Chapter 460 19. Encountering Many Difficulties on the March
The next day, the sky was bright. The minor battle last night did not actually affect the large group of troops, but it was still a defeat, and the momentum of the rapid advance was thwarted.
The plains on both sides of the Hayami River were flat and open, and there was nothing except the messy footprints left by the troops last night.
It was impossible to detect how many Ikko Ikki people came last night, but judging from the traces of people and horses trampling on the other side, there were thousands or even tens of thousands of people.
I think the Ikko sect believers in Nishimikawa have received the news and started to gather and mobilize on a large scale. The troops defending the main mountain, Honshoji, must be very strong.
Xiaoping was too helpless. The Hayami Bridge was burned and half collapsed, and the bridge was broken into several pieces and could not be used. It was necessary to detain civilian boats and build a floating bridge before continuing to move forward.
However, it was obvious that in the nearby villages, except for a few lonely thatched houses, there was no one in sight, and naturally there was no small fishing boat.
They could only look for suitable bamboo and wood on the spot to make water rafts, but they still couldn't find suitable materials after expanding the search range.
There was no other way, so they temporarily borrowed more than 20 small morning boats from the Hamamatsu navy and built two floating bridges. Only then did they transport the army's food and fodder across the river without leaving them behind.
At the same time, Kobayata persuaded all the generals to stuff the captured items into two Guan boats and send them back to Hamamatsu for temporary storage. They would return them after everyone went back after the war.
The bloated small load carrier team always had to slim down, otherwise it would go slower and slower, dragging down the speed of the entire army.
The Ikko Ikki had already been mobilized, and it was certain that the road ahead would definitely not be smooth.
After a day of busy work, they were finally sorted out. They could continue on their way and march into Honshoji Temple.
In addition, the navy also sent news of the Oda army, which had successfully joined the remnants of Matsudaira Motoyasu and the 600 reinforcements of Okudaira Sadanobu and others.
The goal of about 5,000 troops was to head straight for Okazaki Castle. Okubo Tadayo, a staunch henchman of the Matsudaira family, risked his life to persuade the wavering Mikawa people.
Matsudaira Michiharu of the Sakurai Matsudaira family also felt what Ieyasu had felt before. We are all Matsudaira, why should you, Sakurai Matsudaira, be the boss? We finally worked together to drive away the peaceful Matsudaira family, and we have to provide another father above our heads?
Impossible! Absolutely not!
The people of the West Mikawa people who were like one pair of pants when fighting against Ieyasu Matsudaira fully experienced the road of being in the same boat - sleeping in the same bed but dreaming differently - fighting in the same room - dying together.
If it weren't for the discovery that Ieyasu Matsudaira's various foreign aids were coming one after another, the people of the West Mikawa people might have been torn apart.
Now the people of the West Mikawa people are not convinced, and they are barely united under the command of Matsudaira Michiharu, but there is no news of gathering troops to seek a battle with the Yamauchi army or the Oda Matsudaira coalition. In their current state, they will most likely defend their castles and it will be difficult to completely unify them.
Kobayata wrote a letter to Matsudaira Ieyasu, asking him not to bother with the small fish and try to restore Okazaki Castle first. After all, the political aura attached to Okazaki Castle itself is unmatched by other cities. As long as Okazaki is captured, it is likely that many traitors will be attracted.
Since Matsudaira Ieyasu has received support and has already started to act, Kobayata must also speed up.
The reason is very simple. In history, Matsudaira Ieyasu was penniless due to a great chaos. He had long set his sights on Honshoji Temple and wanted to eat it up completely.
In the end, Honshoji Temple was "restored to its original state"!
How to restore it? It was directly looted and completely demolished, and turned into farmland.
The level of "washing" was no different from that of the one in Echigo. The degree of cleanliness of the washing was praised in history books for his clean and neat handling. Because it was too clean, Uncle Tsunayoshi at least left a lot of rotten tiles on the ground, and Matsudaira Ieyasu even moved the tiles away.
From then on, there was no such thing as Honshoji Temple in Mikawa, until the Battle of Komaki and Nagakute. Toyotomi Hideyoshi's 120,000 troops came in a fierce manner. He was exhausted and got the support of the Ikko sect's ambush troops at the cost of restoring the Ikko sect temple in Mikawa, which made the Ikko sect in Mikawa officially revived.
Kobayata had long regarded Honshoji Temple as a thing in his pocket, so how could he let it go to Matsudaira Ieyasu. It's better to strike first and get it as soon as possible.
Things went against one's wishes. On the second day, not long after the start, Matsudaira Ichisao, who was the first to move, came to report that the road was blocked.
You said he dug up the whole road, but he didn't. The Ikki just dug a half-meter deep and half-meter wide ditch every few meters on the street. At a glance, there are probably hundreds of them, or even more.
For the Ikko clan, which could mobilize tens of thousands of Ikki, this might be a simple matter of a word. With tens of thousands of people on the battlefield, wouldn't it be a matter of minutes to dig a half-meter ditch with a hoe and a rake?
It's not like these Ikki were asked to fight, it's just digging a ditch, that's really easy.
This kind of ditch can be crossed by a person, but what about animals? What about ox carts? It's definitely impossible to carry the food and supplies of 5,000 troops. They can only stop and fill the ditch slowly.
Of course, it's only spring now, and the farmland has not been flooded. The fields that have just passed the winter are also relatively hard, and they won't be deep and shallow. If the soldiers walk normally, it won't be a big problem, but there is still the same problem, how can the carriages and horses pass?
Filling the ditch is just hard work, it's not a big deal. But the Ikko Ikki is not prepared to let the Yamauchi army fill the ditch properly, he still continues to play tricks.
They didn't send any large army, not even strong men, but let two or three people organize the weak-footed people. They didn't attack the Yamanouchi army, but encouraged them to approach the Yamanouchi army. If they met them, they would just scatter.
The weak-footed people are different from the well-footed people and the unfooted people. This is the saying of the Shimazu family. Those who can wear armor and go to the battlefield are the well-footed people, and the various auxiliary personnel who don't have money to buy armor but also go to the battlefield are the unfooted people.
As for the elderly, women, and children who shouldn't even go to the battlefield, these people are called weak-footed people.
In the legendary battle of the Battle of Jiulong River, 90% of the more than 300,000 troops of the Ikko Ikki were this kind of weak-footed people. That's what it means to coerce the people and rush forward.
But don't look at these weak-footed people in groups of three to five hundred. They don't come to fight, but just circle around you like flies. If you don't fight them, maybe there will be one or two hundred monks in a team of weak-footed people, and then there will be a big mess.
But if Xiao Pingtai sent people to attack them, these people would run away in a flash, relying on their familiarity with the local geography.
Xiao Pingtai really couldn't hit them, but he couldn't not hit them either.
This disgusting method was really disgusting, and it made full use of the advantages of the Ikko clan's men, women, old and young, who all went to the battlefield and had sufficient human resources, and did their best to harass the Yamauchi army.