The Oda army burned Mount Hiei, and Kitakami and the Asai Asakura family clashed again. The Takeda family happened to mobilize Kamiro at this time, and the sword pointed directly at the Noubi Plain, the core territory of the Oda family.
Ashikaga Yoshiaki seemed to have seen an opportunity again and began to think wildly again.
But after several attempts, she had already lost the last bit of the Ashikaga Shogun's prestige. Now, who within and outside the shogunate is willing to accompany her in her madness?
No, Ashikaga Yoshiaki had just made a test in Kyoto, and the news quickly spread to Oda Nobunaga.
Oda Nobunaga shook her head. She was tired of continuing to play this boring game of cat and mouse with this ignorant and poor man.
"After we defeat the Asai Asakura family this time and defeat the Takeda family's Kamiro, let's exile this troublesome guy.
The Kyoto side will keep a close eye on her first, and then they will take action after everything is settled in the military affairs."
The Ashikaga shogun cannot be killed. Although the Ashikaga shogunate has declined, the direct descendants of the Kawachi Genji family are the pillars of the samurai family. Even if he is angry with Ashikaga Yoshiaki, Oda Nobunaga will not kill her.
After wiping out the Asai Asakura family, the Oda family has almost completely established a foothold in Higashikon. Oda Nobunaga is now qualified to not care about Ashikaga Yoshiaki and can kick her out.
If Ashikaga Yoshiaki continues to stay in the capital and lets her pretend to give orders, it will cause a lot of trouble for the Oda family. It is better to expel her to facilitate the construction of a new political territory.
In the Oda family's plan to rule the world, there was never a place for Ashikaga Yoshiaki. Once the situation was stabilized, Oda Nobunaga began to demolish the decadent shogunate in Kyoto and establish his own political power.
Having made up his mind, Oda Nobunaga said.
"Asakura Yoshikage can no longer control the Asakura family, now is the best opportunity to pursue her and destroy the Asakura clan in Ichijogani City.
Hideyoshi Hashiba, guard the Tora Gozen stronghold and guard against Asai Nagamasa's counterattack.
Sakuma Nobumori, take your troops to the Yuanjiang Kingdom to support His Highness Tokugawa.
The rest of the troops will follow me into Echizen Kingdom and take off Asakura Yoshikage's dog head!"
Originally, Oda Nobunaga was still hesitating whether to kill Asai Nagamasa first, or take a risk and try to destroy Asakura Yoshikage.
Yoshigan Shiba's non-interference and Yoshiaki Ashikaga's eagerness to make a move made her finally make the decision.
Asai Nagamasa is already a trapped beast, and it is only a matter of time before she is killed. Asakura Yoshikage, on the other hand, cannot give her a chance to breathe, so he must take advantage of the internal discord within the Asakura family to kill her in one go.
As long as the Asakura clan is destroyed, the Echizen forces, which were already torn apart, will be able to spread the word.
Without the Asakura family as a foreign aid, Asai Nagamasa is no longer a problem, so it is worth taking the risk to attack the Asakura family first.
As for the Takeda family, Tokugawa Ieyasu will definitely resist desperately in order to preserve his family business. Oda Nobunaga is not in a hurry to rescue, and can wait until the Asakura family is settled before sending troops.
———
Yuanjiang Kingdom, Hamamatsu Castle.
After Tokugawa Ieyasu conquered Toe Province, he occupied Hima Castle and expanded it into his own castle, which was called Hamamatsu Castle.
At this time, the atmosphere in the city's council hall was solemn, and bad news came one after another from the front. Takeda's army broke through very quickly, and almost all the important towns in the northern and eastern parts of Toejiang Kingdom fell.
Tokugawa Ieyasu looked at the letters on the case and felt sad.
She wrote to Oda Nobunaga to complain and ask for help, but Oda Nobunaga's reply was filled with complaints, even worse than hers.
It was clear that he had gained an absolute advantage in Kitaomi, but Oda Nobunaga would rather counterattack the Asakura family than look back at Tokugawa Ieyasu, so he just sent Sakuma Nobumori to deal with it.
Sakuma Nobumori's men numbered only 3,000. This time Takeda went to Luo, and Takeda Shingen devoted all his resources to mobilizing no less than 27,000 men.
What use are these meager reinforcements?
What's even more annoying is that in his reply, Oda Nobunaga kindly reminded Tokugawa Ieyasu.
