"Peace talks?" This word made Tokugawa Iemitsu very unhappy when he heard it, "You want to go to peace talks with the Han?!" ”

"Please forgive me!" As if sensing the anger of the Lord, Doi Toshikatsu hurriedly touched the ground with his head, "The minister is here today to say these words, it is just the minister's personal opinion, if the lord doesn't want to hear such an idea, the minister will definitely not say it anymore!" ”

For a moment, the whole room fell into dead silence. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

Although he was very angry at this proposal for peace talks, Tokugawa Iemitsu also understood that Doi Toshikatsu was willing to tell him such a thing at this time, it must be out of loyalty, and at this time, he should not push someone else's center away.

"No, go on." He gradually regained his composure, then waved his hand and motioned for the other party to continue, "It's just the two of us here, and anything you say won't be passed on to the outside, but it's okay to say it." ”

"Thank you, sir!" After getting Tokugawa Iemitsu's approval, Doi Toshikatsu himself breathed a sigh of relief, "The current situation is obvious, the opposition forces in our country have taken advantage of the opportunity of the Han attack to gather, some people have made it clear that they will stand up with the Han to oppose us, and there are many people who must be secretly ready to move now, waiting for the situation to become clearer before opposing us......"

Tokugawa Iemitsu's brows furrowed slightly, but he also knew that the other party was telling the truth, so he didn't interrupt the other party and let him continue.

Therefore, the minister felt that the biggest enemy of the shogunate was not the Great Han...... Rather, it was these foreign vassals and the imperial court. These foreign vassals, as well as the imperial court, have a deep grudge against us, and if they get the opportunity, they will definitely do everything they can to put the shogunate and the shogun to death, and the Han ...... Not necessarily. Toshikatsu Doi said cautiously.

"Although the wording used in the Han Dynasty's inscription is very harsh, but if you want to come to the Han Dynasty to send an army to fight, it will definitely not be just to crusade against the shogunate, the Han Dynasty is different from the previous Central Plains Dynasty, it looks very practical, and also pays attention to business and interests, and obviously loses money and should not do it......"

"But they've already called!" At this time, Tokugawa Iemitsu finally couldn't help it.

"Even if they do, it's not completely out of room after all...... After all, the Han sent troops to fight like this, after all, they had a plan, no matter what they were plotting, they were easier to get from us than others. If they want gold and silver, we have ...... We can also give him, as long as we can consider the stakes clearly, it may not be impossible to ease the two sides. "Toshikatsu Doi doesn't look scared, he still has the same composure." My lord, as long as we can send the Han army away, we can finally wipe out all the traitors everywhere in one fell swoop, and re-consolidate the world of the shogunate! ”

"This ...... It's too lucky, since the big Han has called, then they will definitely not give up easily, even if we want to negotiate peace with them, how easy is it? Tokugawa Iemitsu was still very hesitant. Besides, now that the progress of the Han army is so dead, they must be encouraged up and down, a hundred times excited, how can they accept peace with us? ”

"The minister also feels that the Han will not negotiate peace easily, which requires us to work the battlefield, and only by resisting their soldiers can we force them to negotiate peace with us, so fighting a war is still the first priority. But we can test it first to see what the big man wants, and we might as well prepare as soon as possible. Doi Toshikatsu leaned forward slightly, getting closer to Tokugawa Iemitsu, "My lord, now that the Great Han has landed, then we should also figure out their plans." ”

Tokugawa Iemitsu was silent, and he realized that Doi Toshikatsu made a lot of sense. This war disaster was an unexpected disaster for him, and if it continued, it was obvious that the shogunate would be in turmoil from internal and external troubles, and he would become a sinner for the Tokugawa family...... If it was really possible to send the Great Han away in some way, it would naturally be the best for the shogunate.

Of course, this also requires the shogunate to be able to earn enough chips on the battlefield to at least hold on to the Han, otherwise there is no need for the other party to negotiate peace with him.

"In your opinion, if we really make peace with Dahan, how much will it cost?" After being silent for a long time, Tokugawa Iemitsu suddenly asked, "Is it really possible for the Great Han to accept the peace talks?" ”

When he heard the Shogun's question, Doi Toshikatsu felt relieved, knowing that the Shogun actually wanted to take this path and try it.

"I don't dare to say that I am completely sure, but if I don't try it, there will be no hope at all. So, no matter what, there is nothing wrong with sending someone to tempt it...... At the beginning, presumably the big man will ask for a price, but when the price is over, it will definitely reveal what they want, and we will bargain through the battlefield little by little, and there will always be a time when both parties are satisfied. ”

"But now that the Han has clearly ordered us to pursue it, how can it be so easy to negotiate peace." Tokugawa Iemitsu shook his head, obviously still not optimistic. "Haven't you read the text sent by the big man, he said that we are all sinners, and he wants to punish us...... Can we sit idly by? ”

"The Great Han and the shogunate and shogun have no personal enmity, and the so-called explicit investigation is just a previous propaganda strategy...... In the face of interests, it is not necessarily impossible to change. Doi Toshikatsu was not nervous, "If the two sides can negotiate, the big man will back down and withdraw with what he wants, and we will take out some of the first evils that make the two countries bitter to punish them, so that everyone has a step to go down......"

