Warring States Survival Guide

Chapter 169 The Father-in-law Was Not Rescued

Harano left a small group of troops to set up camp in the Sumata area, and at the same time sent a message to the base, preparing to use the Kiso River system to transport the population backwards. Then the large group of troops crossed the Kiso River and continued to advance, officially entering the territory of Mino.

All attention in Mino was now focused on the fight between Saito father and son. The powerful families along the way saw Haruno's army of unknown origin from afar and rushed to close their doors and prepare for battle, but no one dared to attack and stop them, allowing them to advance straight in.

A day later, the Wanjin army rushed to the Nagara River line again, and took advantage of the night to force their way into a village called "Yupingjin", and took control of the river crossing.

At this point, most of the mission of the Wilderness Vanguard has been completed, ensuring that the marching route is basically unobstructed, but the remaining half of the mission, which is to try to pick up Saito Dosan, cannot be completed for the time being - at present he cannot determine the location of Saito Dosan, Saito Dosan is being chased by his son and is in a very bad situation, and has been moving.

A-man was extremely anxious and worried about her grandfather, so she immediately led people to Mino to gather information and search for Saito Dosan and her grandfather without any delay.

Before getting accurate intelligence, Yuanye temporarily hid at the ferry, and by the way, packed up the villagers of Yupingjin and transported them to the area of Sumata - he did not commit a crime, this village was similar to Hibijin Village, the common people were all skinny and had a hard life, at least they could have enough food to eat in Shinwanjin. At most, the villagers of Yupingjin would not understand and would cry for a while, but time would tell.

He did another job in Meinong. In addition to eliminating some of the wealthy families and gangs, he also kidnapped more than 500 men, women, old and young. But the next day, he received two pieces of bad news:

The first piece of bad news was the urgent military intelligence sent back by Aman. Now Mino was in chaos. Saito Dosan was already unpopular before, and now he was even more unpopular. Everyone wanted to kick him. The entire Mino, led by Saito Yoshitatsu, had united to get rid of this scourge. They had gathered a huge team of more than 17,000 people, claiming to be an army of 50,000, and were besieging him from all sides.
The second bad news was that the Wanjin Army seemed to have been discovered by Saito Yoshitatsu and was regarded as the vanguard of the Oda family. Saito Yoshitatsu reacted quickly and ordered the nearby powerful families to try to retake Uohira-jin, or at least to retake the ferry. However, the powerful family that came was not very strong, with only more than 300 people. They were blasted away by a blast of cannon fire from the more than 100 people stationed by the Wanjin Army at the ferry on the opposite bank, and their will to fight was not firm.

Yuanye didn't take the second bad news too seriously. His territory and population were limited, so he couldn't defeat guardian daimyo like the Imagawa family and the Oda family. But he was at the top level among the powerful families. As long as Saito Yoshitatsu didn't lead a large group of troops, the powerful families nearby would not be able to drive him away. But the first bad news...

The enemy has at least 17,000 people. He and Oda Nobunaga together are not even a fraction of the enemy. Now he has only more than 400 people on hand. How can he support Saito Dosan?

The situation was more than twice as bad as initially expected, and he now did not even dare to cross the river.

Of course, if it were a legendary novel, it would be possible for 400 to break 17,000, and it would even be natural in an online novel, but he really traveled through time, and he only had one life. It was not easy to save this little money with great effort, and he suffered a lot for this, so...

Let's leave this matter to Oda Nobunaga, he can't handle it!

When it comes to my elder brother-in-law’s affairs, it’s already very kind of my brother-in-law to take the lead. If there really is something wrong, my elder brother-in-law should do it himself!

Yuanye immediately asked Maeda Toshiie to personally urge Oda Nobunaga to speed up the march. If Oda Nobunaga was willing to use more than 5,000 troops to confront Saito Yoshitatsu's 17,000 troops, then he could bring more than 400 people to help him and share a thousand people with him, but no more than that. Now most of the Wanjin troops were just seedlings, and he didn't want to lose too much strength.

For a moment, he became doubly cautious, sending out a large number of scattered soldiers and secret sentries far away to prevent a surprise attack by the large group of troops. He kept sending people to urge Oda Nobunaga to move faster, but he did not forget his personal mission to come to Mino to participate in the war. He sent most of his men to actively attack several nearby Mino powerful families, to prevent being attacked by them and to help them reduce the population burden.

His goal this time was to transport back at least two thousand people. This matter was much more important than Saito Dosan's life.

…………

Yuanye was looking forward to Oda Nobunaga bringing a large group of troops as soon as possible. Such a large-scale battle with more than 20,000 participants was too demanding for his current development condition, and he could not bear it. But after waiting for another two days, Oda Nobunaga still did not arrive, and Saito Dosan had no way to escape, and was caught up by the unfilial son Saito Yoshitatsu in the Heshan area.

"Saito Dosan is dead..." Ah Man wiped the blood off his face, took the water Ah Qing brought and drank two glasses in a row, picked up a rice ball and stuffed it into his mouth, chewing hard while mumbling, "He died a tragic death, his nose was cut off, his head was chopped off, and two people took the credit for it. It couldn't be a more tragic death, not even dignified at all!"

"Eat slowly!" Yuan Ye advised, then couldn't help but sigh softly, "He's already dead!"

