Time goes back to the evening of the previous day.
When Tuka led more than 20 fully loaded men and went ashore to go home, it was already dark.
Everyone held torches and walked into the village laughing and joking through the woods, agreeing to pick up the goods from the Thor the next morning. Just as they were about to wave goodbye, from behind each house in the village, from the shadow of the fence, hula-la-la appeared.
Hundreds of people.
Before these Ainu people could see who was coming, dozens of Jumonji spears and straight guns emerged from the darkness with sharp edges, surrounding Tuka and the others.
"Who!" Tuka was shocked. He almost woke up from the drunkenness, threw the two bottles of wine he was carrying towards the black shadow in front of him, and reached for the short knife at his waist.
Unexpectedly, as soon as his hand was placed on the handle of the knife, a long-blade feather spear (the spear head has a long blade, which can be used for slashing in addition to stabbing, and later some people directly used this spear head as a short knife) was already pressing heavily on it.
On his neck, the sharp blade-like gun tip scratched the skin, and a trace of blood immediately flowed down.
The Shachuan tribesmen around him were shocked when they saw it. Everyone threw away the goods on their shoulders, some pulled out the short knives they exchanged for the Thor, and others held wooden spears or bows and arrows, and rushed towards the black shadows around them.
Start fighting.
In the darkness, the attackers brandished spears that were one to two meters long, stabbing the Ainu people to the ground from the front and sides. (The length of the spear in the island country is measured in "jian",
One room is only 1.8 meters, and the longest one can be up to three rooms. However, in this era, most islanders are only 1.5 meters tall.)
Continuous screams echoed over the village. Soon, apart from Tuka, who had been restrained early in the morning, only half of the other Shachuan people standing in the field were left.
The massacre that occurred in the clearing triggered a commotion in every house in the village. Seven or eight Ainu women screamed and broke free from the obstruction of their families, rushed out of their homes and ran towards the clearing.
"Wow!" The sound of a samurai sword being unsheathed sounded. Several rays of cold light kept passing by, and these women fell into the empty space one after another.
Tuka's eyes were about to burst at this moment, but he had no choice but to be restrained by others, so he could only shout: "Stop it! Let the woman go!"
At this time, a voice sounded from more than ten steps away: "Chief Tuka, tell your people not to act rashly! Otherwise..."
Tuka didn't wait for the man to finish speaking, and hurriedly shouted, asking the tribesmen not to move.
In the dark night, a man took out flint and tinder (steel pieces) from the "fire bag", cracked it a few times, and the cattail spikes mixed with saltpeter were quickly ignited. Immediately afterwards, the appearance of each lamp was painted.
White lanterns with circular split rhombus patterns (a kind of stone stacked family emblem) were lit up one after another.
At this time, Tuka finally saw clearly that what was painted on the lantern was the family crest of the Matsumae clan.
"What are you going to do?!" He didn't expect Matsumae-han to react so quickly. Something happened just in the afternoon, and these guys came in the evening.
"Put down your weapons!" Several gun-wielding samurai with bowl scrolls tied around their heads shouted. The surviving Ainu had no choice but to drop their weapons and squat on the ground dejectedly.
At this time, the surrounding warriors made a way out of the way. A man wearing a small sleeve and a feather-covered outer garment followed a warrior and walked in from outside the crowd.
"Is that you?" Through the light of the lantern, Tuka could clearly see the two leaders.
The samurai who came over was the leader of the four Matsumae clan samurai who boarded the Thor in the afternoon; as for the man next to him, he had never seen it before.
The leading samurai looked stern and said sternly: "The Sachuan tribe colluded with the foreign barbarians and killed the Matsumae family samurai. On the order of Lord Shimamomo, we will capture all the Sachuan clan! Tie these people up!"
"おー!!!" All the warriors present echoed in unison, and then a dozen warriors came forward with ropes and tied the hands of Tuka and others who had put down their weapons.
Tuka and several tribesmen struggled while shouting angrily at the warrior who gave the order: "If the Sagawa tribe is not under the jurisdiction of the Matsumae clan, why are you arresting us?!"
