This is the idea Kusanagi presents in the final chapter of the gaiden.
Soo-wonās line, āWe can trace a line and connect Kouka, Xing and Sei just like this,ā sounds as though he were solving a childrenās connect-the-dots exercise.
Then they say that Kouka does not have to bear the burden. If the line had at least been āthe burden doesnāt have to be taken only by our country,ā it could be understood as the costs being shared among the countries involved. But it does not say only.
The moment a route enters another country, Kouka no longer has authority there. It cannot hire workers, lay out roads, occupy land, or decide priorities in foreign territory without formal agreements. Even empires usually have to pretend to negotiate before planting a road.
And there is another question: why would the neighbouring countries accept the exact routes designed by Kouka? Xing might want to connect different markets, Sei might prioritise its ports, and Kai might have neither the money nor the interest to restore a corridor that mainly benefits Koukan merchants.
The proposed solution is to mobilise the merchants and wealthy people interested in the routes, without clarifying whether they are from Kouka, foreign, or a mixture of both. And somehow, national and foreign money will simply flow.
The rich pay for it, and the poor build it. Perfect.
The text itself says that those who invest will receive priority use. If the investors are foreign, Kouka would be allowing foreign merchant capital to finance strategic infrastructure within its territory and receive preferential access to it.
The most charitable interpretation would be that merchants from all interested countries jointly finance the network, while each state regulates the sections within its own territory. But that would require treaties, cost-sharing arrangements, limits on privileges, and public oversight. The scene mentions none of that. It simply moves from āKouka does not have to bear the burdenā to āthe merchants and the wealthy will pay,ā and then to āthey will have priority.ā
If the investors are domestic, the system encourages internal oligopolies. If they are foreign, it adds external dependence over strategic infrastructure.
Either way, the proposal is a recipe for privatising the routes and granting preferential access to those who finance them. It creates an obvious incentive for the concentration of economic power: those with priority access can earn greater profits, invest in further routes, and strengthen their position even more.
This is neither a new nor an innocent mechanism. The history of chartered companies shows how far the combination of private capital, commercial monopoly, and state-granted power can go.
Whoever controls access to a route can influence transport costs, which goods circulate, which markets prosper, and which regions are left out. This is not some remote possibility. It is the logical incentive created by the model, unless the state imposes strict limits that the scene never mentions.
And the real problem is that this idea is placed in the mouth of the character who, for almost twenty years of manga, has been portrayed as someone capable of calculating consequences several generations ahead.
With Hak, one can accept that political economy is not exactly his battlefield. But Soo-won is supposed to be a strategist who understands incentives, resources, and power. It is difficult to believe that he would fail to see that granting priority to investors amounts to creating a class with institutionalised commercial privileges.
Soo-won should see the trap. That, to me, is the real narrative failure. Not simply that the idea is simplistic, but that it is given to the one character who should be able to recognise exactly what is wrong with it.
Maybe I simply think too much.
Kouka would be allowing foreign merchant capital to finance strategic infrastructure within its territory and receive preferential access to it the proposal is a recipe for privatising the routes and granting preferential access to those who finance them It is difficult to believe that he would fail to see that granting priority to investors amounts to creating a class with institutionalised commercial privileges. The rich pay for it, and the poor build it. Perfect.
Yep there's that. Was not mentioned at all. Su-Won's plan is economically naive.
I would love these complications to surge up in the process. Sadly, I believe just as silly as the connect the dot idea is, it will also be solved by silly solutions like the power of friendship between kouren and yona and oh so to pay the debt to the great benefactor(couldn't have done it without her). Oh and of course can't forget the aura farming....that's the blessed child's must have ingredient.
