Owari Yumeki Golden Day

With a few apprentices and horses laden with ropes and bamboo poles, the surveying team would hit the road the next day. Re-measuring the street lengths actually benefited Kawamura-ya, as the horses were charged according to the distance of the journey.

Re-determining the distance between Tsushima and Komakiyama would be very helpful for Kawamuraya to set the price for horse transport. This is probably one of the reasons why Nobunaga asked Shichibei to take charge of this matter. After all, it was related to the economic interests of Kawamuraya, and Shichibei would not just give up and hand in a random map.

57. Laughing with children for a penny

Fortunately, the winding road from Tsushima to Komakiyama Castle is only 20 to 30 kilometers, which is not a long distance. Owari is not a very large place. Nobunaga set out from Kiyosu Castle at dawn and arrived at Atsuta Shrine before dawn. Just how big is this area?

Even in the middle of summer, it was incredibly hot. The wheat had already been harvested, and once it was stored, Nobunaga would undoubtedly go out and confront Saito Tatsuoki, seeking to bring misfortune upon his beloved nephew.

What Nobunaga never expected was that he himself would run along the street route that Shichibei had planned in advance. Then he saw Shichibei on the roadside, using the Oda family's three-and-a-half-long spear, making clear data corrections on the rope.

If Owari were to be unified, the standards to be used would undoubtedly be those established by Nobunaga. This is not about pleasing the leader, but about following the will of heaven and the people, and assessing the situation.

As expected, when Nobunaga saw Shichibei holding his proud three-and-a-half-length spear, he rode his horse over and tapped Shichibei's forehead with his whip.

You are really serious about your work, and my love for you is not in vain.

Hearing Nobunaga's call, Shichibei finally stood up. Nobunaga dismounted and picked up his own spear. Seeing Shichibei using it as a standard for "rope lengthening", he was very interested and wanted to measure it with Shichibei.

This is called setting an example personally!

"Have you planned the stables along the way?" Nobunaga was easy to get along with when he was in a playful mood.

"Yes!" Shichibei answered of course.

In addition to the main branch in Tsushimacho, Shichibei has established branches in Atsuta and Kiyosu. The Atsuta branch handles business in the Mikawa area, while the Kiyosu branch provides a central hub for all of Owari. The branch at Komakiyama Castle is more than just a branch; it serves as a vital branch for receiving horses from the Takeda clan, selling horses and alfalfa to all of Owari, and supporting Nobunaga's military campaigns.

A branch in Sumata will be established soon.

Of course, this "soon" refers to the time when Nobunaga conquers Mino and becomes its lord, and when travel between Mino and Owari is completely unimpeded. Currently, Sunomata is still at the forefront, making it unsuitable for setting up a stable.

On the northern Ise side, if Nobunaga can break the eight counties of northern Ise and bring them under his command, Shichibei will also choose a suitable relay point for deployment.

When Nobunaga's power became strong enough to subjugate Tokugawa Ieyasu into a de facto retainer, stables were set up in Okazaki and Yoshida in Mikawa, and Hamamatsu and Kakegawa in Totomi.

Wherever Nobunaga's gun points, Shichibei's stable will go there.

"You're good." Nobunaga patted Shichibei's shoulder and praised him sincerely. Shichibei didn't hear anything else.

Apart from anything else, Shichibei's firm belief that Nobunaga would succeed and build a great fortune was enough to make Nobunaga happy and admire him.

"I don't dare to take credit for it." Shichibei didn't have any special feelings. Since he was already here, he might as well just follow along.

You can't just eat cold rice with hot water every day. If you can get ahead one day, you have to have tempura and fried pork chops. Don't be like now, where you have to be stingy with the 1.8 cents for a piece of tofu.

The other morning, while drinking miso soup, Shichibei saw the 1.8-cent tofu and thought to himself, I'm a big boss with thousands of kan of capital, and this is all I end up eating.

What picture?

This life has been lived in vain.

"Okay." Nobunaga smiled, got on his horse, and took a few young men and attendants with him to continue surveying the route from Komakiyama to Tsushima.

You're just saying good things, why don't you give us something? We're sitting here in the hot summer, scorching hot. Give us three or five yuan, and we can find a fellow villager to buy some peaches. Although peaches back then haven't been bred to the size they are today, and they haven't been bred to be incredibly sweet, peaches are still peaches, and I'm craving one now.

Forget it, he bowed 90 degrees and watched Nobunaga leave. Shichibei took out some money and asked the apprentice in the store to run to the nearby village to buy two peaches to eat.

