Although the southern part of Kuwana County, Kayo, and Tomita have been nervously guarding against me, I have no intention of attacking them for the time being. The total territory of these three families is only about 10,000 koku, and with my current strength, I can take it steadily, but if I recruit the alliance of the Northern Ise Hao clan, I will not be able to deal with it for the time being. Moreover, even if I take it, it is still a question whether Nobunaga will send the Ansho document again. In the past year, my territory has increased too quickly, and I have jumped from 3,500 stone to 30,000 stone at once. Although 10,000 stones are not directly collared, they have already attracted the criticism of many people in the family.

At present, in Ise Province, my power is almost negligible, but I only occupy an enclave on the west bank of the Kiso River system. Historically, Takigawa Kazuki's invasion of Kita-Ise was when Nobunaga basically assessed Mino and led Mino to besiege Inabayama Castle. At that time, Nobunaga's prestige increased greatly, and Takigawa Kazuki borrowed his prestige, so he successfully occupied the two counties of Kuwana and Hiben.

And now, Nobunaga is in a bad time, and I have nothing to take advantage of. If you want to calm Ise as soon as possible, you can only rely on your own efforts.

I decided to increase my presence in Ise first, so I set my sights on four places: Kuwanakajuku and Shigamachijuku in Northern Ise, Tsu-cho in Naka-Ise, and Ujiyama-cho in Southern Ise.

In 1601, the Tokugawa shogunate began to build five streets: Tokaido, Tsukiko, Oshu, Nakasendo, and Koshu Kaido, starting from Edo Bridge and based on Kamakura Kaido (official road). The most important of these is the Middle East Kaido, which runs from the Edo Bridge to Otsu Port on the shores of Lake Biwa in Minami-Omi (near the World Heritage Sites of Enyuji Temple and Enjoji Temple). Mulberry is the forty-second post, also known as the ferry of seven miles; And the fourth said that the city is the forty-third post, also known as the ferry of ten miles.

It is the only section of the Tokaido sea route that runs from Shisa Machijuku via Kuwanakajuku, Atsuta Miyajuku, and Narumi to Iketsuyajuku to Iketsuyajuku, with a total length of 10 days, or about 40 kilometers. Since the Kamakura period, this sea route has been used as an official route and has been one of the main routes from Kanto to Kansai. At the beginning, Hattori Tomoto defected to Imagawa Yoshimoto and went to attack Narumi, perhaps in order to control Narumi-juku, and may even have reached a relevant agreement with the Imagawa family.

Despite the troubled times, the commercial towns centered on the two houses were still very prosperous. For example, the town is called Shisai City because every four days there is a large-scale trading fair, and the prosperity can be seen.

According to the custom of the time, a large-scale trading fair was held every ten days in the town. However, in some towns, where commerce is more prosperous, the holding period is shortened to make it easier for businesses to come and go. This is where the name of Shisai City comes from. The same nomenclature was the case with the Gogaku Municipality in Kyoto, the Shichigaku in Ueno Province, the Hachigaku Municipality in Higashi-Omi, and the Togaku Municipality in no less than 20 locations in each region.

In modern times, Shisai City Port, to which Shisai City belongs, is one of the six major ports of Saikomoto, along with the Port of Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya Port, Osaka Port, and Kobe Port.

Located in Anno County, Tsu Town was the seat of the later Mie Prefecture Prefectural Office, and the port under its jurisdiction was originally an excellent port in Ise, and its prosperity was no less than that of Shigashi Port. However, in 1498, an earthquake struck the nearby Tokai Sea, causing a tsunami that killed almost all of the town. Sixty years have passed since this incident, but the entire Anon-gun people are still worried about it, and the Nagano family, who controls the prefecture, even abandoned it and threw it to the Hosono family, who were divided into families.

As for Uji Yamada Town, also known as Ōminato Town, you can tell it by listening to the name. Daminato means big city in Chinese. At present, Uji Yamada Town is a large commercial port on a par with Sakai and Hakata towns, and there are thousands of households living in the town. The tsunami of 1498 also affected the area, destroying thousands of houses and killing 5,000 people.

However, this place does not belong to the Kitabatake family, but to the Ise Jingu, and is nominally governed by the current shrine under the Aisu Shunzuna, but in fact it is governed by 24 rendezvous members, who pay a certain amount of money to the Kitabatake family every year......

My idea is to infiltrate these four commercial centers first and try to achieve a certain level of control and expand my influence in Ise.

In view of the fact that these four places are close to the sea and have relatively complete port measures, which are suitable for the role of the navy, I began to vigorously transform the navy.

First of all, there is the problem of ships, because they have always been involved in water transportation, most of the boats used in the navy are loaded with goods, and then there are clippers called Xiaozao. The defense of this kind of ship is relatively weak, and it is mainly used in close combat, but the mobility is quite good, and it is most suitable for pirates to rob their homes, and the object is naturally an ordinary merchant ship or a Dutch ship. But when used for water warfare, it is a little thinner, and if it is used to control those four ports, it is estimated that it will not achieve the goal. As far as I know, the strength of the Ise Kitabatake family's naval forces is quite strong.