She believed that the Tokugawa family could trade space for time, withdraw from the Toe Country, retreat to the Mikawa Country, wait for the Oda family to settle the Asai and Asakura families, and then come to the rescue with all their strength and counterattack together.
Tokugawa Ieyasu looked at the letter in front of him and wished he could tear it into pieces.
Tokugawa Ieyasu was very clear about Oda Nobunaga's thoughts. He managed the Toe Country with all his heart, and his strength increased greatly, which made Master Yoshi's sister feel uneasy.
Oda Nobunaga wanted to use the Takeda family's help to weaken the Tokugawa family, so that the Tokugawa family would continue to be willing to bow their heads to the Oda family and pretend to be allies, but in fact they were tools of lackeys.
After a long silence, Tokugawa Ieyasu said bitterly.
"What do you think of His Highness Oda's suggestion?"
Sakai Chuji bowed and said.
"The Takeda family is coming with a menacing attack, and our military is not strong enough to fight it.
What His Highness Oda said is not unreasonable. Our army can set up defenses at all levels to block the Takeda army's advance.
Wait until the Takeda army is exhausted and the battle line enters the Mikawa Kingdom. Waiting for His Highness Oda to calm down the recent chaos and come to the rescue in a large scale, Takeda will definitely be defeated."
Tokugawa Ieyasu frowned slightly, and his eyes subconsciously glanced at Ishikawa Sumasa.
Ishikawa Tsumugi met his master's eyes, bowed and said.
"Your Majesty seconded the proposal."
Tokugawa Ieyasu was already unhappy.
Oda Nobunaga didn't know who leaked the information to Takeda Kamiro, but with the excellent intelligence capabilities of the Hattori family ninjas, Tokugawa Ieyasu had already figured out who was leaking the information to him.
Tokugawa Ieyasu was actually surprised that Terutora Uesugi would reveal the secrets of the Takeda family to him. Is she planning to attack Takeda Shingen?
Because of the imperial decree of peace in Kanto, Tokugawa Ieyasu did not dare to place hope in Uesugi Terutora, but she had a feeling that as long as she gritted her teeth and persevered, the war situation would definitely turn around.
But now, his ally Oda Nobunaga wants to use his sword to weaken him. And these important officials of the Tokugawa family also have some bad intentions, which makes Tokugawa Ieyasu extremely angry.
In order to stabilize the new territory, Tokugawa Ieyasu moved his residence to Hamamatsu Castle and concentrated on management.
In Mikawa Kingdom, she appointed Tadashi Sakai as the head of the East Mikawa flag and Ishikawa Sumasa as the head of the West Mikawa flag to manage the old territory.
The Mikawa Princess warrior is famous all over the world as Mikawa Spirit, but as long as it is a samurai group, it has its own little thoughts, even the Mikawa Spirit, which is famous for its loyalty, is no exception.
The Tokugawa family started from Okazaki Castle in Nishi-Mikawa and conquered Higashi-Mikawa. There were also many conflicts between the East-Mikawa samurai families.
Sakai Tadashi and Ishikawa Sumasa respectively represented the interests of the two princess samurai warriors. Naturally, they had constant quarrels on a daily basis, and their relationship was not much better.
But today, it is rare for the two of them to stand together, because they both represent the interests of Samurai Mikawa.
In the past few years, Tokugawa Ieyasu had devoted himself to the Far River Kingdom and devoted himself to governing this new territory. It was inevitable that he would focus on one thing at the expense of the other in his governance.
The rapid improvement of the Yuanjiang people's status and your long-term residence in Yuanjiang Kingdom have already made the Mikawa Princess warriors dissatisfied.
The Mikawa people claim to be conquerors, and of course they don't want to see the conquered Tojie people on an equal footing with themselves, not to mention the deliberate show of favoritism shown by Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Normally, Tokugawa Ieyasu could still control the situation. But this time the Takeda family came to Luo, and all the important towns in the northern and eastern parts of Toe Country were vulnerable, allowing the Takeda army to quickly attack.
The Mikawa people despised and despised the Tooe people even more. They didn't really care about Oda Nobunaga, they really felt that they should return to Mikawa Kingdom to defend themselves.
These weaklings in the Tokugawa Kingdom are unreliable. Only the Mikawa Princess warrior who possesses the soul of Mikawa is the power that the Tokugawa family can rely on.
This little thought of the Mikawa clan troubled Tokugawa Ieyasu very much, even more than the Takeda army who had attacked them in front of them.
