Chapter 992: The Rise or Fall of the Imperial Nation Rests on Sakurajima! (Please Subscribe)

The distance between Nagasaki Harbor and Funai Castle in Bungo is quite short — only about three hundred seventy or eighty li. Although there was no six-hundred-li express relay or anything of the sort, the Shimazu clan's secret agents could still get word to Funai Castle within two days that the Great Ming Navy's grand fleet had arrived off Nagasaki and that 1,000 Ming matchlock musketeers had marched into Nagasaki Harbor.

Shimazu Mitsuhisa, the Chief Elder of the restored Toyotomi house, was at that moment holding and reading the oath of allegiance to the Toyotomi regime sent by Mori Tsunahiro, lord of the Choshu domain.

Mori Tsunahiro was the second-generation lord of the Choshu domain, and like Shimazu Mitsuhisa, he too was a "second generation." But he was far younger — only eighteen years old this year, at the very height of hot-blooded youth.

Moreover, because the Choshu domain had been carved up so brutally by the Tokugawa shogunate after the Battle of Sekigahara — cut from 1.2 million koku before the war down to 299,000 koku, a reduction of three-quarters! — although the Mori house had worked hard at land surveys and forcibly raised its assessed yield to 369,000 koku, and had also instituted a monopoly system for domain products to gain commercial and industrial revenue, no matter how hard they tried, they simply could not balance the domain's finances.

This was because the Mori house had been fabulously wealthy before Sekigahara, for the Mori wealth came not only from their 1.2 million koku of territory, but also from the world-famous Iwami Silver Mine! According to the assessment of people at the time: Terumoto had so much gold and silver that he could have replaced every bridge from San'in and San'yo all the way to Kyoto with bridges of gold and silver.

A great daimyo of such wealth naturally maintained an enormous corps of retainers. After losing 900,000 koku of territory and the Iwami Silver Mine, the Mori house's financial strength declined by eighty or ninety percent, yet the originally vast retainer corps could not be correspondingly reduced. The poverty of the Choshu samurai was so extreme that it astonished even the Satsuma samurai!

Therefore the Choshu samurai's hatred of the Tokugawa shogunate far exceeded even that of the Satsuma samurai.

Yet in the fifty-odd years since the founding of the Tokugawa shogunate, the Tokugawa realm had appeared as solid as a fortress of metal, not something that a mere 370,000-koku Mori house could possibly shake.

So the Choshu samurai had no choice but to turn their resentment into war of words. Every year at New Year's, the lord of the Choshu domain would ask loudly, like a fool: Can we overthrow the shogunate this year?

And then the domain's senior retainers would answer, like idiots: The time to overthrow the shogunate is not yet ripe.

It was much like a child who, after getting beaten, cries and says he'll hit back once he's grown up!

And the Tokugawa shogunate, with its keen ears and eyes, of course knew that the Mori fools and idiots were throwing childish tantrums. But considering that there were too many "beggar samurai" over in Choshu, and that it would be hard to deal with them even after destroying the Mori house, the shogunate had for decades simply pretended not to know about the matter.

But now the Tokugawa house had reached the point where it had no choice but to plot usurpation of the imperial throne — and before usurping it, they naturally had to slaughter the treacherous outside-lord domains like Mori and Shimazu as a warning, like butchering monkeys!

So the shogunate no longer feigned deafness and muteness, but began picking quarrels with the Mori house, sending men to the Mori residence in Edo to demand an explanation for the Choshu domain's discussions of overthrowing the shogunate — if this were verified, the Choshu domain would be finished!

When the news reached Hagi Castle, where the Choshu domain administration was located, it immediately caused panic and unrest. The panicked ones were the upper ranks of the Mori house — no matter how poor, they were still people standing at the top of the samurai class!

And the ones stirring with unrest were the lower-ranking domain samurai and country samurai of the Mori house, who had suffered for decades. They had waited for decades, waiting for just one sentence: This year we can overthrow the shogunate!

Now that the shogunate had come knocking of its own accord, were the great men of the Choshu domain still going to endure it?

Just as divisions were emerging between the upper and lower ranks of the Choshu domain, even more exciting news arrived from Kyushu: the Shimazu house had already been the first to raise the banner of overthrowing the shogunate, and had fought all the way to Funai Castle in Bungo, where they had enthroned the Toyotomi elder Hideshige as their leader — the Toyotomi had been revived!

Shortly afterward, envoys from the Shimazu house arrived at Hagi Castle bearing an order signed by Toyotomi Hideshige (that is, Toyotomi Kunimatsu — Kunimatsu was his pre-coming-of-age name, so after formally restoring the Toyotomi surname, Kunimatsu changed his name to Hideshige), demanding that Mori Tsunahiro swear allegiance to the Toyotomi house, send an oath of loyalty, and agree to serve as the Toyotomi house's Second Chief Elder.

