Chapter 1566: The Restless and Uneasy Shogunate

Yet, he quickly laughed at himself. "No, there's no need to say it."

How could there be any certainty in such a matter? It was nothing more than a gamble. Since ancient times, when the Central Plains dynasties were ruled by Han people, there had never been an instance of them proactively dispatching troops to conquer Japan. They were merely clinging to a sliver of hope because the current Han emperor's conduct was vastly different from previous Han emperors—even they themselves knew this was just a sliver of hope, and the likelihood of failure was greater than success.

But even so, the Cloistered Emperor wanted to try, to test his luck. If he succeeded, he could, like Cloistered Emperor Shirakawa and Emperor Go-Daigo, overthrow his political enemies and rule alone as emperor, never again suppressed, never again living as wretchedly as he did now—even if he would then have to serve the Great Han as a suzerain, he would at least be the monarch of a vassal state.

If he failed, then that too... that too would just be the same as now, living a life of swallowing his anger in silence, then growing old and dying quietly—what difference would there be? Since he had already decided to gamble, he absolutely could not turn back now.

"When can we send Hashimoto out?" he asked again.

"The sooner the better, of course. If Your Majesty has finished writing the letter, I will immediately pass it on to him and have him hurry to Nagasaki," Nijo Yasumichi answered at once. "The Hashimoto clan is not under much surveillance. If Sanemura claims he is unwell and needs to rest at home, few will pay attention. Once we find an opportunity to deliver the letter to the Great Han's special envoy stationed in Nagasaki, the task will be complete."

The Cloistered Emperor could of course tell that Nijo Yasumichi was subtly urging him to act quickly—to finish writing the letter and hand it to Hashimoto Sanemura to take away, without further hesitation or delay.

And now he had made up his mind. "Good, I will begin writing now. In a few days, when I summon the imperial physician, you may come and collect it. There is no time to lose—once you have the letter, send someone out at once!"

"Thank you, Your Majesty!" Nijo Yasumichi was overjoyed and then knelt prostrate on the ground. "Your servants shall never fail the trust Your Majesty has placed in us!"

After issuing the command, the Cloistered Emperor fell silent once more.

Write the letter, deliver it there—after that, it would all depend on Heaven's will. If Heaven still favored him, still favored the imperial court, then perhaps the Han emperor would answer his plea, raising a great army to subjugate the shogunate. And at that time, the shogunate would surely be beset by troubles both internal and external, and in the end be utterly annihilated. Tokugawa Iemitsu, that arrogant and domineering shogun, would certainly receive his retribution.

But, Kazuko... what would become of Kazuko then? She was Tokugawa Hidetada's daughter, after all. The thought suddenly flashed through the Cloistered Emperor's mind.

Because Tokugawa Iemitsu had been far too arrogant and overbearing before, he truly could not endure it any longer and wanted to seize every hope to overthrow the shogunate. While scheming, his heart had been filled with hatred for the Tokugawa family, and so he had decided. But now that everything was settled, he thought of Kazuko again.

Although she was a daughter of the Tokugawa family, she had served him devotedly for many years and had never once behaved as Iemitsu did. One could say her feelings were sincere and true. When she had come to visit him just earlier, that concern and apology had not been feigned.

All these years, caught between the imperial court and the shogunate, every conflict required her to find ways to mend the rifts—it must have been very hard on her too...

He could not worry about so much now; he would deal with it when the time came! This momentary hesitation was quickly cast aside by the Cloistered Emperor.

He clenched his hands, as if he could not wait to write the letter at once. It was only with great effort that he suppressed the impulse in his heart and maintained the proper bearing of a cloistered emperor.

"You may withdraw for now," he said, waving his hand lightly.

……………………

The imperial court was not the only one still awake deep into this night. Within Edo Castle, another group of people in this country likewise found it hard to sleep. And compared to the court, which had been stripped of all power and thought only of overthrowing the shogunate, this group had far more problems to consider, and far more complex ones at that.

Compared to Kyoto, which revered ostentation and culture, Edo was far more solemn—a city built up year by year according to the needs and tastes of the Tokugawa shogun's house. All its solemnity and majesty were meant to embody the might and wealth of the Tokugawa shogun's clan.

