Warring States Survival Guide

Chapter 43: Tanegashima Cannon
Oda Nobunaga is coming?

Yuanye was slightly surprised, but his body was pulled crooked, and Jubei's broken leg was also pulled crooked. Jubei immediately wailed again, indicating that he could not live in so much pain, so it would be better to kill him directly to save him from suffering.

Yuanye came back to his senses and quickly pushed A-Man away. He continued to focus on the work at hand and said casually, "Let them wait for a while. I'll be there as soon as I'm done here."

"Don't worry about his legs for now!" Aman was still very anxious. He no longer cared about Jubei's life or death, and Jubei was worthless. He just wanted to discuss countermeasures with Yuanye as soon as possible - it would be best if he was willing to be a retainer. Although Oda Nobunaga was a lunatic, he was very rich, and it was not too bad to be his retainer. He was just afraid that Yuanye was unwilling, so he had to think carefully about how to escape!
At the very least, you should refuse in a tactful way and use more artistic language so as not to irritate that psychopath.

Well, she had no confidence in Yuanye's "softness". If she didn't discuss it properly and give him some instructions, she felt that she might really have to collect his body later.

Yuanye had nothing to do and had imagined various situations of encountering Oda Nobunaga. At this moment, he was able to keep his composure, his eyes still focused, and said calmly: "Don't panic, the situation is not as serious as you think, nothing serious will happen."

"You guy..." Aman was helpless. Seeing that he was useless and acted like nothing had happened, she thought about it and cursed him in her heart before running back to make some preparations. In case Oda Nobunaga really wanted to kill him, she could at least create some chaos so that he could have a chance to escape.

It was because Yuanye had always been nice to her, otherwise she would have dragged Aqing away to hide and wait and see, and then shamelessly come out to eat and drink for free when everything was fine. How could she worry about him so much?

If Yuanye doesn't stew two chickens for her later, it would be unfair to her for all her hard work!

…………

It took Harano another quarter of an hour to treat Jubei's injuries and put a splint on him. He was not afraid that Oda Nobunaga would get impatient. After all, he was now a "benevolent doctor" and could not easily ruin his image - no one had ever heard of a doctor abandoning a patient during surgery and rushing to curry favor with the powerful. If he did something like this, Oda Nobunaga would probably have a worse first impression of him.

He was wiping his hands and thinking about how to deal with Oda Nobunaga and what he needed to pay attention to, when someone next to him suddenly asked, "Can you survive?"

As the sound came, the person next to him wanted to reach out and press Jubei's wound to try out the bandage effect. Yuanye instinctively grabbed the other person's wrist, then looked up and saw the "Beggar Gang disciple version" of Oda Nobunaga.

It was not quite the same as he had imagined. In 99% of Japanese literary works of later generations, Oda Nobunaga appeared as a "peerless hero", usually depicted as tall and strong, with thick eyebrows and eagle eyes, and a hawk-like gaze. But the man in front of Yuanye was not like that at all. His stature was only considered tall in Japan, his eyes were gloomy, and his expression was a little cynical, as if he was ready to make a few sarcastic remarks and find fault with others at any time.

If he had to make an analogy, Yuanye felt that he was more like the leader of bad boys in later generations - if he had a cigarette in his mouth and dyed his hair yellow, he would look even more like him.

He looked at Oda Nobunaga for a moment, then released his wrist and said calmly: "If you can recuperate well and not suffer secondary injuries, you should be able to survive."

"Really?" Oda Nobunaga didn't care about his rudeness and continued to look at Jubei who was almost wrapped like a dumpling.

On the way here, he had seen Jubei's injuries and felt that Jubei was only 70% to 30% injured. If he started to have a fever and didn't make it, he would die 70% of the time. He had seen many similar cases since he was a child, but Yuanye's answer was quite confident now, so he asked with some doubt, "What medicine did you use? Is it special?"

In fact, Yuanye did not use any special medicine. He was reluctant to give Jubei anti-inflammatory drugs. He mainly used the methods of "the goddess with the lantern" Nightingale, which was to carefully clean the dirt and debris on the wound, bandage the wound with boiled and sterilized gauze and change it frequently, eliminate rats and fleas in the clinic, keep the room clean and ventilated, change the bed sheets and quilts for the wounded every day, etc.

Simply put, it means maintaining good hygiene.

