Chapter 60: The Astronomical Chaos of Kanto (Seeking Bookmarks)

  This visit to the Zhongyuan family was very inauspicious, and it made his aunt, Fang Yutai, very unhappy. First, he gave gifts, then sealed an envelope with a sum of money, and only after speaking quickly did his aunt forgive him. He repeatedly promised that he would not disappoint his uncle and aunt's expectations, before leaving the Zhongyuan family in a dejected manner.

  Akane was given a two-month long vacation by him, first letting her return to the Atago family and reunite with her family. Before leaving Kyoto, she also had to take Shouko on a tour of Kyoto, which was something she had promised to do. If she didn't do it, she would definitely be nagged to death by the little loli. So first they went to visit the upper and lower shrines of Hata Shrine, then they visited the famous To-ji Temple and Shoren-in Temple, and finally they went to Daitoku-ji Temple and Myoshin-ji Temple. The whole trip took a total of five days, almost wearing out his boots.

  He then returned to Sakamoto and took a short rest, while also checking on the preparations for the siege of Sakamoto Castle. As soon as he arrived at the Sakamoto Imperial Palace, he received a large amount of new information. First was news from Mikawa Province: Oda Nobukatsu had finally fallen, failing in his defense of Anjō Castle in early September and becoming a prisoner of war. It's likely that this shameful defeat was due to his uncle Oda Nobumitsu abandoning him.

  The Kanto region also underwent a dramatic change, and the old riverbed of the Tone River was unable to withstand the Northern Army's attack. The Northern Army easily broke through the old riverbed, and Sano Yasuyuki, who had been besieged in the old riverbed for many days, died on the spot. Ashikaga Fujin and his mother, Lady Sano, took their own lives along with 18 members of their family, and their heads were sent to Odawara Castle. I wonder if Uesugi Kenshin's face was very difficult to look at.

  The worst is not that the mother and son of Ashikaga Fujuuji died, but rather that Chiba Kōsuke's eldest son, Chiba Harusuke, who was Ashikaga Fujuuji's uncle, managed to escape with his life. He took Ashikaga Fujuuji's younger brother, Ashikaga Fujimasa, back to their castle at Sekiyado and barricaded themselves inside, proclaiming Ashikaga Fujimasa as the new Kantō Kubō and calling on the people of the Kantō region to rise up against the Hōjō clan.

  This news spread out and immediately caused a stir in the Kanto region. If there were still doubts about the death of the former Shogun, then the fact that the newly enthroned Shogun was killed by the Hojo clan after only one month is undeniable. Countless Kanto warriors rose up in indignation and revolt, sparking another great upheaval in the Kanto region. More than 100,000 people from the Kanto region spontaneously formed a national army to besiege the Hojo clan.

  The determination of Uesugi Kenshin was also very decisive, he married his daughter to the Imagawa family at the fastest speed, and let his eldest son, Motouji, be named as Uesugi Kagetora to marry the daughter of Takeda Harunobu, completing the last step of the Kōsō Sun god alliance in advance, and then invited the two allies to enter Kantō with an alliance.

  The reaction of the Hojo family was not unexpected, but the people of Kanto were not to be underestimated either. Almost all the people in Musashi Province who had surrendered to the Hojo family rebelled against them, and the power that the Hojo family had established over Musashi Province through their hard-won victory at the Battle of Kamakura was broken in an instant.

  Most of the territory of Musashi Province was lost, and the people who had surrendered to the Hojo family again defected. Even those who still belonged to the Hojo family were shaken. Tokimune Hojo could only barely defend a few isolated castles in Musashi. Even the incompetent Uesugi Kagenaga began to plot, taking advantage of the situation to retake several cities in Kozuke Province that had defected to the Hojo side and stabilizing the situation once again.

  This news also caused a stir in Kyoto, and the name of "Tenka no Ran" was spread around. No one would have thought that the culprit was just a nine-year-old child, and the reason was only a momentary greed to steal a famous sword, resulting in this shocking and earth-shaking war, which is an unprecedented event in history. Kiyohara Motosuke inadvertently plucked the strings of fate.

  Kiriyama Mantsumaru was very satisfied with Hattori Yasunaga's efficiency, and after praising him a few times, he asked: "The Kanto explosion of the Tenmon War, this name doesn't sound bad either! But didn't the Date family of Mutsu just end the Tenmon War? Is Kanto also called the Tenmon War?"

  "According to the information I have received, the courtiers proposed that the Tenshō Iga War be renamed the Tenshō Disturbance, and the one in Kantō was called the Tenshō War."

  In the 18th year of Tenbun, if we were to talk about what major event occurred, it would undoubtedly be the Battle of Kizugawa that broke out in Settsu Province this summer. Although it was only a siege battle between three thousand men on each side, with Hosokawa Harumoto fleeing in defeat, the Miyoshi clan, representing the four countries' powerful families, completely rose to power and overthrew the main house of Hosokawa, taking control of nearly half of Kinai. In terms of impact, it was undoubtedly the most significant battle of that year.

  The second is the "Heavenly Rebellion" that has just broken out in Kanto, where it is said that Hojo Tokimune's image in Kanto has been greatly damaged, and he has been molded by the people into a demon with two horns on his head, chicken-like hands, copper bell-like eyes, and a fondness for eating the hearts of young children. The castles of the Hojo clan have been taken one after another, and many of those who were listed in the "Odawara Shoshiroku" have also rebelled. Except for a few strongholds such as Kawagoe Castle and Edo Castle, most areas of Musashi Province have already broken away from the control of the Hojo clan, and Hojo Tokimune can only meet this great rebellion stirred up by the people of Kanto with anger and incomprehension.

