"So you just said... you wanted to massacre the city, but you didn't want soldiers to kill people. You were afraid that the sword would be blunt, so you decided to kill them and bury them alive, right?" Imagawa Yoshimoto recalled Takeda Harunobu's initial answer and asked in a low voice.
.
"Yes, there will be a war later. If you kill thousands of people here, you will probably have to break a lot of knives. And after you finish cutting, you still have to find a place to bury the bodies, otherwise there will be diseases. It will be too troublesome. Dig thousands of them
How much energy does the trap cost? How could I waste my army's physical strength here? What if the enemy comes to raid?" Takeda Harunobu nodded matter-of-factly, and at the same time pointed with his toes to the mass grave that was beginning to take shape in front of him:
"So I asked these people to dig their own holes. After digging, I pushed them in and buried them. This killed two birds with one stone and saved trouble."
"They know they are digging a hole to bury themselves, so why are they still digging it?" Imagawa Yoshimoto looked at the pale crowd on the wasteland and couldn't help but sigh. They all buried their heads, as if they were threads without souls.
Like a puppet, they numbly used the tools in their hands to mechanically repeat the movements of digging. Those who moved slowly, hesitated, or wiped their tears secretly would be whipped if they were seen, and in the end they had to
Get up and keep digging.
"Of course there are some people who refuse." Takeda Harunobu pointed to a small commotion that suddenly occurred in the west: a dozen strong men suddenly broke out, holding shovels and poles and trying to break out of the way, but they were immediately killed by the Takeda soldiers.
He was chopped down neatly and fell into the pit covered in blood. There was also a woman who didn't know what happened. She just lay on the ground and curled up in a ball, refusing to dig. She refused to move even though she was beaten with whips all over her body. Finally, she was kicked
Kicked into the pit.
The other people around him seemed to have accepted their fate, turning a blind eye to the corpses in the pit and still digging shovel after shovel.
"But that's how most people are, that's how human beings are. When the future outcome is too bad to bear, they will selectively ignore the outcome and give up thinking. Instead of thinking about how to struggle, they will think about
Right now, they are thinking about other small things that they can bear." Takeda Harunobu showed a playful smile:
"Knowing that they will die, they can only live for a few more hours at most. But in order not to be whipped in these few hours, they will do it honestly and relieve their pain before death. Human beings are destined not to be good at thinking.
Creatures of the future. The simplest example: Even though we know that ‘the boss is just sad’, aren’t there still large groups of people who are ‘young and not working hard’?”
Before evening, the pit had been dug. The Takeda Army supervising the pit cooked simple delicacies in a field pot, but these people who were about to go on the road were destined to die to eat their last meal. They were surrounded by groups
They were driven and kicked into pits that were deeper than human beings, waiting for the Takeda Army to come and bury them after they finished eating.
Until then, the people who had been avoiding thinking about the outcome were forced to accept their destined death. One after another, some people collapsed, and howls and screams were heard in countless large pits, and soon spread to thousands of residents.
Some people seemed to have finally plucked up the courage and tried desperately to get out of the pit, but were shot several times by the soldiers guarding the Takeda Army. Many more people stood on the edge of the pit, begging in tears to stay alive.
The enemy soldier whom he met said all good things to him in the hope that he would spare his life.
Some of the new ashigaru who had joined the army seemed to have softened their hearts and were a little shaken by the pit. However, the samurai who were used to seeing all this had long ignored it and just looked at them coldly. They casually scolded the vacillating ashigaru, but
There is nothing to worry about - after seeing this scene a few times, they will become numb. Everyone needs the process of growing up - these are troubled times.
In a pit closest to the high ground where Imagawa Yoshimoto and the others were, there was a woman holding her infant baby in her arms. She was digging at the dirt by the corners and trying hard to lift the baby to the ground. Her voice was not loud, but it was very loud.
It is easy to identify, so Imagawa Yoshimoto can clearly hear what she said.
"Master, please, please take this baby in!"
"It's easy to feed her. She doesn't cry or fuss. She can survive with just a little feeding. She can be a maid or servant for you when she is raised!"
