Chapter 249: The Fruit is Ripe
The Kitabatake family was in a difficult situation, unable to gather troops for a while. Their frequent harassment yielded no significant achievements, and they could only watch as the Wanjin army built a small city of gray volcanic ash cement, their defenses becoming increasingly complete.
Because this city was located by the seaside on the east side of the Suzugamine Plain, Yuan Ye named it “Deer Ferry Port,” disregarding the fact that Suzugamine County already had a Deer Ferry Port built along a river. In any case, his naming ability was not strong, so he simply named the future administrative center of Ise Province.
With things as they were, the Kitabatake family found it even harder to decide on a full-scale attack. They mobilized for half a month, and their troop strength was only one to two thousand more than the Wanjin army’s, with their morale being quite unstable. The thought of a forced assault on the Deer Ferry defense line alone made their scalps tingle.
Even if they could win, the Kitabatake family would likely be half-crippled. Moreover, there had been numerous skirmishes between the two sides during this half-month. Judging by the combat power the Wanjin army had displayed, the more they fought, the less confident they became.
At this time, Japan’s traditional typhoon season also arrived. The temperature suddenly dropped, and rain became frequent, turning the ground into mud. It was during this period that Yuan Ye changed his mind. Even if he were willing to fight the Kitabatake family head-on, it would likely devolve into both sides rolling around in the mud, making it difficult to determine a victor.
The situation became increasingly awkward. The Kitabatake family was incapable of launching a full-scale attack and had no confidence in crushing Wanjin in one fell swoop. Meanwhile, due to the greatly increased risk of sailing during the typhoon season, Wanjin’s reinforcements were nearly cut off, and they remained even more entrenched.
Both sides continued to endure, and this endurance lasted for another month.
In the wars of the Medieval Period, a month was not a long time. Sieges of strongholds in this era often lasted six months or more. However, the famine in Ise grew increasingly severe. Paying the annual tribute pushed a large number of commoners to the brink of bankruptcy. Furthermore, more people discovered that it wasn’t just the fields that had suffered disaster this year; wild vegetables, another important food source for commoners, also experienced a strange, large-scale decline in production. Conversely, rats proliferated.
In those days, even rats began to compete with people for food. Many commoners had hoped to find something to eat in the wilderness in the autumn. However, after searching far and wide, they realized that their households might not even survive the winter, let alone complete spring plowing next year. Their spirits began to despair.
Everyone in the Kitabatake family now knew that disaster relief was necessary, at least to alleviate the domestic situation in Ise Province. However, knowing was one thing, and being able to do it was another. Who should be responsible for disaster relief?
Should the Kitabatake family provide unified disaster relief, or should their subordinate samurai and local lords provide it separately?
When it came to matters requiring actual money, local lords were generally unwilling to cooperate. Back in the day, when Oda Nobunaga wanted to improve the roads in Owari to stimulate the economy, he sent people to urge them daily. After half a year of nagging, not a single local lord was willing to cooperate, all of them complaining about hardship.
Compared to the local lords of Owari, the local lords of Ise were no different. It was impossible to get them to willingly open their coffers.
As for the Kitabatake family footing the bill for comprehensive disaster relief, they were also somewhat reluctant. If they gave all their reserves to the commoners, what if it was embezzled by local samurai and local lords?
Furthermore, if all the grain was used for disaster relief, how would they support the inevitable major war with Wanjin that was to come?
The Kitabatake family also considered purchasing grain as an emergency measure. After all, they had earned some money from Wanjin this year. However, the “empty ear blight” had spread further than expected, affecting almost the entire Ise Peninsula. After the autumn harvest, grain prices had skyrocketed, and there was even hoarding. Even with high-price purchases, they couldn’t acquire much grain in a short period.
In previous years, after the autumn harvest, grain prices were usually around six to seven hundred mon per koku. However, in just over a month, grain prices on the Ise Peninsula had risen to over two kan per koku. Even the grain prices in the Kinki region were affected, with prices rising across the board, and even the prices of grains were high.
Indeed, this was all Yuan Ye’s doing. He had purchased owls and frogs at high prices. There were also intelligent people in the Ise Peninsula who bought them cheaply from the Kinki region to exchange for Wanjin’s cheap salt quotas, engaging in a resale scheme. This led to a large-scale decline in production in the Kinki region this year, although it was not as severe as on the Ise Peninsula.
Further afield, heavy goods like grain were generally not transported by land, as it would mean giving money away for free to the local lords along the way. Even if they knew that transporting grain to Ise this year would be highly profitable, few dared to do it.
