Prime Minister Bizen

Chapter 762 The Battle of Qingjin and the Northern Expedition to Ezo

Keicho 4 March 3, Qingjin (Aomori), Sannai Maruyama Castle.

This place belongs to the Qingjin area, but it was placed under the ownership of the Nanbu family when Oushi was established before, and it has always been the key area of ​​competition between the Qingjin family and the Nanfang family.

Now that the soldiers from the south are coming again, the owner of the city has already changed.

Nambu Lizhi rode on a horse and looked at the burning city and the howling bandits in the city. He felt a little bit unbearable. When he turned his head to look at the young man under the banner of Gendan Wuqitong pattern not far away, he found that he was Watching the battle in the city calmly.

"Sannai Maruyama Castle can be taken quickly by accepting the surrender, why waste troops here in vain."

Nanbu Toshinao didn't understand the decision made by that young man. In his opinion, the battle at Sannai Maruyama Castle was a completely meaningless battle. These people in the city were obviously young and hardworking, but they wanted to completely wipe them out here, and even wanted to fight for them. This pays almost equivalent to the lives of the attacking soldiers.

"That adult doesn't look like Chuzhen at all." As the elder of the southern family, Bei Xinai couldn't help feeling his maturity when he looked at Toyotomi Zhengjia.

After a while, the shouts of killing in the city gradually subsided, and a charred samurai ran out along the burnt outer pill.He came to the gentian Wuqitong flag and knelt down and reported, "My lord, Sannai Maruyama Castle has been captured, and more than 300 bandit soldiers in the city have been wiped out. There are more than 100 women and children. What should I do?"

The boy just sat on the saddle and listened to the general's announcement with his eyes closed, as if he was thinking about what to do.After a while, his eyes slowly opened to reveal a shocking cold light, and he faintly uttered the word "kill".

The samurai who came to deliver the news obviously did not expect his Patriarch to give such an answer.After all, in the Warring States Period, the city had already been taken, and women and children generally would not pursue it too much.

Not only him, but Captain Maeda Keiji, who was sitting by the side, also looked at the boy beside him in astonishment and couldn't help persuading him, "The Yuzhijiang Palace, the city has been taken, and the rebels have been wiped out. Let me look at the women and children."

Before Keiji finished speaking, the boy once again scolded his samurai who came to deliver the order, "I said kill all the people in the city! The order is not clear enough!"

"Eh!" The warrior was stunned for a moment, but quickly responded: "Yes, I will pass the order here."

"Don't go!" Just as the samurai was about to get up, Maeda Keiji's scolding came immediately, "The city is occupied by my Utsunomiya people, and I am their captain. I say no to go!"

Maeda Keiji is such a person, he is a samurai who has his own ideals and his own restraint principles, and hates evil like hatred.It is no problem to let him go to the battlefield to kill people, but if you let him attack unarmed women and children, he is 1 unwilling.

But the boy didn't give Keiji Maeda a chance to speak again, and continued to threaten the samurai kneeling on the ground, "I am the general of this army and also your lord. Why are you still hanging here? Could it be that you don't even listen to my words?" It's gone!"

The samurai was reprimanded by the politicians, there was no reason to stay here, so he turned and left immediately to deliver the order.

Seeing the samurai leaving, Maeda Keiji glared at the young man beside him and said, "Your Highness Tamanoe, you are also a great name. You should rule the world with benevolence, otherwise the people's hearts will be lost."

Facing the threat of a giant beside him, the politician did not take it seriously and said, "My benevolence and righteousness are reserved for my people, and the only thing that greets my enemies is cruelty. Stop chaos with killing, and move people with benevolence. This is what His Royal Highness taught me. of."

"If my lord were here, I would definitely not slaughter women and children!" Maeda Keiji still argued, "Your Highness is still young, and there is still a long way to go. You should establish a correct view of warriors, and don't be led astray by those around you." .”

"Today's matter, I will tell the master exactly." Maeda Keiji said, staring coldly at several samurai of the same age standing behind the boy, striding towards Sannai Maruyama Castle, he was going to stop a group of The scene is senseless massacre.

Looking at the back of the muscular middle-aged man going away, the corners of Toyotomi's mouth curled up indiscernibly, that smile seemed to be mocking, but also relieved.

The conversation here cannot be transmitted to Nanfang Lizhi, but the dispute here can be seen.That night, Xiu Zheng, the son of the Xiu family, ordered the slaughter of all the people and animals in the city. The order came from the barracks, and both soldiers and warriors feared the son of Youfu.

