Koyama Hidetsuna is supporting Hojo, and it is precisely because of this that the Hojo clan is sure that Yuki Harumo must have sent him here this time to discuss the matter of returning to his family.

Sure enough, after meeting the Hojo clan, Koyama Hidetsuna unreservedly expressed the lord's desire to return to the Hojo family.

Of course, the Hojo clan did not refuse to come, but in order to completely control the Hojo family, the Hojo clan put forward two demands. The first was to ask the Yuki family to hand over the hostages, which the two sides quickly agreed on, after all, once they became vassals, then it can be said that the surrender of hostages became a common practice.

But the second request made by the Hojo family made Hidetsuna Koyama a little difficult.

The second requirement of the Hojo clan is that at the same time as the Hojo family attacks the Utsunomiya family, he uses troops against Satake, which Hojo clan has his own plans, compared to the Satake family, the Utsunomiya family is much weaker, especially the retainers of the Utsunomiya family do not have any outstanding talents, and Ashigaru is mainly a peasant soldier, so with the current strength of the family, as long as someone restrains the Satake family, then once the Utsunomiya family is fully armed, it can be eliminated within three months, and this confidence is still there in the Hojo clan.

The idea of the Hojo clan is good, first easy and then difficult, first eliminate the relatively weak forces, and then concentrate on destroying the more powerful Satake, so that the family will have no worries, and this is also the best plan, but this is going to be bitter Yuki family, Yuki family does not have the strength to independently resist the attack of the Satake family, if the Satake family comes to attack in a big way, it will be good if the family can hold out for a month and a half.

And Koyama Hidetsuna saw that the Hojo clan wanted the family and Satake to fight to the death, and then take over the total and Tokiriku. Once the main family and Satake carried out. Then the family will still be unable to escape destruction. At that time, the Hojo family will be able to truly control the entire territory, and the Satake family will definitely be weakened a lot under the desperate resistance of the family, and at that time, it will definitely be much easier for the Hojo family to destroy Satake.

That's exactly what the Hojo clan thought, but this proposal was just a test of the Yuki family, and raised the price to give the other party room for bargaining. After all, if you push the other party into a hurry and let the Yuuki family fall to Satake and Utsunomiya again, then the family will lose more than it gains.

Therefore, after seeing that Koyama Hidetsuna, who was sitting in front of him, had a firm face and no intention of compromise, in order to ease the atmosphere, he said, "I'm afraid that Koyama-sama misunderstood what I meant." ”

"Could it be that Hojo-sama doesn't need the family to contain Satake?" Koyama Hidetsuna hurriedly asked.

However, to his regret, after seeing the Hojo clan shake his head, he said: "That's not the case, the Yuuki family will definitely not change if they contain Satake...... but his tone changed. continued: "However, the family can send an army. Aid the Yuki family while they fight Satake. However, the military expenses need to be borne by the Yuki family. ”

Koyama Hidetsuna didn't care much about military spending, although the Yuki family was not strong, but the funds were quite sufficient, he only cared about how many reinforcements the Hojo family could send, so he immediately asked, "I don't know how many reinforcements the adults can send?" ”

"Fifteen thousand troops, it should be enough." After some serious consideration, Hojo Masa said the number. Now that there is no threat to the south of Hojo, the Takayama family in the west will definitely not attack this year, so it is no problem to send 7,000 five colors and 10,000 elite soldiers who have completed the separation of soldiers and peasants while attacking Utsunomiya, and the Hojo clan has sent so many troops at one time, of course, there is an ulterior secret, that is, it still wants to take full control of the two countries after the two families fight to the death.

Hojo clan politics has such an idea, completely influenced by the Takayama clan, why the Takayama clan can use all its strength every time to fight, not because the wealthy clan under its rule is either eliminated, or the weak can be ignored, so that you can ensure that when using troops, there is no need to worry about the stability of the territory, this is only one of the benefits, the second is why the Takayama army can win more with less every time, and achieve the final victory under the absolute disadvantage of the army, Hojo clan believes that in addition to the elite of the Takayama army, There is also one of the most important but easily overlooked reasons, that is, the command of the military is basically directly under the military force, so that the military can be commanded like an arm. Although the family is invincible and the number of people has reached tens of thousands, but every time there is a foreign war, it is necessary to leave a lot of troops to prevent Satake and other forces, but the territory also needs a large number of troops, once the front-line combat is unfavorable, the role of these troops is to prevent the occurrence of rebellion in the territory. In this way, when the family fights abroad, it needs the military strength of the Hao clan to not fill the lack of military strength, and the Hao clan who are loyal to the family is good to say, but more of them are those wall grass, when they fight a tailwind battle, they can be seen everywhere to snatch the figure of the war merit, once they fall into adversity, then these people only want to preserve their strength, and even have the possibility of defection at any time, so that the family is invincible when attacking the weak forces, but the credit is robbed by the Hao clan a lot, so that they are getting stronger and stronger, And once faced with a powerful enemy, it is almost impossible to make any progress, and even if the final victory is achieved, it is achieved with a large number of losses of the own family, and the losses of those wealthy families are minimal.