Doi Toshikatsu was sleek and deep by nature, and when the shogunate was discussing the issue of trade with the Great Han, out of the interests of the shogunate, although he also supported the restriction of the scale of trade between the two countries, but because of caution, he deliberately did not make a very clear statement and instructions on these issues, let alone participate in the specific implementation, but watched coldly and let Sakai Tadashi and others act.

It is precisely because of his 'innocence' on this issue that he put forward the proposal for peace talks so easily -- since he is not involved, then he will definitely not be held accountable when punishing the chief evil, and if the peace talks can really succeed, he can even take this opportunity to eradicate some people who he does not like, and it will not hurt him at all.

"Punish the first evil ......" Tokugawa Iemitsu's heart moved.

Although Doi Toshikatsu was very vague, Tokugawa Iemitsu naturally understood that he meant to let some people take the blame for the war between the two countries.

And he did see that some people were not pleasing to the eye, if he could really negotiate peace, wouldn't it be a good thing to push these people out to apologize?

The premise is that the two can really negotiate peace as expected.

Either way, it's always a good idea to test it. Tokugawa Iemitsu finally made up his mind.

"Alright then, just do as you say, you choose a few people you can trust, go to the western country to communicate with the people of the Han Dynasty, and see if there is any possibility of peace talks-you must act cautiously, and you don't have to let the people in Kyoto know."

Although he was very dissatisfied with the treacherous Han, he hated these people who rebelled against him even more, and if he could, he really wanted to pay some affordable price to send the Dahan away from the plague gods, and then concentrate on eradicating these rebels in the country one by one, and realize the long-cherished wish of the complete unification of the Tokugawa family.

"Obey orders!" Seeing that his proposal was adopted, Doi Toshikatsu was very happy, but on the surface, he just smiled indifferently, and the smile quickly faded, and he reminded his lord, "However, my lord, the minister is still the same sentence before, since ancient times, we can only make peace if we can fight, and if we want the other party to make peace, we must fight for ourselves...... Therefore, adults must not be left to chance because of the temptation of peace talks, but still stick to the previous strategy and keep the foundation of the shogunate! In this way, regardless of whether the peace talks can be achieved or not, at least there is still hope for everything. ”

"Of course I do." Tokugawa Iemitsu was a little impatient, "Anyway, you can do it for me, get this matter done as soon as possible, and I will get a result if it can be done." ”

After giving this order, he muttered again, "You said earlier that you would move the royal family and feudal lords of the western kingdom to Edo, and this matter is going well, but now we are afraid that it will not be enough for us to only move the feudal lords of the western country, so let's just move the feudal lords of the eastern kingdom over as well." ”

Because the daimyo of the western kingdom have returned to bed, Tokugawa Iemitsu now has a very distrustful attitude towards all the daimyo who are not relatives and non-genealogies, and in his opinion, although the great feudal lords of the western kingdom are unstable, are the great feudal clans of the eastern kingdom very stable? It's not the same and there is an antipathy.

For example, the Date family of the Sendai Domain, northeast of Edo, had thought about competing with the Tokugawa family for the world. Date Masamune, the head of the family, was quite talented when he was young, and after many years of conquest, he finally obtained the territory of 620,000 koku in Sendai in the hands of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. And he has always been arrogant, repeatedly lamenting that he was born twenty years late, so that he had to bow down to Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu, and could not compete for the world like them.

After the death of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Tokugawa Ieyasu intended to win over the powerful Date family, so he arranged a marriage with the Date family, allowing his son Matsudaira Tadaki to marry his daughter. Later, when the Battle of Sekigahara broke out, in order to get the support of the Date family, Tokugawa Ieyasu even wrote a personal letter to the Date family, promising to give the Date family a million stone of land as a reward.

However, after winning the Battle of Sekigahara and gaining the right to rule, Tokugawa Ieyasu never mentioned it again, as if he had promised nothing at the beginning, Date Masamune asked the shogunate several times for an explanation, but the shogunate rejected him directly, which made him indignant.

But even if he was indignant, he had no choice but to accept this result, but since then, he has been conspiring against the shogunate and has participated in several power struggles for the shogunate. Although Date Masamune is now dying, it is conceivable that if he had the opportunity to rise up against the shogunate, I am afraid that he would not refuse this opportunity to retaliate.

I am afraid that the Date family is not the only one who is dissatisfied with the shogunate in the Kanto region, such as the Maeda family of the Kaga Domain, who has always been very cunning and accustomed to steering the rudder, and it is very doubtful how much loyalty they have to the shogunate. They have a total of one million stone in the territory of Kaga, Noto, and Echichu, and their strength is very strong, which is really difficult to reassure.

Therefore, it is not surprising that Tokugawa Iemitsu wanted to extend the relocation order against the feudal lords of the western kingdom to the eastern country.

Toshikatsu Doi, however, has a different view.