As for sea transport…
The Wanjin Navy was not for show. As long as someone dared to transport goods, Yuan Ye dared to… Direct robbery would give them a bad reputation. Wanjin had always supported free trade and was cracking down on water bandits, so they couldn’t be water bandits themselves. However, they could intercept and forcibly purchase the goods. In any case, they would not allow grain to flow into Ise.
In the end, after all their efforts, the Kitabatake family couldn’t buy much grain even with their money. Only their in-laws and allies, the Rokkaku family, lent them a batch of grains to tide them over. But there was no more. The Rokkaku family was busy fighting Azai Nagamasa, and they themselves didn’t have enough grain.
With the local area suffering from disaster and no significant grain imports from outside, Yuan Ye also came to confront them forcefully. This caused the Kitabatake family’s over six thousand men to begin depleting their resources. Not only that, but they also needed to conscript a large number of rookies and ashigaru to act as transport teams and laborers, carrying their own provisions. This led to the worsening of the disaster in Ise, causing a qualitative change from a quantitative one, finally erupting into famine.
Indeed, A Man also played a part. She actively directed the “Life Preservation Style” to spread rumors in Ise, stating that the Kitabatake family was going to wage a major war this year and would levy two more waves of “military rations rice.” She also imitated fox calls and messages hidden in fish bellies. Based on the stories Yuan Ye used to tell her when he was idle, she instructed her subordinates to perform various acts of sorcery, fearing nothing but chaos.
Originally, some villages were prepared to endure and flee, but after being incited and stirred up by the “Life Preservation Style,” and seeing so many people causing trouble, they also seized the opportunity to rise up. At the very least, they wanted the local lords and even the Kitabatake family to return some grain so they could hold out until the wild vegetables sprouted next spring.
The five counties of the Kitabatake family were in complete chaos. Samurai rushed about suppressing rioters, but as soon as one problem was solved, another arose. Just as they crushed a village in the east, another village in the west began to cause trouble.
Furthermore, a large number of commoners began to band together for “Samurai Hunts.” Since they might not live to see the next spring anyway, they decided to fight the samurai directly, to die together!
After the typhoon season passed, Yuan Ye had done nothing. The samurai of Ise were already embroiled in a fierce conflict with their own people. The number of “uprising groups” continued to grow, and they were completely uncontrollable.
While commoners fighting in open formation were no match for samurai, they were adept at sneak attacks and ambushes due to their familiarity with the local terrain. They even had intricate connections with local samurai and local lords, easily finding insiders. This led to several incidents where they broke into the residences of local warriors and small castles of local lords.
With beacons of fire rising behind them and the proportion of rebellious commoners increasing, the main force of the Kitabatake family, which had been blockading the Wanjin army at Deer Ferry, finally couldn’t hold on. Several transport teams were robbed, each time more brazenly. Even though these “uprising groups” lacked combat strength and didn’t manage to steal much, it was still not a good omen.
Moreover, morale became increasingly unstable. Kitabatake Tomonori was no lunatic like Oda Nobunaga; he had never implemented “separation of farmers and soldiers.” His followers were usually dispersed throughout manors and villages, engaged in farming. Now, with the rear in chaos, they were worried about their homes being plundered and had no desire to remain in this desolate place, confronting the Wanjin people.
The situation for the forcibly conscripted ashigaru was even worse. Their families were starving. Instead of letting them go back to find food, they were being made to prepare for war with the Wanjin people here, digging trenches and building fortifications…
They didn’t dare to mutiny directly, as the samurai and their followers had a military advantage, and they didn’t want to die in vain. However, they could flee.
A large number of ashigaru, and even some followers, began to desert their posts. At first, it was three to five people sneaking away at night. Gradually, it developed into entire units leaving on missions and never returning. There were even instances where low-ranking samurai were surrounded and killed, and their subordinate ashigaru collectively fled.
By late autumn or early winter, the Kitabatake family could no longer sustain themselves. Without fighting a major battle and with few casualties, they could no longer hold on. They completely abandoned the idea of besieging the Wanjin army there, leaving behind the nearly completed defenses, and voluntarily retreated to the Notsuki Castle area to make a stand. Their aim was to free up some troops to clear out the ever-increasing number of “uprising groups.”
After they left, Yuan Ye stopped practicing the “Turtle Divine Skill.” He finally slowly emerged, hitched horses to the mobile fort, and began to sweep the surrounding areas.
He had already established a foothold in Ise. The fruit of Ise had ripened, and it was time for him to reap the rewards.
