Owari Yumeki Golden Day.

Within the framework of the Muromachi Shogunate, Nobunaga wasn't even the governor of Owari Province; at most, he was nominally the deputy governor of Owari. Ashikaga Yoshiaki only designated Nobunaga as an outsider. Mitsuhide, on the other hand, was a gokenin (retainer of the royal family), a legitimate public servant, and even the head of the public servants. Within the old system, Mitsuhide's political status was slightly higher than Nobunaga's.

One was a member of the Eight Banners and a powerful official in the capital. Although he was a fifth-rank official, he was still better than a fourth-rank prefect who was a Han Chinese from outside the capital.

"Jubei, here's four thousand kan. Come and serve me." Nobunaga waved his hand, not caring about such nonsense, and using the method most in line with his personality.

Throw money!

Money talks!

Mitsuhide Akechi, who had already slowed his horse and was preparing to dismount, almost stumbled. His companion, Fujitaka Hosokawa, was equally incredulous; who would throw out a winning hand right off the bat, offering 4,000 kan of cash?

It should be noted that Akechi Mitsuhide's stipend was with the Asakura family, and his salary was a mere one hundred kan. He had to support a large family and maintain the dignity of a retainer of the shogunate; one hundred kan was truly a meager amount. Moreover, he only received it last year; before that, he had been constantly on the run.

"Please allow me to refuse." Mitsuhide Akechi's answer was even more unexpected.

"Is it too little?" Nobunaga walked up to Mitsuhide, who was kneeling on one knee. Judging from his tone, he was genuinely willing to add more.

“To abandon a lord in distress is disloyalty, to covet a generous stipend is unjust, and to readily believe others’ promises is unwise. Do you really want a subordinate who is disloyal, unjust, and unwise?” Mitsuhide spoke very directly, and even shifted the blame back to Nobunaga.

"Hahahaha... You're very good, you're really good." Nobunaga wasn't annoyed at all. He grabbed Mitsuhide and practically linked arms with him as they walked back.

Shichibei saw it clearly: Nobunaga genuinely admired Mitsuhide. Moreover, Mitsuhide's performance just now clearly demonstrated his unparalleled loyalty and righteousness, so Nobunaga's last remaining doubts should have dissipated.

101. A breakthrough has been achieved in Kita-Ise.

It is said that Nobunaga and Mitsuhide slept in the same bed last night, probably mainly to chat, since Akechi Mitsuhide is indeed very talented. Asakura Kageyuki also publicly praised this, saying that Mitsuhide could anticipate the enemy's moves and was a wise general with exceptional intelligence.

The next day, Nobunaga personally rode his horse and escorted the two of them all the way to Inuyama. After crossing the pontoon bridge over the Kiso River, they returned to Komakiyama.

Perhaps this is true love.

Shichibei wasn't in charge of reception or catering; he was directing the demolition of the Kawamura-ya branch shop below Komakiyama Castle. The timber was being sent to Gifu Castle to expand the Gifu branch shop. After the shop was demolished, they would stay in a tent for a day, pack up, and head to Tsushima.

Nobunaga, accompanied by dozens of attendants and laden with bags and bundles, rode swiftly to Gifu. The Sakuma residence was demolished; the Komakiyama castle town, which had once housed tens of thousands of people, was now completely razed, leaving only a blank expanse.

Nobunaga had previously granted us a piece of undeveloped land near the castle to use as a horse racing track, but now we've returned it all to him. We're waiting to find another horse racing track near Gifu Castle.

"Hanbei, you've gotten quite tanned." On the way back to Tsushima, we spotted Takenaka Hanbei washing his feet in a ditch.

"Is the relocation of Komakiyama over?" Takenaka's legs were both in the ditch, and he was rubbing them from side to side.

“It just ended yesterday. I asked Goro Saeya to build a house for you outside the castle.” Shichibei gestured for the others to continue towards Tsushima, while he stayed behind to talk with Takenaka.

The Takenaka family was, after all, a wealthy household with a fortune of 8,000 koku, and held a place within the Oda clan. It was essential to have a residence near Gifu Castle; if he and Shichibei went to war, the Takenaka family's family members and children would have to remain in their residence in Gifu Castle.

