663.your subject Yun Dam (尹譚), humbly report.
While Park Seong-jin was pacifying Kyushu alone, Yun Dam and the Goryeo army entered Karatsu in Hizen.
It was the moment he had waited for a long time.
It meant the governance measures for Tsushima and Iki had been fully completed.
Goryeo officials had been dispatched, and troops had been stationed.
A local self-defense corps had been organized from the residents, and Goryeo educational institutions had also been installed.
The king's palace tablet (殿牌) was sent down, and the islands were incorporated as one of Goryeo's local jurisdictions.
Defensive facilities throughout the castle were reinforced, and a practical force capable of cutting off the wakō at the source was deployed.
The method of roaming Goryeo's coasts and fighting wherever they appeared was inefficient.
When pursued, they fled.
When they hid along the intricate coastline, searching took enormous effort.
Blocking them at the forward edge where they arrived—and destroying them there—had real power.
Tsushima and Iki were the places best suited to those conditions.
With that, the mode of war changed.
With Yun Dam's arrival, the circumstances grew even more orderly.
Through the coming and going of reports, the broad situation had already been grasped.
But he did not stop there.
He inspected the field in person and rechecked the war situation in finer detail.
Now the fight would be decided not by a moving blade, but by the strength that held its ground.
---*
Respectfully submitted (謹啓)
I, your subject Yun Dam (尹譚), humbly report.
As the war situation across Kyushu is being brought into order, I have led the Goryeo forces and entered Karatsu in Hizen.
The governance and defensive measures regarding Tsushima and Iki have been concluded as follows, and I submit this report.
Garrison and administrative measures
We have completed the garrisoning of Goryeo troops in Karatsu of Hizen and secured public order and defense inside and outside the fortress.
Officials of Goryeo have been dispatched to Tsushima and Iki, establishing an administrative system.
Local residents have been organized into a self-defense corps, tasked with maintaining order and supporting defense.
Goryeo educational institutions have been established to lay the foundation for long-term rule.
The king's palace tablet (殿牌) has been delivered, clarifying and organizing the chain of command for military and civil administration. Defense and maritime control
We have expanded and reinforced the defensive facilities of Karatsu Castle and other key points.
Troops have been placed at major ports, forming a posture capable of cutting off the anchoring and resupply of wakō vessels.
Surveillance over sea approaches has been strengthened, deterring large-scale infiltration. Enemy situation (敵情)
The wakō forces are dispersed, and signs of unified command are weak.
Their ability to assemble large forces and conduct prolonged operations is judged to be greatly diminished.
The possibility of sporadic infiltration using small craft remains, but our current forces can respond. Operational judgment
Operations that patrol the entirety of Goryeo's coasts and pursue the enemy are inefficient.
The most stable method is to block at the front and maintain fortified strongpoints.
With the current garrison and defensive system, the front has entered a stable phase.
Thus, the front centered on Karatsu of Hizen is stabilized, and Tsushima and Iki are in a condition enabling long-term garrisoning and governance.
Should any change arise, I will report immediately.
Humbly submitted.
Goryeo, Year ○○, Month ○, Day ○
At Karatsu, Hizen
Your subject Yun Dam (尹譚), respectfully (謹上)
---*
Gaegyeong, the royal audience hall (便殿).
When the court eunuch raised the document with both hands, at the king's gesture it was passed in turn among the ministers.
The writing on the paper was not long, yet the hall grew quiet as it was read.
The first to set the document down was the Minister of War.
"…This isn't a mere garrison. It's a settling-in."
At his words, several ministers lifted their heads.
The Minister of War tapped the document and continued.
"They've placed troops, sent administrators, formed a self-defense corps, and even built a school.
This isn't suppression. It's rule."
The Minister of Taxation let out a low laugh.
"Do you know how much silver leaks away catching wakō?
We send troops along every coast, float ships, chase them, come back—every year the cost rises.
If Yun Dam's report is true, we'll spend less of that money now."
The Minister of Rites took up the thread.
"The part about establishing a school catches my eye.
Isn't that choosing to bind them with letters rather than press them down with the blade?"
The Minister of Taxation asked back.
"Is that a problem?"
The Minister of Rites nodded slowly.
"It's acceptable.
But it is a judgment that looks too far ahead.
Whether barbarians can be bound by education—perhaps the time is early.
It may look like needless effort."
Meanwhile, one man kept his face hard and did not fold the paper.
The Left Censor-in-Chief.
"If you loosen your mind at the words 'the front is stable,' judgment will blur."
The Minister of War glanced at him.