"Please, sir, the little money I saved has been stuffed into the baby's clothes. You can take it with me! It's just a little baby, it won't be a problem!"
"Please, sir, please, sir, if you can't help it, just pick her out and throw her away at someone's doorstep! From now on, it's up to her to make her own destiny!"
"Master, please do it, please do it, I beg you..."
After all, Imagawa Yoshimoto didn't even eat a bite of food.
"If I want to stop you from massacring the city, is it possible?" Imagawa Yoshimoto looked at Takeda Harunobu, who was enjoying a meal at the side.
"Impossible." Takeda Harunobu wolfed down a big mouthful of noodles and muttered vaguely, "If I stop now, where will my prestige be? How will the world view me?"
"Where are the women and children left?" Imagawa Yoshimoto understood that Takeda Harunobu was telling the truth and took a step back very simply.
"No." Takeda Harunobu replied simply, "This is a matter for our Takeda family, and the prisoners are also prisoners of the Takeda family. How to deal with it is our business. Goro, you have always been well-educated, why would you cross the line?"
"Just keep the kids."
Imagawa Yoshimoto finally whispered.
"Give us Kai an extra half of sea salt every month." Takeda Harunobu filled half a bowl of noodles for himself as if nothing had happened.
"Okay." Imagawa Yoshimoto agreed, and then stood up.
"Take the Imagawa family and pick up all the children. You can only pick up those that are no higher than the horse's belly." Takeda Harunobu added.
"Okay." Imagawa Yoshimoto put down the bowls and chopsticks and asked Hayasaka Nao, Kira Usei and Taro Shen Kentaro to pass on the order.
"Then if you have such a bodhisattva heart, I will slaughter every city I encounter in the future, how can you still exchange half of the sea salt for each city?" Takeda Harunobu said sarcastically with a smile.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! "People will always avoid things that are unacceptable." Imagawa Yoshimoto quoted Takeda Harunobu's words just now, "I hope Tora Chiyo will not push me to this point.
It’s an unacceptable level.”
"City massacre is a normal thing. Really, it's just the first time for you, Goro, so you feel a little uncomfortable. Every year, it is estimated that hundreds of cities are massacred. It's just that Uehara City happens to have more people, so the scene is more spectacular.
That's all." Takeda Harunobu paused, and then asked half-jokingly, "You won't break our alliance because of this, will you?"
"No, I am not a naive child. I cannot abandon my important alliance for the lives of strangers in Shinano City. To put it bluntly, I, a hypocrite, cannot be like a bad person." Imagawa
Yiyuan shook his head, but his eyes became a little weak:
"But I hope there will be such a good person, and I hope that the Imagawa family in the future can be led by him,"
Imagawa Yoshimoto led the Imagawa family's samurai into the pit, and the Takeda family's samurai got out of the way. When the people waiting to die in the pit saw the sudden changes on the ground, they instantly had the hope of escaping.
Everyone cheered gratefully to the Imagawa Army. Imagawa Yoshimoto looked at the joy on the faces of the people that seemed to burst out of despair, but had to extinguish it with his own hands.
"I can only take away children that are no higher than a horse's belly."
Imagawa Yoshimoto walked up to the woman who was desperately holding up the baby and said sadly in a deep voice.
There was a moment of dead silence in the pit, as if a pair of scissors had cut off the cheers and joy just now. The joy on the faces of the people was frozen at first, then gradually solidified, and then slowly faded away. In the end, what emerged was only endless sadness and joy.
Painful. Nearly a thousand eyes seemed to have lost their color, and they were so empty and dark that it was terrifying. Witnessing the loss of great joy and great sorrow and the ensuing despair was simply the most cruel and inhumane torture for bystanders.
Imagawa Yoshimoto's heartache was so severe that he had to start imagining to escape his inner guilt. He imagined that he was a just and kind-hearted hero. No matter what the family interests were, no matter what the overall situation was, after seeing so many innocent people suffering,
When it comes to the common people, he is desperate to save them at all costs, in order to stop the massacre of the Takeda family. If Takeda Harunobu objects, he will even lead the Imagawa army to break the alliance and fight to the death with him on the spot to save these people.
