Chapter 817: The Mongols Are Coming

Oboi would not be catching the wokou leader So Yoshinari this time, because So Yoshinari was not on Tsushima Island but in Edo Castle.

He was originally from Edo — born in Edo, raised in Edo, and enthroned in Edo as lord of the Tsushima-Fuchū Domain, only occasionally returning to his domain to take a look around.

But when the "wokou" at the Waegwan in Dumopo, Busan, had all fled back to Tsushima, he happened to be at home. Upon learning the shocking news that a combined fleet of Japan had invaded Joseon, So Yoshinari immediately set out back to Edo to report to the Tokugawa shogunate.

This was a matter of tremendous importance!

A combined fleet of Japan had come, and its Regional Commander even bore the surname Ukita!

Could it be the one who had fled from Hachijō Island?

So he had to go to Edo to report the drastic change that had occurred in Busan.

Of course, even in Edo he would not get to see the "dim shogun" Tokugawa Ietsuna — Ietsuna was only thirteen this year and still wrestling with Elementary Arithmetic!

And he did not manage any affairs anyway.

Because this generation's shogun was rather dim, his uncle and regent Hoshina Masayuki, together with the senior councilors Matsudaira Nobutsuna, Abe Tadaaki, Matsudaira Norihisa, Sakai Tadakiyo, and others, had devised a fine method to help the shogun govern.

That was, while His Excellency the Shogun was single-mindedly counting on his fingers doing multiplication and division, the senior councilors would report state affairs — these affairs had all been discussed and resolved by the senior councilors, then reported to His Excellency the Shogun together; so long as the Shogun raised no objection, it meant he approved the senior councilors' decision, and the underlings would carry it out accordingly.

So it did not matter how dim the shogun was, as long as he said nothing — this method began in Ietsuna's era and was used until the Tokugawa shogunate closed its doors. Apart from a few sharp-witted shoguns, the other shoguns simply listened to state affairs and let them pass.

Even more absurdly, sometimes the senior councilors or chamberlains, to save time, would report several state affairs at once — several men reporting together, several men speaking at once, reporting different matters! In this way the shogun could not understand a word they were saying, and so could raise no objection.

Many people like to talk about the Ming Grand Secretariat being constitutional or some such, but compared with the Tokugawa shoguns, even the Tianqi Emperor counted as one who managed a fair amount of affairs!

But the matter So Yoshinari came to report this time was one that not only the dim shogun could not understand — even brilliant senior councilors like Hoshina Masayuki, Matsudaira Nobutsuna, Abe Tadaaki, Matsudaira Norihisa, and Sakai Tadakiyo were baffled. So they had no choice but to hold meetings for days on end to discuss it, and even invited the lord of the Mito Domain, Tokugawa Yorifusa, to join the discussions.

"It must be the Shimazu clan up to mischief!" The wise and brilliant Tokugawa Yorifusa, after hearing So Yoshinari's report, immediately reached a conclusion!

All bad deeds were done by the Shimazu — the great men of the Tokugawa shogunate had always regarded the Satsuma Shimazu as villains!

"This matter is probably not something the Satsuma men could have accomplished!" Hoshina Masayuki raised a dissenting opinion. "According to reports from the people at the Dumopo trading post, the so-called combined fleet of Japan that invaded Busanpo consisted of twenty large Chinese sand ships. Each sand ship carried at least two hundred men — twenty sand ships would be an army of four thousand! If the Satsuma men had mobilized that many people, we would not have failed to know of it."

"That makes sense!" Tokugawa Yorifusa nodded. "It seems the Mōri clan also had a hand in it. They have never given up their treacherous ambitions, always thinking of overthrowing the shogunate!"

The Shimazu were villains, and the Mōri were certainly no good men either!

At the time of the Battle of Sekigahara they had harbored ill intentions; had the Divine Lord of the East not been so formidable, these people would surely have pounced and destroyed the Tokugawa house.

And after the Battle of Sekigahara, the Mōri clan's territory had been greatly reduced, from 1.2 million koku down to 300,000 koku (370,000 koku after land surveys) — one could say their vitality was severely damaged. The Mōri clan had therefore borne a grudge against the Tokugawa and were bent on overthrowing the shogunate.

"But what is their purpose in doing this?" Matsudaira Nobutsuna asked.

He had just returned from the Satsuma Domain not long before — he had gone to Satsuma to investigate the escape of Ukita Hideie, and of course had found nothing, so he had no choice but to make the Shimazu clan head, Shimazu Mitsuhisa, retire from public life as a way of settling the matter.

