Empire of the Ring

Arirang Farm was applying experimental city planning. The harmony between residential and commercial areas had no problem benchmarking the world’s famous cities but preventing the northern and continental winds of the Ural Mountains had been the main topic.

Building a city in an empty plain without mountains needed more than stonewalls. To prevent the winter winds which were similar to natural disaster, many plans were brought up.

Eventually, people came to the conclusion that the city had to be in the form of a fortress.

As Youngho shook his head looking at the city planning, Park Youngsun opened his mouth.

“Mr. Lee, look at this topographic map carefully.”

He pointed to the little hill at the farm which was used as a temporary residential place.

“Dr. Park, are you talking about building the castle again? I thought I told you that it’s too early for that. Can it wait?”

“The hill is in the north and it’s not too far away from the branch river of the Ural River. That place is in the path, that not only the wind from the Ural Mountains but also the wind from the river are blocked naturally. This is the first line that stops the northern wind. That’s why I’m saying we should get the construction started as soon as possible.”

Park Youngsun’s idea was to spread the castle on the hill, so it could act as a wall to block the northern wind and as a watchtower for the river and town in the south. Since the castle would be watching over the whole farm, it would act as a landmark of the farm.

Where the castle would be was at a distance northeast from the immigrants’ town. Since it would be on high ground, it was great for the watchtower and it would also have some prestige to it.

The outline of the second village through the fifth village slowly began to emerge. Each village would have the capacity of 500 households and would be built yearly, set up in a semi-circular fashion. The curve part of the semi-circular setup would face the north and there would also be a square at the center of the semi-circle. In the South of the residential areas, was the airfield and the runways. Around the central square, there would be facilities such as a mall, cafés, restaurants, bank, public office, library, theater, and visitor lodging.

The towns would be surrounded by a stone wall to block winds, and since big buildings like storage warehouse and a school were at the outskirt of the residential areas, they also acted as wind blockers. There is also a ranch area and underneath is where the underground gym was planned to be built.

Some of the stone walls built last year had to be removed since it was between the first town and the second town. Since most of the wolves were killed during the winter, the stonewalls surrounding the town was only used as a wind blocker.

***

The construction of the backbone network of the towns, road and water and sewage, was already finished, and the second and third towns’ residential construction was in its process. It was being hurried since the people who would be moving in this year were prospected to be more than a thousand families, also, the empty houses in the first town could not accommodate all of the newcomers.

People who worked in the construction for building houses were the Kazakh people from the nearby city, Kulsary, Koryoins, and the first immigrants. Since building houses did not need special skills and Most of the houses in Eastern Europe and Central Asia were built by the owners themselves, it was not a difficult job for the people if they had enough materials.

After Kim Chun assigned a Koryoin construction expert in charge, the houses were being built with surprising efficiency. He was a man of capability that he had trained common people as expert construction technicians. With the use of heavy equipment, the number of houses being completed was exponential.

The Koryoin director suggested about twenty different house designs with a reason that uniform house designs hurt the fine view. He said that if differently designed houses were laid in a block, it would help improve diversity and the fine sight of the town.

Youngho had not thought about the aesthetic part of the towns since he only thought that the speed of the construction was important. It seemed that the director had been frustrated by the uniform design of the residential town.

“Boss, it takes about the same time until the towns are completed regardless of the house designs. Have you seen the houses built during the era of the Soviet Union? They’re suffocating. I want to change that since I’m in charge of the construction.”

“I guess I was in such a hurry. You’re the one in charge, you can do whatever you want.”

Although he had majored in construction engineering, he had a mind of a humanist.

This was his theory: People who live in a standardized form of housing and people who live in different types of housing also differ in the diversity of thinking because the environment around people influences people’s characteristics and personalities.

Because the farm was on a plain without any mountains or streams, he wanted to build diverse buildings. Youngho was impressed to hear his perspective.

On that day, the Koryoin director was promoted as the director of the construction department of Arirang Farm. Youngho and his group decided to begin the castle construction under his direction as well.

The Koryoin director’s name was Nikolaevich Min. As he was hired permanently, he immediately brought his family to live on the farm.

***

Kim Ilkwon was picked as the person in charge of the first group to travel to the Port of Burgas to receive the second group of immigrants.

As watching him leave with ten Serbian young lads on Arirang from the Baku’s port, Youngho poked Jongil’s side.

“We’ve got about four days. Let’s go to Amsterdam first and then the Mediterranean to reach the Black Sea.”