It is said that Nightingale used this simple method to reduce the mortality rate of the British wounded camp from over 42% to 2.2%, which created a miracle in an era without anti-inflammatory drugs. Hara is now preparing to copy the same method and treat Jubei as a seriously injured soldier. It is believed that the possibility of his numerous wounds becoming inflamed and unable to survive is not high, so he thinks he should survive.

It was just that he couldn't explain this to Oda Nobunaga. Oda Nobunaga was probably also illiterate in medicine, so he just said casually, "It's a medicine for external injuries handed down from our ancestors."

Oda Nobunaga really didn't understand, but seeing that Jubei was carefully bandaged, the gauze was clean and tidy, which looked much better than a bloody mess, he felt that the possibility of his survival had indeed increased a lot, at least to a 50-50 chance, and he couldn't help but nod slightly - it was hard to say now, he would continue to pay attention to this matter, and see in the future whether Jubei could really survive.

"It's dirty and messy here, and the injured need to recuperate. Sir, please go inside and sit down!" Seeing that he seemed to have no questions, Yuanye extended his hand to invite the guest.

Oda Nobunaga nodded without comment and turned to leave. Yuanye followed behind and greeted Maeda Toshiie and Ikeda Terumasa at the door. Ikeda Terumasa politely returned the greeting, while Maeda Toshiie winked at him and grinned, revealing a mouthful of white teeth.

The four of them went to the earthen seat in the room and sat down as host and guest. Yayoi trembled as she served tea, and Aqing followed in and sat in a corner of the earthen seat, pretending to be a maid, in case of any emergency. Aman pretended to boil water in the earthen room, with a bulge in his arms, and no one knew what was hidden.

Although Oda Nobunaga said he was sitting down, he was actually leaning on the mat, looking very casual. Ikeda Terumasa sat beside him, took the tea and tested the temperature, then took a sip and found that it was loose tea from Ming Dynasty. It tasted good and was drinkable, so he put it back next to him. Maeda Toshiie introduced them formally and said to Yuanye: "This is my lord, Oda Saburo; this is Ikeda Nobutero, who is a close retainer of the lord like me."

Yuanye nodded politely and his eyes passed over Ikeda Terumasa.

He remembered this person, who was also quite famous in later generations. His mother was Oda Nobunaga's wet nurse, and he was Nobunaga's wet brother. His father died early, so he grew up with Oda Nobunaga since he was a child. He should be Oda Nobunaga's most trusted confidant.

Then his eyes fell on the cannon that Maeda Toshiie had in his hand. Only then did he realize why Oda Nobunaga was dressed so strangely, like a disciple of the Beggar Gang - most of the cloth bags hanging on Oda Nobunaga's body were filled with lead bullets, gunpowder, and primer, which were part of the equipment of the musketeers.

Oda Nobunaga noticed Yuanye's gaze, picked up the cannon and threw it at him. He was not a stingy person. He had looked through Yuanye's things before, and now he didn't mind Yuanye playing with his treasures. He tilted his head and asked calmly: "I heard that you are from the West. Have you used a cannon before?"

Yuanye reached out and caught the iron cannon steadily, took it in his hand and looked at it, and felt it was quite novel for a moment. This was the first time he touched a matchlock gun in person, and he actually played with it - a very crude matchlock gun, not a very good imitation, with a flat wooden stock, an iron fire pan and a copper snake-shaped fire clamp, the bottom plate was fixed with bolts, there was a mountain-shaped sight, no rain cover, the trigger was unsheathed and small and round, the total length was more than 3.759 centimeters, the caliber was about four liters (about grams per liter), the overall thickness was short, and the weight was not light. If it were put in the future, it would probably be considered a Satsuma gun.

While playing with it, he casually replied, "I guess I've used it before!"

In the past, Meng Ziqi's father had sneaked him and Meng Ziqi into the factory when the militia was training, and he did fire a few shots, but he didn't use a matchlock gun.

Oda Nobunaga sat up slightly and became interested. "Oh, then what about my cannon?"

"This one is just average!" Yuanye didn't say it was garbage directly, after all, that would be too rude.

Oda Nobunaga was stunned for a moment, sat up a little straighter, lowered his thick eyebrows, and asked with a little displeasure: "This iron cannon... is it ordinary?"

This is a high-priced item that he bought for 160 strings of coins!

