Chapter 209
Whether they were born that way or learned it later, I cannot say, but the Japanese bastards were as deceitful as could be and possessed not the slightest bit of loyalty.
The Japanese of the twenty-first century may be different, but the Japanese bastards of the early to mid-fifteenth century betrayed others so constantly that one might think their very purpose in being born was to stab people in the back.
Would a lord purge the samurai under him for no reason and expand his own direct domain? Would a samurai suddenly betray the lord he served because he found him distasteful? ...
In this era, Japan was a place where people readily nursed grudges over all sorts of novel reasons and killed one another in an endless cycle of mutual slaughter.
Since the ruler of a land populated entirely by such human failures was the shogun, it was easy to mistakenly assume that the Wokou were also sent at his orders, but...
‘The Wokou and the shogun are separate matters.’
I knew this very well, but I would continue insisting before the shogun that this whole mess had happened because he had failed to control the Wokou properly.
That was because saying so was advantageous to Joseon at present.
“Ming recognized the bakufu as the undisputed ruler of Wa and acknowledged that it possessed the authority appropriate to that position. That is why it granted the title and seal of King of Japan to His Highness Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, the third shogun of the bakufu.”
In fact, when Ming ritual was examined strictly, a shogun who held the title of ‘King of Japan’ was fully entitled to be called ‘His Highness.’
Though he ranked somewhat below the king of Joseon or the king of Yue (Vietnam), a nominal king was still a king, after all.
So if I kept emphasizing this form of address and rebuked him by asking how a man who had even received the title of ‘King of Japan’ could possibly fail to manage the Wokou...
Ashikaga Yoshinori would be driven into a corner.
If he objected by asking what business Joseon had interfering in Japan’s affairs, I could retort by asking whether it made sense for a man who called himself the ‘King of Japan’ to be unable to manage the Wokou...
If he claimed that the Wokou were outside his control and therefore not his responsibility, I could simply throw the Tai Chi back at him by saying that he was then unqualified to call himself the King of Japan, so there was no need for things like tally trade.
“Therefore, the looting of the Ming coast by the Wokou may be considered the responsibility of His Highness the shogun. However, His Majesty the Emperor of Great Ming, in his mercy, bestowed imperial grace upon you. Rather than rebuking His Highness the shogun, he sent an expedition to the Western Oceans led by the eunuch Zheng He to attack the Wokou’s bases and wipe them out.”
When you examine it, justification can become a nose ring when hung on a nose and an earring when hung on an ear.
It has a tendency to change arbitrarily depending on the perspective from which it is viewed.
From the bakufu’s perspective, the Ming bastards had invaded at will without even notifying them and opened fire with cannons, so it was understandable that they found it outrageous, but...
That was merely the Japanese bastards’ subjective perspective. Looking at it a little more objectively, the shogun—the equivalent of the chairman of Japan’s organized-crime association—had failed to manage his subordinate organizations properly, so...
Ming had stepped in directly and annihilated the unruly subordinate organizations, sparing the King of Japan the trouble of taking action himself.
‘They saved him the trouble of hunting down the Wokou. If that is not imperial grace, what is?’
“But while His Majesty bestowed imperial grace, surely he must also have thought this?”
“You really spout whatever you please just because you have a mouth! Go on, then. Say whatever you like.”
There is an old saying that if you take something too far—far beyond the limits of human imagination—it becomes art.
Conversely, if you do it halfheartedly, it simply becomes an awkward overextension, and you end up looking like an idiot.
Since I had already started, I would run all the way to the edge of the cliff.
‘The half-assed are the ones who die.’
“Could it be that His Highness the shogun, the King of Japan, has no intention of exterminating the Wokou? Perhaps His Majesty even suspects that you are encouraging them from behind the scenes.”
Upon hearing this, the shogun, furious to the tips of his hair, sprang to his feet from the tatami and ordered an attendant to bring him a sword.
He drew the sword he was handed with an incredibly stylish flourish, then strode toward me and pointed its gleaming blade menacingly at my neck.
He looked ready to cut my head off at any moment.
But I knew.
I knew that he would never be able to bring that blade down on my neck.
That might have been different if Joseon had imposed a maritime prohibition on Wa, as Ming had, and closed every avenue for trade with it.
But we were a country that had openly opened a gateway for trade with Wa at Jeongui County on Jeju Island.
And if he cut down the chief envoy officially sent by Joseon?
Relations with Joseon would immediately collapse, and the trade port would be closed.
Then his control over the kanrei (the office overseeing multiple daimyo), daimyo, and shugo under him would plummet.
Would a madman obsessed with absolute power, who devoted his life to playing the tyrant, cut off my head despite knowing that perfectly well?
‘He absolutely cannot do it.’
“Are you desperate to die?”
“I am Joseon’s chief envoy. If it is for Joseon’s national interest, I am perfectly willing to lay down my life.”
“Then I shall ask you, Joseon’s chief envoy. Since that is Ming’s position, is Joseon’s opinion also the same as theirs, or is it different?”
