Japan's Warring States Period: The Rise of the Wakasa Tiger

Fortunately, with the help of Hatano Hidetada and Rokkaku Sadanori, and Yoshishige's personal visit and generous gifts, Hosokawa Harumoto was able to let down his guard a little.

However, during the conversation with Yoshishige, he still reminded Yoshishige that "a tree that stands out in the forest will be destroyed by the wind." Times are different now. The Takeda clan is now a big tree that attracts the wind. From now on, every step must be taken with extreme caution. They must handle the relationship with the surrounding forces well. It is not advisable to continue to use force against foreign countries and fall into the quagmire of militarism and the danger of making enemies on all sides.

On the surface, Yoshishige nodded repeatedly, expressing his gratitude for Hosokawa Harumoto's "kind" reminder, and promised to maintain good relations with the surrounding forces and not make things difficult for Hosokawa Harumoto.

However, through conversations and visits in Kyoto during this period, he roughly knew the real reason why Hosokawa Harumoto said this.

It turned out that the Kinki area was not peaceful during the period before and after the New Year, especially after Miyoshi Toshinaga became the lord of Settsu Koshisui Castle. Hosokawa Harumoto discovered that this guy was not honest and was always making moves in secret.

Last year, after Yoshishige's mediation, Miyoshi Tosinaga announced the withdrawal of his troops, and Hosokawa Harumoto also took the opportunity to show goodwill. Not only did he hand over Koshimizu Castle to him, but at the end of that year he formally requested Ashikaga Yoshiharu to appoint him as the guardian of Settsu, allowing him to legitimately issue orders to the powerful families and people in various parts of Settsu. This appointment unexpectedly led to the expansion of his power.

In order to further win over Miyoshi Toshinaga, Hosokawa Harumoto decided to marry the daughter of another important minister, Miyoshi Masanaga, to him as his principal wife. Hosokawa Harumoto did this in order to ease the conflict between Miyoshi Toshinaga and Miyoshi Masanaga and make them better for his own use.

But Miyoshi Toshinaga did not stop there. He first changed his name to "Miyoshi Norinaga", and then used the identity of Settsu Shugodai given to him by Hosokawa Harumoto to expand his power in Settsu. What's more, he secretly collected fees in Toga-sho, Uhara County.

The so-called Duan money refers to a temporary tax on farmers. The so-called Duan is a unit to measure the size of farmland. The larger the Duan, the more tax needs to be paid.

Miyoshi Nobunaga's behavior was stopped and severely reprimanded by Hosokawa Harumoto. After all, for a long time, the work of collecting the money for the dan was the responsibility of Hosokawa Harumoto's close associates and Michisuke, and the money collected went into Hosokawa Harumoto's pocket. Miyoshi Nobunaga's private collection of the money for the dan was undoubtedly cutting off Hosokawa Harumoto's financial resources, and naturally he would be strongly opposed by the latter.

But what surprised Hosokawa Harumoto was that in the face of his reprimand, Miyoshi Nobunaga did not stop, but instead became even more aggressive.

He directly ignored Hosokawa Harumoto's order to stop, and expanded the scope of collecting Danqian to the entire Shimogun area of ​​Settsu Province (Toshima County, Minamikawabe County, Muko County, Uhara County, Hachibu County), resulting in a "double Danqian" situation in the area where Miyoshi Nobunaga and Towa Dosuke took turns to collect taxes, which caused Hosokawa Harumoto's extreme dissatisfaction, and the relationship between the two gradually became antagonistic.

Taking this incident as a starting point, Miyoshi Nobunaga began to deeply infiltrate Settsu, and won over some local people who had long been dissatisfied with Hosokawa Harumoto's rule. Gradually, Koshimizu Castle controlled by the Miyoshi clan had become the ruling center of Settsu Shimogun, and the Miyoshi clan's status and influence in Settsu were already able to compete with Hosokawa Harumoto.

Miyoshi Nobunaga also began to take action in the military, not only in politics and economy. Not long ago, he joined forces with his father-in-law Miyoshi Masanaga to attack the "disobedient" Settsu native Ueda Hironobu and took his territory and castle for himself, without informing Hosokawa Harumoto in advance.

It was not until this time that Hosokawa Harumoto realized that his previous kindness to Miyoshi Nobunaga was like shooting himself in the foot.