Because Mitsuhisa's son Tsunahisa was under greater suspicion (at the time of Ukita Hideie's escape, Mitsuhisa was living in Edo, while Tsunahisa was governing in Satsuma), they directly installed Tsunahisa's son Nobuhisa as the new head.

"Perhaps it is dissatisfaction with the shogunate's policy of national seclusion?" said Sakai Tadakiyo, who had only recently become a senior councilor. "Recently, because of the Ming country's great opening of the country, voices opposing seclusion have appeared among samurai and rōnin."

Japan's seclusion was in fact not adopted in imitation of China; this country had been playing at seclusion since China's Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, and the target of its seclusion was actually China!

Although Japan had absorbed a great deal of Chinese culture, it was unwilling to be assimilated by China, and that was why it practiced seclusion.

But by the Tokugawa shogunate period, many Japanese samurai no longer knew how seclusion had come about, and simply assumed it had been copied from China.

Since China had opened up, Japan ought to hurry up and copy that too!

Why was it still locked up? Could it be that His Excellency the Shogun was too dim to copy it?

"A pack of fools!" Tokugawa Yorifusa cursed. "The consequence of the Great Ming's opening of the country is the decline of the scholar-officials. The Great Ming's scholar-officials are the equivalent of our country's samurai!"

The difference between scholar-officials and samurai was of course very great — one civil, one martial!

But Yorifusa was right about one thing: once Japan opened the country, the samurai would surely decline.

Because opening the country meant moving toward the sea and participating in international competition. And Japan had two means of participating in international competition: one was commercial competition; the other was military expansion.

The former had basically nothing to do with the samurai.

The latter — Japan was an island nation! Military expansion had to be primarily naval! And the foundation of the Japanese samurai was land; a military aristocracy based on land found it very hard to go to sea in the age of sail.

Matsudaira Nobutsuna let out a breath. "It must be for the sake of opening the country. Satsuma and Chōshū have too many samurai and no way out; perhaps they want to make money through maritime trade!"

Hoshina Masayuki said, "Where are there not too many samurai? The greatest problem of the country of Japan is that there are too many samurai!"

These senior councilors were no fools!

Although Zhu Cilang's agents had been trying all along to make the shogunate believe that the Satsuma Domain was supporting the remnants of the Toyotomi, they had not fallen for it.

Because the Tokugawa shogunate's military and financial strength was overwhelming relative to the few disobedient "powerful domains," and it did not fear anyone overthrowing the shogunate at all.

"The problem of too many samurai can be discussed later," Matsudaira said. "The urgent matter now is to explain the misunderstanding to the Great Ming and Joseon. We should send envoys to China to explain in person to the Great Ming Emperor, and by the way inspect the situation of China's opening of the country."

"Let my family's Mitsukuni go!" said Tokugawa Yorifusa. "He is well versed in both old and new Chinese learning; now is exactly the time to put that to use."

"Enemy attack!"

"It's the Mongols."

"How is that possible?"

"It is the Mongols — it's written on their sails!"

Before Tokugawa Mitsukuni had even set out, Fuchū Castle on Tsushima Island was already in complete chaos!

Because the Mongol navy had already arrived at their doorstep, had just carried out a round of bombardment, and was now lowering small boats, preparing to land on the beach near Fuchū Castle.

Fuchū Castle stood right by the sea on southern Tsushima Island, and below the castle was the port of Izuhara Town. From the castle walls one could use a telescope to see clearly the flags of the Mongol warships on the sea and the three Chinese characters "Great Mongol" on their sails.

So Yoshizane (Yoshinari's son), who had remained behind in Fuchū Castle on Tsushima, also held a telescope in his hand, observing the Mongol fleet on the sea in the company of several retainers.

He too had seen the words "Great Mongol" on the sails of several large Western sailing ships — far too conspicuous! There should be no mistake: the Mongols had come to attack!

But why would these Mongols embroider Chinese characters on their sails? Why not Mongolian script?

And besides, why were the Mongols using Spanish-style galleons?

The So clan of Tsushima were no ignorant country daimyō; their family had engaged in foreign trade for generations and had seen many Western sailing ships, so of course they could recognize Spanish-style galleons.

The Mongol navy did not use Mongolian script on its flags and sails, and did not use Mongol-style galleons either — no matter how one looked at it, this matter was somewhat suspicious!

Could it be that the Spanish had falsely used the name of the Mongols?

Just as So Yoshizane was pondering this, one of his retainers came running over and reported loudly: "My lord, the ship is ready. Please board at once and leave Tsushima Island! Leave the defense of Fuchū Castle to us!"

(End of Chapter)