It can be understood as hostages or protection, depending on which aspect you analyze it from.

Only the three men from Mino, with their large and powerful families, were able to avoid relocating their main relatives to Gifu; they only needed to hand over hostages. Within a few years, the local tyrants of Mino would be forced into complete vassalage by Nobunaga, gradually losing direct ties with their territories.

Oh, right, Nobunaga hasn't issued the "retainers gathering" edict yet.

Only Nobunaga's personal retainers, pageboys, and stationary foot soldiers permanently resided in the castle; many other local lords remained in their respective domains. However, this collective departure of Owari's main local lords to Gifu to serve in the government may be the beginning of a system where retainers resided in concentrated numbers. If the implementation proves effective, Nobunaga may extend it throughout his entire domain.

"Is the Oda family so wealthy?" Takenaka Hanbei was a relatively old-fashioned samurai. He studied military strategy and spear techniques and was good at planning strategies, but he was somewhat lacking in the management of his territory.

To put it simply, when land becomes abundant to a certain extent, landowners will focus all their wisdom and main energy on gaining political power. In fact, this is a two-way street; only by possessing the corresponding power can one hold onto vast tracts of land.

Therefore, large landowners neither had much nor the energy to manage their territories or innovate agriculture. They were always busy in the court or on the battlefield.

On the contrary, the rich peasants had a strong desire to become even wealthier. They couldn't touch the power, but they could see with their own eyes the wealth that their hundred or so acres of land could bring.

This group of people is often the main force in rural development and a strong advocate for agricultural technology innovation and farmland irrigation.

This statement has a touch of 18th-century French Physiocratism, but it is relevant to the current era.

The vast majority of lords and samurai adopted a sustainable, exploitative policy, making it difficult for them to develop abundant sources of wealth. Naturally, they could not do what Nobunaga did: on the one hand, communicate with Ashikaga Yoshiaki to transfer power to the imperial court; on the other hand, move the capital to Gifu and carry out large-scale construction; and on the other hand, improve the streets within their domain to prepare for the next year's conquest.

What a wealthy and powerful company!

Takenaka Hanbei, unable to comprehend such extravagant spending, naturally had his doubts. His former lord, Isshiki Yoshitatsu, was also a formidable ruler, conquering far and wide, but none had ever displayed such lavishness as Nobunaga.

Mino was also a large country, and the Kiso River area was a very fertile agricultural region, no less so than Owari. Ōgaki was also a crucial port for entering and exiting the sea route within the Kinai region, and after a customs post was established there, it became incredibly profitable.

So why did Nobunaga end up so rich, while Saito became poorer and poorer as the war went on?

“Even the hardest work in the fields has its limits, but prosperous trade and the flow of people can bring greater possibilities.” Shichibei originally wanted to explain, but then he thought that it would be too long to explain, so he decided to just show off in front of Takenaka.

"Hmm?" Takenaka Hanbei put on his straw sandals and seemed to be deep in thought.

"How is the construction of the post stations in Iwakura and Katsuhata progressing?" Official business is more important; Nobunaga may attack the northern region at any time.

"It's all in progress." Takenaka was very attentive when talking about business and replied immediately.

Needless to say, Iwakura Castle was captured and burned by Nobunaga. Katsuhata Castle, on the other hand, was deliberately abandoned, since Tsushima had already completely fallen into the hands of the Oda clan, and there was no longer any need to set up Katsuhata Castle to exert pressure on Tsushima.

Fortresses chosen for construction by our ancestors were either strategically located mountain fortresses or key transportation routes. Clearly, on the Owari Plain, these former castles were situated along such routes. Now, utilizing the existing castle foundations to establish post stations can even be used to strengthen military fortifications in the event of future warfare.

Looking at the street beneath your feet, in a typical daimyo's area, street maintenance mainly involves "leveling" the road. Potholes are filled in, and if there aren't any, you can just walk across them, as long as it looks like a proper road.

However, if you want to prepare carefully, the first thing he does is dig a trench.