“Your Highness does not believe that the shogun, the King of Japan, would betray the imperial grace of His Majesty the Emperor of Great Ming.”
Upon hearing this, the shogun sheathed his sword and returned to his seat.
This was the order I had received from Sejong.
Rebuke the shogun of Wa severely for failing to control the Wokou.
And secure a port within Wa where Koreans and Japanese could legally trade with one another.
Therefore, I could not say this directly to the shogun.
‘You were already waiting for an excuse to destroy the Shoni clan. So use this opportunity to pin responsibility for the Wokou raids on them and crush them.’
‘After crushing the Shoni clan, have this bastard report to Ming that they had been using the samurai under them to carry out raids. Then Ming will trust the King of Japan. After that, things like tally trade will pass without difficulty.’
‘Wouldn’t crushing the Shoni clan while strengthening your own power be the perfect way to kill two birds with one stone?’
But saying that would mean openly defying the king’s orders as the man sent here as his chief envoy.
So, taking that bastard’s personality into account, I decided to speak indirectly.
Yes, Ashikaga Yoshinori, my friend...
Hurry up and turn Wa into a madhouse.
And enjoy yourself playing tyrant to your heart’s content.
If you end up being killed by a sword, so much the better for us.
“But this is true of every country... Even when a ruler wishes to soothe his people’s difficult lives and guide them toward a righteous way of living, are there not corrupt and greedy officials lurking beneath him, exploiting the people and committing all manner of tyranny?”
“Indeed, your words are correct. There are several of my vassals who engage in piracy in defiance of my will as shogun and govern the people through tyranny. I will not stand idly by and watch them. You need not worry about that. And does Joseon’s chief envoy have anything more to say beyond what he has told me?”
“Joseon has complete faith in His Highness the shogun, the King of Japan. In addition, Joseon wishes to continue and expand its exchanges with Wa. Therefore, could you designate several ports and permit Joseon and Japan to trade freely with each other?”
Naturally, this had to be kept secret from Ming.
Otherwise, the Ming bastards would step in and cause an uproar, claiming that we were violating the maritime prohibition.
“I shall hear the opinions of my senior ministers and make a decision.”
If another shogun had said this, I would have believed that he truly meant it. But hearing it from this shogun—a power-addicted psychopath feared by everyone—made it utterly unbelievable.
He had no intention of listening to the opinions of his senior ministers at all.
If he held a meeting, it would be nothing more than a meeting for show...
One daimyo who had correctly read his intentions would step forward and say, ‘That sounds wonderful!’ Then the meeting would end with him pretending to be a benevolent shogun who had heeded his vassals’ petition.
“Thank you, Your Highness.”
**
After his first meeting with Kim Dae-beom, Ashikaga Yoshinori’s face was filled with rage.
It was not because of Kim Dae-beom, who had come from Joseon.
At first, when Kim Dae-beom arrived and said that perhaps the Wokou were running rampant because the shogun himself was incompetent, Yoshinori’s guts had twisted with rage, and he had even drawn his sword and pointed it at Kim Dae-beom’s neck, but...
All Kim Dae-beom had done was point out that this was how Ming viewed the matter, and had he not immediately offered a solution as well?
“Hosokawa.”
At these words, Hosokawa Mochiyuki, the highest-ranking among the several kanrei serving under the shogun, answered.
“Yes, Shogun.”
“What do you think of the Shoni clan?”
“...... The Shoni clan?”
“Answer honestly.”
In Hosokawa Mochiyuki’s view, the Shoni clan were traitors through and through.
This was not merely because he was the bakufu’s chief senior minister. Even from an objective perspective, the Shoni clan were unquestionably traitors.
“The Shoni clan are indeed traitors.”
“Do you have a reason for thinking so?”
“Did Your Highness not make Chikuzen (the present-day Fukuoka area) a direct domain and entrust its administration to the Ōuchi clan?”
Shogun Yoshinori showed his displeasure.
“There is currently no daimyo family in the bakufu that owns Chikuzen, so in principle it should have become the shogun’s direct domain... Yet the Shoni clan came forward and spouted the nonsense that it was rightfully their territory because records showed that their ancestor had received Chikuzen as a grant from Lord Yoshimitsu several decades ago.”
After saying that, the Shoni clan raised a great army, claiming that they would subjugate Shibukawa, the Kyushu tandai (overseer of Kyushu).
Of course, the Shoni clan were defeated by the pro-bakufu forces, including Shibukawa and the Ōuchi, and lost much of their territory.
However, the Shoni clan still survived, and this fact greatly displeased the shogun.
“They had always been cornered, so they must have used their senior retainers, the Sō clan, to commission Wokou raids in order to raise funds for war.”
“Yes, there is a very high probability that they did.”
The ‘daimyo Wokou,’ directly operated by the daimyo, were a form of piracy carried out according to plan to secure military funds...
And it was an atrocity that daimyo in the Kyushu region would invariably engage in at least once.
“Prepare once more to subjugate the Shoni clan. And summon the monks of Mount Hiei and have them compose a state letter to the Ming emperor declaring that the Shoni clan stood behind the Wokou.”