Chapter 85

Chapter 85: Cowpox and Tobacco.

It had been quite a while since the splendid sailors and crewmen spent their time on an island in the Caribbean Sea.

‘I want to go back to the mainland.’

They longed to see the scenery of the bustling metropolis where countless imperial citizens moved about.

But the splendid sailors and crewmen could not do that.

They could not leave this island until Kim Ki-woo’s permission came.

Of course, they knew this fact when they applied for the expedition, so the splendid sailors did not resent it much.

But still, missing something was inevitable.

The daily routine of the splendid sailors and crewmen was very simple.

They just managed various livestock that they brought from Europe.

But today, something special happened.

“Is this what His Majesty was talking about?”

“It seems so.”

The splendid sailor nodded his head.

To his eyes, it almost perfectly matched the appearance that His Majesty had personally explained to him.

‘Why on earth does he need this?’

He could not understand why he needed the pustules near the cow’s udder.

But the splendid sailor shook his head.

It was impossible for him to fathom His Majesty’s profound intentions.

He just had to faithfully carry out the mission that His Majesty had ordered him.

The splendid sailor said.

“Be careful not to hurt it and send it away.”

“Yes, sir.”

Then, they carefully collected the pustules from the cow’s udder, sealed them, and handed them over to the imperial soldiers.

“You have done a great job. His Majesty will surely be very pleased.”

“I hope so.”

Thus, the cowpox, or vaccinia, began its voyage toward the imperial mainland.

***

After hearing the news that the sealed cowpox had arrived at the research complex, Kim Ki-woo left everything behind and headed to the laboratory.

As soon as he entered the laboratory, he asked right away.

“Where is it?”

“We knew you would come looking for it, so we prepared it in advance. Please come this way.”

“Really?”

Kim Ki-woo smiled brightly and approached a transparent glass bottle placed on one side of the table.

“Oh!”

There was something that looked like cowpox sealed inside it.

Seeing that, a thick smile naturally bloomed on Kim Ki-woo’s face.

‘Hehe…’

He was so happy that he wanted to kiss that glass bottle deeply.

That was the countermeasure against smallpox that he had been longing for all this time.

Other infectious diseases were also deadly enough, but smallpox was the most dangerous among them.

The mortality rate was very high, and above all, it was highly contagious.

Wasn’t smallpox also the one that inflicted the most damage on the Native Americans in the original history?

But with the cowpox in front of him, he could ease his worries considerably.

Then, an investigation on cowpox was conducted.

They checked the cowpox tissue through a microscope and described any peculiarities.

However, they could not confirm the cause of cowpox.

‘Damn. If I had an electron microscope, I would have observed even viruses.’

It was too ambitious to observe viruses with the current optical microscope.

Knowing this, Kim Ki-woo quickly erased his regret from his mind.

Of course, scientists also vaguely knew about the existence of viruses.

They did not observe any causative bacteria in diseases that were transmitted by viruses.

Thanks to the microscope, scientists now realized that there was a clear cause for every phenomenon.

That is, he realized that there were pathogens that were too small to be observed by the equipment.

The scientists understood that this nodule was also one of them.

After inferring the identity of the nodule to some extent, the experiment moved on to the next stage.

“Be very careful with the bison. They are very aggressive and can cause serious injuries during the experiment. I don’t want to see any casualties.”

“Yes, we will keep that in mind!”

Kim Ki-woo warned the researchers once again.

Soon, the researchers slowly approached the captured bison.

‘They look really fierce.’

Kim Ki-woo shook his head slightly as he looked at the bulky bison.

There had been continuous attempts to domesticate the bison.

But the extremely wild mainland bison had thwarted those attempts time and time again.

As a result, they had given up on domestication to a certain degree by now.

Still, the bison were a good source of protein for the imperial citizens.

And if this experiment was successfully concluded, they could also be used as a vaccine reservoir.

“Can we start now?”

“Proceed.”

“Yes!”

As soon as Kim Ki-woo gave his permission, the experiment began.

Thump! Thump!

The bison kept struggling and snorting, but they were firmly tied up and could not resist much.

The researcher cautiously approached the bison and infected them with the nodule using a needle.

The bison seemed to feel the sting of the needle and thrashed even harder.

“Back off!”

At the senior researcher’s words, the researcher who was in charge of the infection quickly retreated.

In this way, seven bison were infected with the nodule.

Of course, the experiment subjects were not only bison.

They also had to check what harm this nodule caused to humans, so they conducted human experiments on death row inmates as well.

Of course, Kim Ki-woo already knew that the mortality rate of this nodule was very low, but he had to conduct experiments to obtain data.

‘Now I just have to watch the progress.’

After infecting both bison and death row inmates with the nodule, time passed.

Kim Ki-woo checked the changes in both groups from time to time and drew a conclusion.

‘As expected, the nodule is also infecting the bison. And as expected, the mortality rate of the death row inmates is not very high either.’

It was only natural that the nodule would infect the bison, who were cattle even if they were not domesticated.

The variolation performed on death row inmates was also as expected.

‘Now I just have to spread this nodule among the bison.’

If there were many domesticated cattle, he wouldn’t have to use this cumbersome method.

But currently, there were very few cattle being raised on the island.

It would take too long for these cattle to breed and increase their numbers before performing variolation on them.

He didn’t have time to wait for that period. He didn’t know when smallpox from Europe would break out.

That meant he had no choice but to perform variolation on the countless wild bison on the mainland.

After that, he released the captured bison into the wild herd and continued to artificially infect various bison.