Why dig ditches? To clearly define road boundaries. This isn't meant to belittle any farmers, but this phenomenon does exist in many rural areas. Even outside paved roads (cement or asphalt), there's often a half-meter to a-meter-wide patch of muddy ground. Those who follow the rules won't touch it, but those who don't will start planting vegetables, or even wheat, in it.

Even worse, some would nail iron nails into the wooden strips and then stick the strips into the ground that should have been the roadbed, so that passing vehicles wouldn't dare to run over their "ground".

There are also the most despicable types; they'll dig up five centimeters of cement road one day, ten centimeters the next. Eventually, they'll turn a two-lane road into a single lane.

Would someone be beheaded for something like this? Impossible.

The final result is mostly leniency, because grassroots governance has long since collapsed, and everyone just muddles through.

The same applies in Japan; if the roadbed isn't properly protected, someone might dare to dig it up. Therefore, it's essential to dig ditches on both sides of the road to clearly define its boundaries.

The excavated soil is used to raise the roadbed. Sigh, it feels like saying this is mindlessly slandering farmers, but in the countryside, even a piece of mud can be fought over.

It's true that some people go out in the middle of the night to dig up roadbeds and haul the mud into their own land to raise their own foundations. The reason is simple: in the same village, some land is on higher ground and some is on lower ground. Higher ground has better drainage, making it easier to grow most crops. Lower ground floods when it rains, and nothing can survive there.

Even when growing rice, it's not necessary to keep it submerged in water all the time; if rice is soaked for too long, its roots will rot.

So some people steal mud and spread it on their own land to raise the foundation of their fields. When it rains, the water flows downhill, flooding other people's land.

In the future, to prevent people from stealing mud from the roads, Okubo Nagayasu would set up a ri-zukuri (a mound of earth) next to the road, which would serve as both a road mileage marker and a measuring target.

The so-called "one-mile mound" was simply an earthen platform, upon which trees were planted to stabilize it. The distance from the tree roots to the road surface should be 1.7 meters. When officials patrolled the streets on horseback, they ensured that the road surface was more than 1.7 meters above the tree roots, and no local farmer could escape their notice.

After turning up the soil from the ditch to raise the roadbed, it is necessary to use horses to pull stone rollers to continuously compact the ground, so that the ground will not become a mud pit after just a few steps.

To be honest, Japan's stonemasonry technology is really poor. On the neighboring mainland, wheat flour has become a staple food in the north. The main reason is the development of stonemasonry technology, which allows for the production of a large number of stone mills.

While Japan also grows wheat, they primarily consume it for rice. Some areas don't even grow wheat, opting instead for crops like beans, buckwheat, sesame, and barnyard grass. The main reason is that these crops cannot be processed into flour for making pastries.

Some might ask, what about those sweets made with Japanese glutinous rice? Well, you steam the glutinous rice until it's cooked, then pound it into a ball.

Another, even more laborious method, involves pounding the rice in a stone mortar and pestle, grinding it into rice flour. This method is far more strenuous and rarely seen.

Therefore, Takenaka Hanbei doesn't use a stone mill to grind the ground now; he uses logs. A cleaned log can also be used to grind the ground, but it needs to be ground back and forth several times, more often than with a stone mill.

Logically, between the existing road surface and the newly paved road surface, there should actually be another layer of shaped stones and a layer of gravel. This is to facilitate drainage from the road to the ditches on both sides. Kinoshita Hideyoshi had paved roads in this way when he was conquering western Japan.

The effect was so great that it allowed him to seize the world.

Because when Akechi Mitsuhide launched the Honnoji Incident, Japan was in the rainy season. Mitsuhide, after all, wrote a famous waka poem with Satomura Shōba.

"At this time, the drizzle is falling on the May day (时は金あめが下しる月かな)"

Mitsuhide was clearly certain that it had been raining every day for those few days, almost nonstop. This led him to conclude that even if Hideyoshi returned, he couldn't possibly arrive so quickly on such a muddy road.

Who knew that Kinoshita Hideyoshi, in order to welcome Oda Nobutada to the western provinces and reap the great reward of destroying the Mori clan, meticulously prepared the streets so that Oda Nobutada could walk steadily.

As it turned out, Oda Nobutada didn't need to use it; he used it himself. The road from Himeji to Settsu not only didn't collapse due to prolonged rain, but it wasn't even severely flooded, allowing for quick passage.

