On July 15th, the fifth year of Guangde, on the Ghost Festival of the Lunar Calendar, a strong earthquake occurred in Honshu, Japan. The epicenter was located in the center of Edo Castle where Tokugawa Iemitsu was located, and the location was where the shogun was. The Gohonmaru.
It is said that Tokugawa Iemitsu did not have time to write a posthumous edict - something that was usually done by the defeated shogunate - before he fell silently into the bottomless crack, and in the end he only uttered a cyan-filled cleft.
All is dead.
Earthquakes occurred frequently in Japan. The Japanese people living on various islands were buried alive by landslides caused by earthquakes, killed by falling stones, burned to death by fires, and killed by robbers who took advantage of fires... ··
In short, earthquakes are a common thing for everyone, and they can be said to be commonplace. Just like Kang Yingqian's lust and Liu Zhaosun's quest for immortality, they were not worth mentioning at first.
However, this Edo earthquake was unprecedented in its intensity, destruction, and death toll.
Most of the more than 100,000 houses in the city collapsed overnight, and several shrines were directly turned into ruins. The tombs of Tokugawa Ieyasu and Tokugawa Hidetada were burned by fire.
The fire caused by the earthquake ignited all the houses in the city that had not been destroyed, causing more damage than the Qi army's incendiary air raid that lasted for half a month.
Edo residents suffered heavy casualties and were hit by earthquakes and fires. At least 100,000 of the population of 500,000 were lost. Many people did not dare to escape from Edo City until they died, fearing the siege of the Qi army.
Of course, when talking about this, we cannot but praise the craftsmanship of the Japanese country, because according to the pre-war planning and layout of the shogunate and the "tens of thousands of pieces of jade" formulated by Tokugawa Iemitsu and other major figures, the samurai and peasants of Edo and surrounding areas, various People must stick to their posts and no matter what happens, they cannot escape easily.
It must be said that the Japanese people showed admirable and rigorous discipline in executing the orders of the shogunate.
The same discipline is also reflected in the way they clean the toilet. It is said that they have to clean the toilet seven times regardless of whether it is clean or not. After watching the Cuju competition, the fans will stay and clean up the garbage in the venue.
Of course, these are all stories that happened in another time and space, so I won’t go into detail here.
In short, on the Ghost Festival in the fifth year of Guangde, despite frequent earthquakes and raging fires, the strong Edo people still stick to their posts until the fire devours them...
Edo Castle has a population of over half a million, making it a veritable metropolis from a global perspective.
However, overnight, all the prosperity was gone, and destruction came.
The earthquake not only caused a fire, but also caused a tsunami. Half an hour after the earthquake, a huge wave more than ten meters high swept through the entire city of Edo like a wall, like a doomsday judgment, taking away all the Japanese people.
By noon on July 16, half of Edo Castle was submerged in water and half was still burning.
Groups of octopus, tuna, salmon, and saury swim around the city.
Although all the Japanese were dead and injured, the punishment of Edo Castle did not stop there.
After earthquakes, fires and floods, Mount Fuji violently erupted.
The boiling magma poured down the hillside like a flood. Wherever the boiling magma passed, the mountains, rivers and vegetation were all turned into coke.
Edo Castle is adjacent to the Mount Fuji volcano to the north, and to the west is a series of small villages and towns that are also close to the volcano. On land, the fastest way to leave Edo is to go east. But there is a river to the east, and only two bridges can cross it.
After the volcano erupted, the volcanic ash and debris that poured down, the thick smoke from the raging fire, and the toxic gases emitted when the lava erupted did not subside for several days.
The Qi army evacuated early to the west of Kyushu Island and watched the fire from across the shore.
The amount of smoke and projectiles was huge. The smoke and dust in the sky blocked the sun, floated in the air and reduced visibility. When it fell on the ground, it covered the roads on Honshu Island, making people lose their direction.
The toxic gases emitted by volcanoes are even more deadly.
The Tokugawa shogunate, together with the hostages handed over by each feudal clan in Edo, were eventually taken away by earthquakes, fires, floods and volcanic eruptions. Only a few thousand of the half million people escaped from the city.
In addition, other vassals were in disaster
The disaster caused millions of casualties and turned the state into a hell.
Before the earthquake broke out, the Qi army had withdrawn from Edo in an orderly manner, leaving only a small number of Korean soldiers to pretend to continue the attack, and the main force withdrew westward to Kyushu Fukuoka Domain.
Before withdrawing his troops, Zhao ordered the Sixth Corps to set fires everywhere around the city gate to ensure that most of the Japanese people had no chance of survival.
On July 20, three days after Mount Fuji erupted, something even more terrifying happened.
At noon on the 20th, a roar from the ground resounded throughout the island, and then, the entire Honshu Island, with Edo as the center, opened a huge gap hundreds of miles long and half a mile wide in the east-west direction.
Countless seawater surged up to the ground along this huge gap. At first, it was just a spring. Later, the tax grain became larger and larger, turning into a fountain. Finally, the huge flood roared from the depths of the earth like a beast breaking free of its chains. came out and submerged the entire Honshu Island with a thunderous force.
Honshu Island, which has experienced fires, earthquakes, and magma, has long been riddled with holes. It was completely torn in half at the last moment and sank into the sea at a speed visible to the naked eye.
On the same day, part of the northern part of Shikoku Island was also submerged by sea water.
