Seoul, South Korea - After the ground-breaking study regarding the use of hag fish mucus as a means of combating erectile dysfunction was released last week, a maelstrom of changes have occurred.
Economies have shifted and fishermen have completely altered their planned catch to accommodate the massive demand for fresh hag fish mucus. Plants made to process the animals' mucus and fisheries used to farm them cropped up seemingly overnight.
Countries are fighting to overturn laws governing whaling in order to use whales for bait as the bottom feeding hag fishes staple diet is rotting whale carcasses lying on the ocean floor. These changes and the social reactions to them are still in infancy. Predictions cannot be accurately cast regarding the effect of the eyeless, lock jawed fish and its mucus on the world at large aside from its effect on the nether regions thereof.
With tensions already high in the Korean Peninsula and claims by both South and North Korea made to portions of the sea surrounding their nations, the hag fish has increased the pressure in the area to a boiling point. China, Taiwan, and Japan have also made similar oceanic claims to fishing rights in traditionally disputed waters, but the two Koreas have reached the point of war over it.
Statements from both nations have made this clear. The South Korean government released this statement: "The United Nations and thus the world recognize our rights to the waters in dispute. The violence with which North Korea has contested our economic freedom to capitalize on this highly profitable fish infringes both on our agreed upon borders and our rights as a nation. Seriously, you'd think a communist nation would at least comprehend the idea of sharing in a financial enterprise. Failure for the North to heed our fishing rights will have serious consequences during talks of reunification."
The DPRK promptly responded with a characteristically flowery diatribe.
"The puppet state's claims on the hag fish in our waters is crass and outrageous. It is the puppet state and the United State's desire to take away a means to increase our mighty nations virility and population. They are attempting to destroy our next mighty generation of revolutionary minded geniuses by blocking our access to hag fish mucus in our own waters. It is well known that the DPRK refutes the proposed borders of our waters as given by the puppet state and the foolish and ineffectual hovel that is the UN. Failure to recognize our proper borders and fishing rights will force us to respond violently in self defense of our potential glorious unborn."
The North then promptly shelled a South Korean island at which point the South shelled the North in turn.
The US has responded by condemning the violence and pleaded again for renewed six way talks between both Koreas, the US, China, Russia, and Japan.
President Obama is quoted as stating at a press conference, "Look, we all desire access to hag fish mucus. Some countries do not require it as much as others and I am not in anyway stating that I would like to or need to use hag fish mucus myself, but all nations should at least be able to profit from and use this miraculous fish within their own borders. The North's actions today only confirm what everyone had long suspected about their virility. The American people support South Korea's claims to its fishing rights and desire nothing more than for this matter to be sorted out as peacefully as possible."
In response the DPRK has made repeated threats of war and of launching a newly developed missile at an unspecified location in South Korea.
"I honestly don't think North Korea could get it up," stated a US intelligence source who wished not to be identified. "The missile I mean."
With tensions so high, there is no way of predicting what may happen in the coming days, but experts in the region's culture and history say it seems bleak.
"North Korea is notorious for its inferiority complex. With the properties of the hag fish and the nations' fight for access to it on the line, there is a major probability that the country will react with overwhelming force if it does not get its way," states Dr. Su Kweiong of the prestigious Asian Studies Society.
"The frustrations and personal shame in the region could cause this to explode into something to take the world's eyes of the nation's apparent failings. Talks may improve the situation, but North Korea will continue acting out until the nation's self esteem is improved. Hag fish mucus may assist in the matter. Provision of hag fish mucus from another nation as a gesture of goodwill may help to smooth things over. We should seek to allow an abundance of the mucus to harden the nation instead of inadvertently hardening its resolve for combativeness."
China has been called on to make a donation of hag fish mucus to North Korea from its own abundant reserves, but has yet to officially respond. As stated by an underground news source in China's Hebei province, "personal reasons" have impeded much governmental progress in the nation since the discovery of the mucus' properties and China's massive acquisition thereof in the days that followed.
