In the twenty-first year of the reign of King Taejo the Wise of the Sanbang Dynasty, Queen Sindeok fell ill and died. Having loved her dearly, King Taejo fell into deep heartsickness. He drank day and night and abandoned his royal duties until he died of overconsumption in his study. The kingdom of Geum fell into disarray. King Taejo had sired no sons, for Queen Sindeok had birthed him only one daughter, and being a man of great attachment, King Taejo had refused to father a son by a concubine. Thus arrived the Day of Deliberation: the royal government officials gathered together in the central courtyard and debated for hours on end as to which man should take the throne.
"Perhaps the King's second cousin, who is now a young man," a military official suggested.
"That young man has no decorum. We should crown the King's elder brother, who knows the properties of Ru scholarship!" countered a scholarly official.
"The King's elder brother is nearly dead! He would last no more than five days on the throne!" another official insisted.
And so the debate dragged on for hours. It was the first hour of dawn when a figure entered the courtyard, dressed in silks and gold. It was the First Princess Yi Soomin. She was crossdressed as a man, in the outfit prescribed for a First Prince. The officials were offended, but they dared not insult her. After all, she had dressed this way since childhood, and King Taejo had always punished them for scolding her.
"Ascend me to the throne," demanded the Princess. "I will take my father's place, and Geum will prosper."
The officials protested with bowed heads.
"Your Highness, though you are intelligent and skilled, we cannot crown a woman!"
"Truly, such a decision would be against the gods!"
"Neither can we crown a witch as our ruler—the people would revolt!"
The last scholar who spoke promptly shut his mouth, realizing his mistake. The Princess' eyes blazed with demon's fire. It was true; she had been a witch from birth, born with the magic of the mind and the dead. Witchcraft was not widely accepted in Geum, and so, like all witches, she had been forced to practice her magic in private. The Princess had lived hidden away from the public eye her entire life. Every time she stepped foot outside the palace walls, whispers of "madness" and "scandal" followed her like ghosts. It was thought that to be a witch was to be mad, for most witches were women, and how improper it was for a woman to practice such dangerous arts! Who would choose to raise the dead rather than to oversee a home? So the Princess had only been able to escape the confines of the palace at night in the guise of a man.
Now in the midst of the royal officials, the Princess raised her hand. All the officials cowered before her, anticipating an evil spell. But the Princess only spoke, pointing at the official who had insulted her:
"If you will not have me because I was born a woman, I will find a place of my own. I will build a kingdom of my own! Give me three hundred men and women who are willing to follow me, and I will travel West. You won't have to worry about me again."
The officials were terrified, but also skeptical. Three hundred men and women? The Princess was already a maddened witch. How could they be sure she would not stage a coup? But they saw that she was set in her ways and that she had little desire for a throne not freely given. The Princess was given three hundred men and women willing to follow her, and was sent away in a caravan to the West. The scholars sighed in relief and returned to their arguments. In the end, they crowned King Taejo's second cousin, King Injo, who led Geum into a century of poverty and invasion.
Meanwhile, the Princess sailed to the West. She sailed south of Gongkua and continued onward until she landed on the eastern shores of a strange land called on Geuman maps "Juggeum Ttang", the Land of the Dead. It was said that, many hundreds of years ago, there had been an unjust war in those lands, and the dead bodies of the fallen had risen as vengeful ghosts, forever roaming the land and seeking to destroy their killers. Much like the legends had said, the Princess found the lands infested with vengeful spirits. Before her men and women could strike down the vengeful ghost with their swords, however, the Princess raised her hand.
"They are merely restless. I will set them free," she told them.
Then she sat among the rotting spirits as they swarmed around her. Her men and women watched from their turtle ships, wondering if she would die. But she did not. One by one, the Princess communed with the restless spirits and comforted them until they dissipated, returning to the spirit realm where they belonged. Some stayed, too enraged by their unjust deaths to exit the mortal realm. These spirits, the Princess promised vengeance to; if she ever found the spirit of the king who ordered their death, she would avenge them by killing him, she promised.
Once the shores were cleared of vengeful ghosts, the Princess invited her men and women onto the land. They all swayed in awe and fear of her power; many had heard of the mad witchcraft of the Princess, but few had seen it. Since they had agreed to follow her as their ruler, however, they all obediently went with her, for the teachings of Ru scholars ran deep in Geum. First is the ruler, then all others come after.