At the very least, it is impossible for the Xiu family to receive a small report from Keiji Maeda for a period of time. At this moment, the Xiu family has already brought people to Hakodate Castle on the opposite shore of Ezo Island by boat.

Originally, this place was the core of the Xiu family to drive away wolfs and tigers, but now the bandits who are raging in Qingjin and Lubei are all flowed here to solve the Ezo tribe here for the Xiu family.

However, as Todo Takatora previously instigated the Ezo tribe to cross the sea and invade the northeast, the Kazuto here also made trouble and went south together.

As a result, the Xiu family came up with another tactic, mobilizing people to the south bank of the sea, but withdrew the boats, and left several tribal soldiers and rebellious soldiers from Hakodate in Qingjin.

Previously, more than 1 bandits gathered in various parts of the Qingjin Plain. The cold winter came but they could not return to Ezo, so they could only huddle in various cities to survive the cold winter.

Now in various parts of Qingjin, the armies of various daimyos led by Toyotomi Hidetada are pulling out the fortresses occupied by bandits and Ainu on the Qingjin Plain one by one.

Taking advantage of this time, Xiujia led more than 6000 people belonging to the feudal clan as the vanguard, and crossed the sea first to try to launch an offensive against the relatively weak Matsumae tribes.

There are many Ezo tribes in the Beidou Plain in later generations, because it is located at the southernmost tip of Hokkaido.

And there is no mountain barrier on the southeast side, the monsoon brings the warm water vapor from the Pacific Ocean here, and the snow here may even melt earlier than the Echigo Deha place.

In the future planning of the Xiu family, this place will be the top priority for emigrating to Ezo in the future, and the Xiu family will also transfer one of their sons here.

In the past, the tribes here resisted the Hide family’s rule, and the Oysterzaki family could only implement bondage rule over this place, using trade to ease the relationship with the local tribesmen. Live in a mountain.

But this time, a large number of young men in these tribes were lured to Qingjin and Lubei by the Xiu family. Without the protection of the tribal soldiers, these tribes appeared in front of the Xiu family like charming girls and let the Xiu family attack them.

What Hideka has to do now is to launch a raid on the plain of Hakodate in the future from the Shitaikan in the former Ezo Sankan to the northwest, and finally build the city again.

At the same time, in Qingjin, the two legions led by Toyotomi Xiuzhen and Toyotomi politicians launched an attack on the tribal people in the Qingjin area.

Before leaving, the Xiu family ordered that the prisoners of war should be preserved as much as possible. These are the future labor resources.

When the clearing task on the Qingjin side lasted until mid-April, the tribal soldiers who had landed on Honshu Island before had been basically wiped out, and some fled to the Shisanhu area in the north of Qingjin and the Dounan area in Lubei.

One of these two areas is a remote place full of swamps and lakes, and the other is the North Pole of Honshu blocked by mountains, both of which are beyond the reach of the Japanese regime in this era.

During the Warring States period, the northernmost limit of Japanese rule in the Qingjin Plain was south of Sakayanagi and Nanangaoka, and the development further north was not realized until the middle and late Edo and after the Meiji after the flood control.

The Dounan area in Lubei is the place where the Meiji government allocated the Uesugi Domain in history. It is the land of the entire Shimokita Peninsula, plus the land of the four counties of Hokkaido. According to the statistics of Zong Zhixing, it is only 7000 shi, which is far lower than The standard of 3 koku promised by the Meiji government.

It was so barren at the end of the Edo Shogunate, let alone now.A group of tribal people fled there, and neither Toyotomi Xiuzhen nor Toyotomi politicians were interested in pursuing them.

The ownership of these two lands originally belonged to Oysteraki Yoshihiro and Nambu Toshinao, and it was the utmost benevolence for the army to help deal with those powerful existences. Naturally, those small groups of rogues were left to them to deal with themselves.

After Hideka established a firm foothold in the Hakodate area in southern Ezo, he immediately ordered Akashi Zento, his subordinate, to be responsible for building the city in Hakodate.As for continuing the expedition northward, the Xiu family temporarily shelved it.

The reason why Xiujia put it on hold is simple. He came north to shoot the first shot to set an example for the daimyos behind, to prove that Ezo is not difficult to fight, and even profitable, so as to motivate other daimyos to contribute in the next northern expedition.