In this era, several relatively large naval armies were mainly composed of large and large Ataku boats that could carry more than 100 people, and then combined with smaller clippers such as Sekichuan and Xiaozao as escorts to form a naval fleet. The largest Ataku ship, which can be 50 meters long and more than 10 meters wide, has armor protection made of plates from bow to stern, and is full of holes for archery and guns, and there are no dead spots in the front, back, left and right. When approaching an enemy ship, you can also turn the slab downwards to turn it into a bridge to the enemy ship. The bottom of the boat is also designed with waterproof partitions, so that even if part of the boat gets into the water, the boat will not sink.

If I encounter such a ship, my Xiaozao will be a live target, and I will only be beaten, and I will not be able to hurt them at all.

However, to build an Ataka ship that can compete with it, it requires not only time and money, but also a high level of technical accumulation. So I gave up on this idea for the time being and instead built a Sekiki ship about 20 meters long and 4 meters wide. At the same time, I divided the navy into two parts, and the small part of the personnel continued to operate water transportation on inland waterways, and expanded to a suitable scale with them as the backbone; Most of them will be full-time combatants and will be equipped with new customs ships to enter Ise Bay.

Of course, I've made some improvements over the general shutdown. The first is to abandon the flat bow and adopt the shape of the domestic dragon boat and the warship of later generations, with a sharp front end in order to reduce the resistance of the ship. There is also a ramming angle in the bow of the ship, which is definitely more than enough to deal with Xiao Zao. In addition, I increased the number of slurry seats on the ship, even exceeding the quota on board, in order to make the boat faster; The ship is equipped with rattan cards, which can enhance the protection of bows and arrows when engaging at long distances...... In short, my idea is that ordinary long-range attacks can't hurt me, most boats can't catch up with me, and the small hayaboat that can catch up can't beat me.

Such a ship is not much slower than Xiao Zao in terms of speed, but its protection is much stronger than Xiao Zao. When encountering an enemy naval army, at least it will not be too weak, and it can basically escape. That's what I'm designed for, not to win battles, but to survive. Because I don't want to fight the Kitabatake water army at all. These ships were actually used to divert troops and intercept merchant ships.

Since my standing armament was mainly based on the Kawanami people, and the rest of the people had basically experienced water warfare, I used the standing armament as a naval corps to attack ports and merchant ships.

By the end of October, the renovation was almost complete. I had the navy and standing camp practice at the mouth of the Kiso River for half a month, and then I and Iwamatsu Jingding began to lead the team to attack frequently. In Kuwanakajuku and Shisō Ichijuku in Kitaise, I mainly led an army to attack the offices of the town, and I exercised restraint towards merchants and merchant ships. But for the port of Tsu and the port of Ujiyamada, I am not so polite, and I frequently intercept merchant ships in the open sea, and the benefits obtained are considerable. During this period, the Kitabatake Navy's navy attacked several times, even disguised as a caravan, but I escaped.

In any case, it is unlikely that merchant ships will use Ataka ships, and they generally use Totachi or Akami ships that focus on carrying capacity, safety, and comfort, as long as they see Ataka ships, they will immediately open the way. And if it's not an ataka ship...... Is my professional army still afraid of being in close proximity to pirates?

The Kuroshio Current, which flows through the southern part of Honshu, is the second warmest current in the world's oceans, and is commonly known as the Kuroshio Current because of its deep blue color and black appearance from a distance. In summer, the surface water temperature of the Kuroshio Tide reaches 30°C, and even in winter, the water temperature does not drop below 20°C. In the whole of Ise Bay, there is basically no cold weather throughout the year. Until December, my interception continued, and for two months, the sea trade route was almost cut off. And although I robbed, I rarely hurt anyone, and as long as I didn't try to resist, most of the merchants who were robbed escaped from Ascension, and even received food and fresh water. Under the "publicity" of these surviving merchants, my reputation spread rapidly. Now, as long as the pirate Kira is mentioned, there are almost no merchants in Minami Ise who don't know. It is said that some merchants made a special trip to Cheongshu to accuse Oda Nobunaga of my illegal acts.

After receiving the accusation from Ise, Oda Nobunaga didn't pay much attention to it, and he didn't have the leisure to take care of the interests of the enemy merchants. All of his energy now is spent on dealing with Tsuda Nobukiyo. The first goal was to capture Koguchi Castle, which was an outpost of Inuyama in a difficult terrain.

However, since Cheongju was too far away from Koguchi Castle, every time the Cheongju army attacked, Koguchi Castle was able to get news in advance. After a long journey, our side has become a tired army, and in the face of Koguchijo, which is ready for defense, it is natural that it will suffer setbacks again and again.

Under these circumstances, Nobunaga made the difficult decision to abandon Kiyoshu Castle, which had been the capital of the prefecture for 150 years since the Onei period, and Kiyoshu Town, which had been governed for several years and had become the largest commercial center in Owari, and moved the castle to Komakiyama, which was located halfway between Kiyoshu and Inuyama.