Like most cities, Edo Castle was composed of concentric rings of fortifications, and the city's residents settled in order from the outside inward according to differences in power and status. From the outer city, where commoners' dwellings clustered as densely as stars, moving toward the center, the population grew sparser and the buildings more and more grand—aptly reflecting the significance of the shogunate's center of power.

Upon reaching the very center of this city, a long moat divided the inner castle from the outer castle. The inner castle was further divided into two parts: the inner enclosure and the outer enclosure. The outer enclosure, closer to the outside, was a residential area where attendants and townsfolk lived intermingled. The inner enclosure, however, was the residence of the one family and the place where the Tokugawa shogun and his shogunate officials handled government affairs. It is no exaggeration to say that this was now the true nerve center of Japan.

Because the inner enclosure was the shogun's residence and the center of power, it was built with exceptional grandeur, with continuous halls and towers stretching out. These halls and towers were divided into several zones according to the central kuruwa, and each palace also assumed different functions according to different divisions of labor. The Honmaru Palace, where the shogun lived and handled government affairs, was the most critical. The Nishinomaru Palace was originally supposed to be the residence of the previous shogun, the Ōgosho Tokugawa Hidetada, and his principal wife, Sūgen'in. However, because the shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu's mother, Sūgen'in, had died several years earlier during Hidetada and Iemitsu's journey to Kyoto, and Tokugawa Hidetada himself had died the previous year, it now stood unoccupied. And because the current shogun had no heir, and moreover preferred quiet, so many halls and pavilions were instead empty and silent, with little sign of life to be seen.

The Honmaru Palace was divided into three sections: the Omote, the Nakaoku, and the Ōoku. The Omote was where the shogun received shogunate ministers and where the ministers conferred and worked among themselves. The Nakaoku was where the shogun personally handled government affairs. And the Ōoku was the shogun's sleeping quarters and the residence of the women of the household; apart from the shogun himself, no other men were permitted to enter.

Between the Honmaru Palace and the Nishinomaru Palace lay a high ground, the highest point in all of Edo Castle, named Mount Momiji. On this mountain, the Hie Shrine had been built, which had now become the Tokugawa family's ancestral shrine, enshrining the spirit tablets of both Tokugawa Ieyasu and Tokugawa Hidetada, father and son.

The former Toyotomi Hideyoshi had liked to affect cultural refinement. Through several acts of currying favor with the imperial court, he had the emperor of the time bestow upon him the surname Toyotomi and also had the Toyotomi clan listed among the court nobility families. Even after receiving such an honor, he was not satisfied, and so he sought to deify himself, obtaining the divine title Toyokuni Daimyōjin, using this method to satisfy his vanity while also consolidating his rule.

When the Tokugawa came to rule, Ieyasu was naturally unwilling to be placed beneath Hideyoshi. By means of coercion, he too had the court honor him with a divine title, "Tōshō Daigongen." Thus, the shogunate and the common people now respectfully referred to Ieyasu as the Divine Lord when mentioning him, and the shogunate also built Tōshō Shrines dedicated to him in various places.

It was now deep into the night. Under normal circumstances, the shogun would have already retired to the Ōoku to rest, and the shogunate's executive officials would have left the Omote, where they worked during the day, and returned to their respective residences. Today, however, the situation was somewhat unusual. In the conference hall of the Omote, a group of the shogunate's executive ministers had not left today but instead gathered here to hold a special meeting.

The flickering, dim candlelight made everyone's face appear somewhat blurred and uncertain, and also made the atmosphere within the hall even more somber.

The participants in the meeting were all the highest-ranking officials of the shogunate—the six Rōjū: Sakai Tadayo, Matsudaira Nobutsuna, Doi Toshikatsu, Inaba Masakatsu, Sakai Tadakatsu, and Naitō Tadashige, as well as the Tairō Ii Naotaka. They could now be said to be the masters of power over all of Japan, assisting the shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu in ruling the country.

The Tairō Ii Naotaka was the highest in title and prestige among them, and the unquestioned host of this meeting. Although his title was "Tairō," he was only forty-four years old this year. He hailed from the Ii family and was the second son of Ii Naomasa, the famed Warring States general honored as one of the Tokugawa Four Heavenly Kings. Because he had shown outstanding talent from a young age, he had served as an attendant at Tokugawa Ieyasu's side from the age of twelve. He had displayed great valor in both campaigns against Osaka and had always enjoyed the deep trust of successive Tokugawa shoguns. After the shogunate unified Japan, the Ii family also became an important member among the fudai daimyō.