The expansion of the Wu family was not as centralized as that of the Celestial Dynasty. If they wanted to establish an effective feudal and feudal system, it would take several generations of hard work to draw strength from new territories and strengthen themselves.
Before the effective feudal transformation is completed, the new territory is often a burden to the master family, rather than a help to the master family.
But what time is it now? It’s troubled times!
It’s such a troubled world when you go out during the day and act arrogant, but when you come home at night, your whole family will be killed! Who has time to wait for several generations to slowly transform the territory?
The great names of the Wu family abandoned the original guardianship system one after another and moved towards the Warring States Period reforms, pursuing rapid centralization of power and turning new leaders into supporting forces as soon as possible.
From the Yashiro Shogun Rebellion to the present, there have been hundreds of years of troubled times, and many heroes have succeeded. Oda Nobunaga's innovations are not new, they are all paths that have been trodden by predecessors for a long time.
But no one was as ruthless as Oda Nobunaga, who could persist in these innovative policies for a long time despite the dissatisfaction of the retainers.
Tokugawa Ieyasu was not as decisive as Oda Nobunaga. She chose a compromise approach, focusing on running the new territory by herself and leaving the old territory to the management of her trusted retainers.
But even though she was so careful, she still couldn't avoid the narrow and xenophobic nature of the island nation's culture.
In this resource-poor island country, tolerance and generosity do not exist. There are only short-sighted greed among small groups snatching resources from each other, and few people have a broad and far-sighted vision.
Perhaps, this is the mentality of the islanders.
Tokugawa Ieyasu's dissatisfaction lies in the unabashed stance of the Toishi Mikawa banner, which negates her efforts in running the Toe Country in recent years.
If she really listened to the Three Rivers people and retreated while fighting, retreating to the Three Rivers Kingdom. Even if she could take back the Yuanjiang Kingdom in the future, this land would have been devastated.
Tokugawa Ieyasu will not only lose the results of his hard work over the past few years, but also lose the loyalty of the people of Tokugawa. The people of Tokugawa will no longer trust her, who abandoned their master at a critical moment.
This actually fulfilled Oda Nobunaga's wish. The Tokugawa family was brought back to its original shape and could only continue to live as dogs for the Oda family.
Tokugawa Ieyasu is unwilling to take this path, so she must react strongly to the Takeda family's Kamiro to let everyone in Tokugawa understand that her master will not give up on her.
Whether we win or not is a matter of ability, but whether we fight or not is a matter of attitude. This is a political battle, and political scores must be settled.
Tokugawa Ieyasu was very confident in the expanded Hamamatsu Castle. Even if he failed in the field battle, he could withdraw to Hamamatsu Castle and wait for reinforcements after expressing his attitude.
She didn't believe it. Could Oda Nobunaga really watch Takeda Shingen kill him? Let the Takeda family's soldiers rush into the Nobi Plain and take away the Oda family's lair?
And the sneaky Terutora Uesugi, who worked so hard to deliver a message to herself, could still watch Takeda Shingen kill her and take over the entire Tokaido?
In order to make a political statement that he would defend the Toe Kingdom, Tokugawa Ieyasu had to get the Mikawa people in front of him who were reluctant to shed blood for the Toe Kingdom to send troops to fight against the Takeda army.
But at this point, it seems that this is not easy.
Just when Tokugawa Ieyasu was at a loss what to do, a man jumped out.
Honda Tadakatsu, who was petite but had a sinister look in his eyes, suddenly burst out laughing in this serious military meeting, rolling on the floor with laughter, very unscrupulously.
When Tokugawa Ieyasu saw her acting like this, instead of being angry, he felt happy.
On the contrary, Sakai Chuji and Ishikawa looked at each other with bad expressions, and Sakai Chuji shouted.
"Honda-hime! This is a military meeting! Please be decent!"
Honda Tadakatsu picked out his ears and glanced at Tadashi Sakai, looking like an old lady who was too lazy to talk to you. She had a childlike face and a lolita body, but this posture actually made her look cute.
It's just that Tadashi Sakai and Tsukumasa Ishikawa are both big bosses in the family, and they were both furious when they were so slighted by her.
But before they could speak, Honda, who had never spoken at the side, sighed again and said.
"Zhongsheng, don't mess around in front of His Highness."
The Honda clan is a major clan in the Mikawa Kingdom. They are all descendants of the same people who originated from Honda Village. Although they are not necessarily related by blood, they are always one and the same to the outside world.
Honda was Tokugawa Ieyasu's teacher and an elder. Although Honda Tadakatsu was from the Honda clan, he still had to give her three points of respect.