“You’ve no idea how busy I’m as the director of the intelligence group of Kazakhstan. Bring Niksic’s grandson instead. I’ll fly there later.”

Jongil did not seem to want to go on a long journey.

“Oh, yeah? Okay. You can’t take it back then.”

“I won’t try to.”

“Mr. Choi had found an amazing bar in Amsterdam. Did he say that the bar does strip shows?”

Jongil’s face suddenly changed at the sound of ‘strip shows.’

“W–wait. I think I’ll have extra time if I make a call to Smith and ask him about a few things.”

At the third wharf of the Amsterdam, two of the ships that Youngho had newly bought were getting ready to set off. The ten-year-old used freighters were newly painted on their rusty spots and labeled as Zeynep 2 and Zeynep 3. Since a decade-aged ship was considered pretty new, crewmen were proud to be on those ships.

New ships would have a big ceremony before their first sail but as for used ships, the new ship owners would instead give a bonus payment envelope to crewmen on their first sail day. It was because the ship was already proven to be safe, so taking care of crewmen was more important than celebrating the ship’s first sail.

Although Youngho wanted to have a wild drinking night with the crewmen, they were busy loading every cargo and checking the ships. He had to let them go after giving them envelopes.

“Youngho, is this all? Why are we here?”

Jongil followed Youngho since he wanted to drink wildly with the crewmen but a sudden unexpected situation occurred.

“What do we do. The crewmen are busy with carrying the goods and they don’t even have time to drink.”

“You deceived me!”

“Man, what for? Let’s just take Mr. Choi and drink in a small group.”

“We need to take the crewmen so we can go to a wild place. Man! I was fooled to come here.”

Since he could not go to the wild bar he had been wanting to go, he was upset. He would have to sail for three more days after today’s little free time.

“Mr. Choi. Do you know a good place for drinking?”

Jongil could not hold it in any longer and he shouted to Choi Sunkil who had just finished talking to a wharf staff and was walking toward the group.

Choi Sunkil was fast-witted enough to see what Jongil was asking for.

“Mr. Park seems to be in the mood for a drink. Should I take you to a great place?”

Jongil’s face brightened. It seemed that they would not be able to return to the hotel before midnight.

***

It was bad timing to travel the Atlantic in April. The current was heavy and the ship constantly wavered by high waves.

Feeling ill, even many experienced crewmen did not show up at the cafeteria, but Youngho and Jongil were stuffing food into their throats.

“There’s something special in the ring. We’ve never seen these high waves recently but we’re all safe without a scratch.”

“Insoo is so going to beg of Zeynep if he finds out about this.”

Zeynep had taken back her ring because pimples came upon her face.

“Is Fatima alright?”

“What, are you afraid if she’s going to take away the ring from you too?”

“If the owner asks it back, I have no choice but to give it back.”

“Don’t worry. Fatima is holding up fine. It’s Leon who’s affected by the seasickness.”

Because of the rings, Youngho and Jongil were called as monsters by the crewmen since they had not shown a single sign of seasickness. Gilbert and Choi Sunkil also were surprised by the huge waves, saying that they had not been seeing such waves in the recent time.

As the ship entered the Mediterranean, there were no more heavy waves that could shake the freighter that weighed 50,000 tons.

Zeynep 1 was on its way to the Black Sea because Youngho received the message that the new immigrants had a lot of belongings with them. The ship would deliver their belongings to the Sea of Azov in Russia.

It was reported to him in advance that there would be about 350 families or 1,900 people of immigrants, but the number might have increased in the meantime.

The moving ritual would not be over after this time since there were two more migrations was scheduled after this was over. Four car-ferry ships from Turkey were chartered already, which was enough to transport a little more than 2,000 people, so there would not be a problem this time. The only concerns were any hygienic problems and the occurrence of patients due to large-scale personnel transfers. So, Youngho had already paid a high expense and arranged doctors and nurses from Atyrau to come to Bulgaria before the ship would set off.

If people who left their hometown to live with the Archduchess died during the migration, it would be a controversial issue for the future. Since such large-scale migration of people needed to be processed with care, Youngho did not leave the job to others but did it himself. Another reason was to gain people’s trust. Seeing the person in the leadership position making efforts to better communicate with the people and to care for them would definitely be seen as reliable.

Since the Serbian immigrants were the basis of the Arirang Farm, it was natural for Youngho to go receive them by himself.