It was precisely because of this appreciation and trust that after Ii Naomasa's death, Tokugawa Ieyasu decreed that this second son inherit the position of family head of the Ii clan. Of the family's 180,000 koku fief, he received 150,000 koku, while his elder brother Ii Naokatsu received only a 30,000 koku fief.

After Ieyasu's death, he continued to receive the trust and heavy employment of the two generations of shoguns, Hidetada and Iemitsu. Over a year ago, as Tokugawa Hidetada lay dying, he had specifically entrusted him to continue assisting Iemitsu well, and additionally conferred upon him the unique title of Tairō, which demonstrated his standing within the shogunate as the foremost vassal. It was also to show respect and gratitude toward him that Tokugawa Iemitsu had not long ago expanded the Ii family's domain to 300,000 koku, making it the largest domain among the fudai daimyō.

Among the Rōjū, the highest in status was Doi Toshikatsu. Doi Toshikatsu was exactly sixty years old this year. He was the chief Rōjū and wielded immense power and influence.

He was originally the youngest son of the Warring States daimyō Mizuno Nobumoto. During the Warring States period, Mizuno Nobumoto, as a minor lord, served the Oda clan, participating in battles everywhere and securing a 240,000 koku fief for his family. However, in the third year of Tenshō, because he had believed slanderous talk, Oda Nobunaga suspected him of secretly colluding with his enemy Takeda Katsuyori and had him beheaded at Daijuji Temple in Mikawa. The Mizuno family's fief and family name thus vanished into thin air.

This youngest son, who survived, was adopted by Ieyasu's retainer Doi Toshimasa and renamed Doi Toshikatsu, becoming a retainer of the Tokugawa family. Because he fought bravely during the Tokugawa family's rise and repeatedly rendered meritorious service, he received heavy employment from the shogunate.

At the same time, because he had advanced together with Hidetada during the Battle of Sekigahara, he was regarded by Hidetada as a trusted confidant. After Tokugawa Hidetada became shogun, he was increasingly heavily employed. And after Ieyasu's death, he managed to secretly incite Tokugawa Hidetada to purge Honda Masazumi, the domineering and powerful minister of Ieyasu's era, stripping him of all shogunate posts, thereby becoming the chief of the Rōjū within the shogunate.

He was a notoriously ruthless figure within the shogunate, having single-handedly formulated many policies targeting the imperial court and the various daimyō, and could be said to be greatly feared. After Hidetada's death, in recognition of his many years of assistance, Tokugawa Iemitsu specially expanded his fief to 160,000 koku. The Doi family thus became a powerful force among the fudai daimyō.

Sitting beside Doi Toshikatsu was Sakai Tadayo. The Sakai family was one of the earliest retainer families under the Tokugawa house (still surnamed Matsudaira at the time), and was even of the same branch origin as the Matsudaira family itself. It could be said to be the most trusted and heavily employed family among the shogunate's retainers, with several branch families ranked as fudai daimyō.

Because Sakai Tadayo came from such a family, he had always been highly valued by the shogunate and had become a Rōjū very early on. By now, he had held the position for twenty years, and he was over a dozen years older than even the Tairō Ii Naotaka. He could now also be considered a chief Rōjū, likewise a top-ranking official of the shogunate.

Another Rōjū present, Sakai Tadakatsu, had been appointed Rōjū ten years ago. He also hailed from a branch of the Sakai clan and was, by reckoning, Sakai Tadayo's younger cousin (their fathers, Sakai Shigetada and Sakai Tadatoshi, were full brothers, both sons of the Tokugawa general Sakai Masanori). Two cousins from the same family serving as Rōjū simultaneously showed the shogunate's reliance on and trust in this family.

However, Sakai Tadayo's health had been poor recently, and he had been frequently afflicted with illness. Thus, among those present, his complexion was the worst—pale and bloodless, and his spirits were also greatly depleted, his eyes half-closed most of the time. Compared to Doi Toshikatsu, who was of a similar age and wildly ambitious, he seemed far less conspicuous.

