After Keiji Maeda finished nibbling on a leg of mutton, he was about to unload the other. At this time, I only heard Sanada Masaaki ask, "Maeda-sama, is this really so delicious?" ”

"Sanada-sama will find out if you try it."

"This ......" Sanada Masaki still hesitated.

"Oops, what's the big deal, No, this is for you." Keiji Maeda said as he tore off a piece of meat from the leg of lamb that had just been chopped off and stuffed it directly into the other party's hand.

Sanada Changhui wanted to excuse himself, but he didn't move as fast as the other party, at the moment he was holding a piece of lamb leg meat in his hand, whether he was eating or not, not eating, and finally, gritting his teeth and stomping his feet, closing his eyes, he still put this piece of meat in his mouth and chewed it fiercely, as soon as the meat entered his mouth, he immediately felt a refreshing feeling that he had never felt before, and the aroma of meat continued to wrap around in his mouth, so he actually had a feeling of being unstoppable, so after eating, he unconsciously cut off a piece with a knife......

All the retainers present were observing Sanada Masaaki, and seeing that the other party was so affectionate, they didn't hesitate, they all started to go to the next piece, and after eating, they knew that Maeda Keiji did not deceive them.

Due to the large number of retainers present, plus Maeda Keiji grabbed two legs of mutton, the other retainers only got a small piece each, and the five lambs had already been divided. Of course, these retainers adhered to the spirit of the samurai, and their appetite for appetite was not as exaggerated as Maeda Keiji had shown, but the clan could see that they were no longer resisting, and he knew that he had succeeded.

And the next step is to promote it in an all-round way. You can marinate more jerky. As for the retainers. Especially the important ministers in the family, send someone to learn.

Not to mention that the Takayama family has made some progress in promoting meat, it is only said that the entire Hojo family has now fallen into silence.

Since Hojo Clan's escape from Minowa Castle, the journey has not been as smooth as he thought, not only did it not go well, but on the contrary, he fell into trouble several times, if it wasn't for his desire to survive more than ordinary people, then maybe he would have died in the chaos long ago.

This is not as predicted by his retainer Kotaro Mimura. Encountered a bandit, but encountered a much more powerful Hao clan force than the bandits, when Kohata and other three coalition forces attacked Ueno, they also encountered the situation, and what was worse than the three coalition forces was that because he was the younger brother of the Hojo clan, many of the Hao clans who had decided to rebel thought that if they could capture the Hojo clan, then when they took refuge in the Takayama family. It's definitely a credit, with such a credit. Then the family business will be much more stable.

In this way, the Hojo clan was sad, after encountering several such situations, not only the army was greatly consumed, but even he himself did not dare to take the big road, and chose those roads with few people, that is, those wealthy families did not come up with the trick of tricking them into the city first, otherwise the Hojo clan would really not be able to escape.

But even if it walks the mountain road, it is not so safe, although it will not encounter the power of the wealthy clan again, but the mountains and forests are the territory of the bandits, those bandits don't matter who you are, and what they like to rob the most is those down-and-out samurai, robbing civilians can grab a few money, once the samurai are robbed, then nothing else, just grabbing weapons will make a lot of money.

After getting rid of the pursuit of the Hao army, the army under the command of the Hojo clan was reduced from 500 to 30 people, where can these people withstand the robbery of several waves of bandits, the most dangerous one, the Hojo clan Tadashi saw that all the troops were killed, had to throw the soft burden full of gold and silver in his hand far away, and when the other party picked it up, this escaped Musashi, and when he entered Sagami, the situation improved greatly, Sagami is the base camp of the Hojo family after all, this is not only the direct jurisdiction of the Hojo family, and the security is much betterOtherwise, Hojo Clan will definitely never see his brother again.

When he came to Odawara Castle, the Hojo clan did not return to his samurai mansion, but rushed straight to the castle tower, and the Ashigaru who was standing guard in the Hojo family saw that he was the brother of the lord, and did not dare to stop him, so he walked in with him.

