Chapter 70. The Pope is a Smuggler(?) (2/2)

Jeon Bak smiled when the two finished exchanging greetings with each other.

“I had heard that you were interested in mathematics.”

“Yes.”

“That’s very good. I look forward to the future of the church.”

When Jeon Bak laughed with a proud face, Gongson Chun Gi waved his hands as if he was signalling Jeon Bak to get on with something.

“Enough small talk. Tell him about what’s going on in the church right now.”

Jeon Bak nodded. He immediately began to explain what was going on to Cho Ryu Hyang.

“Till now, the church acted as the bridge between the mainland and the western world and earned much from it. For us, who live on land that cannot even be farmed, this was the best and the only way to earn money. That method alone let us survive till now. But recently we’ve encountered a troubling problem.”

Jeon Bak took out an abacus and put it on the table.

“The church’s military force was always being used up as we fought with the organizations of the mainland. There was never a case where the number of our soldiers exceeded a certain number. But when the current Pope stepped up, the whole situation took a strange turn.”

Jeon Bak calculated something as he agily used his abacus, then stretched out his hand outstretched as he opened his mouth.

“There are too many soldiers that are doing anything. We’ll lose all of our money in five months if this keeps going.”

“Before that happens, we’ll need to go earn some money for ourselves. That’s why we are going out to Sichuan.”

Cho Ryu Hyang’s eyes sparkled only then as if he realized what was going on just now. All the organizations of the martial world operated based on martial might and financial power.

Of course, there were things such as spies and the like but these always played the support role and weren’t really necessary for an organization.

Anyway, the Heavenly Demon Church at the present moment was far too big for its own good. There was no way that their current job alone would be able to support the entire church. The balance within the church had been broken.

“Sichuan, to the church, is akin to the land of hope. As long as we manage to successfully station our soldiers there, the amount of money we would be able to earn would be twice the amount we are earning now.”

“Twice the amount…….”

Cho Ryu Hyang began thinking. He didn’t know just how much the church manages to earn every year, but it’s an amount of money that allows a massive organization like this operate.

Twice the amount of the current earnings was something that Cho Ryu Hyang couldn’t even fathom. He couldn’t imagine just how the church was managing to earn that much money. Jeon Bak realized what Cho Ryu Hyang was thinking and smiled.

“The church took the goods of the mainland with some difficult methods over to the west and sold it there. We did the same for the goods from the western world. If we manage to take control of Sichuan, we won’t need to go through difficult operations which would allow us to spend less than we are now. Other than that, we would be able to aim for something even bigger.”

Something bigger? When Cho Ryu Hyang made a confused face, Jeon Bak smiled mischievously and looked at the Pope. He was asking if it was alright to tell Cho Ryu Hyang. Gongson Chun Gi nodded and decided to tell Cho Ryu Hyang himself.

“It’s salt.”

“…….!”

Salt? Wasn’t that something that the nation strictly forbid merchants from selling?

“Till recently, this old man here got together with other old men and worked quite a bit. Thanks to them, we were able to attain some salt from Xizhang (西藏: Tibet).”

Cho Ryu Hyang’s mouth widened. The scale of this operation was far bigger than he previously thought.

“Smuggling?”

“Yeah. Well, I guess it’s a little bigger than that.”

It was something that the Heavenly Demon Church was doing. There was no question that it would be a big operation.

“It’s the way to earn the most money as possible in the current world. You must know as well, but salt is worth its weight in gold.”

Right. Salt that was regulated by the nation itself was extremely valuable. As a necessary commodity, it was far too expensive.

The imperial palace was earning most of its money from salt, in fact.

“We worked our asses off to get salt. It would be a shame if we were unable to sell it.”

Cho Ryu Hyang nodded. Expansion into Sichuan was something that the church needed to do. Right then, Jeon Bak opened his mouth.

“This isn’t a simple thing though. It’s not like we can sell salt right away if we bring it to Sichuan. That’s because salt isn’t something that can be sold out in broad daylight. Because of that, we must first create a market where we can sell such a thing.”

Jeon Bak began to calculate with the abacus once more as he continued talking.

“In order to do that, we must take over more than half of Sichuan. Under five months at that.”

Gongson Chun Gi scratched his neck as he opened his mouth.

“It wouldn’t be easy, but it has to be done.”

“So it’s that serious of a problem.”

“Yes. It’s mostly due to a person in the church who likes to spend too much.”

When Jeon Bak glared at Gongson Chun Gi with eyes like a snake, Gongson Chun Gi flinched and turned away. The one who had been spending as much money as he liked was him after all.

“Hum, hum. Well, with this, we’ll be able to take care of all our problems.”

Gongson Chun Gi made this all sound very easy, but Cho Ryu Hyang didn’t really think this was going to be easy.

‘There are three things I’m afraid of, disregarding all the unforeseen variables that could affect this mission.’

The first thing was that the church was trying out something entirely new, and the second thing was that the martial artists of Sichuan wouldn’t just stand there and watch their home get taken from them.

‘And…….’

The last thing was what worried Cho Ryu Hyang the most. It was the reason why no one sold any salt despite knowing that it would make them a huge amount of money.

‘Would the imperial palace just stand there and watch?’

The imperial palace was incredibly sensitive when it came to matters regarding salt. There were always salt being traded in the mainland but only the likes of small merchants did it.

If something as big as the Heavenly Demon Church began to sell salt like this, there was no way the imperial palace wouldn’t notice. That worried Cho Ryu Hyang the most.

‘He should have a plan……’

There was no way Gongson Chun Gi failed to think of the three things that he thought of just now. There was also no way that Gongson Chun Gi failed to put up a plan to deal with these problems.

Did he sense Cho Ryu Hyang’s worries? Gongson Chun Gi grinned, and opened his mouth.

“Don’t take the church too lightly. The power of the church is much greater than you might think.”

Cho Ryu Hyang nodded. Like Gongson Chun Gi said, the power of the church was far greater than Cho Ryu Hyang had initially imagined it to be and that power was now moving towards Sichuan.