Ah Man was eavesdropping in the room and was getting a little anxious. He secretly hated Yuan Ye for not being able to flatter him. He couldn't help but put his hand into his arms and began to wink at Ah Qing. If something went wrong, he would make a scene. The two of them would drag him away, but Yuan Ye didn't care at all and said directly, "It's true that the imitation is very ordinary, but it's not the craftsman's fault."

Maeda Toshiie glanced at Oda Nobunaga and found that his face was beginning to darken. Knowing his temperament, he quickly calmed down and asked curiously, "Why don't you blame the craftsman?"

Yuanye glanced at him, nodded slightly in thanks, and said lightly: "This is a long story. In the 12th year of Tenbun, some barbarians (the Japanese name for Westerners) arrived at Tanegashima, 18 miles south of Kyushu Island, to avoid a storm. Two Portuguese people used the Ming Dynasty interpreter Wang Zhi to show the matchlock guns to the nobles of Tanegashima. The local Tanegashima family regarded them as rare items and bought two guns at a high price of 2,000 kan. They also sent their retainer Xiaochuan Koshiro to learn how to make projectiles, gunpowder and matchlocks."

Here, Yuanye paused for a moment, took a sip of tea, and glanced at Oda Nobunaga's face. Seeing that he seemed quite interested, he continued slowly: "The following year, that is, in the 13th year of Tenbun, the Portuguese sailed again and wanted to sell muskets again, but the Tanegashima family was short of money and could not afford to buy them. They wanted to buy a few more, so they sent their retainer Jinbei to learn the musket making technology. From then on, Tanegashima had the ability to make muskets and began to pay tribute to the Shimazu family.

When the news spread, the merchant Tachibana Usaburo from Izumi Province rushed to Tanegashima to seek advice and spent two years learning how to make a matchlock gun. When he returned to Kinki, the people of Kinki were surprised to see the matchlock gun and asked him what it was. He said, "It's an iron cannon." So the matchlock gun was renamed as an iron cannon.

So, if we calculate this way, the iron cannon has only been introduced to the Kinki region for five or six years. Compared with the original, the imitation is very mediocre. It can't be blamed on the craftsmen. After all, they also need time to slowly perfect it. Now they can probably only do this much."

Yuan Ye knew so much about it thanks to the animated film "5 Centimeters per Second". The film was set in Tanegashima, and he took a look at the situation on Tanegashima while watching the film. As a result, he saw "The Story of Tanegashima Iron Cannon" and the famous "honey trap" on the Internet - Jin Bingwei was ordered to learn how to make matchlock guns, but the Portuguese did not want to teach him. After all, a gun could be sold for 1,000 kan, which was faster than robbing money. They were not stupid, so how could they provide the manufacturing process?

Jin Bingwei had no other choice. Seeing that he was going to be killed or even have to have his caesarean section performed, he came up with a crooked idea and asked his daughter to seduce the Portuguese. As expected, the Portuguese fell for it and were completely bewitched by Jin Bingwei's daughter. In addition, the Tanegashima family was determined not to buy the guns at the price of 1,000 kan each, and they really could not afford so much money. In the end, the Portuguese had no choice but to teach the matchlock gun-making technology in exchange for Jin Bingwei's beautiful daughter. It was barely considered that their trip was not in vain.

However, Jin Bingwei's daughter was also very cunning. She used the excuse of being sick and homesick to trick the Portuguese into visiting Tanegashima again the following year. Then she suddenly "died" on the night of visiting her relatives on the island and was "buried" early the next morning. In the end, only the Portuguese left cursing and spreading the news that they had fallen into a Japanese trap.

The descendants of the Tanegashima family also felt that this matter was a bit embarrassing, so they kept it secret and did not mention it when they engraved the stone tablet of "The Story of the Tanegashima Iron Cannon". They only said that the Portuguese took the initiative to teach and were very kind and generous. By the way, they also engraved the name of Wang Zhi, the later owner of the Ming Dynasty pirate Wufeng, on the stone tablet to thank him for his outstanding contribution to Japan's possession of iron cannons and to share the firepower.

Harano didn't care whether the Tanegashima family was embarrassed or not, and told them all at once. The more Oda Nobunaga listened, the straighter he sat up and the more focused he was. After all, the spread of information in that era was too slow. He liked the iron cannon very much, but he was not very clear about its origin. Now that Harano explained it so clearly and it was very interesting, he was fascinated for a while.

(End of this chapter)