And after seeing his younger brother so embarrassed, the Hojo clan didn't need him to speak, he knew that he was afraid that Minowa Castle had been lost, lost a city, he didn't care, after all, he didn't sit in Odawara Castle all day and do nothing, since he was an enemy of the Takayama family, he also began to pay attention to the collection of intelligence, although the Takayama family could not penetrate for the time being, but it was not difficult to know the other party's military movement, especially the movement of the army.

And before he met the Hojo clan, he hadn't received any unusual news from the Takayama family, so even if Minowa Castle was really lost, it should be the so-called of those wealthy families who took refuge in the Takayama family, so there was nothing to worry about.

So I saw that he still asked very calmly: "Shizhong, it's not for my brother to say you, if you can put the time you spend wandering around the Flower Street and Willow Lane on government affairs and martial arts, how will Minowa Castle be lost?" Say, which one is so-called, and the brother must be severely punished. "For his younger brother, the Hojo clan is still very fond of it, not only because of his father's deathbed confession, so that he can treat his family well, but also because, this younger brother has no ambition at all, whether he has the ability is secondary, the most important thing is reliable, as long as he doesn't want to overthrow himself, then he wants to enjoy, it's up to him, of course, if he can help himself, it would be better, so this is the thing that makes him guard one side.

"Brother...... Brother, this time it wasn't the Hao family who did it, but ...... It's the mountain army, otherwise with those wealthy families, there is no possibility of capturing the city. Hojo Tadashi saw that his brother had misunderstood, so he hurriedly said.

Hearing this, the Hojo clan's heart suddenly tightened, and after thinking about it carefully, after confirming that the Takayama Army had indeed not been mobilized during this time, he couldn't help but sink his face and said: "Nonsense, if the Takayama family has a large army mobilized, how can they hide it from me?" Hmph, it's time to recapture the city if it's lost, but I don't want to be deceived, you know? ”

"Brother, Shizhong really didn't lie to you, ...... that night" Seeing that his brother's face changed, Hojo Shizhong hurriedly told what happened that night.

However, the more the Hojo clan listened, the more relieved he became, and when the other party finished speaking, he only heard the Hojo clan say: "Brother." You have been deceived by those wealthy people. Where there is a mountain army. Let me tell you, even if there is, it is also pretended by those wealthy clans, if you think about it carefully, if it is the Takayama army, how can it leave you a way out, it is all because those wealthy armies are not strong enough to form an encirclement of Minowa Castle. That's why we only attack one side. And if it's really a mountain army attacking the city, then it's still used to send the city to deceive the city? ”

Hearing this, Hojo Shizhong came to his senses, yes, he didn't see the Takayama Army from beginning to end, and he didn't find any trace of the enemy when he sent people to investigate before, so would the Takayama Army still fall from the sky?

He was still afraid of the military strength of the Takayama family, which did not mean that he was still afraid of those wealthy clans, so when his brother finished analyzing, he only heard Hojo Clan Zhong say: "Those wealthy clans are really hateful. He also asked his brother to give Shi Zhong an army, and Shi Zhong promised to eradicate them all. ”

Originally, it wasn't a big deal. And seeing that the clan has such an idea, the Hojo clan is very happy, he thinks that maybe his younger brother, who is not a weapon, will work hard because of this matter, and may become a big help for himself in the future, for his request, of course, the Hojo clan is unconditionally supported, especially the other party is only a wealthy family, as long as he sends a large army, he is sending a deputy general who can fight well to assist, and it is not difficult to recapture Minowa Castle and eliminate those wealthy clans.

But just as he was about to say yes, he suddenly saw a servant walk in quickly, and said loudly: "Report to the lord, the big thing is not good, go up to ...... Ueno Kuni's Hachizaki Castle has been broken by Yura, Kohata, and Saito. ”

"Hmph, it's these bastards again, do they want to dominate Ueno?" After hearing the news, although the Hojo clan showed anger, but his heart was happy, he was thinking about how to turn all the places controlled by those wealthy clans into direct jurisdiction, now it's okay, if the Yura three families can really wipe out all those wealthy clans, then all he has to do is to destroy them.

Don't look at them have already surrendered to the Gaoshan family, but it is said that the Gaoshan clan did not accept their request, so he is not worried that the Gaoshan clan will prepare a big battle with the family for the sake of these three people, after all, he knows that the expansion of the Gaoshan family does not seem to have been fully completed, even if the other party has such an idea, there is no such ability, and the family can take advantage of this time to take all the Ueno, once this place is under control, in addition to the newly acquired Shimono, Anfang, Xia Zong, there will be an extra stone of one million stones. This is enough to increase the strength of the family by three percent.