And now Mori Tsunahiro's oath had already been delivered into Shimazu Mitsuhisa's hands!

The Choshu Mori house had also formally raised the banners of the Toyotomi house and of overthrowing the shogunate!

"Good, good — excellent!" Having finished reading Mori Tsunahiro's oath, Shimazu Mitsuhisa finally broke into a smile and said to the retainers before him, "With the Mori samurai holding off the Tokugawa traitors in the east, we can set our minds at ease and boldly deal with the Eight-Nation Alliance that has invaded our divine land of Japan!"

"What? The Eight-Nation Alliance has come?"

"My lord, you just said the Eight-Nation Alliance—"

"When did this happen?"

"My lord..."

At the mention of the Eight-Nation Alliance, the Shimazu retainers who had just been brimming with spirit now one by one showed expressions of alarm.

Shimazu Mitsuhisa took in every change in their expressions, and his own face darkened as well. He snorted and said: "I too have only just received word — it came from Nagasaki. The Eight-Nation fleet has already reached the Goto domain, and has sent five great bird-ships carrying 1,000 musketeers into Nagasaki Harbor."

"What? They've already entered Nagasaki?"

"And the Nabeshima men just stood by and watched?"

"Could it be that the Nabeshima house has also gone over to the shogunate?"

That remark sounded wrong the moment it was spoken! The Nabeshima house had always been vassals of the Tokugawa shogunate — outside lords, to be sure, but still Tokugawa vassals. What "going over" was there to speak of?

"The Hizen domain will not change its neutral stance!" said Shimazu Mitsuhisa. "Nor will the Kuroda, Hosokawa, Tachibana, and Arima houses lightly make enemies of the Toyotomi house. So what we must face is merely the Eight-Nation Alliance."

In truth there were not even eight nations — Annam and Joseon were there merely to make up the numbers, and Japan's own Tokugawa shogunate had not sent troops to join the alliance. The Shimazu house's enemies were only five nations: the Great Ming, France, England, Holland, and Portugal.

Shimazu Mitsuhisa paused. "A countermeasure has long been prepared. The Spanish admiral Garcia has already concluded that the allied fleet and army will certainly take Sakurajima!

Sakurajima is the gateway to Kagoshima Bay. If Sakurajima falls, Kagoshima Bay will be completely blockaded, and the Satsuma domain will lose all outside aid — we would then be trapped in Kyushu!"

He had only spoken half of it — once the Satsuma domain was trapped in Kyushu, its destruction would be only a matter of time.

Because once Sakurajima, Tanegashima, and the Goto Islands were all controlled by the Eight-Nation Alliance, the Spanish fleet would no longer be able to deliver weapons and equipment to the Satsuma domain. And the Shimazu house would then have to face enemies from both sea and land simultaneously!

At the same time, the Tokugawa shogunate would be able to receive a continuous stream of support from the Eight-Nation Alliance by sea!

So after losing Sakurajima, the Shimazu house's prospects would be quite bleak.

Shimazu Mitsuhisa continued: "Therefore the deployment for the Battle of Sakurajima began long ago. Nejime Kiyoo has already led the Satsuma domain's new army onto Sakurajima, and is waiting for the Ming infantry to come. The Satsuma new army is a samurai army, equipped with the latest Spanish muskets and cannon, and its strength far exceeds that of the Ming's peasant army.

Moreover, the Spanish navy's Invincible Armada will also sweep into Kagoshima Bay once the Battle of Sakurajima begins, and deliver a fatal blow to the Eight-Nation fleet!

So there is no need for any of you to worry. You need only wait here with me in Funai Castle for news of victory from Sakurajima.

As long as Sakurajima is victorious, the Hosokawa, Kuroda, Nabeshima, Tachibana, and Arima domains will surely join the Toyotomi house, and together we will overthrow the shogunate and honor the emperor!

The rise or fall of our Japanese imperial nation rests on this one battle at Sakurajima!"

"Admiral Li, the landing has succeeded! It seems there are not many Satsuma troops on Tanegashima!"

"With Tanegashima taken, the next step is Sakurajima... Once Sakurajima is in our hands, the war in Japan will essentially be over."

At that same moment, the naval and land forces commanded by Li Yuanyin and David Jones were attacking Tanegashima.

The allied fleet and army had now been divided into three parts: one at Nagasaki, one in the northern Goto bay among the Goto Islands, and the main force had followed Li Yuanyin and David Jones to Tanegashima. After taking Tanegashima, they would then sweep into Kagoshima Bay and take Sakurajima — there was no need to take the whole island, only the western part of Sakurajima, enough to blockade the channel into and out of the bay, and the mission would be accomplished.

After that, the Toyotomi-Tokugawa war within Japan would have nothing more to do with the Great Ming and the other nations.

(End of Chapter)