The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 422 Ronin vs. Japanese Pirates
Wanli deceived the captured Japanese pirate daimyos and generals, and these guys actually wrote letters home.

In addition to reporting safety and reassuring family members not to worry, these family letters also focused on speaking well of the Ming Dynasty.

What a country of etiquette the Ming Dynasty is.

What do you mean the Ming Dynasty is not warlike?

What do you mean the Ming Dynasty treated them so well?

Why would the Ming Dynasty let them go back?

What do you mean the Ming Dynasty had no intention of attacking Japan?

What do you mean? Don't listen to Toyotomi Hideyoshi's nonsense.

In short, what they meant was to tell their subordinates not to listen to Toyotomi Hideyoshi's hatred of the Ming Dynasty, and to frantically prepare for war, forcing the Ming Dynasty to send troops to attack the Japanese mainland.

In fact, they are not stupid and are not so easily fooled.

The key point is that Wanli told them the consequences of war between Ming Dynasty and Japan.

At that time, not only will the Ming Dynasty not let them go back, but they will also chop them all off as sacrifices!

Who is not afraid of death?

They may not be afraid of death on the battlefield, because the more afraid of death they are on the battlefield, the faster they die.

The problem is, this isn't a battle between two armies at all.

They were all captured.

Now they have only two choices: either the Ming Dynasty and Japan do not go to war, and the Ming Emperor releases them in batches; or the Ming Dynasty and Japan go to war, and the Ming Emperor kills them all.

Who wants to die like this?

It's too unfair to die like this.

Therefore, they all did not want the Ming Dynasty and Japan to go to war.

As for the fact that they spoke highly of the Ming Dynasty in their letters, it was not because they were shameless and were licking the Ming Dynasty shamelessly.

The key point is that they all know that these family letters will not be sent back just like that. The Emperor of the Ming Dynasty will definitely order someone to check them carefully before sending them back.

If they spoke ill of the Ming Dynasty in their letters, then in all likelihood their letters home would not be sent back.

This is not the most terrifying thing. The most terrifying thing is that just because there are a few bad words in the letter, the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty may very likely arrest them and not let them go.

They all want to go back.

Therefore, they all praised the Ming Dynasty in their letters, hoping that the Ming Emperor would let them go back as soon as possible.

Wanli did indeed order people to carefully examine the letters written by these daimyo and generals.

However, he didn't want to see if these people said anything bad about him.

He wanted to print a Japanese tabloid. These people's letters were free manuscripts. There was no problem in typeset and printed them all into a Japanese tabloid. He would print as many pages as he could!
There is nothing wrong with the letters written by these daimyos and generals, so they can all be typeset and printed into Japanese tabloids!
As a result, there were five Japanese tabloids.

He began to make arrangements after the Japanese tabloids were laid out and printed.

Early in the morning at about noon that day, he had just finished dealing with the memorials and ordered someone to call Li Yuansheng over.

After the emperor and his ministers exchanged greetings, Wanli picked up a handful of envelopes and instructed, "Yuansheng, these are letters from the captured daimyo and generals. You must personally deliver them to Kitakyushu, Japan, and give them to Kobayakawa Takakage. Have him arrange for someone to secretly deliver them back to these daimyo and generals."

I went to Japan just to deliver a letter?

If you were not His Majesty, I would not go. Do you have so much free time?
Li Yuansheng took the envelope respectfully and nodded repeatedly, saying, "I understand."

Wanli thought for a moment, then asked, "How many Japanese wanderers are there?"

How do you say this?

Li Yuansheng said carefully: "There are many ronin in Japan, especially during times of war, there are ronin everywhere. Toyotomi Hideyoshi was born a ronin, and many of his close associates were also originally ronin.

As for how many ronin there are in the whole of Japan, I really can't say for sure, because there are too many and no one has ever counted them.

If His Majesty asks me to give a rough estimate, I estimate that there are at least 100,000 ronin in Japan right now. Wanli then asked, "How many ronin confidants do you have under your command?"

What do you want to do?
Li Yuansheng explained in detail, "If we count the ones who are completely trustworthy, there are only about a dozen of them. These are the ones who help me recruit ronin to load, unload, deliver goods, and pay wages. They also secretly bribe ronin to distribute the Japanese tabloids."