At the same time, since the Xiu family wants to colonize Ezo in the future, and the Hakodate area is the top priority of the Xiu family, the Xiu family must have a reason to control this land in the future.There is no better name than personally leading troops to fight down.

Of course, the construction of a 20 koku daimyo city was not completed overnight. Hideka just asked Akashi Zento to be responsible for excavating water holes on the flat ground to build the city, and surrounded the city with wooden slabs.

The construction period is very tight, and the deadline is only one month. The screen panels were built in the way that Hideya used to mix two layers of wooden panels with rammed earth in Bizen, and then painted the wooden panels with white paint to look like a stone wall from the outside.

After explaining these things, the Hide family set off to return to Qingjin, later registered in the Aomori area, and went to Namioka Castle to meet with the daimyos.

Among these daimyos, the one the Hide family wanted to meet most was the representative of the Mori family's reinforcements, Mori Terumoto's adopted son Mori Hidemoto.As the heir of the Mori family, his status became extremely embarrassing after Terumoto Mori's own son was born.

Mori Terumoto definitely wanted his own son to inherit the family business, but Mori Hidemoto's wife was Toyotomi Hidecho's adopted daughter, and Hidemoto even received a gift from Hideyoshi.

After Hideyoshi's death, Teruwon no longer concealed his dislike for Hidewon. Fortunately, under the arbitration of Maeda Toshiie and Tokugawa Ieyasu, a total of 17 shi of Nagato Ikuni, Shufang Yoshishiki County, and Aki Saeki County were resettled. Maori Xiuyuan, the dispute over the successor of the Maori family has just come to an end.

In this life, with Xiuji as Mao Li Huiyuan's support behind him, Huiyuan became even more unscrupulous in disposing of Xiuyuan.

You must know that Xiuyuan's wife in this life is the historical wife of the Xiu family, Haoji. Even though the Maeda family was punished before, she is still a daimyo of 50 shi, and she also has some rights and interests in the Hakata trade. little people.

And because Maori borders on the territory of the Maeda family in this life, the Maeda family has also contributed a lot to the resettlement of Hidemoto. The current Maeda Toshinaga of the Maeda family has personally written to Terumoto Mori many times, expressing the hope that he will come from Buzen or Nagato. Place Xiuyuan.

But in the end, Mori Terumoto only gave him a territory of more than 3 shi in the Izumo County and Izumo County with the acquiescence of Hideji.

It is absolutely impossible for Mori Terumoto to place such an adopted son related to the Maeda family on the western border bordering the Maeda family, so it is natural to place him wherever it is far away.

The Northern Expedition to Ezo was essentially an exile by Mori Terumoto. The Mori family requested to mobilize 2000 people for military service, of which 1000 were from Hideo's territory, and the remaining thousand were from Nagato, It came from Fengqian.

The Gifu Domain also said before that it would support 3000 people from the Hide family. The general in charge of the army was called Shigetsu Kimura, and he was the son of Shigesaka Kimura.

The lieutenant general is Masasa Sato, a native of Mino, and his mother is the older sister of Kanamori Nagakin.

His own data in Xinye is above average, but because he is a native of Mino, he did not move to Bizen with Toyotomi Hidehisa before.

After Xiuci arrived, he suppressed the local aborigines, and appointed his own Echizen and Omi people as the main ones. This time, more than half of the 3000 people organized by the Central Mino aboriginal tycoons sent troops.

From the configuration of the two parties, it can be seen that Xiuyuan was completely thrown by Terumoto Mouri. If the Xiu family persuaded it properly, it might be possible for Xiuyuan to let him use it for him.

And Kimura Shigetsu is undoubtedly Xiuji's hard-core retainer. He is responsible for supervising the Mino and Owari aristocratic aristocrats headed by Sato Kasamasa, and at the same time governing Xiuci quickly.

Sato Fangzheng is the object of Hideka's custody and wooing, and Kimura Shigetsu doesn't have to think about it. It is a good idea to let him attack and kill Kimura Shigezuna to submit a certificate when necessary.

It's just that the Xiu family doesn't have the time to meet with them alone at the moment, even if you go to the door now, they may not be willing to talk to you, why should the Xiu family make it difficult for them?
"Everyone was ordered to come from all over the world to gather in the Northeast. Now Qingjin and Lubei bandits have been pacified, but the troubles of bandits have not disappeared. I promised my lord in Osaka that I would wipe out the untouchables for Toyotomi's family and open up the territory for the emperor. Tuotu.

Now is the time to realize the original promise!