Isn't it a coincidence? Sometimes success is simply a result of countless coincidences coming together.

Unfortunately, Owari is not a source of stone, and there wasn't enough crushed stone to pave the roadbed, so this step was skipped. At worst, when the road started to have problems in a few years, they could just ask Nobunaga for funding to continue repairs.

Nobunaga knew that the streets of Owari were not reinforced with cobblestones, and he had a good idea of ​​how many years they would last. He didn't think that Shichibei had done a shoddy job.

"Are there enough horses to pull the millstone?" Shichibei inspected the quality of the road and then got down with his shovel to dig.

"Of course, the more the better." Takenaka Hanbei wasn't afraid of inspections; he always did things honestly. If he cut corners as soon as he joined the Oda clan, it meant he suspected Nobunaga's sword wasn't sharp enough.

"Alright, I'll allocate it to you tomorrow." With one shovelful, the road surface was compacted, and Shichibei was very satisfied.

The two were standing by the roadside discussing when someone ran past them. After a short while, the person turned back, looked at Shichibei, and suddenly knelt down on one knee.

Huh? Who are you?

The visitor claimed to be a subordinate of Takigawa Kazumasu, who had gone to Komakiyama to find Shichibei, but unexpectedly found Shichibei on the way.

Upon hearing this, Shichibei gestured for him to stop talking. Some things were still confidential and not suitable to be discussed. Shichibei waved to Takenaka Hanbei, indicating they would talk later, and then followed the man back to Tsushima.

He galloped back to Tsushima, where Takigawa Kazumasu was already waiting at Kawamura-ya. The two exchanged a glance and immediately knew they had important matters to discuss.

After sitting down in the inner room and confirming that no one was around, Takikawa Kazumasu expressed his wish that Shichibei immediately give him 1,000 kan, as he had a useful tool for him. Moreover, he could hold a hostage at Kawamura-ya, guaranteed to be a legitimate hostage with a name and surname.

Shichibei certainly had 1,000 kan, but who was Takigawa Kazumasu trying to bribe? As someone who was jointly responsible for the northern Ise campaign with Takigawa Kazumasu, Shichibei needed to know where the money went.

Wooden furniture policy!

Wow! This is the head of the prestigious Kitabatake family, a renowned woodworking clan in the north, and he comes from an extraordinary background, being from the Kitabatake clan, one of the three great states of the Sengoku period. His elder brother is Kitabatake Tomokyo, the head of the Kitabatake clan known as the Sword Master of the State.

"Alright," Shichibei immediately agreed, "but we still need to send someone. It's not safe to hand over a substantial sum of 1,000 kan directly to Takigawa Kazumasu. Let a retainer from the Kawamura family carry it and hand it over directly to Mokuzuki Tomomasa. Even if we lose it in the future, we can get reimbursed by Nobunaga."

What about the hostages? Where are they?

Takigawa Kazumasu stated that the hostage was in Kanie Castle and could be sent to Shichibei immediately. He was a member of the Kizuki family and the third son of the previous Kizuki Toshishige.

The two agreed that Shichibei would go to exchange the gold, and Takigawa Kazumasu would go to fetch the man.

Previously, we planned to give Nobunaga 5,000 kan in cash, but when transferring it within Owari Province, Shichibei didn't exchange it for gold; it was all copper coins. Now that we're sending it to northern Ise, 1,000 kan is too heavy and bulky to transfer easily, so we have to use gold.

A thousand strings of gold can be carried on the back of a strong man.

The next day, Takigawa Kazumasu also brought people, but strangely, they weren't samurai. Just like before, when Ando Uemon came to Owari in place of his father, Ando Mamoru, such insider matters had to be handled by trusted samurai.

But today's visitor was a monk, quite young, almost like a greenhorn. Takigawa Kazumasu guessed Shichibei's confusion and quietly explained that since their family had adopted Kizuki Tomomasa as their heir, the legitimate son would have to become a monk.

Makes sense.

May I ask for the Dharma name of this eminent monk?

The source is pure and the master is mysterious.

102. The letter intends to enter the Northern Territory.