In the past, the Hojo family could allow such a thing to happen, but the main family was about to go to war with the Oda family's Tokoku army, so such a thing must not happen. So this time the Hojo clan plans to send 20,000 Hao clan troops as reinforcements to help the Yuki family attack Satake, once the attack fails, then on the one hand, he can use this as an excuse to greatly reduce the territory of the Hao family, on the other hand, after the strength of the Yuki family is greatly damaged, he can completely bring the general manager into control, and can also achieve the purpose of weakening the Satake family, which can be described as killing three birds with one stone.

Although there is still a lot of risk in doing so, but now, if the Hojo family does not make changes, then once the Takayama family completes the expansion of the army, with the reinforcements of Sakuma, the family will not be able to resist at all. So even if there is a big risk, he must complete the integration of the territory this year.

And Koyama Hidetsuna's ability is limited after all, he has not seen through the tricks of the Hojo clan at all, and he thinks that the Hojo family's willingness to send reinforcements is a great thing, which is enough to prove that he has sincerely accepted the Yuki family.

With this in mind, the two sides quickly came to an agreement, and from this moment on, the Yuki family became a vassal of the Hojo family.

The choice of the Yuuki family made Satake Yoshishige feel very angry, but because he had lost the opportunity, it was no point to rush to send troops now, so he could only ask for help from colleagues who had strengthened ties with Utsunomiya, such as the Uesugi family.

Satake Yoshishige has respect for Uesugi Kenshin in addition to respect, so as soon as the Yuuki family betrayed, he thought of the Uesugi family, and soon sent Ota Shimasa, who is known as the link between his family and the Uesugi family, to Echigo Kasuga Yamashiro to express his wishes like Uesugi Kenshin.

However, what disappointed him was that the Uesugi family had to face the Oda family's fierce eyes, and they were already too busy to take care of themselves, how could they have the spare strength to help the Satake family set up a strong enemy, even if Uesugi Kenshin wanted to, the retainers of the Uesugi family would never agree.

Therefore, after Ota Shimasa returned, in addition to bringing back Uesugi Kenshin's words of encouragement, he only brought back a famous sword: Bizen Saburo Kunimune, if it had been before, Satake Yoshishige would definitely be happy because Uesugi Kenshin had come to express his appreciation, but now he can't be happy, not only is he not happy, but he is very angry. In his mind, at this time, Uesugi Kenshin gave him a sword, indicating that he hoped that he would continue to be hostile to the Hojo family, which would be of great benefit to the Uesugi family, at least in the near future, Uesugi would not have to worry about the threat from the Hojo family in the south. In this way, he can continue to accumulate strength, and when the time comes, he can attack Oda. This is clearly treating the Satake family as an outcast.

After getting this result, the Ota Castle Tower Assessment Room, more than a month ago, Satake Yoshishige and the important ministers of the family were here to talk about the future of the family, with the containment of the Oda family, then the family will no longer have to worry about the threat of the Kanto overlord, not only do not have to worry, but they can also fish in troubled waters after the two of them are launched, and continue to grow, so the atmosphere is quite warm.

But after more than a month, not only did the situation in the Kanto region not develop according to the ideas of the Satake family, but it took a sharp turn for the worse, and with the betrayal of the Yuki family and the attitude of the Uesugi family, the Satake family, which was originally in a good situation, suddenly became precarious. So this time, the atmosphere in the assessment room was very dull.

Although the meeting had been going on for a short time, after understanding the situation, the retainers all bowed their heads and pondered, and none of them spoke rashly.

Although the retainers of the Satake family are not bad, such as the Mabe clan, Wada Akiwei, and Suda Morihide are all capable ministers and brave generals, and Satake Yoshishige's own talent is definitely worthy of the number even if he looks at the world, in terms of ability, even the head of the Hojo family, the Hojo clan, is inferior. However, in the face of absolute strength, no matter how strong an individual's ability is, it cannot play a decisive role.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this year will be the most severe year for the situation, and this is related to the survival of our family, so you can speak freely, even if the suggestion is wrong, I will not pursue it." Satake Yoshiki saw that his retainers didn't speak, so he couldn't help but speak.

The retainers present were not blank in their minds, in the face of such a big event, who didn't have an idea, but the more they were at such a critical juncture, the more they didn't dare to speak rashly, after all, this was related to the survival of the Satake family, they didn't dare to come up with an idea casually with a hot mind, in this way, it would definitely make the lord feel dissatisfied. But now that they have the Lord's assurance, they have no such worries. (To be continued.) )