The nodule gradually spread among the bison, and hunters were able to collect nodules while hunting them.

“The nodule is an important resource, so be sure to collect and store it.”

Kim Ki-woo announced to numerous bison hunters.

Of course, it wasn’t free.

He gave them a certain reward for collecting and handing over nodules to the imperial government.

“Ugh… Why do we have to collect this dirty pus?”

The hunters frowned at the nodules that suddenly became popular.

They couldn’t understand it at all according to their common sense.

But it was Kim Kiwoo’s order, and he paid them a decent amount of money, so they didn’t complain much.

That’s how they started to collect the milk from the cows.

***

As the empire’s economy grew rapidly, many merchants looked for profitable products with greedy eyes.

Yellow Footprints was no exception.

He had risen to the rank of a high-ranking officer in the Lightning Merchant Group, one of the top two merchant groups in the empire, but he was not satisfied with that.

From the moment he joined the Lightning Merchant Group, he had never intended to stay there for long.

“Do you really have to do this?”

“I thank you for taking care of me until now. But I want to challenge my limits. Please understand.”

The leader of the Lightning Merchant Group, Quiet Sea, tried to dissuade him several times, but Yellow Footprints did not budge.

He was very reluctant, but Quiet Sea also decided not to hold him back any longer.

He recognized the achievements that Yellow Footprints had made so far.

“…Fine. But if you compete with our group, I won’t go easy on you. Remember that.”

“I don’t intend to do that either.”

“Hmm. Surprising, isn’t it? I thought you would start with a business that you’re familiar with. Do you have something else in mind?”

“I’m still just thinking about it.”

“Haha! Your thoughts, huh? That’s scary.”

Almost everything that came out of Yellow Footprints’ head had been successful, except for the financial business that failed because of Kim Kiwoo.

Maybe that’s why?

Quiet Sea had a strong feeling that this talented man would succeed again this time.

“Let’s have a drink together after you succeed.”

“Yes. Thank you for everything, leader.”

That’s how their meeting ended with regret.

After that, Yellow Footprints took his foundation and capital from the group and established his own merchant group.

The first thing he did after founding the Flame Merchant Group was none other than the tobacco business.

‘This can’t fail.’

Yellow Footprints’ eyes were full of confidence.

There were still people who smoked tobacco in the empire.

But not many.

Tobacco had been cultivated for a very long time, but it was mostly used for ritual purposes, and it gradually disappeared as the spirit faith became dominant.

Also, tobacco smoke was very harsh and bitter, and it was widely known that it was not good for people’s health.

Thanks to that, the low smoking rate was maintained.

But Yellow Footprints focused on the fact that smokers couldn’t quit smoking.

‘Tobacco is very addictive.’

That meant that if more smokers appeared, the tobacco business would make a lot of money.

But it was hard to popularize tobacco with its current state of being harsh and difficult to smoke.

‘I need to improve tobacco to make it easier to smoke.’

Yellow Footprints set his goal and visited many places where tobacco was grown.

And he constantly tried to figure out how to make tobacco better.

“Are you sure this is okay?”

“I only trusted you and left the Lightning Merchant Group, but when are we going to start the business?”

Of course, it took a long time to finish the improvement work on tobacco.

The merchants of the Flame Merchant Group who believed firmly that Yellow Footprints would succeed were also getting impatient as time passed.

But they were already on board.

Most of them did their best to improve tobacco with Yellow Footprints.

Their hard work was not in vain.

“Yes, this is it!”

Yellow Footprints smoked the improved tobacco himself and confirmed it.

The smooth throat feeling, the strong addiction, and even the beautiful packaging of the tobacco.

This cigarette was sure to lead many non-smokers who had an aversion to strong cigarettes to the path of smoking.

Afterwards, Yellow Footprints started producing cigarette products in earnest after contracting with tobacco farms.

And they made their first appearance in the market.

“What is this bland cigarette? Who would smoke this kind of thing!”

“Ugh! It only ruined my taste!”

But the first reaction from the smokers was very bad, almost close to anger, beyond indifference.

They threw the cigarettes from Flame Top, which didn’t have much taste, on the street.

“Sigh…”

“Is this really not going wrong?”

The merchants of Flame Top were greatly flustered by such a fierce reaction.

But Yellow Footprints was not shaken at all.

“I expected this kind of reaction anyway. Our goal is not them, is it?”

“That’s true, but…”

“We just have to do what we have to do quietly. Don’t worry.”

“…Okay.”

The merchants’ agitation subsided as Yellow Footprints spoke with confidence.

After that, Flame Top moved quickly.

They widely advertised the soft and mild cigarettes in various newspapers, and even gave away cigarettes for free to non-smokers for a whole month.

“Are you really giving it away for free?”

“Haha. Don’t worry and take it. This month, the cigarettes from our top are free, so come whenever you need them.”

Thanks to giving away cigarettes for free, Flame Top’s finances quickly deteriorated.

The huge fortune that Yellow Footprints had accumulated so far also drained out.

But Yellow Footprints never hesitated in making decisions.

“Hmm… It doesn’t cost money, so why don’t I try it once?”

Indeed, free was great.

Many non-smokers were tempted by the word free and tried it once.

“Cough, cough!”

“Oh! It’s not very strong, is it?”

At first, they naturally coughed, but as they smoked a few puffs, the softness of the cigarettes was clearly different from the existing ones.

The scary thing about cigarettes was that many of them became addicted to the taste of cigarettes after being exposed to them.

In the end, many non-smokers fell into the path of smoking after being exposed to Flame Top’s cigarettes.