Owari's great thing about it is that it's located on a plain, with ditches dotting the landscape like a spider web. The roads are lined with ditches, some man-made, some naturally formed. They use the water from the ditches to wash their peaches and wash their hands. Shichibei and the others sit by the roadside, eating their peaches and washing their feet.

Wearing straw sandals every day, my feet were covered in dust. But at least it was better than the village kids. They didn't wear shoes, not even shorts in the middle of summer, running around naked, regardless of gender. Before the age of seven, not only was there no gender distinction, but children weren't even considered human. After all, the mortality rate for children under seven was incredibly high, everywhere.

Several village children also sat on the other side of another ditch, holding peaches and munching on them. These days, peaches aren't big, so they're just a snack. Farmers don't take the fruits they grow in the village seriously.

If you go to Guangxi and ask a fellow Guangxian who is farming on the roadside to buy a piece of sugarcane, he will not hesitate to charge you and will just split one and give it to you.

Didn’t Runtu also say that it was perfectly fine for passers-by to pick and eat the melons in the field? The main thing was that he was afraid that badger crickets would eat all the melons at night.

Hey, do the kids in the village have nothing to do right now?

Shichibei asked the child on the other side of the ditch what he was doing. Although Shichibei was unfamiliar, his accent was familiar, which didn't make the child panic or anything. The child chewing the peach asked who Shichibei was, but he didn't know him.

Whether I know you or not is no big deal. Come and help me. How about I give you a Yongle Tongbao?

The summer harvest has already been completed in the village, and the main farm work is spreading the wheat to dry. Before, the children in the village had no free time. All of them were driven to the fields to scare away birds and prevent them from stealing the ripe wheat ears.

During the period before harvest, even if you were a five-year-old child, you had to take a small bamboo pole, tie pine branches or something like that to it, and run around the fields to snatch food from the birds' mouths.

So, there is a proverb in Japan that says poor people have no free time.

I have been busy since I was three or five years old, and I rarely have time to sit down and eat peaches.

When the child heard that Shichibei was going to give him a Yongle Tongbao coin, he was quite interested. Even a child of seven or eight already had a concept of money and a rough idea of ​​its value. When Shichibei explained that he was a horse-carrier in Tsushima Town, he asked what errand he wanted him to run.

You don't have to run. You can take a long bamboo pole, stand in place, tie a rope to the pole, and then find a child to carry the rope and run forward until the rope runs out. That's enough.

It's that simple?

Yes, it's that simple.

After hearing this, the child quickly finished his peach and threw the core into the ditch, attracting several small fish. Then he turned around and went to the village naked to call his friends.

Soon, a dozen or so children, both young and old, came running over. These days, there are no elderly people in the village, so there are only a lot of children. Farmers, after all, strive to have more children; increasing the family labor force means increasing the ability to withstand risks.

Get to work, get to work, or else they say kids are just full of energy. Shichibei was running like crazy, and the other kids were having so much fun, I don't know what the fun of running was.

By the evening, the progress of today's work had greatly improved, and I had completed several kilometers in one breath.

Qibingwei kept his promise and gave each of the children a Yongle Tongbao. He also asked the older child who led the group, "If you are free tomorrow, call all your friends to come to me, and I will give you another Yongle Tongbao."

By the way, I secretly gave the older kid some extra money as an agency fee.

The little boy clutched a Yongle Tongbao coin in each hand and ran happily with his friends for three kilometers back home, chattering away. It was truly an energetic experience. He even looked back as he ran. An adult like Shichibei, who kept his promise, should have a somewhat positive image in their eyes.

After sending the children away, Shichibei looked through the detailed data. Since there was suddenly enough manpower, the book even included the length of each village in detail.

It's a good thing...

Maybe it will be useful in future land inspections.

Never mind. I’m not a prosecutor, so this has nothing to do with me.

The next day, Xiaohaige and his dozen or so friends were already waiting for Shichibei by the ditch. What a shame! Shichibei wanted to ask Xiaohaige if he had a name, but he didn't. Japanese also has words like "hei" and "yo" to indicate mood. Xiaohaige wasn't the eldest son in the family, so he hadn't even been called "dalang" (big brother). So, he was still called "hei" by everyone.

Forget it, just call you Yu Xun. Qibingwei was about to give the little brother a name, but when he thought about the two characters that were too unfamiliar to the little brother, he was afraid that the little brother would not recognize it even if he called him, so he kept his mouth shut.

Come on, come on, let’s get to work.

The task was not difficult, but it was troublesome. After writing down the route one by one, he worked for another three days and finally completed the task. Shichibei worked all night to draw a route map to be submitted to Oda Nobunaga, and before he knew it, it was already late at night.

He got up to drink some water, only to find it had already gone cold. He gulped down a cup, and then a thought occurred to him: could he set up a flying kick system within the territory to facilitate the flow of information?