For three months, the Princess and her people scoured the land. While the Princess communed with vengeful spirits, setting hundreds free each day, her people built houses and castles from wood, hunting boars for food and examining the native flora. Within a year, the land had been cleared of most vengeful spirits. The few thousand ghosts who remained roamed the land in a tragic stupor, waiting for the Princess to bring them the head of their captor's spirit and bestow them with peace. The Princess' kingdom grew, and children were born. She named her kingdom Jayu. Under her magic words and clever hand, Jayu flourished, and her people were content.
When three years had passed, the Princess heard word of conflict at the southwestern shores of Jayu. She traveled with her handmaids to those shores, which were called Meolli, for they were far from the heart of the kingdom. There she found many crashed ships shaped like strange dragons. Without her knowledge, people of the islands to the southwest had been traveling North to the shores of Jayu in an attempt to enter the land. But they had failed again and again; those vengeful ghosts who had been waiting for her to bring them peace had all gathered at the shores of Meolli to attack the arriving ships. When she arrived, the vengeful ghosts were fighting men with pink faces and green eyes who streamed from a gold ship, stronger and more fortified than all the rest. The Princess called on the vengeful ghosts to be calm, and when they had stepped aside, she went to speak with the men of the ship.
One of the men stepped forward, and he said that his name was Biyoon. He was an enormous man. He held a great axe that stank of blood. It was far rougher than any weapon the Princess had seen in Geum. He did not speak Geuman; his words were harsh and sharp, like broken glass. Seeing this, the Princess took Biyoon's hand and communed with his spirit, where they might understand each other without language. The Princess saw that his people had been terrorized for many years. Perhaps they had angered the heavens, for she saw that they had been hailed on without relief and gorged on by terrifying monsters of the sea for a hundred years. She saw that Biyoon and his men had come to Jayu to seek out a new land for their people to live freely.
The Princess saw all this, and was conflicted. It was clear that Biyoon's people could not go on living in such lands of death and torment. On the other hand, it was clear, too, that the vengeful ghosts she had come to befriend sensed danger. They moaned and cried out all around her, begging her to send them away. The Princess was torn. She touched Biyoon's hand and told him in spirit that, being the Queen of this land, she needed to think on this situation. She invited him and his men to come and stay five days and five nights at her palace. The Princess was clever; at the palace, these strange men could be watched over by her seasoned guards. With her magical protection, none of the pink-faced men could destroy her warriors. At the same time, she, too, could watch the men closely herself and judge their intentions. Biyoon agreed, and the Princess called on the vengeful ghosts to step aside and be calm. The strange men were afraid, but the Princess told them to not fear; she had befriended the ghosts, and as long as she was present, they would harm no one.
Five days and five nights the Princess hosted this strange crew of men at the palace of Jayu. Word spread outside the palace walls. Fishermen told tales of hulking men with pink skin burned from the sun, green eyes like shining frogskin, wearing furs and metal pieces like warriors from the Far North of Geum. Within the castle, the Princess confined the green-eyed men to the royal courtyards so as to keep an eye on them. Every night, she held an incredible feast for them seasoned with sedatives to keep them subtly amicable, and at each feast, she spoke with Biyoon. As his men laughed and ate all around, the Princess learned much about Biyoon's culture. He came from the Islands of Nit to the South, where the people believed their endless hail and ocean of sea monsters was a curse from the gods. Biyoon's people had three gods: two men and one woman. The Princess told Biyoon that her people did not all believe in gods. Some believed in an Emperor in Heaven; some did not. Some practiced magic; others did not. Biyoon did not understand. When the Princess asked what plans Biyoon and his men might have now that they had found the land they sought occupied, Biyoon proposed they share the land. As Jayu was to the northeast, perhaps the people of the Islands could live to the southwest. The Princess thought about this proposition. There were not so many people on the Islands of Nit. What is more, to leave these green-eyed men under the wrath of their gods would be to sentence them to death. But the Princess could not ignore the creeping feeling of distrust gnawing at her stomach. She told Biyoon she would think on it and come to him with an answer on the fifth night. Biyoon was satisfied.
