The Ming Dynasty began from Sarhu

Chapter 310 Disaster
A stack of Korean paper letters signed "Seii Daesung Shogun Liu" was thrown into the fire.

Amid the crackling sound of burning, Ping Liaohou's hope for peace talks turned to ashes.

"Asshole! How disrespectful! How dare you call yourself the Shogun! And even dare to threaten the shogunate! Are Shimazu and Nabeshima puppets? Or are they deliberately condoning these bandits? Damn it!"

"General, Lord Nabeshima has died for his country. The barbarians cut off his head and hung it on the top of Chisugawa Castle. Lord Shimazu, he escaped!"

Edo Castle Honmaru Palace.

The genuine Shogun slammed the table and stood up, hysterically cursing Liu Zhaosun, who claimed to be the Shogun.

The sword on the hilt was shaken by the roar, making a slight clicking sound.

Asai E of Midaisho knelt obediently on the tatami.

The beauty lowered her head and looked downcast, like a gentle kitten.

Kneeling around were daimyo who came from Shikoku and Honshu.

They are about to be attacked by the Kaiyuan army.

After presenting the peace terms sent by the barbarians - the barbarians called it the Treaty of Shimonoseki - the Shogun became furious.

Tokugawa Hidetada threw the letter from the "Shogun" into the fire, showing an attitude of fighting to the death.

"You want to occupy Kyushu! You want 30 million taels of silver? You're just dreaming!"

Nagato clan leader Mori Terumoto added:

"General, the thirty million taels is to compensate them for their military expenses. We need to pay the compensation for the barbarians who died in the battle separately."

"enough!"

The Mori clan was one of Toyotomi Hideyoshi's most loyal supporters, and the Nagato clan made great contributions during Hideyoshi's unification of the world.

When Hideyoshi invaded Korea in 1592, Mori Terumoto also led a detachment to participate in the battle.

Seven years had passed since the fall of the Toyotomi clan, but the Mori clan and the shogunate were still at odds.

When attacking Korea, Maori dispatched 15,000 troops.

They are panicking now.

The daimyo looked at the letters burning in the stove with different expressions.

"General, December 30th is the deadline given by the barbarians. If their demands are not met or if no response is given by then, the flat-armored ships will cross the Bungo Channel, attack Shikoku Island, and then land in Edo..."

The lord of Tosa Domain, Yamauchi Masatoyo, knelt down for a long time, his voice trembling:

"If we don't negotiate peace, the barbarians will continue to massacre the city. Their envoy said that they will massacre according to the number of troops each vassal sent that year..."

There were exclamations from all around.

It should be noted that Toyotomi Hideyoshi led nine legions, totaling 150,000 troops, to attack Korea.

Almost all the feudal lords participated in the wars against Korea and Ming Dynasty.

In other words, the barbarians now want to kill 150,000 Japanese.

Maori Terumoto, who is nearly sixty years old, recalled the fierce battle that took place more than twenty years ago and whispered:

"The Higo clan dispatched 3,600 men, and after the barbarians captured the main city, they chopped off 3,600 heads."

"Beast!"

Tokugawa Hidetada was furious:

"They want to attack Edo, but that's wishful thinking. Don't pay any attention to them! Once the food runs out, they will naturally retreat."

Edo Castle was still a thousand miles away from Kyushu Island.

British, French and foreign merchant ships are active in the middle waters.

The Westerners promised that they would "maintain the normal order of Japanese commerce."

In other words, if barbarians attacked Honshu, foreigners would intervene.

Therefore, the shogunate was confident that it could continue to fight with the barbarians.

"Winter is approaching, with heavy snow and wind. Once our food supply is cut off, the barbarians will be destroyed. You must persevere!"

The lords of Tosa and Nagato domains looked at each other, obviously disagreeing with this view.

The two fiefdoms were adjacent to Kyushu and were under threat from the Kaiyuan army.

Especially the Nagato clan, which was only a few hundred steps away from the barbarians.

There is only the shallow Kanmon Strait separating them.

As long as this fake Shogun is willing, his army, which makes Kyushu tremble with fear, can attack Nagato Domain at any time and massacre 15,000 people.

More than 20 years ago, the Mori clan followed Toyotomi Hideyoshi and dispatched 15,000 people to do many bad things in Korea.

If the peace talks failed and the barbarians crossed the strait, the Nagato clan would suffer devastating losses.

The news of the tragedy at Hizen Domain has spread throughout Japan.

The cities of various feudal lords were completely slaughtered by the barbarians, but those city lords who did not send troops out of Korea were safe.

Everyone knew that this was a trick of the barbarians to defeat them one by one, but there was nothing they could do.

Because of Tokugawa Hidetada's inaction, the Kyushu daimyo completely lost trust in Edo.

When Tokugawa finally sent the shogunate army to aid Satsuma, daimyo such as Shimazu refused to allow the shogunate army to enter.

The slogan of Kyushu Domain was:
"It is better to give it to foreign barbarians than to let the Tokugawa monkeys get it." This is strikingly similar to what Empress Dowager Cixi later said when she measured China's national strength and the country's happiness.