Considering that this matter would be too laborious and would inevitably be opposed by the retainers of the family and resisted by the people of Kiyoshu Town, Nobunaga first posted a notice announcing that he would build a castle on Mt. Ninomiya, to the north of Mt. Komaki and almost close to Kuroda Castle, and then move the castle there. As soon as the proclamation came out, the entire castle and the town of Kiyoshu were all opposed by one color, so Nobunaga "carefully considered" and finally chose to build the castle on Komaki Mountain, and this time finally received the support of the retainers, and the townspeople seemed to find it acceptable, so Nobunaga appointed Niwa Nagahide as the general commissioner, and the construction of the castle began smoothly.

At the same time, the rebuilding of Crab River Castle was completed. The renovated Crab River Castle, with its three-story castle walls and two three-story castle towers, is much more magnificent than Kamikawa Castle. The castle is fully equipped with facilities, so even if you live in the castle as a daimyo you don't have any problems. I stopped the looting for the time being and moved to a new town.

Two days before Chinese New Year's Eve, Xiejiang City welcomed its first guests after reconstruction.

After receiving a briefing from Yasuyo Yamauchi, I walked into the interview room and saw a samurai dressed in simple clothes with a child about ten years old. The samurai's face was rough, with a weathered look, and he was not too old, estimated to be less than thirty.

Looking at him, I suddenly felt a little familiar...... By the way, people who have lived on the water for a long time, such as Masakatsu Wasuka and Tomosada Hattori, have such a face.

I sat down on the throne, and the two of them bowed down at once. But the first person to speak to me was the child, who was about ten years old.

"In the lower nine ghost family, the head of the Nine Ghost Family, the Nine Ghost Chenglong, I have seen the Kira City Lord." He said in a childish voice.

"Nine Ghost Family? Shima's Nine Oni Family? ”

"Exactly." The child said.

"Then the head of the family is here, what advice do you have?" I asked, my eyes turning to the older samurai. When the representative of the family comes to the meeting, it is natural that the head of the family will come forward. But he is too young to make a decision when it comes to specific matters. And this samurai, if I'm not mistaken, should be the uncle of this child, the Nine Demons Yoshitaka who served as his descendant.

Sure enough, when the head of the child's family heard my words, he immediately looked at the uncle.

"In the Lower Nine Ghost Jialong, I came with the head of the family this time to unite with the city lord and deal with the Kitabatake Water Army together!" Nine Ghost Jialong said neither humbly nor arrogantly.

"Oh? Dare to ask how many ships and how many people are under His Royal Highness the Nine Ghosts? I looked at him with interest.

"This ...... Because the Seven Shima Clans colluded with the Kitabatake family and captured the family's territory, Wada Castle, it ...... However, there are still nearly 100 people in Asahma Mountain, all of whom are brave and loyal people in my Shima country. As long as the castle lord is willing to borrow troops, he can immediately recover the old territory, and then gather thousands of troops to assist the castle lord to defeat the Kitabatake water army! Seeing that I seemed to be confident, Nine Ghost Jialong gritted his teeth and told the truth about his family.

"Your Highness the Nine Ghosts, since you are so frank, I won't make a lie." I say.

"Please ask the lord for advice." Nine Ghost Jialong bowed.

"As far as I know, it's been two years since the Nine Ghost Family was destroyed, right? During this time, it was enough for the Kitabatake family to clear the influence of the Nine Ghost Family. And the Kitabatake family also serves as the guardian of Shima, which is justified. Even if I can defeat the Shima Seven Parties, His Highness the Nine Ghosts will have the confidence to restore the power of the Nine Ghosts and resist the counterattack of the Kitabatake Family? ”

"This ......" Nine Ghost Jialong was speechless.

"So, it's better to see the situation first...... The Kitabatake Navy is strong, with 200,000 stone territory at home as support; However, my navy is newly formed, with a territory of only 30,000, and with such a huge disparity in strength, I did not expect to be able to defeat the Kitabatake navy immediately. This is the difference in strength...... Therefore, I will not do anything for His Royal Highness the Nine Ghosts for the sake of an empty promise and an impossible vision. I shook my head.

"So, speaking of the situation, the castle lord has angered the Kitabatake water army, in addition to fighting, do you still expect good?" Nine Ghost Jialong was unwilling to give up.

"That's it, since His Royal Highness the Nine Ghosts is so confident, how about sending His Royal Highness the Nine Ghosts down to see His Highness Danzheng as an intermediary? Maybe there will be a satisfactory result. ”

“…… I'll leave it to the lord of the city. "The Nine Ghosts Jialong thought about it and agreed to my interrogation.

I know that he has been trying to maintain his reciprocal status, because he does not want to lose his reading surname. This is very similar to Hattori Tomosada, and is more persistent than Hattori Tomosada. And I didn't really want to accept him. My navy has already formed a preliminary system, and will have its own direction, with a surname like him, if he and his people come in, it will definitely not be arranged, and it will only be an obstacle.

In the small Ise Bay, it is enough to have one "pirate......

Moreover, the Tao is different, and they do not conspire with each other. Looking at the child beside the Nine Ghosts Jialong who looked at him with admiration, I secretly felt sad for him. Maybe he wouldn't have thought that he would be poisoned by this uncle!;