The leading samurai sneered, pointed at the man wearing a haori next to him and said: "This is Hidaya Kyubey. He has been authorized by this domain. From now on, the trading rights in Sagawa will belong to Hidaya."
(Hida-ya is the business name and Kyubey is the name; like the previous Katsuyama Denzo, strictly speaking it should be called Katsuyama-denzo.)
At this time, Hida Yakubei smiled apologetically and bowed to the samurai, saying, "Thank you very much, Sekiguchi-sama."
What the samurai was talking about was the "place request system" implemented by the Matsumae clan mentioned earlier.
In other words, the Matsumae clan granted the trading rights and fishing and hunting rights of Sagawa to Hidaya Kyubei and levied taxes on him. However, Tuka and the tribesmen he led have changed from the local owners to the recipients of Hidaya.
Exploited indigenous labor.
Tuca struggled hard and shouted: "Where is my family?!"
"Your family members are all in the house over there. If you leave the house without orders, you will be killed immediately." The leading warrior saw that the Ainu people present had been tied up, and then waved his hand, and a dozen warriors escorted him.
Tuka and others entered the largest house in the village - Tuka's own home.
Immediately, several officials from the Sapporo Tax Office began to torture Tuka and others in turn, forcing them to tell everything about the Thor.
Because the samurai was shot and killed during the day, these officials would only be more ruthless against the Ainu people who were colluding with the foreign barbarians in front of them.
As soon as he entered the door, Tuka's clothes were stripped off. Before he could react, an official held a bamboo whip full of thorns and whipped him hard on the back.
The thorns of the bamboo whip dug deeply into his back, and Tuka was immediately in agony. Even if he wanted to confess, he couldn't say anything, and his mouth was all used for wailing.
After Tuka was whipped more than a dozen times, the officials who tortured him temporarily stopped. According to these people's past experience, basically if they were whipped 50 times in a row, even the strongest person would die of anger.
"Master Patriarch! Tell me. What is your relationship with the foreigners on that big ship? How many people are there? Where do they come from?"
"I, I just met them today... today. Where did they come from... they didn't, didn't say." Tuka had run out of energy to shout and was talking intermittently.
Several officials looked at each other, and it seemed that they did not get the answer they wanted in the first round of torture. At this time, one of the officials nodded, and the other two immediately tied Tuka's hands and feet behind his back, and then
Lift it up about three or four inches above the ground. Then the prickly bamboo whip begins to shine again.
The second round of interrogation began.
Outside the house, a dozen Ainu people kneeling on the ground heard the howls coming from the big house, and their faces turned pale with fright.
A warrior looked at these natives and yelled: "If you don't tell the truth, not only will you be whipped, but you will also be executed tomorrow morning!"
"What do you think their leader's name is?!" The sound of whipping in the room stopped again, and an official asked fiercely.
"ら...い...じ...ん(Thunder God)." Tuka's body was already covered with scars, and many of the wounds were punctured with large and small bamboo thorns.
"Nonsense! How can anyone call me such a name? Hit me again!" The interrogating official was furious. According to the descriptions of the three samurai who came back, those people all had oriental faces. It was obvious that they were a group of foreign pirates. How dare they call them
The gods themselves.
After a few more whips, Tuka was already unconscious.
After that, the dozen Ainu people kneeling outside the house were tortured. In the end, the officials obtained the same confession as what Tuka had said before.
After the leading samurai named Sekiguchi received the report from the interrogating official, he was confused for a moment.
It is said that the negotiators under his leadership were shot and killed by a group of inexplicable foreign barbarians, which was really unprecedented. If this is the case, which tribe in Ezo will be afraid of the Matsumae Clan in the future?
For the Matsumae clan, the death of one of his samurai was nothing, but the loss of the clan's face was a big deal.
So after he and his men left the Thor and landed in despair, they immediately hurried back to the tax office in Sapporo.
