1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 3631

If the battle to regain control of the Kanmon Strait boosted the morale of the Kyushu domains and gave them hope of repelling the shogunate army, then the news brought back by Shi Diwen was like a bucket of cold water poured on their heads.

Forty warships, plus various weapons and equipment sufficient to arm thousands of people, was not only an astonishingly large military procurement order, but also a declaration of the shogunate's determination to continue the war.

After half a year of fighting, the Jiuzhou coalition had suffered considerable losses, especially the warships purchased from Hai Han, of which there are now less than 40 ships.

Although Hai Han Shipyard still has orders for warships under construction, they are far less than the number of the shogunate's new orders. Once the shogunate receives this batch of warships, it will likely crush the Kyushu coalition fleet.

Although the delivery cycle of this order may be long, it has already posed a real threat to the Kyushu vassal states. After hearing the news, several daimyo were anxious and asked Shi Diwen for advice, hoping that he could give them some advice.

It is obviously unrealistic to persuade Hai Han to voluntarily give up this order. Everyone knows that Hai Han is an international arms dealer, and the sale of weapons and equipment is one of its most important business projects. If this order is cancelled, can the Kyushu vassal states make up for it by doubling the amount?
For now, we can only hope that Hai Han will not give up on Kyushu and provide a certain degree of assistance to the vassal states again.

Shi Diwen's advice to them was very clear, which was to follow the shogunate to continue to place additional arms orders to ensure that the military strength of both sides would not be too far apart.

Shi Diwen's words came out lightly, but to the several daimyos it was undoubtedly a heavy burden.

In order to win this war, the various feudal lords in Kyushu had already drained their own pockets in preparation for war, and the large-scale recruitment of young and strong people to participate in the war had a huge impact on social production. The direct consequence was that both grain production and taxation in the jurisdiction decreased, and the fiscal revenue of each feudal lord was much lower than before.

When purchasing arms from Hai Han in the first half of the year, the Kyushu vassal states were no longer able to pay, and were only able to place the orders with the special loans provided by Hai Han.

At that time, the daimyo felt that they had gotten a little advantage by using the fertile fields, ports and other real estate owned by the various domains as collateral. After all, as long as they won the war with the shogunate, all the collateral would not be at risk.

But after half a year of fierce fighting, the daimyo gradually realized that the original hope of defeating the shogunate and then dividing the world was unrealistic. Once it entered the stage of attrition war, Kyushu would find it difficult to outlast the more powerful shogunate.

And those assets that have been pledged to Hai Han in exchange for weapons and equipment seem to be shrouded in a layer of risk.

If they want to keep up with the shogunate’s military expansion now, it means that the Kyushu domains will have to continue to overdraw their finances and borrow money from Hai Han to complete the next military procurement order.

Even if Hai Han was willing to lend the money, it would still have to provide new collateral according to the rules. How many times could the valuable real estate in Kyushu be mortgaged?

Shi Diwen seemed not to notice the bitter faces of the big names, and continued: "Don't wait and see, otherwise if other buyers place orders during this period, you don't know when your orders will be delivered!"

"If you need to borrow money from our country to purchase equipment, you will still follow the previous rules. Haihan Bank will provide special loans, and the interest rate will remain unchanged."

Shi Diwen did not mention the collateral, but the daimyo knew that the special loans from Hai Han Bank were not free, and if the formalities were not in place, there was no hope of getting a penny. Moreover, these loans could only be used for specific purposes and only for the purchase of weapons and equipment, which meant that the money only nominally passed through the hands of the Kyushu vassal states and then returned to Hai Han to be exchanged for the weapons needed by the Kyushu coalition forces.

Each daimyo felt like a gambler sitting at the gambling table. Seeing that his opponent had placed a heavy bet again, if he did not follow suit, he would be kicked out of the game, and the money he had invested previously would be lost. In desperation, he could only borrow money from the casino to continue betting.

They have no way of knowing when the game will end, and can only hope that their opponents will give up after their stakes are exhausted. However, they don’t know that their opponents are not much better off than them, and are also looking for the casino to borrow money to place bets.

However, Hai Han, which owns the casino, is not satisfied with the current situation of both parties betting against each other, and is still trying to lure more people to come in and place bets.

After Tokugawa Ietsugu returned to the front line, he quickly organized a large-scale counterattack. Relying on his military advantage, he temporarily repelled the Kyushu coalition forces, regained control of the northern end of the Kanmon Strait, and saved the life of the garrison in the Kitakyushu camp.

However, the consequences of Tokugawa Ietsugu's departure from Kyoto soon became apparent. When the various forces in Kyoto learned that he had quietly returned to the front line and that Nijo Castle was just a puppet giving orders, Kyoto fell into a new round of chaos.

The anti-shogunate forces began to come to the fore, calling on more people to take up arms against the shogunate. The ronin warriors got a lot of weapons and armor from nowhere. Although they were just cold weapons, they were enough to cause trouble for the few shogunate troops in Kyoto.

Over the next few days, a number of small-scale bloody incidents occurred throughout Kyoto. The nature of these incidents was no longer the unilateral suppression of rioters by the shogunate army, but had evolved into a real armed conflict.

Although Tokugawa Iematsu transferred some troops from surrounding areas before leaving, these feudal troops were not very enthusiastic about carrying out the orders of the shogunate. After all, they could not get any practical benefits, and once they showed stronger combat effectiveness, they might be transferred by the shogunate to the Kyushu front to fight, which would be even more unprofitable.

As a result, this part of the troops often did not put in any effort, and the main force for suppressing the rebellion was still the small number of shogunate troops. Naturally, the effect was greatly reduced. They were unable to take care of everything and would still leave many opportunities for the opponent to take advantage of.

This time, the royal family showed more enthusiasm and took the initiative to ask the shogunate army to stop its actions so as not to exacerbate the unrest in Kyoto.

At the same time, in the name of maintaining order, the royal family organized nearly a thousand armed personnel and began patrolling and deploying troops in the area around the imperial garden.

At first, Sakai Tadamasa in Nijo Castle did not realize that there was anything wrong. Later, the shogunate army who was searching for the rebels was stopped by the patrol team arranged by the royal family around the Imperial Garden, and they were refused to enter the refugee area outside the Imperial Garden to search.

This led to a conflict between the two sides, and the armed patrol team, which was under the orders of the royal family, behaved extremely tough and acted as if they were ready to fight to the death.

After a long standoff, the shogunate army finally chose to retreat, and the royal family received unanimous praise from the onlookers.

Sakai Tadaki felt bad after hearing the news. It was rare for the royal family to take such a tough attitude, and it was definitely not a good sign. As for the royal family's claim of acting for the people, he didn't believe a word of it. The untouchables seeking shelter outside the imperial garden were not worth the royal family taking such a big risk.