Chapter 9   Shikoku, Mikawa

The Portuguese traders finally arrived in Hizen in the winter of 1543. As the "Ashigaru Clan", we gladly accepted the deal. The trading post in Owari started next Spring, and two churchs under construction as well (we only had two free large castles). We later on depleted our koku to erect another 2 large castles.

The campaign of Shikoku went well. The backup troops did the cleaning before the arrival of lord Oda Nobuhide. We received no resistance in Iyo (1543 winter), Sanuki (1544 spring) and Awa (1544 summer). The only two battles were in Tosa (1544 summer) and Awaji (1544 winter).

On the other hand, as the preparation of our eastern campaign, we invaded the defenseless Imagawa river province of Mikawa (Spring, 1544). The enemy retreated into the castle. Mikawa is much easier to defend than Owari as there is only one bridge to cross. The general in charge was Kanamori Nagachika (rank 3 as he appeared in Kii, a monk general!). You can see more information of him here.

Summer 1544

Rank 0

Iyo and Sanuki had surrendered, and Tosa is as usual occupied by a large number of ronins. Yeah you should recall, Chosokobe, rank 5. However, to our disappointment he was not there.

The enemy had 900 men, we 652. They chose the hill at the center for the base. This hill could be accessed from the other end (right), however, it would be a long way marching up, and as long as the enemy moved up to the top of the hill, all our efforts in vain. As a result we picked the slightly lower hill on the left, while there is a reasonable passage between the two that does not require a lot of climbing.

Soon we started the archery duel. The inexperienced enemy Taisho bravely charged down the slope, and soon got surrounded by all of our yari units and monks. Our fighters chased after him, and started a massacre because many his units refused to flee in the first place.

Blocking the enemies' way of return, we started a large-scale massacre. Two-third of the enemy was killed. One Ashigaru unit took 141 heads from the enemy (the record was 246 in Buzen, summer 1939). Ashigaru really rocks sometimes.

Summer 1544

Yoshimoto's Confidence

Now lets go to the east. The same time as Lord Oda Nobuhide celebrates his easy victory in Tosa, Lord Imagawa launched a total attack of Mikawa, 2838 men from Shinano. As we had prepared the defense, a well-balanced 943 men army is waiting for them in Mikawa.

We first drew the units far enough from the bridge, so we do not receive any archery fires from the enemy. Also we ask most of the archers to hold their fires, mostly 2 units firing at the same time. This way, we hopefully would have enough arrows to last till the end of the battle.

As happned in history, Lord Imagawa Yoshimoto was very confident in his military power. He soon launched an attack on his own, charging into our bronze-shielded Naginata. Immediately, our Taisho Kanamori Nagachika ordered a fire-at-will to all archery units, and all yari units run forward to intercept him.

Unfortunately, the rank 4 Yoshimoto ran fast - or it is because our Yari troops were too far away at this moment. Seeing the daimyo running through the bridge, we pulled back all units to avoid enemy arrows. We also now emplyed the Yari units a little more to the flanks, so we could cut-off the retreating route of routing enemy if needed.

Lord Imagawa Yoshimoto was not a good learner. Soon he charged again, and this time we didn't let him go. All of the Yaris started moving when he was still on the bridge, and as soon as he crossed and charged towards our Naginatas, his way home was completely blocked. He is now welcomed by our entire army.

Needless to say, his head added to our collection in the throne room. As the daimyo got killed, all his army routed and we started a full charge over the bridge.

Losing some units due to the enemies' reinforcement, we still received a full victory. Lord Imagawa is dead, and we had killed his son Ujizane a few years ago. So...

No it can't be Hojo, his ally!

Well, his another ally the Takeda clan took over. All of the remaining 3 provinces of Imagawa went into the pocket of Takeda Nobutora. Now the Takeda clan is as large as Hojo!

And Clan Takeda attacked Mikawa right in the next season, drawing all available men from Shinano (1440 this time - although we only killed 380 on the battlefield, many routed soldiers went into the Mikawa castle and probably perished due to the limited castle capacity).

Autumn 1544

Using exactly the same tactics, we defeated Takeda and killed their rank-0 general. This time, there were quite a few archers standing still in the opposite side of the river, so we waited for a longer time till they all left their positions and came to the bridge. The Takeda clan was smarter and stopped attacking us. In the next season he moved all his great troops and generals (yes, including rank 6 Takeda Shingen) to Shinano and started its expansion to the north.

Winter 1544

Monks rush

In the next season, Oda Nobuhide attacked Awaji, the last south-west province not yellow! The local army, numbered only 300, was easily crashed by our elite force of 513. The enemy lied against the steep cliff to gain some height advantage. However, their formation was instantly broken as our monks rushed towards them.

WIth few losses, we conqurered Awaji easily.

Did't want to waste time waiting, we assaulted the large castle of Awaji the coming spring. The enemy had quite a few archers, but we finished them finally.

Now, lord Oda has arrived the east front through the sea. Needless to say our next target would be Uesugi's Hida, Takeda's Shinano and Totomi. We might need more yaris to counter the massive calvary of Takeda - the famous armoury in Mino has  completed for a while!

The harvest in 1543 and 1544 were both normal. However, the peasants were unhappy for our switch to the new religion with cowardy weapons. We had a lot of shinobis ready, but still lowered the tax to minimum. The troops that we generate was not much, making the total army force of 4400.

So here comes the horde of Oda! Notice that Uesugi has taken back Dewa from Hojo, and Takeda got Echu from the ronins supposedly revolted against lord Imagawa.

We have half of Japan. 1945 spring, extactly 15 years after Nobuhide's marginal victory in Ise.