"What concerns you?"
"A phase that relies on the prestige of a single general needs a system if it is to last.
While Park Seong-jin remains, it will be quiet.
But what of the posture after he leaves? That troubles me."
A brief silence fell.
The Minister of Personnel spoke quietly.
"That is why Yun Dam is there.
And there is something more important. Look at the flow of the report."
He pointed to a line.
"'Do not let the general's absence appear as weakness.'
This means they are building a system, not clinging to one man."
The king watched every reaction without speaking, then took the document back into his hands.
After reading a moment, he said slowly.
"It took thirty years to chase the wakō.
Now they tell us to block them. To sit down and press."
The ministers bowed their heads.
The king's gaze stayed on the paper.
"This is not Yun Dam's method.
It must be Park Seong-jin's."
As he folded the document, he added,
"From now on, the sea is not a battlefield.
It becomes our land."
Among the ministers in the hall, not one took those words lightly.
---*
Yun Dam sent the same report to Park Seong-jin, who had been roaming the south.
Park Seong-jin, advancing north through Higo (肥後, present-day Kumamoto Prefecture)—a land where fertile plains met mountains—stopped what he was doing as soon as he received the letter.
He turned at once.
He shortened the road as if skipping steps.
By the time he arrived in Karatsu, the sun was already slanting.
When they faced each other, no words came first.
It felt as though too much time had passed.
It had been time filled, each in his own place, by his own share.
"You've lost weight."
Yun Dam spoke first.
Park Seong-jin gave a short laugh.
"I had no time to rest."
That was enough.
"You have to eat well."
"You're still at an age to grow."
The two of them chuckled.
Most of the generals and provincial officials who had accompanied the expedition had already returned.
They turned back from Tsushima; some reached Iki and then turned.
Those who had made it as far as Hizen were the original thousand horsemen who had left Gaegyeong.
Most were cavalry, and bringing the horses had required no small number of ships.
When only the two of them remained inside the tent, the long conversation finally began.
Yun Dam did not unfold the report again.
Park Seong-jin already knew its contents.
Instead, he asked, listened, and confirmed.
"What is Higo like?"
"I haven't gone there yet."
"Those with strength left to fight, those trying to survive, those who have already folded their hearts—every sort exists."
Yun Dam nodded.
"Surrender?"
"In form, they all surrender."
"The problem is the content."
They went through the surrender documents from the many small states of Kyushu one by one—
disbanding troops, tribute, hostages, opening sea routes, rooting out remaining wakō.
For each matter, Park Seong-jin asked, and Yun Dam sharpened the judgment.
At times their directions diverged.
In the course of it, what Park Seong-jin had done began to surface one by one.
Reparations.
At that word, Yun Dam stopped speaking for a moment.
"Actual reparations?"
"Not land. Supplies and silver—and slaves."
"I took what I could."
"How did you…?"
"It must be divided back to each affected district."
"Most of it is piled here now."
"It must return to the people harmed by the wakō."
"If anyone grows greedy here, I will cut them down at once."
Yun Dam said nothing for a long time.
The idea that the gains of war were not rations or loot, but something to be returned to the people.
He breathed out slowly.
And immediately he thought of distribution—
the most difficult work in the world.
"If distribution twists, resentment remains."
"So I left standards."
Park Seong-jin handed over a document.
Something he had written at Hirado.
"Scale of damage, records, testimony."
"All must be left."
Yun Dam asked no more.
He already knew the importance of putting it into documents.
Time flowed like a dream.
Even when the sun was fully down and the night deep, their conversation did not end.
How to bind Kyushu.
How many troops to leave.
To whom to entrust—and whom to exclude.
At the end, Yun Dam said,
"Now this land is not the end of fighting. It is the beginning."
Park Seong-jin nodded.
"That is why I needed you."
"Let's make a plan for what to do, and deliberate together."
The conference grew long.
Nabeshima Motonari, the new lord of Hizen, offered to hold a banquet, but Park Seong-jin refused.
Instead he chose a place to eat with the soldiers.
They put an entire ox into a great cauldron and boiled it down.
They skimmed the fat and left only the broth, ladling it into bowls.
They poured it over white rice.
Goryeo-style gukbap.
There was no lavish liquor, no music.
Only steaming broth—and faces that had endured hard time.
Yun Dam lifted the bowl and drank slowly.
"This is better."
Park Seong-jin gave a short laugh.
"Even when war ends, eating remains."
That night, the Goryeo army sat in one place and ate one food together for the first time in a long while.
And quietly, they pledged the next ten years of Kyushu.