fangcaodi School, had already arrived in Jeju. They were sent in batches to Jeju and Taiwan. Besides serving as clerical and technical personnel, they also used their spare time to serve as teachers, conducting literacy classes for the refugees in the purification camps.

The local collaborators and promising members of the labor service corps could also enjoy this treatment. After all, they had to master the Chinese language and writing to be used effectively.

Kim O-sun was also studying in the literacy class. Although her spoken Mandarin was not bad, her reading and writing skills were a bit hazy.

Her brother took out a roll of paper from a basket on the wall and opened it. She recognized two of the four characters on this roll of paper: “Jeju.” Her brother read aloud: “Jeju News.”

The Jeju News was a small, open-sheet newspaper compiled by the Jeju Island Forward Committee, specifically for the local people of Jeju and the refugees in the camps. It was published irregularly. The local manuscripts from Jeju were written and then sent by radio telegraph, and the Lingao Times was responsible for the specific editing and printing.

The writers were basically all Yuanlao—the naturalized citizen cadres were not yet able to write reports in the “Yuanlao’s composition model.” Because the target audience was illiterate and semi-literate, the wording was as simple as possible, and characters with fewer strokes were used as much as possible. The content was mainly local news, various administrative orders, and simple teaching and popular science content. Some of the content was excerpted from the Lingao Times.

The headline on the front page of the newspaper was in bold black: “Express News from the Temporary Capital,” which was basically a summary of the Lingao Times.

“Number Two Blast Furnace in Ma Niao Industrial Zone Successfully Ignited This Week!”

“Phase Three of the Bopu Commune Workers’ New Village Broke Ground Today, Expected to Be Completed by the End of June. Upon Completion, It Will Provide One Hundred and Twenty-Four Housing Units for Workers, Expected to Greatly Alleviate the Housing Shortage for Workers…”

“On the Tenth of This Month, the Gunboat Chunchao Was Officially Launched at the Bopu Shipyard. Minister of the Navy, Rear Admiral Chen Haiyang, Attended the Launching Ceremony…”

This news from the “temporary capital” was both strange and novel to them. However, it made the collaborators feel that they were not alone—there was a happy paradise outside their miserable world, although this world was so far away from them.

He read the front-page news aloud. The front-page news was about the upcoming first Political Consultative Conference on Jeju Island. The content was very simple, more like a “notice.” Even so, the brother and sister only half-understood many of the words in it. They only roughly knew that the Chiefs were going to ask all the people on the island to elect their leaders to attend a meeting to discuss how to handle the island’s affairs in the future.

Because Kim O-sun was a “cadre,” she had attended several study sessions for naturalized citizen cadres. She had heard her superiors talk about the meaning and importance of this meeting at the sessions and knew it was a matter of the first importance. Because her whole family was now tied to the “Chiefs,” the “Senate,” and the “Great Song,” she was very enthusiastic about this matter and wanted to understand what was going on.

The two of them were leaning over, studying the newspaper. It was already dark outside, and they could hear the neighing of horses in the distance. In the night, the melodious sound of a bugle call rang out—it was the signal for the army’s dinner.

Just then, the sound of chaotic footsteps suddenly came from outside, and several dogs in the horse farm began to bark fiercely.