Despite Biyoon's agreeable appearance, he was far more cunning than he seemed. Beneath his tiger's skin, there lay a snake. During the day, his green eyes scanned the flora and fauna with hunger, desiring to possess them for himself. At night when the Princess entered the banquet hall in her crossdress wear, his eyes followed her like crows, gleaming with impatience and jealousy.
On the fourth and fifth nights, the Princess took Biyoon out to the royal garden pavilion to speak privately. She sent her guards away and poured him wine, in which she had poured a truth potion. Biyoon, being a cunning beast, distracted the Princess with a joke and slipped a sedative into her wine. Together, they drank; Biyoon drank the truth potion, and the Princess drank the sedative. Not realizing what had been done to her, the Princess called on Biyoon:
"What is it you are planning to do with this land?" She said, looking at him carefully.
"We will take the land for ourselves entirely," Biyoon said. His face turned red. His lips contorted, and he spoke with eyes red with rage, realizing what she had fed him. Without a sound, he grabbed the Princess and pushed her to the ground, filled with madness. He crushed her throat until she could not speak. Having expected this, the Princess called on her vengeful spirits to aid her. But she was slow and weary; her body was weighed down with dizziness from her wine. Seeing her calling on spirits for aid, Biyoon was afraid; he reached into her mouth and tore out her tongue. When the Princess screamed and looked to the heavens for help, Biyoon, fearing her magic further, gouged out her eyes with his fingers. Then, because he was a coward, he beat her ears until they bled. Lastly, seeing her hands twitching upon the ground, he reached down and crushed her finger bones to a pulp. At last, this green-eyed beast was satisfied. The Princess lay there on the ground, unable to sense the world apart from pain. Across Jayu, the thousands of vengeful spirits stumbled about in a state of confusion; they had been commanded, but the one who had commanded them was nearly no more. They became helpless and aimless, wailing upon the shores. To this day, they wander the forests of Omminivithr, calling out for a savior.
Many things then happened. Being a cunning snake, Biyoon had long ago called on more of his people to come to the shores of Jayu in preparation for battle. He had, too, poured sedative into the wine stores of the palace and instructed his men not to drink. In this way, the Princess was defeated, and her warriors were left stumbling and directionless. Upon destroying the Princess, Biyoon called out for his soldiers to wreak havoc on the palace. People of the Islands of Nit who had lain in wait streamed in from north, east, south, and west, slaughtering, raping, and burning all in sight. Soon enough, the great palace of Jayu was burned to the ground. It took only three days for the people of Nit to overtake Jayu entirely with their axes and thick swords. In those three days, the Princess lay locked away, blind, mute, deaf, and bandaged, unable to throw herself away into the sea as she desired.
When Biyoon at last completed his conquering rampage, he returned to see the Princess destitute, unable to hear or see him. He relished in her helplessness. For months, he cruelly kept her as a prisoner of war, refusing to let any Geuman doctor see her for fear that they might put her out of her misery. The Princess lay in despair for many days and many nights, wishing that she were dead, but unable to find a method of escape. However, despite her injuries, she was still as clever as ever. Over many moons, she smelled and collected parts of her meals, until she was able to brew a lethal potion. She waited until Biyoon came to visit her one night, then she drank it in front of him. Her skin turned blue, and she died. Biyoon was furious. He called all the Geuman apothecaries and Nitean healers to cure her, but it was no use. The Princess was dead. As healers stood all around her broken body, her mouth opened, and a black magpie flew out and into the night, wailing sorrowfully. The magpie rose into the sky and became the Bright Eastern Star. It is said that a stone magpie, too, emerged from the Princess' lips in a spurt of blood. Biyoon kept this stone magpie, having lost his greatest treasure of war, and vowed to destroy any ancestors of this Princess who dared practice magic. To this day, Biyoon's people, those green-eyed beasts, rule the land that was once the prosperous kingdom of Jayu. They kill witches and keep Geuman people as servants, treating us as less than dogs.
Do not trust those with green eyes, for they will tear out your tongue, gouge your eyes, box your ears and crush your hands until you are a shell. Grow your knowledge behind closed doors and sturdy walls, and perhaps one day, all children of Soomin who live in these lands might become strong enough to kill the green-eyed devil and avenge the name of Soomin the Clever, Princess of Geum and Queen of Jayu.