Matsudaira Nobutsuna held the most superior status among the rest. He hailed from a branch of the Matsudaira clan and could be said to be the representative of the shinpan faction among the Rōjū, his standing quite transcendent. At the same time, he had also grown up at the shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu's side since childhood as an attendant page, and his relationship with the shogun was extraordinary. However, he was a man of low profile, always sparing with words, and thus had never caused any conflict with others.

Compared to the five men of extremely high birth and status mentioned before, the two Rōjū Naitō Tadashige and Inaba Masakatsu were of much lower standing. However, precisely because of this, they were, compared to the previous few, actually much closer to the shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu.

Naitō Tadashige had always been Iemitsu's trusted confidant and had also been responsible for Iemitsu's early childhood education; he could be said to be greatly respected and trusted.

Inaba Masakatsu, however, was even more extraordinary. He was the son of Iemitsu's wet nurse, Kasuga-no-Tsubone, and had also attended at Iemitsu's side since childhood. When Iemitsu was in a precarious position because he was not favored by his parents, he had always followed him, and it could be said that he shared a bond with Iemitsu akin to that of brothers. It was precisely because of this bond that as soon as Iemitsu ascended to the shogun's seat, he began to focus on cultivating and promoting him. At the mere age of twenty-six, he became a Rōjū of the shogunate, and now, at only thirty-six, he had already been a Rōjū for ten years—a clear sign of the degree of trust placed in him. Furthermore, Tokugawa Iemitsu had repeatedly increased his fief, which now amounted to 85,000 koku, making him a member of the daimyō by virtue of this.

Because of Iemitsu's deep attachment to his wet nurse, Kasuga-no-Tsubone's influence did not remain confined solely within the Ōoku but even permeated the shogunate's court.

However, although he was the youngest among those present, Inaba Masakatsu's body had recently been plagued by illness; he had even coughed up blood several times, and his complexion was even more unsightly than Sakai Tadayo's, making it seem as though his lifespan could not be extended much longer. There were rumors that the shogun intended, should he die, to have his nephew Hotta Masamori succeed to the Rōjū post, which showed the shogun's trust in and reliance on Kasuga-no-Tsubone's family.

All these men submitted to the shogun as feudal lords and possessed various kinship ties to the shogun's house. Relying on blood ties and trusted confidants to rule Japan—this was the governing system personally forged by Tokugawa Ieyasu, and it was still operating effectively now.

Under the dim candlelight, the expressions of these men were all dark and uncertain, restrained and profound, scarcely revealing any joy or anger. Though their features differed, they seemed almost to be wearing the same mask.

Just as time trickled by bit by bit, Ii Naotaka, the highest in status, finally spoke.

"Has there been a reply from Yagyū's side?"

Though not old, perhaps in pursuit of a sense of authority, his tone was unhurried and slow, carrying a somewhat pompous air.

"Yagyū Gensai has now gone to the Great Han's capital and begun negotiations with the Great Han's court," Naitō Tadashige, the Rōjū temporarily responsible for negotiations with the Great Han, replied in a low voice with almost the same tone. "However, judging from his reply letter, the Great Han's attitude is very tough. They demand that we resume trade as quickly as possible and, additionally, make up for the previous shortfall..."

Upon hearing such a reply, not only did the Tairō Ii Naotaka start slightly, but even the other Rōjū were also stunned.

"That was their reply?" Sakai Tadayo slowly turned his gaze toward Naitō Tadashige. "Did Yagyū say anything else?"

"No, Yagyū merely said that the Great Han is pressing him very urgently, but they have only ever raised these two points with him, and no others." Naitō Tadashige indicated that he was not concealing anything. "Additionally, Yagyū reported that the Great Han's attitude toward him is growing increasingly tough, though his treatment is still decent—they have been entertaining him with the protocol due an envoy all along."

"It seems the Great Han is anxious. But if the Great Han is anxious, why are they still dragging out the negotiations without yielding a single step?" Sakai Tadakatsu, the other Rōjū of the Sakai family, voiced the doubt in everyone's heart. "We have already made our position so clear. If they truly find it unacceptable, then there is no need to continue negotiating with Yagyū; if they feel they need the copper and can compromise, then they should be making concessions in the negotiations now and proposing new terms, shouldn't they?"