The official in charge of the Sapporo Tax Office was furious after hearing Sekiguchi's report. The Matsudaira Domain had never suffered such a big loss, and he immediately ordered Sekiguchi to lead dozens of samurai from the domain and ronin recruited from several merchant houses.
, servants, rushed to Shachuan overnight to try to repel the foreign barbarians.
But Sekiguchi knew that the opponent's ship was too big, and the Ainu's small boat or the feudal clan's Sekiguchi would definitely not be able to knock it down.
While everyone was thinking about it, a ronin leader suddenly suggested that he had a mixed Ainu and Islander under his command. He could have this person disguise himself as a member of the Sagawa tribe tomorrow and go to the big ship to report the news and lure those on the big ship.
Land and then ambush them.
(The shogunate, which suffered great losses from the Tsarist Russians, did this later. In 1811, the garrison stationed on Kunashiri Island attacked the Russian sailors who landed ashore, captured them all, and sent them to the Ezo Prison for imprisonment.)
Guankou's eyes lit up, and this was a good idea. As for the location of the ambush, he chose the dense forest to the southwest of the village. There were thick bushes there, and the more than 100 people under his command would hide there, so the foreign barbarians would definitely not be able to find them.
Guan Guan was still a little wary of the musket in the hands of the foreign barbarians that could kill his men with one shot without igniting it. After thinking about it, he ordered his men to build wooden shields overnight.
Fortunately, in the village of the Shachuan tribe, in addition to leather goods, the most abundant materials are birch wood, which is very convenient to make wooden shields. By dawn, a dozen wooden shields had been made and camouflaged with moss and mud.
When the samurai set out to enter the ambush site, they saw at the pass a forest of swords and guns, thick wooden shields, and seven or eight iron cannons. They felt relieved, so they sent out the mixed-race Ainu spy, and then the samurai ronin passed by.
Put on a disguise and wait for the other party to come ashore.
…
Since Sekiguchi was shot, his crotch has been bleeding profusely. He kept rolling on the ground, trying to relieve the severe pain in his lower body. Two of his men rushed up, squatting, and seeing the injured position of Sekiguchi, there was nothing they could do for a while.
.
You can't take off your pants in public...
One of the men took out a handkerchief from his pocket, sprinkled some styptic powder on it, then hurriedly wrapped Sekiguchi's crotch, then put him on his back and ran towards the village.
Their horses were tied up in the village, and their injuries were so severe that they had no choice but to take Sekiguchi back to the Sapporo Tax Office for treatment.
At the entrance of the village outside the woods, Hidaya Kyubei and several of his men were anxiously waiting for news from the front. He originally thought that after this battle, all the fur goods, fishing and hunting business in Sagawa would be his.
But he was very surprised by the whistling sounds coming from the other side of the woods. Just as he was about to send one of his men to see what was going on, he saw a warrior running out of the woods with a man on his back, followed by another.
"What's going on?" Hida Yajubei stepped forward and asked.
"Master Sekiguchi was hit by a barbarian iron cannon and was seriously injured. We have to send him to Sapporo quickly." The samurai carrying Sekiguchi stopped and the other man hurriedly went to fetch the horse.
"How is the battle ahead?"
"The barbarian iron cannons are very sharp. Kyubey, I advise you to come with us."
While the two were talking, a continuous "bang bang bang" sound like a heavy rain came from far away from the beach. The expression of the warrior carrying the pass changed and he lost his voice and said: "Why are the barbarians' muskets so sharp?"
!Jiubei, it seems we are in danger, please run away."
After saying that, he and his companion who led the horse helped Sekikou onto the horse. In a panic, the two of them touched the wound on Sekikou's crotch. The unconscious Sekikou let out a scream and fainted completely.
The two warriors did not care about these many things. After getting on their horses, they grabbed the reins of the horse at the pass and galloped towards the east.
Hida Yakyubei was so frightened that he didn't know what to do, and quickly called his men to escape together. As for the ronin who were recruited, just wish yourself good luck.
This chapter is not very good. I updated it in a hurry. I'm really sorry. I'll revise it tomorrow.