Empire of the Ring

“Oppa! Over here!”

At Frankfurt Airport, Yunsuh and Sangchun greeted Youngho’s group. They were busy trying to catch their little boys and greet Youngho at the same time.

Youngho and Jongil visited Frankfurt for the CIA’s meeting and Sangchun’s parents followed them alone to look around their son’s family’s new place. They decided to stay at the farm even after their son’s family left to Frankfurt since Youngho was also like a real son to them and there were still a lot of jobs for them to do at the farm.

“You didn’t have to come out to get us. Your place is not far from the airport.”

“These little devils were dying to get out of the building. We needed to freshen up a little.”

“You don’t send them to preschool yet?”

“We’re going to give a few months before sending them to preschool. They only speak English and Korean now. I want them to learn basic German at least before going to school.”

Yunsuh did not want her children to be isolated at preschool because they did not speak German. It was true that in any country, in order to be treated equally and fairly, learning the local language was necessary.

Sangchun’s parents were satisfied with the antique and roomy building of Zeynep Wine’s European sales store.

“Youngho, you’ve done a great job. You must’ve spent a lot for them.”

Cho Sangchun interrupted his father.

“Dad, what are you talking about? I bought all of the appliances by myself.”

“You fool. Even that money is from Youngho.”

“…”

“Father, I could come this far because of Sangchun. Because he backed me up from behind, I could do whatever I wanted.”

“See, dad? Do you hear what his saying?”

“That’s not something to be proud of, Sangchun!”

Although Sangchun’s father was scolding him, he had a satisfying smile on his face.

Taking advantage of the joyful atmosphere, Jongil wanted to have a housewarming party. When he asked Yunsuh to have a party, she gave him a weird look.

“Jongil oppa, don’t ever think about getting food from me, okay?”

“What did I do?”

“You have no idea how many times I had to say sorry to my friends after you got married to Karajan. Someone like you is women’s archenemy! Argh… Why do I have to clean up your mess? You’re the one who made the mess!”

Jongil was out of words. He knew exactly what he deserved.

“Why are you doing this? It’s been years and you were quiet all along, what can I do to make it up to you?”

“I’ve only withheld my feelings because of Karajan. Well, she’s not here, is she? I’m going to give you an earful from now on. You need to take it until I feel better. ”

“If Karajan finds out about this, she’s going to kick me out. Please don’t tell her about anything! I’ll take whatever from you…”

“Well, we’ll see about that.”

Youngho interrupted.

“You pathetic! Why do you even live?”

“Dude, you couldn’t even touch the woman she set up for you. You have no say in this!”

At his remark, Yunsuh struck his back with her palm, which made a loud sound. It left a red, swollen, hand mark on Jongil’s back.

***

Youngho signed the contract for the Frankfurt’s hotel and assigned Cho Sangchun as the general manager of the hotel. Since he already hired a management specialist for the hotel, Sangchun’s position was only given to him for the sake of title. He would be in charge of Zeynep Wine’s sales in the regions of Europe and it would help him if he had a credential title. Arirang Hotel’s general manager sounded more appealing than less well-known Zeynep Wine’s branch manager.

At the hotel, Zeynep Wine would be sold and displayed at the hotel bar and café and Youngho ordered the employees to suggest Zeynep Wine to customers if they asked for recommendations. It was a way to advertise the corporation’s own brand wine since people would have some expectations if a winery had its own hotel chain business.

It was a commonly used marketing means that many corporations used to advertise their own brands. Since many people who visited high-quality hotels tended to stay at the same hotel in a long term or to be rich, they would be curious about products displayed in the lobby.

Youngho’s potential customers were businessmen because he was not going to sell his wines individually to the public, but was going to sell them wholesale to distributors and retailers.

Because Yunsuh’s little boys did not want to be apart from their grandparents, Youngho left them there until he comes back to Frankfurt for the next month’s meeting. He flew to Volgograd with Jongil because Michael gave them an assignment to report about the current movements of Southern Russia’s mafias.

There was a US intelligence agency based in Russia but it was not related to the European chapter. Since Russia is a huge empire that ran the world, the country probably had the most agents working in the country.

The European chapter had to go through the CIA’s headquarters in the states in order to learn about Russia’s information, so it was autonomously collecting information through its agents. Youngho was a great resource for Michael who was an ambitious leader, he could ask for the information from the headquarters but he did not want to expose his interests since there were power struggles in the CIA’s high rankers.

“That old man is just too greedy.”