He had a premonition before. The Wanjin army saw corpses floating down the Nagara River yesterday. It is estimated that there was a fierce battle in the upper reaches of the Nagara River. At that time, he guessed that Saito Dosan could not run anymore, or was surrounded and could not run away. He wanted to fight to the death, and was forced to turn around and fight with his son. It is estimated that the end would not be too good, and the result was indeed so. He was emotional for a while. It is said that he started as the adopted son of an oil merchant, and started as a Lang party and an official. He worked all the way to a samurai and a local tyrant, and even expelled his lord, becoming the first real "Warring States Daimyo" in Japanese history. The insidious guy nicknamed "Mino Viper" ended up being killed by his son. He never thought of this before.

Yuanye sighed inwardly for a few words before asking Aman, "How is the battle going? Did Saito Yoshitatsu suffer heavy casualties?"

"He's not small, Saito Dosan is still quite capable!" Aman had been hungry for two days. After swallowing a rice ball, she picked up another one and swallowed it hard. Her voice was still unclear. She told Yuanye and Aqing about the battle. At that time, she was lying near the battlefield pretending to be a dead body, and watched Saito Dosan go to his death with her own eyes.

As for the course of the battle...

Saito Yoshitatsu was worthy of being the son of a viper. He was determined to kill his own father, so he sent his family elder Takeyoshi Dochen to attack Saito Dosan's main camp. Although Saito Dosan had only more than 2,000 people under his command, they were his direct retainers who had followed him for many years. He almost turned the tables by defeating the enemy with a small force. After killing Takeyoshi Dochen in the battle, he even counterattacked his son's main camp, attempting to replicate the Battle of Kanaguchi, capture the leader first, and defeat the enemy in one fell swoop.

However, the difference in military strength between the two sides was too great, nearly eight times the gap in strength. Not to mention the viper, even if the dragon came, it would be difficult to resist. In the end, Saito Dosan was killed on the spot in the melee, and there was even a farce of fighting for credit on the battlefield.

The Mino noble Nagai Tadazaemon and the Saito family's retainer Kozaki Genta both believed that the enemy general died at their hands, and almost drew their swords to fight over who would cut off his head. Finally, after being persuaded by the people around them, one cut off his nose and the other cut off his head, and presented them to Saito Yoshitatsu for appreciation, barely sharing the credit equally.

I just wonder what Saito Yoshitatsu felt when he saw his own father's body torn apart and unrecognizable, and after he praised the "enemy who murdered his father" and gave him letters of loyalty and thanks.

It is probably a very wonderful feeling. After all, most people don’t have the opportunity to experience this feeling.

Ah Man briefly described the death of Saito Dosan. She didn't care whether Saito Dosan lived or died, and Yuan Ye didn't care either. As long as he could roughly understand what happened, he would be fine. After listening to her, he asked with concern, "Have you found any trace of your grandfather?"

Aman had previously suspected that her grandfather was in cahoots with Saito Dosan, and she had risked sneaking into the battlefield to conduct a thorough search after the two armies had engaged in a battle. She had also led people to capture Saito Yoshitatsu's accomplices and interrogated them, which resulted in her being covered in blood, but she had found nothing, and the risky forced confession had not yielded any useful information, and her grandfather was still missing.

When she heard Yuan Ye asking about this, she stopped eating her rice balls and said irritably, "No! This old man is such a bastard. I told him to come to me and enjoy his old age. But he refused to listen and insisted on following Saito Dosan, that stingy guy. Now look what happened. He's dead... He can only blame himself for his death!"

She said so, but her frowning face was obviously still worried and she was just speaking in anger. Ah Qing beside her also had a worried look on his face and lowered his head, and no one knew what he was thinking.

Yuanye didn't have any good solution for this. Aman couldn't find anyone, let alone him. But after thinking about it, he comforted him, "It may be a good thing that he didn't find anyone. This means that your grandfather didn't go with Saito Dosan. Now he may just be pursued by Saito Yoshitatsu's men and forced to hide somewhere. He is safe now."

Ah Man thought about it and felt that what he said made some sense. His eyebrows slightly raised, but he was still very unhappy. He muttered, "Anyway, I tried my best. I was lying on the edge of the battlefield and was ready to rescue him. He can't blame me for being unfilial. Now he can hide wherever he wants!"

She paused after she finished speaking, hesitated for a moment, then looked at Ah Qing and whispered, "Forget about the old man, he is a real worry. I don't have the strength now, you can run a trip for me and leave some secret messages at the nearby ferry crossings to find those two little beasts."

Ah Qing nodded gently, knowing that she was just being stubborn because she was too worried and actually still wanted to find the old man, so she got up and went.

Aman sighed again, feeling extremely annoyed. She always felt that her old man was in a bad condition, but she couldn't find him. She was so annoyed that she simply stopped thinking about him and fell asleep right in the wilderness. She soon began to snore - she had been running around for several days and was very tired.

Yuanye took off his coat and covered her with it. Seeing that she was frowning and looked uncomfortable, he gently rubbed her eyebrows.

Well, Oda Nobunaga’s father-in-law was not rescued, and Aman’s grandfather was not found. The First Battle of Mino was not very smooth!

(End of this chapter)