It can be seen that history just repeats itself in cycles.

"Who is the barbarian leader? So rampant!"

"His name is Liu Zhaosun, a servant from a family background, just like the fishmonger Toyotomi Hideyoshi, he was born into a humble family and had great ambitions!"

the Shogun asked curiously.

"Whose servant?"

"Liu, Liu Jing."

Hearing the name of his adoptive father Liu Zhaosun, Lord Maori trembled. He was besieged by Liu Jing for seven days in Pyongyang, Korea, and survived by drinking horse urine.

Tokugawa waved his hand and interrupted the fear of the Mori clan leader.

"What's the current situation in Jiuzhou? Can the barbarians completely conquer this place with just a few tens of thousands of troops?"

Maori Terumoto coughed lightly and continued:
"The lords of the Kyushu Domain collapsed at the first blow and have fled into the mountains. Only Lord Nabeshima bravely resisted."

Several other daimyos also took the opportunity to shout:
"General, Kyushu is trying to divert the disaster eastward! Otherwise, how could the barbarians have marched so far in such a short time, all the way to the Kanmon Strait, clamoring to sign the Niuguan Treaty at the Qiufan Tower in Shimonoseki?"

"What? The Niuguan Treaty?"

Tokugawa Hidetada had a ferocious face.

This is intolerable. Even the location for signing the treaty has been determined. This is simply a great insult to the Yamato people!

"Beginning in November, the barbarians will relocate farmers from Busan, Korea, occupying islands like Tsushima and Iki. They will be exempted from taxes for three years. Next, they will also migrate from Liaodong to Kyushu..."

Tokugawa Hidetada exclaimed:

"There's not much arable land in Kyushu. How are they going to survive after crossing the sea? Are they going to become pirates like the Shimazu clan?"

"No need to learn, they are just robbers."

Several daimyos looked at each other, and finally said together:

"General, the situation is critical. If we continue to delay, the enemy will invade other domains. We dare not negotiate peace on behalf of the shogunate, so we ask the general to make the decision. Should we fight or make peace? If we want to negotiate, we can send the elder Hasegawa, who is good at peace..."

Tokugawa Hidetada looked at everyone with a sharp gaze, and seeing that everyone looked embarrassed, he could not help but lower his head.

At this time, a woman coughed on the tatami, and Hidetada quickly looked towards Ae.

The most powerful woman in the Great Inner Palace swung her hand at the air and whispered to her husband:

"war."

Hidetada gritted his teeth:
"I will go to Kyoto to pray to the Emperor and gather the Eastern Kingdom's army. Just like my father did at the Battle of Sekigahara, we will drive out the barbarians and kill Liu the bandit. You should all work together!"

In December, ships of pioneer groups - that's what the Koreans called them - passed through the Tsushima Strait and occupied Tsushima Island and Iki Island.

Koreans invaded the coast of Kyushu and occupied all arable land.

They carried away all the Japanese food and supplies like ants.

The various feudal lords in Kyushu still have strength, but no one is willing to fight anymore.

This tactic of massacring the city at will made the Japanese soldiers feel terrified.

This kind of warfare only existed in the distant Mongol Empire era.

In fact, the panic caused to the enemy by the burning, killing and looting by the barbarians in Kyushu was far more terrifying and real than that caused by Kublai Khan's eastern expedition.

The "Shogun" used Koreans as the vanguard and fought from Hizen to Chikuzen, and immediately massacred any resistance.

The number of people massacred strictly followed the number of troops sent by each domain during the Bunroku and Keicho campaigns that year.

For example, in the Hizen Domain, the daimyo Nabeshima sent out 1,600 men, and the barbarians chopped off 1,600 people and hung them on the city walls.

North Koreans are passionate about revenge.

What the Japanese army did when they landed in Busan was now being repaid double by the Korean soldiers in Kyushu.

The Korean soldiers' masters - the Liaodong barbarians of the Ming Dynasty - acquiesced to the killing.

Neither support nor oppose.

They would only provide assistance when the vassal army was unable to cope.

The flames of war spread across the nine provinces.

The daimyo of each domain in Kyushu led their samurai retainers to retreat to the mountainous areas of Higo and Bungo, defending themselves in the deep mountains and forests.

They did not take the initiative to attack, but hoped that the Kaiyuan army could pass through Kyushu and attack other daimyo eastward.

The envoys sent by the Kaiyuan Army to Shikoku, Honshu and other places made the contents of the Treaty of Shimonoseki public, and all the feudal lords knew about Liu Zhaosun's ambitions.

After witnessing the devastation in Kyushu, other daimyo began to reconsider their relationship with the Kaihara army.

At least, peace talks become one of the options.

Against this background, the Iyo clan on Shikoku Island and the Nagato clan on Honshu Island began to put pressure on the shogunate.

Everyone hoped that the shogunate would negotiate peace with the Kaihara army.

Whatever the final terms, the fighting must stop.

(End of this chapter)