  Yamamoto Kanetsugu looked at the latest intelligence and was stunned for a long time before sighing, "I have had the honor of meeting Lord Hojo, he is an excellent family head and a broad-minded person. In my younger days when I wandered in the eastern provinces, my footprints covered all ten countries of Kanto, but I have never seen any lord who can compare with Lord Hojo."

  Kiryu Manzamaru was astonished to hear Yamamoto Kansuke's high praise for Hojo Ujiyasu, and he should have been full of praise for Takeda Harunobu by rights; it is also possible that due to his intervention he did not yet know Takeda Harunobu.

  Yamamoto Kansuke said: "The eight provinces of the Kantō region are the home of warriors, and it is the place where two generations of shoguns have risen to power. Only by taking control of the Kantō can one unify the country."

  "Oh! So that's how it is! I've learned something new!" Kiryū Manzōmaru's expression was one of disdain, leaving Yamamoto Kanbee at a loss for words. The saying "A disciple may be stupid, but what's scary is when they develop their own thoughts and no longer listen to their master" was something Yamamoto understood all too well. At this point, Kiryū Manzōmaru was only thinking about the rich economic foundation and developed agriculture of Kinai, which he had always disregarded in favor of Kantō. He couldn't be persuaded any further than this.

  After inspecting the geographical situation of the Sakamoto Castle site, Kira Yoshinaka returned to the detached palace of Sakamoto Gosho with his men. He had the privilege of residing in a detached palace within the shogun's Gosho, and the right to guard the Sakamoto area was also taken by the Kira family. ōtani Yoshitsugu and Kutsuki Masatsuna voluntarily went to hand over the work of Sakamoto Gosho to Kira Yoshinaka, the former returned directly to Jishō-ji Temple for service, and the latter returned to Kutsukigawa to handle local affairs.

  A few days later, a series of reports came in from the eastern provinces that after the victory at Shiojiri Pass a year ago, the Takeda family had been making frequent sorties to suppress the anti-Takeda forces in Saku District and had won a string of victories. They successively subdued Tanaka Castle's Tanaka Nagayoshi, Hirakawa Castle's Hirakawa Taneie, and pacified the rebellion by the people of Ina District in southern Shinano Province.

  Takeda Harunobu, who had just won a great victory and washed away the dark clouds of defeat, accepted his brother-in-law Imagawa Ujizane's request in early September to strengthen the Suruga-Totomi alliance by marrying off their daughters to each other. However, before he could even celebrate, he immediately received a plea for help from his relative Hojo Ujiyasu, and with it came news that the Tenmon Rebellion had broken out in Kanto, putting Hojo Ujiyasu's life in danger as he was besieged in Odawara Castle, crying out for rescue to his two allies.

  Not to mention the expression on Takeda Harunobu's face, the Imagawa clan of Suruga, also a member of the Kōsune Alliance, had undergone new changes. Although the Imagawa army had advanced all the way to the front of the Hazama family's Kakitagawa Castle after capturing Anjō Castle, and made the ōwari-based Oda clan very worried for a while, unfortunately, the Imagawa clan could only go this far.

  Because Saigō captured Anjō Castle and took the opportunity to subdue the two Mikawa clans of Tōgō, and the neutral Nakajō clan, which allowed the power of the Imagawa clan to expand rapidly. The rapid expansion of the vassal group brought many inconveniences to Uesugi's law enforcement, and the powerful Mikawa national team also made Uesugi suffer. He was considering how to adjust the internal power division of Mikawa Province when he received a request for help from the Hōjō clan.

  Almost like Takeda Shingen, Imagawa Ujizane was also unwilling, but the Suruga-Totomi alliance had just been formed and in order to maintain its effectiveness he could not help but agree to send troops. He was well aware of the importance of the Hojo family's position, and when Hosokawa Harumoto sent Shindori Ise no Taira into the service of Doyo Sanehisa, later known as Hojo Ujitsuna, with the intention of cutting off the road to Kyoto for the Kantō samurai from Izu.

  This time, the two countries of Kai and Suruga came to the rescue of the Hojo family for the same reason. Once the Hojo family is destroyed, the stable iron triangle that has just been established between Kai, Suruga, and the Hojo will be broken. Kai's Takeda and Suruga's Imagawa will also face the danger of being attacked from both front and back. The flames of war in Kanto can burn to their own homes at any time. This is unacceptable for the Imagawa and Takeda who have just conquered or are still conquering. Having enjoyed the feeling of stability, it is not acceptable to let them return to an era where they must always be on guard against threats from behind.

  The storm of the Kanto Astronomical Riot is fermenting, and although it's thousands of miles away, just by reading about it, you can feel the entire Kanto region being engulfed in a terrifying storm, as if a huge barrel of explosives had been thoroughly detonated. The topic of the Astronomical Riot quickly overshadowed the recent Yokogawa War, becoming the hottest topic of the time.

  Compared to the internal strife of the three good families with 3,000 against 3,000, the martial arts war involving tens of thousands of people in Kanto is even more thrilling. Such a large-scale action also alerted the near-Ki samurai families. They had long been aware of the powerful forces of the Kanto samurai, but such a large-scale action was comparable to the total military strength of one side in the ōnin War, enough to make everyone, including the three good families, fearful.

  Kira Mansaburō also had his own thoughts: "The two generations of the Kamakura shogunate, which actually rose in Kanto, who among the heroes of Kanto has the 'capacity' to dominate the world? Thinking of this, he couldn't help but think of the letter he wrote to Sanada Yukimura before. Now that I think about it, it was too impulsive and reckless. I don't know how this 'Dragon of Echigo' will look at it. Does Kanto's Sanada Yukimura, Takeda Shingen, or Hōjō Ujiyasu have the 'capacity'?"