.
However, this kind of self only exists in imagination after all. In reality, it is impossible for such a pure bad good person to survive, and will only be eliminated early in the troubled times. The only ones left are those who have to put their kindness on the shelf because of the cruel reality.
Ordinary people who are trying to survive, and a few evil people who can trample their consciences unscrupulously and become invincible - of course, after the evil people succeed, they will be enshrined in shrines and worshiped by the world as if they are gods. Their stains will be carefully wiped away.
They were clean, and were forgotten by people after more than a hundred years, leaving only the glorious images of heroes in troubled times - no one remembers how many people they killed, anyway, the dead can't speak. But it's really like the historian's evil deeds.
Good people like the benevolent image created by people have long since died in troubled times.
"Thank you, Master Samurai."
The voice of the woman in front of him interrupted Imagawa Yoshimoto's thoughts.
She lifted the baby above her head and put it into the hands of Imakawa Yoshimoto. After Imagawa Yoshimoto bent down and picked up the baby, the woman clasped her hands together devoutly and knelt down to Imagawa Yoshimoto.
"Thank you, sir!"
"Thank you, sir!"
"Thank you, sir, for rescuing my baby!"
"You are truly the reincarnation of the Living Buddha!"
…
More and more people gave away their children, accepted their fate of death, and placed their chances of life and all their longings and attachments on the children. The children clawed at the edge of the pit and refused to leave, howling and crying with each other.
The parents said goodbye, but those parents no longer cried, but kept saying thank you to Imagawa Yoshimoto.
When death approaches in despair, what color will human beings take on? Yoshimoto Imagawa finally knows a little bit about it.
After taking the children out of the pit, the Takeda family samurai took up their positions again. They raised their shovels and threw huge piles of loess towards the crowd, causing countless smoke and dust to rise. Imagawa Yoshimoto watched with his own eyes the man who just sent it to the crowd.
The mother of the child was gradually covered by loess, until the hand stretched out in despair no longer struggled. When the smoke and dust finally dissipated, the mourning also stopped. What was left was only a slightly raised wasteland, and only thousands of insignificant people disappeared.
life.
How many people died? Imagawa Yoshimoto didn't count. It doesn't matter whether it's 5,000 or 6,000. It's just a number anyway, a negligible number in the long history. In the history books of later generations, it will only become a page.
The few lines of ink on it serve as a slight condemnation of Takeda Harunobu's atrocities. If Takeda Harunobu finally unified the world, these lines of ink may not even exist.
But when this insignificant drop of ink falls on a person's head, it is like a stormy wave that sweeps the person into an endless abyss.
What if he falls on top of me? If it were Ginkgo, Taiyuan Xuezhai, Wulang and the others, or myself... then I would feel so desperate.
Just thinking about it made Imagawa Yoshimoto more and more miserable, and he longed for the existence of the hero he had just imagined. He couldn't help but start to outline a character for him in his mind - such a kind and righteous person must be a comely person.
The young man is full of righteousness and gentleness. He will definitely not be different from those samurai who killed innocent people indiscriminately. He will not shave his head, but will have a full head of black hair. What other characteristics will he have? What will be unique about him?
What about making him different from others at a glance?
Imagawa Yoshimoto looked into the distance and saw a maple forest faintly visible among the mountains in the distance, surrounding the foothills.
Maybe he will have a shawl made of red leaves and wear it on his shoulders?
Could it be that the third brother mentioned that the ferryman who will come to Suruga more than ten years later, that person named Yu Qiupei?
Thinking of this, Imagawa Yoshimoto himself laughed. Yes, how could there be such a person? These are just those "hypocrites" who are unable to be enemies of reality in cruel and troubled times but still retain a conscience.
It's just an unrealistic fantasy. They call for the existence of a hero to be the bad guy or true gentleman they want to be but can't be, and do the good things they want to be but can't.