STW War Story VI One of the Horde

Long time no see, noble lords of Hojo! This is Miyoshi Tadayoshi, your humble narrator of the war story.

I am honored to announce the result of the spring 1540 clan meeting (wow feels like ages ago) here: my proposal of attacking Echizen and Hida was approved!

However, this leads to the sad news that Hojo Ujisuna, our clan daimyo has decided to resume dictatorship. There will be no more clan meetings, because his own opinions were overruled in every clan meeting so far. This frustration has built up to a level that he cannot afford to lose more face.  

Yet, I will still update the war story, just not as frequently as before.

Spring 1540

If you recall, in the previous year we have made two successful counter strike to Oda's Mino and Owari, plus totally defeated Oda in the defense of Mino. As a result, now Oda is greatly weakened and we can focus on the ronins in the back. The Kaga castle is falling this season, so I left just a small number of army to continue the siege. My men marched in Echizen first with a large numerical advantage - and the rebels retreated to Hida.

Summer 1540

Hida Hojo 1026 Miyoshi Tadayoshi (R4) Ronin 653 Ichijo Masaie (R0) So the attack of Hida was launched right in the next season, right after the Kaga castle fell under our siege! Our clan has utilized almost all armies available at this moment from Etchu, Shinano, Mino, and Echizen. Our size reached 1000! It is a great honor of me to command such a large army. General Ota Yasusuke (R2) also joined the battle.

It was quite a foggy summer morning. I decided to march my men from the right to avoid a height disadvantage. Soon, we sited enemy ashigaru in the forest!

Our men expelled the enemy with very little difficulty. However, the enemy monks of Echizen has been approaching from the left! I soon asked the archers to run to their position and shoot!

The enemy monks suffered great losses - but they rushed towards our center, where we have three groups of yari samurai and Ota Yasusuke's archers...

The enemy monks, numbered 137 in total, arrived as a formidable wave of terror. Our men had a lot of difficulty stopping them! Also, these fierce Echizen monks (H3) fought nicely even if surrounded by our soldiers. Soon I received the bad news: General Ota Yasusuke was killed in the melee! To revenge for him, I asked all the archers and yari ashigaru on the left flank to join the battle at the center!

On the right, one unit of YS and two YA (including myself) is chasing down an enemy yari ashigaru under the fire of enemy archers. We need more reinforcement from the center and left - so how much longer will these monks last?

Our entire left flank has arrived! It was unbelievable that the enemy warrior monks were still fighting even if they were cut down to one digit... However, they were eliminated finally.

As our entire army can now concentrate on the enemy, the ronin ashigaru and archers have decided to march away from the forest, probably trying to grab the mountain across the valley. But we won't allow them to do so! Our peasants pursue right after!

With our superior speed, the enemy taisho was caught right in the bottom of the valley. Not long after he decided to flee!

I was chasing the enemy taisho personally all the way from the bottom...! But he runs slightly faster than me.

We routed the last group of enemy archers quite easily... that concludes the battle of Hida. We suffered heavy losses by the enemy monks, but had little difficulty defeating the rest. The routed enemy were forced to disband as there was no place to run...

So now we don't have to worry our back. Spring 1541, the Hojo clan is ready to face the Oda again!

Although I successfully fulfilled the mission, general Ota Yasusuke was killed under my command! I feel very bad about this. As I have announced, no more public meeting from now on. However, the future objective is obvious. We shall expand to the west and destroy Oda first! So which province should we attack first, Wakasa or Omi?