I have crossed the sea by boat to see the situation of Ezo for you, and ordered people to build a city at the southern end of Ezo as our base for the Northern Expedition.

It is said that Ezo Kitashima is about a thousand miles from north to south, and a thousand miles from east to west. It is a big island that is not inferior to the main island of Japan.

To tell you the truth, I used to log in in the central part of Ezo to communicate with the tribesmen of Ezo, and moved to the overseas Chinese to guard. Now, not including other income, the annual food production exceeds 10 shi, but the land I occupy is not enough for Ezo 20/[-] of the island.

In other words, if we can completely occupy Ezo Island and develop immigrants here, it will be a land of no less than 200 million stones after thousands of years.

Although you come from all over the world, Ezo now is a bit barren, but if you can gain knowledge here, maybe Ezo in 500 years will be like the Northeast today, and the Kanto territory 700 years ago!
Nanfang’s skill was in Kai before, and then he followed Wuhuang Xiaohouda Zenmen (source Yoritomo) to quell the rebellion of Fujiwara clan in Oshu, and this is how the world of 10 stones can be achieved today.

Of course, it doesn’t matter if you really don’t like the barren land of Ezo. I will record all the credits for expanding the territory and report them to the lord and the big bosses when I return to Osaka. I will not hesitate to reward you . "

Xiujia compared Ezo to the Northeast of Kanto before, which is indeed enough to confuse people.After all, Kanto was also where the exiled prisoners were located hundreds of years ago, isn't it also fertile and thousands of miles away now?

It’s like you went through reform and opening in China and found that Vietnam also copied this set of procedures. Would you invest in Vietnam?

Of course, Vietnam itself has many problems, but risks always coexist with opportunities.Just like 30 years ago, how many people had the courage to resign their government jobs and go overseas to do business?
After all, Xiujia still didn't reveal the truth to the daimyos.His investment in Central Ezo is now more than 10 shi comparable?
But as mentioned in the previous article, today's daimyos have little interest in continuing the Northern Expedition to the Ezou. If they don't say something touching, how can they have the motivation to follow the Xiu family to continue northward?
But some words can't be said too clearly. After all, there are people like Ii Tadamasa and Kimura Shigesa in the team, and they will report the situation of the Xiu family to their boss at any time.

Hideka's plan is divided into three steps. The first is to lure as many daimyos as possible to Ezo, and use Hakodate as a base to clean up the tribal people of the Hokuto Plain and the tribes in the surrounding mountains.

The second step is to encourage the daimyos to continue to go north, and to launch conquests against the countries planned by the Xiu family, such as Zhihou and Danzhen. This part needs to be completed before the snow falls this winter.

Afterwards, the daimyo will gradually come into contact with Date Mino and others who were courageous in exile, and Shushan Yoshishige and other retainers who are courageous in the Hide family.

It wasn't until this time that the daimyos realized that it was not just a matter of having a settlement in the central part of Ezo, but his territory stretched from the coast of Ishiki to Hidaka, and its deepest part penetrated to the east of Sapporo. (Agricultural area east of the Chitose River in later generations)

But now that the road is blocked by heavy snow, and the coast is blocked by ice at the port, it is impossible for the daimyos to go back even if they want to, and they can only be forced to stay in Ezo for the winter.

At this time, they will discover the disadvantages and advantages of Ezo, and take the problems of this island seriously, and will no longer be fooled by Xiujia.

Those who are willing to stay and continue their conquest will naturally continue to stay, and the Xiu family who are unwilling to stay will not force it, but because they belong to the Xiu family, the Xiu family will not let them go, but ask them to participate in the development of the existing Occupied areas, open up fields, build cities, etc.

The reason is also very simple, they are the army under the account of the Eizu Crusade Army, the general was ordered to crusade against Ezo, how could they leave without saying goodbye?
These people are all excellent laborers, and they will be laborers that will not be encountered in Ezo in the next few decades.

They will eventually return from Ezo with Xiujia, but they can use this short time to be scraped off by Xiujia.

And in the end, they, who had suffered so much in Ezo, would go south with the Xiu family to participate in the battle for the seat of Osaka Castle.

You may ask, if you are torturing others so much, why should they still work hard for you?

First of all, the game of politics is not black and white, and there is a clear distinction between good and evil.For the daimyo, what Xiujia needs to promise is nothing more than knowledge and identity, but for the soldiers and civilians at the bottom, it may only need to say "go home" to drive them forward.

(End of this chapter)