But she ignored the embarrassment on the faces of Sakai Tadashi and Ishikawa Sumasa, and bowed and apologized to Tokugawa Ieyasu.
"Your Highness, please forgive me, because it was so funny and I really couldn't bear it."
Tokugawa Ieyasu raised the corners of his mouth and asked.
"what's so funny?"
Honda Tadakatsu shrugged and said.
"We, the Mikawa Princess warriors, are sworn to follow His Highness to the death. We will stand firm in troubled times, fight to be the first, never back down, and make the world's martial arts admired.
His Highness also said that the Tokugawa family has no treasures that can be obtained, but the Mikawa Princess is the family treasure that our family has inherited and established. It is irreplaceable, and it makes us and the Mikawa Princess even more excited.
I originally thought that Yuanjiang Country was the land that we and the Mikawa Princess warriors fought in battle and exchanged for their blood. Anyone who wanted to take our land from us would have to step on our corpses first!
But today, someone actually made such nonsense in front of His Highness that he wanted to give the Toe Country to the Takeda family and make me and the Mikawa Princess warriors go back to Mikawa Country in despair.
Your Highness, do you think it’s ridiculous or not?”
Honda Tadakatsu has a childish face and a hollow voice, like that of a young girl. But the fierce words in his words are as sharp as a knife, causing pain on people's faces.
Honda frowned several times.
"Tadakatsu be careful, Sakai-sama and Ishikawa-sama don't mean this."
Honda Tadakatsu glanced at Honda several times and said.
"Sir, although I respect you as an elder, I am a senior soldier of the banner personally entrusted by His Highness. It is my responsibility to speak out and impartially in military discussions. Please respect my speech!
I don’t care what other people think, I am a Mikawa Princess warrior who is loyal to His Highness, and I will never give up my territory for His Highness and embarrass my fellow Mikawa people!"
Honda Tadakatsu's righteousness was awe-inspiring, but Honda was eclipsed again and again. The two exchanged words like a double act, and Sakai Tadakatsu and Ishikawa Shusei were immediately put on the fire. They were both red-faced and speechless.
Tokugawa Ieyasu couldn't help but praise in his heart. The old man and the young man in this family, one wise and one brave, are really the treasures of the Tokugawa family.
Honda is the teacher of Tokugawa Ieyasu many times. He is highly respected and deeply trusted. He has always been in charge of the internal affairs of the territory.
If the Tokugawa family really gave up the Tokugawa Kingdom, used their own territory to fortify themselves layer by layer, and retreated step by step, the whole process would be scorched and the logistics would collapse.
In addition, the troubles of post-war reconstruction have to fall on Honda again and again, and of course she is dissatisfied.
If the Tokugawa family can't defeat them, that's fine. But before the battle begins, the two banner leaders of East and West Sanhe want to persuade their master to withdraw their troops for selfish reasons. Isn't this a bastard?
There are also several Mikawa Banner shoufu led by Honda Tadakatsu, all of whom were promoted by Tokugawa Ieyasu himself and were always responsible for leading the elite and suppressing them on the front line.
Tokugawa Ieyasu, the governor of the family whose hostage daughter returned to the throne, could not suppress the senior officials of the Matsudaira family, so she chose to promote young people among the Mikawa Princess samurai for her own benefit.
Compared to the East and West Mikawa Samurai Group, the emerging samurai group Mikawa Hatamoto Sensuke was closer to Tokugawa Ieyasu and had a closer interest relationship.
The territory where they were rewarded for their military merits was a new territory established by the Tokugawa family, which was in the Toe Country. The old guys were talking about giving up the Toe Country. How could Honda Tadakatsu not be angry?
?
Just because you put the overall situation first, you are going to make me lose the territory I gained through hard work and meritorious service. Why! You old cowards don't even have the courage to fight, you are nothing but a Mikawa Princess samurai!
After Honda expressed his stance to Honda Tadakatsu several times, the atmosphere of the military discussion changed. Both the Mikawa clan and the Toe clan were unwilling to take the back seat, and the important ministers came forward one by one to express their intention to fight the Takeda family.
In order to prove themselves, Sakai Tadashi and Ishikawa Sumasa had to go out to fight, and they were unwilling to be the cowards that Honda Tadakatsu said.
Tokugawa Ieyasu was overjoyed when he saw that his army was ready, and he was ready to join forces with Takeda Shingen to hunt in the wild and have a good fight.