We didn't need to look for adults, so we could find kids. Of course, the kids in front of us were still a little young. They were limited to twelve years old, and around seventeen or eighteen, specializing in flying kicks. They were cheap, and there was no guarantee we could find a few more available for Kawamura-ya.

The hikyaku industry flourished during the Edo period for two reasons: the financial and manufacturing centers were in Osaka, while the political and consumer centers were in Edo. To facilitate remittance transactions and strengthen financial ties between the two regions, hikyaku were required to communicate the previous week's account books between the two locations within a week.

Another reason was that Edo, as the seat of the shogunate, was home not only to the 80,000 hatamoto but also to 200,000 to 300,000 samurai from across the country. These samurai, who came to Edo to serve as daimyo, would spend a year in Edo, and naturally needed to stay in touch with their families back home during that time.

The hikyaku industry, centered in Edo, naturally flourished greatly, and a hikyaku network was established to major regions throughout Japan.

Why not use horses?

Horses are certainly faster for short distances, but honestly, humans are more practical for long distances. After all, when it comes to heat dissipation, horses and cattle can't compare to humans. Plus, if a horse or cattle dies, it's a huge loss. But if a human dies? We can just hire someone else.

In Owari right now, there's actually no real need for flying kicks. But it's the same principle as when Shichibei started building a stable. If you wait until the industry is mature before jumping in, you'd be like a fool trying to catch the pig in the trough.

The person who blows up the pig will happily use your money to seize the next opportunity, make money and earn more than you can imagine in your lifetime.

Although Nobunaga only controlled Owari, he would eventually control nearly twenty kingdoms. Hideyoshi, who followed him, would unify Japan. At that point, he would need flying kyaku, and not just one or two, but thousands or tens of thousands. From Azuchi Castle, Osaka Castle, and Fushimi Castle, he would radiate across Japan.

Furthermore, Shichibei had an advantage: he would gradually set up stables at key street and town nodes. Therefore, if necessary, he could expand into a long house to accommodate overnight hikage.

Even letting Feijiao sleep in a barn or a straw shed at first wouldn't be a problem. After all, since they're working as Feijiao, their living environment might not be better than a cowshed or a horse stable.

If he started working as a hikage now, he probably wouldn't have much business, as it would require continuous investment. However, to support a hikage, five kan of cash and one shi of rice a year would be enough. Shichibei could still afford to support dozens of hikage.

Once the core of the Owari samurai corps began to follow Nobunaga to Inabayama Castle and then Azuchi Castle, the hikyaku business would surely increase. Once Toyotomi Hideyoshi commanded dozens of daimyo to serve him year-round in Osaka Castle or Fushimi Castle, along with the tens of thousands of samurai who followed them, the business would expand significantly.

You can do it!

With a firm resolve in his heart, Shichibei lay back on the couch, still thinking that this plan could be slowly implemented. Initially, they should select the local Hikyaku from Owari. Once they had all the people out, they could slowly use them as the backbone, branching out into branches and gradually growing a larger tree.

Fortunately, Shichibei wasn't new. I was just starting out with Kinoshita Hideyoshi at the time, and we were in Sunomata. Do you know Sunomata? Together with Hideyoshi, we fought against Saito Ryuoki, who numbered over 7,000 men.

Hideyoshi was in charge of chopping, and I was in charge of shouting.

He had seen all sorts of big scenes, so this little one wouldn't cause him to lose sleep. After he had a good sleep, he rolled up the blueprint, mounted his horse, and hurried back to Komakiyama Castle to present it to Nobunaga.

Due to Nobunaga's order, Shichibei no longer had to wait in line at the gate for notification. He could now go to the palace inside Komakiyama Castle to wait for an audience, greatly reducing the waiting time.

Nobunaga first went to Tsushima Town, then to Atsuta Town. Unsurprisingly, he was preparing for the imposition of a temporary business tax called "yazen" this year. He would collect a small amount of this temporary tax and then attack Saito Tatsuoki.

At this moment, Nobunaga was discussing the issue of sending troops with several important ministers. Because it was not only necessary to mobilize the regular troops, but also the people under his jurisdiction, he needed to discuss it with the important ministers.

When Shichibei entered, he even greeted the elders of the important families. They were all from the old Owari family, and everyone nodded to Shichibei.

After returning to the room, Nobunaga was presented with a route map. He first looked at it intently, comparing it with his own impression of the route map. After taking a quick look, Nobunaga asked Shichibei.

"How much does it cost for you to take charge of this matter?"

58. Entrust you with the post of Haidong Commandery (named by Guo Mou)

My hen...