"My lord, I don't think now is the time to do that." He directly dissuaded Tokugawa Iemitsu, "The great feudal clan of the eastern kingdom has not been directly attacked by the Han Dynasty at present, and is facing the shogunate army, so even if they are ready to move in their hearts, they will still be in a wait-and-see state for the time being, and they will not act rashly...... If the Shogun really gave such an order, then they would probably be suspicious and would take the risk, and it was better to reassure them and not let them participate in the chaos. ”

Doi Toshikatsu's words also made sense, which made Tokugawa Iemitsu difficult. "You have a point, but now that the Han and the imperial court have been circulated everywhere, even if we are blocking the news, they will definitely learn about the situation soon, if we really don't do anything, it will inevitably cause a big incident."

"There is indeed such a risk, but at the moment of the great enemy, the minister really thinks that we should not add more enemies to ourselves." Doi Toshikatsu sighed, obviously not having a particularly good idea about this, "The minister thinks it is better for the shogun himself to appease them, and at the same time promise to give them a reward after the battle, and do not urge them to send troops to pay for food, as long as they are quiet and still." I guess they'd be willing to wait and see......"

"Then we'll have to keep them on the fence." After being silent for a long time, Tokugawa Iemitsu finally sighed gloomily. "Just do as you say."

He has a violent personality, he has always done whatever he wants, and since he became a general, it has been smooth sailing, no one in the world dares to disobey, so no one is even more in sight, but when he faced the real crisis, he found that there were so many crises hidden around him, and it was inevitable to have some depression and exhaustion.

But even if you are tired, you have to support it, because the world of the Tokugawa family really can't afford to lose.

How could the spirits of my grandfather and father allow themselves to corrupt their family business? The pressure was as heavy as a mountain on him, it made him anxious, it made him angry, he wanted to vent this anger somewhere, but there was nowhere to vent it.

"My lord, the minister still has something to advise." At this moment, Toshikatsu Doi suddenly spoke again, "The things outside the shogunate must be cleaned up, and the internal things must also be cleaned up, and the hearts of our internal people must be stabilized, and some unstable things must be put to an end, so that hidden dangers can no longer be troubled." ”

"What do you mean?" Tokugawa Iemitsu didn't understand for a while, and looked at him suspiciously.

And Doi Toshikatsu didn't say any more, just lowered his head, as if waiting for Tokugawa Iemitsu to make his own decision.

Looking at his appearance, Tokugawa Iemitsu finally understood what he meant.

It's a really important thing. It was because of his scruples that he didn't dare to say it openly.

"Yes, the Loyal Chief must be disposed of." After a moment, he said coldly, "At this time, we must not let people use his name to cause chaos in the shogunate. ”

By that, he pursed his lips again, obviously a little disdainful, "He hasn't committed suicide yet, it's just shameless!" ”

He was indeed unhappy that Tokugawa Tadanaga had not yet committed suicide.

……………………

At this time, Zhou Pu and his army were of course ignorant of the movements and news inside the shogunate, and they were now only concerned about advancing towards the only goal, and the end of the road ahead was only Kyoto for him.

They entered the territory of the Hiroshima Domain directly when they marched, perhaps because of the motivation of the feudal bonus, or perhaps because they wanted to show themselves in front of the Great Han, and the allied forces under his command fought very bravely, and the feudal army in the Hiroshima Domain did not put much resistance and began to retreat, leaving a large area of land and castles to the advancing army.

The reason why the Asano clan resisted so little was that they found that the shogunate had no intention of sending a large army to the Hiroshima domain to assist them in resisting the Han army, but instead issued an order for their feudal lord to move to Kanto.

In such a situation, the lord of the Hiroshima domain, Asano Mitsusheng, who was already frightened by the attack of the Great Han, was also happy, and he immediately chose to lead his close vassals to flee the Hiroshima domain, and then ordered the troops of his domain to withdraw north to Kyoto, join the shogunate army in Kyoto, and accept the shogunate's control.

This sixteen-year-old feudal lord inherited the position of family governor after his father's death last year, and he was basically still in the stage of not knowing anything.

In the case of the feudal lords and vassals fleeing, the Hiroshima Domain's feudal army certainly did not have the will to fight, and some of them chose to obey the northern retreat to Kyoto, but there were still many people who refused to leave, they did not have any concept of the country, but only regarded the domain as their duty to defend the territory, so they did not want to go to Kyoto to shed blood and sacrifice for the shogunate in vain, and many of these people simply chose to surrender, and many people scattered directly into the mountains and countryside.

Zhou Pu and others were naturally happy about this situation, and after they conquered the castle of the Hiroshima Domain, they issued a proclamation to let the old people of the Hiroshima Domain in various places maintain order so as not to disrupt the logistics supply of the army, and then left a small number of people to garrison the rear while the army continued to advance.

During this march, Zhou Pu's army looted the villages along the way, Zhou Pu knew that it was inevitable that these feudal armies would be plundered, and they also needed to use some looting to maintain military supplies and morale, but in order not to provoke a rebellion in the rear, he still ordered to restrain the troops, at least so that the Hiroshima domain remained relatively calm.