With such information, the Hojo clan is not in a hurry to eliminate these three, but continues to wait for the best time, it doesn't matter, in just more than ten days, he has received at least dozens of information, and the content is without exception the information of these three families to conquer Ueno, at first the Hojo clan is very happy, the more the other party does this, the more it is in line with the interests of the Hojo family, but later, he can't be happy, because he suddenly thought that he took a fancy to Ueno's piece of fat, so what about the Takayama clan, how could he give up? If Shi Gao is less, the other party will not start a full-scale war with his own family because of this, but if it is a country in Ueno, this is enough to make the other party tempted.

And the most important thing is that these three wealthy families have nominally submitted to the Takayama family, so once the Takayama clan has an idea, then the other party can even directly take over the country of Ueno, and there is no need to fight for it at all, if he is the Takayama clan, what will he do, then he will definitely not give up, and it will not take much effort, and he can obtain great benefits, if he does not accept Ueno, it is not a fool.

Thinking of this, the Hojo clan didn't dare to wait, if he wanted to complete the goal of holding Ueno in his hands, then he had to take Ueno Province under control before the Takayama family made a move.

"Come on, immediately recruit retainers to discuss matters."

The Hojo family is different from the Takayama family, and the military strength of the Takayama family is basically under the direct jurisdiction of the clan, so most of those commanders are also concentrated around the clan, and it is very convenient to have a meeting, and the Hojo family is different, first of all, the five elite reserves of the Hojo family except for Hojo Tsunari's Huang Bei and Bai Bei, who had just withdrawn from Echigo, served as a garrison in Odawara Castle to deter the Quartet, and the other three were all scattered everywhere. In this way, it will be difficult for the Hojo family to hold a meeting, and even if a large number of people are sent to inform them non-stop, it will take several days to reach the farthest one, after all, it will take a round trip.

In this way, even if the Hojo clan gets the news one step at a time, when the decision is made, it will be one step later than the clan.

A few days later, before the retainers convened by the Hojo clan arrived, new news came again, this news can be said to be the last thing the Hojo clan wanted to hear, the Takayama clan had sent 16,000 spear ashigaru to enter Ueno country, and also rewarded the three counties bordering Musashi with 80,000 stone seals to its military Sanada Masayuki, as for the three wealthy families, they were also generously rewarded.

After hearing the news, the Hojo clan couldn't help but feel very regretful, if he had sent a reserve of 8,000 troops to attack Ueno as soon as he received the news, then Ueno at this moment should be flying the three-scale flag of his own family, not the Danyama flag.

And he also analyzed through this news that the Takayama clan is bound to win Ueno, which can be seen from the fact that it sent Sanada Masayuki to sit in the town, not to mention others, even if it is a three-year-old child, they are all singing the nursery rhymes of the three military divisions of the Takayama family, Honda is good at attacking and taking risks, Sanada is cautious and strong, Hosokawa is strategic, and there is no need to know too much, just by this nursery rhyme, it can be seen that Ueno has Sanada Masayuki in charge, so he wants to recapture this place again, unless he sends more than the opponent's army, I'm afraid there is nothing to do except overwhelm the other side with troops.

But the problem now is that the family seems to have a lot of troops, but there are really not too many people who can be dispatched, especially after getting a lot of wealthy families from the mouth of the clan has openly betrayed themselves, the two preparations that could have been dispatched can only be used now, even if the military strength of the retainers is added, at most 12,000 people can be dispatched, and he received news that the Takayama clan sent a spear ashigaru team of 8,000, if you add the three families of Yura, then the opponent's army is also 9,000, plus Sanada Masayuki is in charge, Then he is really not very optimistic about the capture of Ueno.

With the arrival of this news, the retainers of the Hojo family finally arrived.

When the last retainer appeared at Odawara Castle, the Hojo clan did not hesitate and immediately held an assessment at the castle tower.

"Subordinates, etc., see the lord." (To be continued.) )