As of July 22nd, all of Honshu Island, part of Shikoku Island, and part of Kyushu Island have sunk to the bottom of the sea. The Japanese people who have lived on the islands for thousands of years - the descendants of the evil gods - have basically lost their lives. , more than three million people have died in the past ten days. Of course, from another perspective, their souls can finally return to their hometown and return to the deep sea where they can't even see their fingers. They can also continue to serve those evil gods whose bodies are covered with tentacles and whose heads and bodies are covered in mucus.
From this perspective, the Japanese should express their gratitude to the Supreme Emperor...
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On the 22nd, the tsunami gradually subsided, and the volcanic ash continued to drift eastward. The Qi army continued to evacuate to Tsushima Island, and Japan truly became an abandoned place.
If the Japanese country still has a certain strategic value and can become a port for the empire to continue its conquests, now, after this super earthquake and flood, all the excellent ports in various places have been lost, and the lowland plains everywhere have been submerged by sea water. Not to mention the construction of seaports, even Food supplies for the garrison cannot be achieved.
Such a Japanese country naturally has no value anymore. It is in the best interests of Daqi to let this land and the ethnic groups on it fend for themselves.
In late July, the shogunate army died without a fight, and the daimyo of each domain died in Edo City. The surviving daimyo from various places surrendered to the Qi army.
The Tokugawa shogunate's rule in Japan completely collapsed.
On July 25, Zheng Sen, who was trapped in Shikoku Island, cut off food and grass, suffered from volcanic ash, and was helpless. Amid regret and fear, an old illness broke out and he died suddenly.
After Zheng Sen's death, the rest of the pirates immediately fell apart and rushed to Kyushu Island to surrender to the Qi army. Everyone knew that with these disasters, the Japanese country would definitely be starved this winter and would be short of food and clothing. Tens of thousands of people would be in this country. If you stay in a place where you don't poop, you will end up starving to death and freezing to death.
Of course, there are still some stubborn people who refuse to surrender and say they will fight Liu Zhaosun to the end - although Liu Zhaosun's current whereabouts are unknown - the pirates do not have the benevolence, justice, propriety, wisdom and wisdom to believe these false words, and they don't care who they are loyal to, as long as they make money. .
As a result, a few main combatants were killed by others.
Before Zheng Sen's body was cold, the pirates began to fight among themselves, and then surrendered without stopping. The surrendering faction had an absolute advantage, so the surrender went smoothly.
After the Zheng pirates surrendered, Zuo Liangyu, who was also sitting on Shikoku Island, finally panicked.
Long before the Qi Army's Eastern Expedition, Lao Zuo had always wanted to see the limelight.
He wanted to wait until both the shogunate army and the Qi army were defeated, and then come out to clean up the mess. In this way, even if he couldn't win in the end, he could at least become a famous person to do something after the war.
Zuo Liangyu has the capital to imagine. He has more than 10,000 Ming troops under his command, each of whom is equipped with firearms. When he fled from Shandong, he also carried several thousand taels of gold and more than 300,000 taels of silver with him. Children are hard currency in Japan, so there is no shortage of food and grass.
However, as soon as the battle started, Zuo Liangyu realized that something was wrong. First, the armies of various vassals fought against the Qi army, and almost all of them collapsed at the first touch.
The fierce and fierce Satsuma army was also massacred by Liu Zhaosun. The Qi army was invincible. From Kyushu to Edo, no army could stop them.
Zuo Liangyu thought of what he had done before, stabbing Liu Zhaosun in the back many times. I think Qi Jun will definitely not let him go.
The more he thought about it, the more terrifying he became, so he took the initiative to find a counselor to discuss countermeasures. After careful consideration, the counselor suggested to him that Zuo Liangyu should treat the third false prince of the former Ming Dynasty who had been captured earlier as a real person, dedicate it to Qi State, and surrender to Da Qi. , in exchange for survival.
Such a plan sounds like wishful thinking, at least it is impossible for the Emperor to agree to it.
It was a pity that the Supreme Emperor was nowhere to be found, so the power of discussion was handed over to the chief officers of the corps and several cabinet ministers.
What should be done with these prisoners?
Regarding the treatment of the prisoners, the civil and military officials of Da Qi were discussing a lot, and everyone had their own opinions.
After deliberation with Zhao Lijiao, Wang Congzhi and others, Deng Changxiong unanimously decided to execute the remaining members of the Zheng and Zuo families immediately.
Zhang Pu and Lu Xiangsheng believed that these prisoners should be fully utilized and transported back to the country to participate in the work.
Zhao Shujiao insisted on being executed on the spot. Xie Yang came out and said that the mines along the coast were full of people, and the warship capacity was limited, so it was impossible to transport so many prisoners at once.
Deng Changxiong said that bringing too many prisoners into the withdrawal operation would only slow down the march, and if they were not secured, other things would happen later.
So everyone finally reached an agreement to promptly investigate the surrendered prisoners and kill those who had committed any evil acts on the spot.
This also determined the final fate of Zuo Liangyu and other prisoners.
Taking advantage of the gap in retreat, the Qi army cleared out the remaining forces of the various vassals in Kyushu.
Despite natural and man-made disasters, many people still fled the town and hid in the mountains.
In fact, due to the destruction of most of the fields in each domain and the impact of volcanic earthquakes, the food output in various places was not optimistic, and the limited food was confiscated by the Qi army for free.
Therefore, those Japanese people who survived the catastrophe and hid in the mountains were destined to starve to death and were unable to survive this cold and long winter.
