CHAPTER 295: CHAPTER 213: DIVINE ARTIFACT!

"This ship is pretty decent. The money spent on Okabe was worth it."

Ah Man stood atop the deckhouse of Wanjin’s first giant vessel, the "Chita," gazing at the vast Ise Bay, feeling the sea breeze on her face, and speaking with obvious satisfaction.

The main thing was that this kind of giant ship, layered and wrapped with "money," shone with dazzling gold, incredibly luxurious, and even though it reeked of nouveau riche vulgarity, it still matched her aesthetic perfectly.

And Okabe Iyayama really lived up to his reputation as an old carpenter who made it into the history books. He built this ship remarkably well. Even though Ah Man didn’t know carpentry nor much about shipbuilding, just walking around the vessel a few times, she could still sense that the spatial structure was extremely reasonable, all sorts of implements on board showed great ingenuity, and the ship sailed very steadily.

Maybe it’s a case of skill showing in the details, hard to put into words, but anyway, Ah Man thought this ship was more comfortable than any she’d ever ridden.

"That money was definitely well spent!"

Harano was also pretty pleased with the final result Okabe Iyayama handed over; anyway, if it were up to him, his own work would absolutely never reach the level of the "Chita." Principles and craft technique are two different things—just knowing the theory doesn’t mean you can jump fields and actually build the real thing, let alone mass produce it; that only happens in time-travel novels.

Like with wind tunnels or atomic bombs, plenty of people can explain the theory, but if you put them in charge of construction or ask about some particular detail, you’ll only get an eye roll.

With the new warship, the Wanjin Navy was super excited and, under Chief Instructor Yu Da’s command, constantly running various tests—speeding up, slowing down, and using signal flags to direct the accompanying customs ships and kobaya boats to coordinate their actions, eager to get the warship into real combat as soon as possible.

Harano couldn’t care less about their antics, just stationed himself in the deckhouse to serve as a "mascot," letting the Wanjin Navy sail back and forth inside Ise Bay to their heart’s content.

By the next morning (they anchored at night, no night sailing), the "Chita" had drifted all the way to the western side of Ise Bay, and upon seeing the Ise Peninsula, Harano’s interest was piqued again.

Currently, there were four main samurai powers on the Ise Peninsula: the Hokitate Family, the Miyoshi family, the Hosokawa family, and the Rokkaku family.

No need to worry about the Rokkaku family; they only held a small bit of land at the root of the peninsula and didn’t have a strong presence there. As for the other three: the Hokitate Family controlled Northern Ise, making them neighbors just across the sea from Harano;

The Miyoshi family controlled a large central part of the peninsula’s plains, while the Hosokawa family held the remaining parts.

All three families could be considered strong daimyos during the Japan Warring States Period.

Especially the Miyoshi family—they were at their peak, controlling the Kinki region, possessing Yamashiro, Settsu, Kawachi, Izumi, Tanba, and Harima, a total of eight provinces, and effectively wielded real power in the Muromachi Shogunate as the Shogunate’s "Deputy General"—if Harano remembered right, the Miyoshi family would one day hack to death the sword master shogun of the Ashikaga Family, marking the end of the Muromachi Shogunate era.

The Hosokawa family had the next strongest power and wasn’t to be underestimated either: their core territory was in Western Ise, facing Shikoku Island, making them one of the controllers of the Seto Inland Sea route. Their navy was strong, they were filthy rich, but they were the type to make a fortune quietly and didn’t care much for land battles, so their name wasn’t too renowned in history.

The weakest was the Hokitate Family, and yet this weakest one—well, about seven years from now, Oda Nobunaga would try to conquer Northern Ise, mobilizing fifty to seventy thousand troops and fighting for ages without a swift victory. In the end, the best he could do was force the Hokitate Family to pinch their noses and accept Oda Nobuaki as adopted heir, only a symbolic submission at best.

Harano’s eyes were now on the Hokitate Family of Northern Ise, since he was currently boxed in on the Chita Peninsula by Oda Nobunaga and Matsudaira Mototaka working together. Unless he went all out and burned every bridge, he couldn’t get out, so seeking an overseas route was his only choice.

But considering the distance he’s able to conveniently engage at, heading east along the coast means running into the Matsudaira, Imagawa, Houjou, and Uesugi families, all not easy to tangle with. Even the Imagawa family isn’t easy—if he provokes the Three Kingdoms Alliance, with Imagawa, Takeda, and Houjou all ganging up on him, even if he could hold out, the cost in lives would be overwhelming. Heading west along the coast, the Oda Family, Hokitate Family, Hosokawa family, and Miyoshi family are in order, but only the Hokitate Family is weak enough to go after.

Ah Man, who hung around him every day, knew he couldn’t sit still because of some plan. Seeing him staring at the Northern Ise coastline, his eyes practically glowing green, she immediately started nagging: "Save it—you know last time the Hokitate Family fought the Miyoshi family, they dragged out over twenty thousand for a desperate fight, and with their allied reinforcements, it was over thirty thousand. We can’t do anything to them right now."

Earlier, Wanjin’s territory had expanded and needed tons of grassroots officials, forcing many officers and veteran soldiers to switch trades. Now they had just over two thousand professional soldiers, not even as many as during the Battle of Okehazama; with that kind of strength, taking on twenty or thirty thousand and swallowing up Northern Ise—calling it a foolish dream would be generous, the difficulty was off the charts.

"I’m just taking a look, no plans for now... not doing anything yet."

Hardheaded as Harano was, he had no intention of doing any one-man-against-ten stunts anyway. Even if he could recreate the New Wanjin landing, he didn’t have enough grassroots officials to control any new territory right now.

The best he could do was hope for the future...

Harano settled down and decided to bide his time for further development, while the "Chita" didn’t care about the shocked Hokitate Family fishermen along the coast. It swaggered along the length of the Ise Peninsula, all the way to its tip, then made a diagonal crossing back over Ise Bay to New Wanjin, thus completing this round of naval training.