More than ten are enough.

Wanli thought for a moment and then asked, "You said most ronin don't have enough to eat, right?"

Li Yuansheng nodded repeatedly and said, "Yes, if they had a stable income and could eat enough, they wouldn't wander around."

Wanli continued to ask: "Is there a ronin camp in Japan?"

Li Yuansheng nodded repeatedly and said, "Yes, there are some near the larger cities. Many ronin are waiting in the ronin camps for employers to come and do some random jobs for them."

Wanli nodded slightly, then gave detailed instructions: "This time, you are to take a hundred fast ships with 50,000 dan of grain and some large pots for cooking porridge, and first build a larger ronin camp in Hirado Port.

Then ask your trusted men to recruit ronin near Hirado Port. Anyone who is willing to come to your camp will be given two meals of porridge for free every day.

You can also leave them a few boats and fishing nets, let your trusted men take the wanderers who know how to fish to go fishing, and stew some fish soup for them every day.

However, you have to set rules for the ronin who come. All those who enter the ronin camp must be registered and assigned to your trusted subordinates to manage. When there is nothing to do, they can do whatever they want, but when there is something to do, they must be available at any time.

Of course, if there is work, there will be wages. How many ronin do you think this will attract?"

If we do this, I'm afraid all the ronin near Hirado Port will come over.

Li Yuansheng estimated, "Your Majesty, I estimate that we can attract at least tens of thousands of ronin."

so much!
Wanli was quite curious and asked, "Didn't you say that there were only about 100,000 Japanese ronin? How come there are over 10,000 near Hirado Port?"

There is naturally a reason for this.

Li Yuansheng explained in detail: "Your Majesty, the Japanese pirates who originally ravaged the southeastern coast of the Ming Dynasty actually have a general name, that is, the Three Islands Japanese pirates.

The leader of the Mishima pirates was the Matsuura clan of the Hirado domain. They specifically recruited pirates to go to the Ming Dynasty and even its vassal state, Korea, to burn, kill and loot. The Mishima pirates were basically ronin.

Therefore, ronin like to gather at Hirado Port. Now that the Matsuura clan doesn't dare to organize the Mishima pirates to plunder everywhere, the number of ronin near Hirado Port is relatively small. During the Jiajing period, the number of ronin gathered at Hirado Port was often 30,000 to 40,000, or even 40,000 to 50,000.

Oh, so that’s the ronin’s lair.

Wanli nodded slightly and said, "Tens of thousands is enough. The more the better. If the food is insufficient, you can send a fast ship to Jeju Island. There is a large amount of food stored there.

In short, the more ronin your trusted subordinates are in charge of, the better. When they have thousands of ronin under their command, you can let them take their ronin to other vassal states controlled by the Mori clan to build ronin camps.

Remember, the Ronin Camp must be built near a city with a harbor, so that it is convenient for us to send food there. The Ronin Camps you build are all based on the old rules, with two meals of porridge and a large pot of fish soup every day."

Uh, why do you keep so many ronin?
Li Yuansheng bowed and said simply, "I understand."

Wanli nodded slightly, then explained in detail: "The reason I asked you to go to Japan to recruit so many ronin was actually to cause trouble for Toyotomi Hideyoshi.

The Yangxin Palace has started printing Japanese tabloids. You can deliver the letter over there, and come back to get the Japanese tabloids after the Ronin Camp is built.

This time, not only will you have to let these ronin spread Japanese tabloids everywhere, but you will also have them infiltrate the territories of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Tokugawa Ieyasu and other daimyo.

When the time comes, you give the order and they'll start killing and burning everywhere, is that okay?"

Oh, so they raised ronin to deal with the real Japanese pirates.

Let the ronin and the Japanese pirates fight each other!
Li Yuansheng nodded repeatedly and said, "No problem. These wanderers are capable of anything. We can't just keep them doing nothing. They should know this."

This trick is actually a bit damaging.

If they do this, the Japanese civilians will probably suffer.

However, when dealing with Japanese pirates, he cannot be polite and will use any tricks, no matter how despicable.

Wanli nodded slightly, then waved his hand and said, "Well, go quickly."

Upon hearing this, Li Yuansheng hurriedly bowed and took his leave.

(End of this chapter)