Jongil was not fond of Michael’s request. Since he had no idea about Michael and Youngho’s information business, he just thought Michael was a sick, crazy superior.

“I know what you mean but he introduced the building for our wine store for us. We should also do him a favor.”

“That’s why I didn’t say a thing but I still don’t understand why he’s making us do it when he can just make a call to the headquarters. Southern Russia is not an area under our watch.”

“He’s just stubborn and stupidly proud. But, hey. Look at the bright side, we get to drink with Yaniv tonight.”

Jongil smacked his lips at the mention of drink.

“Are you going to tell him about the farm in Kazakhstan?”

“Yeah, I have no reason to hide that. He’s not a bit interested in farming, if he was, he would’ve made a fuss about planting grape seedlings.”

Hot-tempered Yaniv liked businesses that made money immediately, he would be too frustrated to do farming which took long time before it could make him money.

Since he had been a mafia for too long, which was a job anything could happen to him at any time, he never liked businesses that he had to wait until he could make money.

Even so, Youngho had to inform him about his farm in Kazakhstan since he needed Yaniv’s power there for the farm’s protection.

***

“Lee, why would you do such an inefficient business? It’d be better for you to sign a long-term contract with a South Russian grain provider and import grains from him.”

Not knowing that Youngho was preparing for the future and making another base for Serbian descendants, Yaniv only talked about money.

“Mr. Yaniv, you know how much love I have for lands and estates. I just loved seeing that great plain.”

“I see what you’re saying. The Caspian Sea with offshore oilfield spread apart was like that to me.”

To Yaniv, the whole region of the Caspian Sea looked like oil crude.

“I’m a little worried about local mafias harming the farm since I’m a foreigner.”

“Don’t you worry, Lee. I’ll take care of that. I’ll tell them that it’s my business so that they can’t even dare to come near the land.”

***

Genghis Khan once said this, ‘The strength of a wall is neither greater nor less than the courage of the men who defend it.’

Youngho has reminded this quote every time he saw the Serbian residents. Wherever they live, they always volunteered for patrol activities for their town. They habitually protected their residential places.

Now was a time of peace but they still did night patrolling. In the time of danger, they would be even more alarmed and cautious. Youngho’s farms and the ranch were even stronger than courageous men greater than a wall which Genghis Khan talked about because of the descendants of Serbian Kingdom.

Because of the Serbian people’s voluntary security activities, the armed security guards that were originally hired by Zeynep Farm had no work left to do. Since Youngho could not pay them for anything, he assigned them to the wine factory and they rather loved their new job. It was because the amount of payment for factory crews was higher for there was more work to do.

Zeynep Farm’s Serbian residents started out with twenty families, but now they were more than forty families. It had more than enough Serbian security patrols to protect the farm.

***

Now, all of the descendants of the Serbian Kingdom residing in Azerbaijan had joined Youngho’s farms and ranches. Youngho was not sure how many descendants were sold as slaves to Georgia or Armenia were still in those nations. He decided to put an advertisement on newspapers in both nations.

If they still existed and were living a hard life, he wanted to help them settle down at his estates with their consent.

Listening to Youngho’s plan, Chief Niksic thanked him with watery eyes.

“I have no other wishes in life. I thank you on behalf of our people.”

“You’re welcome. It’s nothing. I’m doing it for my own good.”

“You say that all the time but we’re aware of you and the Archduchess’ thoughtfulness for our kingdom. I heard that you’ve bought a huge land in Kazakhstan for Serbian descendants. Isn’t that so? Who would buy land in the empty plain?”

Chief Niksic was saying the truth but listening to him, Youngho felt like he was going back to the medieval time. He was worried that the descendants might really establish a kingdom in Kazakhstan.

Niksic informed that there might be other people who consider themselves as the descendants of the kingdom in the current Kosovo, Croatia, and Serbia. He added that there would be suffering descendants because those places were lately involved in disputes.

There might be people who had not been sold as slaves but had been hiding their identity waiting for the kingdom’s restoration.

According to Niksic, there was a high possibility that all of the descendants were from the same clan society. It was because the babies of the descendants were all born with a blue birthmark on their buttocks.

At his word, Youngho was shocked and he could feel goosebumps on his skin.

The Mongolian spot was a genetic trait shown in the descents of Mongolians.

“Chief Niksic, we call those ‘Mongolian spot’ in Korea. I can’t believe the descendants of the Serbian Kingdom and Korean people share the same genetic trait.”

Surprised by what he just found out, Youngho almost screamed.