A letter from Yi In-jung
About a half month later, a letter from Yi In-jung arrived.
A letter from Supreme Commander Yi In-jung, sent to Jungnangjang Park
Younger brother.
At the farthest edge where the winds of the southern sea come to an end, the name of you cutting down Japanese raiders day after day rises and falls in court without cease.
When one stands in the palace hall, officials look to one another and marvel, saying, "Jungnangjang Park has won again," yet few can measure the stench of blood and the exhaustion clinging to the end of those words.
Each time your elder brother opens your field reports, his chest swells, and at the same time he feels a pain as if he were stroking the edge of a blade.
How could your victories fail to gladden me.
Yet the load you bear alone is far too heavy.
Your single sword has come to hold the nation's breath in its grip, and my heart has no room to rest.
You wrote in your dispatches, "Strike the origin, and an end will come into view."
Your brother also deems those words proper.
Yet in the present state of Goryeo, there are few forces fit to cross the sea.
In recent times we abolished private armies and scattered the martial strength of the aristocrats, so half was absorbed and half dispersed.
The framework seems to stand upright, yet when one tries to fight an actual war, hollow marks reveal themselves.
In the ledgers there are soldiers, and on the fortresses flags hang, yet in truth it is a sight where only wind comes and goes.
If I gather troops and head for the southern sea, Gaegyeong will be left empty, and whether thieves come or an enemy state comes, the strength to block them will be thin.
Pulling one pillar of the nation to prop up another does not easily stand as a wise measure.
This is the grain of fear I hold most.
The way Goryeo endures now is a shape standing by leaning on your one sword.
If you fall even for a moment, the army collapses, and if the army collapses, the nation tilts.
Your life is the very breathline of this country.
So how could your brother lightly send you farther out to the lonely end of the sea.
When night comes, I recall our master's old teaching.
He said that those who learn the Way together are as one body.
You run through blood and stench, while I am nailed to the court, hearing the king's worries.
Shame makes it difficult even to lift the brush.
Yet if I leave my place, the court too will shake.
Please do not harm yourself, and do not try to shoulder every burden alone.
Your sword has astonishing power to cut down the enemy, yet it does not flow toward meaning that those shoulders must carry the entire weight of the nation.
When the time comes to strike the origin, I will open the path behind you even if I must bar the court's doors shut.
For now, however, we lack both men and warhorses, and it is difficult to follow your great intent at once.
Each day, each dawn, I recite in my heart as if in prayer.
May our younger brother Park be safe today as well.
May his sword cut down the enemy, and may Heaven not take his life.
I hope you will know that this heart is more earnest than anyone else's in the court.
Supreme Commander Yi In-jung, with palms joined, respectfully submitted.
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Park Seong-jin slowly folded the letter.
It was a writing that set circumstance line by line.
The meaning that troops were scarce stood clear.
Along with it could be read the difficulty of reaching out again with the very hand that had abolished private armies.
Reasons why troops could not be sent were written through every passage.
What he held in hand were only a few ships of the bureau and a naval force that was half closer to civilians.
With this strength, could an expedition to strike the enemy's origin truly be possible.
That question remained.
Park Seong-jin walked the wild hills for about a day.
The fact that the nation's military frame had thinned pressed into his skin.
He had stood in the lead to clear away private armies, and he had trained and commanded those forces, yet it meant he had failed to look farther beyond.
When evening came and the mind grew quiet, Park Seong-jin took up the brush.
A reply letter from Jungnangjang Park Seong-jin, respectfully submitted before Supreme Commander Yi In-jung
Before Supreme Commander and senior brother Yi In-jung, this younger brother Park Seong-jin humbly bows his head and submits these words.
Having received senior brother's sincere letter, I could not lift the brush for some time.
Senior brother's heart struck and passed through the deepest place of this younger brother's chest before even the dawn wind of the battlefield, and gratitude and guilt tangled together, slowing my words.
Reading senior brother's writing, I understand that the court's forces are hollow and mobilization is not easy.
The grain of concern with which elder brother bears great responsibility while worrying for this younger brother's days—I receive it deeply.
Each time I cut down the enemy and return, I feel as if it is carved into my bones that the path to end this chaos lies at the far end of the sea.
The Japanese raiders in the southern sea are not a rabble driven by hunger.
They are forces that take conquest and expansion as intent, and they scheme to plunder provisions.
Each domain seeks to increase its own forces and treats our coastline like a granary.
To sever this flow, the grain gathers into the measure of striking the origin.
Therefore I report a small plan of mine.
Among local clerks and gentry, there yet remain those who still keep a little force of arms.
They have lost their property and villages to the raiders, and wrong and anger have accumulated deep.
If I go in person and gather their intent, there will be no few who can form ranks.
Already, among the warriors of the southern sea region, a dozen or so came first to seek me out—descendants of Jang Bogo's line who lost their arsenals and wandered, men who once stood as chiefs of local private forces—saying, "If only a royal command is 내려, we will follow and stake our lives."
If, as Your Excellency fears, it is difficult to move the capital's forces in great number, then I wish to gather regional volunteer strength and the warriors who have fought with me, form a naval force, and advance to strike Tsushima and Iki.
Yet this may draw criticism that private forces have been gathered in secret.
Therefore, I beg that senior brother report to the court and obtain a single royal command:
"For the suppression of sea raiders, let regional forces be temporarily unified and placed under command."
When that one royal command descends, private forces within a hundred li will of themselves put their horses in order, and boatmen a thousand li away will of themselves take up their oars.
Even the people who wandered after losing their homes will weep and run, saying, "The nation has held us."
My intent is only this one.
A war cannot be brought to conclusion by the skill of this one body alone.
With the sword's edge, I can block today.
Yet I cannot block the winds of tomorrow for long.
As senior brother instructed, if we are to set two and three measures together, then gathering the strength of the provinces will also become one branch of the proper Way.
How could I not know senior brother's concern.
The southern sea has now become a land of drifting.
Wherever I look, burned villages 이어.
Only by tying this matter off can the lives of the people stand again.
If senior brother brings down the royal command, I will gladly stand at the front, yet I will not covet military merit.
I will not privately command men.
I will offer this one body to gather up the people's tears of blood.
I will carve into my chest the grace of senior brother, the trust of the great king, and our master's teaching.
Respectfully submitted, Jungnangjang Park Seong-jin, with palms joined.
Park Seong-jin halted the brush tip, lifted the paper, and slowly rolled it toward the side where wind seeped in.