No, brother, I work in passenger and freight transport and horse breeding. What makes you think I know how to compile a road project budget? Budgeting is something that only a pure civil engineering intern can handle, or a veteran with more than ten years of experience can handle with extreme caution. Who am I?

When Shichibei said that he didn't know how much money it cost, both Nobunaga, who had been quite casual just now, and the young man kneeling behind him with a sword in his hand, were stunned.

"Hahahahaha..."

Nobunaga laughed heartily, very wildly.

It was obvious that it had been some time since he had heard such an answer from his retainers. Even if others knew it, they would at least come up with an excuse. But Shichibei was a bachelor, so he just said, "I don't know how to do it."

"I am terrified." I really can't do that. Shichibei wouldn't dare to make such a boast.

If we quote a price and Nobunaga thinks the price for the general contracting is good and directly awards the bid to Shichibei, what will Shichibei do?

It's not just a question of whether the costs can be covered or whether there's profit. Shichibei doesn't even have the manpower to act as a general contractor. Even with nine retainers in our family, even if we whip them like spinning tops, there's no way we can complete a 30-kilometer standard village road within the specified timeframe.

It is impossible for nine managers to manage thousands of illiterate migrant workers.

Besides, if all nine managers were in place, what would happen to our business? Would Kawamuraya be abandoned? My stepfather would have run back home even if Matsudaira Motoyasu's father had shot him, just to maintain the Kawamuraya family business.

If another four hundred years had passed and a subcontractor could have been found, Shichibei would have accepted the job. Unfortunately, we can't find a subcontractor right now, so even if we have the connections and qualifications, it's useless.

"Isn't your post station built very well?" Nobunaga probably hasn't come to terms with it yet. He had previously asked Shichibei to build the post station and the stable, and he did a very good job.

"The main reason is that I don't have many subordinates." Shichibei didn't pretend and told the truth.

You see, just now Shichibei told the truth, and Nobunaga didn't blame him. As long as you don't deceive or lie to Nobunaga, Nobunaga probably won't be angry.

"Oh..." Nobunaga understood now.

Last time, Niwa Nagahide was assigned to build the main streets from Komakiyama to Inuyama and from Inuyama to Nakanohide, and Niwa Nagahide could take on this task very easily.

The peasants who were required to serve in the general service were dispatched by the magistrates, while the project management was handled by the samurai families of the Niwa clan. There was a county in Owari called Niwa County, so it's easy to understand what kind of power the Niwa clan was.

Even Nobunaga didn't know the exact extent of their territory, as the Niwa family had defected from their position as retainers of the Sasaki clan to the Oda clan. They were already one of the wealthy locals in Owari, and their joining the Oda clan was more like a small shareholder.

According to Shichibei's estimate, Niwa Nagahide should have a current arsenal of 30,000 to 50,000 koku. He had at least 40 or 50 retainers, and 200 to 300 foot soldiers and other subordinates.

With such a sufficient management team, Niwa Nagahide was certainly able to take on the bid as the general contractor.

"My lord is wise." Okay, now that you understand, then Shichibei is ready to kowtow and leave.

You can go to Niwa Nagahide for the road construction matter. Sakuma Nobumori is also a good choice. They are both small shareholders of the Oda Group and have their own teams.

"Why don't you try to summon Baoie and recruit retainers?" For some reason, Nobunaga's brain didn't seem to be working very well today.

"Your Highness, the Kawamura family only has 260 kan." Shichibei scratched his head and reminded Nobunaga.

"Ah, this..." Nobunaga clapped his hands.

Indeed, the retainers he had just discussed the attack on Mino were all influential and influential officials. Sakuma Nobumori and Shibata Katsuie were both quite powerful. While not as powerful as the hereditary retainers of the former shugo daimyo, they were already prominent members of the Oda clan.

Therefore, Nobunaga also considered the seven soldiers who kowtowed before him as important officials above the rank of Samurai General. Samurai Generals, such as the newly appointed Kinoshita Hideyoshi, were given 500 kan of shogunate. This shogunate was not much, but at least it could support 20 or so retainers.

In a sense, Shichibei was probably the samurai with the lowest salary who served Nobunaga directly at this stage.

"You come from a royal merchant family, so you know what to do." Nobunaga muttered.

Shichibei wasn't a samurai, he didn't wield a sword or spear into battle, he couldn't chop off anyone's head, so how could the people convince Shichibei to be a magistrate? Just like when Nobunaga gave Shichibei money to build the castle, no one objected. Because Shichibei came from the old Owari inner circle, and secondly, because he was given money, there was no objection.

If we add Zhixing to Shichibei, we'll see if anyone objects.