Seeing him maneuvering and expanding his power in Settsu, Hosokawa Harumoto decided to use the trick of "killing with a borrowed knife" again, just like he did with Miyoshi Motonaga, using hostile forces to deal with Miyoshi Nobunaga. Even if he couldn't suppress him completely, at least he could dampen his spirit and let him continue to lurk under the feet of the Hosokawa family. Just after the New Year, Hosokawa Harumoto ordered Miyoshi Nobunaga to suppress the remnants of Hosokawa Takakuni in Settsu. Among them, Shiokawa Kunimitsu, a Settsu native who married Hosokawa Takakuni's sister, became Hosokawa Harumoto's first target.

On the sixth day of the first lunar month, under the order of Hosokawa Harumoto, Miyoshi Nobunaga, Miyoshi Masanaga, and Ikeda Nobumasa formed a coalition and attacked the Ikko Castle, the residence of Shiokawa Kunimitsu. Itami Chikaoki and Miyake Kunimura, who were close to the Shiokawa clan, asked Hosokawa Harumoto's close aide Kizawa Nagamasa to intervene in the matter.

As mentioned before, Kizawa Nagamasa was a favorite of Hosokawa Harumoto and had been expanding his power under the latter's wings in recent years. Like Miyoshi Nobunaga, he actively made marriages with people from Settsu Province in order to gain allies in Kinai. Many of them were people who had once belonged to Hosokawa Takakuni, and this time, Shiokawa Kunimitsu was one of them.

After receiving the request for help, Kizawa Nagamasa sent his younger brother Kizawa Sasawa to lead an army into Itami Castle in Settsu Province, where he engaged in a fierce battle with Miyoshi Nobunaga, Miyoshi Masanaga and others.

Hosokawa Harumoto originally wanted to use Shiokawa Kunimitsu to weaken Miyoshi Nobunaga's power, but he didn't expect that Kizawa Nagamasa would also get involved, and fought with the forces that originally belonged to Hosokawa Takakuni for the sake of the forces that originally belonged to him, which surprised Hosokawa Harumoto.

In fact, long before the war, Miyoshi Nobunaga, Miyoshi Masanaga and others were jealous of Hosokawa Harumoto's favor for Kizawa Nagamasa, and often slandered Hosokawa Harumoto and asked him to distance himself from Kizawa Nagamasa. At that time, Hosokawa Harumoto thought it was just jealousy among retainers, so he said some consoling words in an attempt to ease the relationship between the two sides.

This time, Kizawa Nagamasa actually sent troops to support Shiokawa Kunimitsu, which reminded Hosokawa Harumoto of the previous slander against him by Miyoshi Nobunaga and others, and made him doubt Kizawa Nagamasa's loyalty. Therefore, he ordered Kizawa Nagamasa, who was fighting fiercely with Miyoshi Nobunaga, to not interfere with Miyoshi Nobunaga's attack on Ikko Castle.

But Kizawa Nagamasa was also a stubborn person. In order to maintain the prestige he had established among the people of Settsu, he not only rejected Hosokawa Harumoto's request, but also protested to Ashikaga Yoshiharu, demanding punishment for Miyoshi Norimachi and Miyoshi Masanaga. However, Ashikaga Yoshiharu refused to intervene due to Hosokawa Harumoto's power, saying that the fight between them was a private matter of the Hosokawa family.

Upon learning that Kizawa Nagamasa had disregarded his prestige, Hosokawa Harumoto was furious and ordered the people of Settsu to cooperate with Miyoshi Nobunaga's coalition forces to attack Ikko Castle. Kizawa Nagamasa was not to be outdone and mobilized forces from all over Kinai to attack Miyoshi Nobunaga, Miyoshi Masanaga, and even Hosokawa Harumoto's direct command.

For a time, from Settsu to Kawachi, half of the Kinki region was plunged into war.

Hosokawa Harumoto, who was in the eye of the storm, naturally did not want any more wars to break out around him, which would make the already chaotic Kinai region even more chaotic. Therefore, he asked Yoshishige to "hide his capabilities and bide his time" and not cause trouble for himself at this time.

In fact, Yoshishige didn't want to get involved in the Kinki incident, so he readily agreed to Hosokawa Harumoto's request. Hosokawa Harumoto was very pleased to see Yoshishige's understanding. He once thought that if Miyoshi Nobunaga could be as obedient as his sworn brother, perhaps these things would not have happened.

After eliminating Hosokawa Harumoto's doubts, Yoshishige's trip to Kyoto came to an end. On March 20, he returned to Wakasa with Kumagai Nagisa and Rokkaku Rin. (End of this chapter)