Chapter 154
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 154
Chapter Title: Asia in Chaos
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“Damn it, damn it, damn it all! Those goddamn lunatics!”
Returning from his audience with the Tennō, Shogun Ieyoshi, unable to contain his rage, pounded his fist on the writing table and ground his teeth.
“It’s like they have shit for brains! What? Invite Killian here? Are they out of their minds or….”
As he spewed curses, he saw the faces of his subordinates turn pale and quickly changed his tune.
“His Majesty the Emperor, of course, might say such a thing due to a lack of information, but how could the ministers who serve him say the same!”
Even if the Tennō was a figurehead, openly criticizing him was a risk too great to bear. But criticizing the men under him? That was another story entirely.
The Shogun’s close aide, Dojima, was the first to chime in.
“I believe the term ‘utterly ignorant’ could not be more fitting for such men.”
“Hmph… Yes, you’re right. They’re nothing but trash, worthless for anything other than producing shit day after day.”
The most absurd part was that those who agreed with the proposal weren’t just flattering the Tennō to get on his good side.
Anyone with a brain knew that the Shogun held the real power, and they were well aware of that fact.
In other words, they had voted in favor because they, in their own minds, thought it was what the Shogun wanted.
It was maddening, but surprisingly, a significant number of people still thought that way.
*This is driving me insane.*
“Do you know how the daimyo in the provinces are reacting?”
“Surprisingly, most are in favor. Even Satsuma and Chōshū are saying that General Killian should be welcomed as a grand state guest….”
“Those crazy bastards! They’re usually so uncooperative, so why are they spouting such nonsense now!”
“Well, it was His Majesty the Emperor who first proposed it, and rumors have spread that the Shogun also agrees….”
“Damn it all. Is there really no way out of this? No, no, no! Dojima, you know, don’t you? General Killian is no longer a general; he is the Prince Consort of Igirisu. And haven’t you seen the recent news from Oranda? He’s become the daimyo of a land called Canada, a place even larger than the Qing Dynasty! He’s become a king in all but name!”
“The land may be vast, but I’ve heard the population is not yet comparable. Still, it seems true that he now wields power far beyond what he had before.”
This was not what Ieyoshi had intended.
It was an undeniable fact that Killian was a hero who had brought the Qing Dynasty to its knees and was now enjoying success even within Europa.
Originally, Ieyoshi’s plan was simply to ride the coattails of Killian’s meteoric rise to strengthen the Shogun’s authority and ensure the nation’s security. That would have been enough.
But he had never dreamed that Killian would go beyond mere success and marry the Queen.
And now, a daimyo ruling over a land larger than the Qing Dynasty or India.
With each passing day, Killian’s fame would surely grow to a level that they could no longer handle.
“Damn it. If he were still just a foreign affairs official, we could have invited him under the pretext of signing a treaty. But how can we just summon the Prince Consort of a nation at will?”
“It wouldn’t be a summons, but a polite and formal invitation… but that would still be difficult, wouldn’t it?”
“Of course it would! Even with their fast ships that are barely affected by the wind, isn’t it said that a round trip from Igirisu takes nearly half a year!”
If he were in Killian’s shoes, his only thought would be that those fools had finally lost their minds.
Besides, Killian wasn’t even of true Tokugawa blood; he would have no sentimental attachment to the archipelago or the Emperor.
He might even be enraged by the mere fact that they, the Shogunate, had the audacity to summon him, the Prince Consort of Igirisu.
If that happened, the non-aggression pact with Rosia would fall through, and a misstep could lead to the Shogunate being isolated in Northeast Asia.
“No, that’s not all… If Killian rejects our proposal, it becomes a public refusal of His Majesty the Emperor’s invitation. Then, of course, public opinion will turn sour.”
Since Killian was nominally of Tokugawa blood, the filth would splash back on them.
Domains like Satsuma and Chōshū would jump at the chance to criticize the Shogunate, and since their criticism would be perfectly justified, there would be nothing they could say.
From any angle, proposing that Killian come here would only bring disaster upon the Shogunate.
“Damn. Is there no good way out of this?”
“Still, if Killian were to come, would it not have an immense effect on elevating the Shogun’s authority?”
“No, why are you saying that too? I’m tearing my hair out precisely because there’s no way he’ll come.”
“Then we must make him come. The worst-case scenario is that he flatly refuses His Majesty the Emperor’s invitation. In that case, we have no choice but to take the lesser of two evils. We must ask him to come, no matter what conditions we have to offer.”
“Are you suggesting we open our ports?”
Until now, the Shogunate had adhered to a strict policy of national seclusion, refusing trade with any country.
Even with Oranda, with whom they had a relatively close relationship, they only accepted limited, necessary goods.
Besides, Ieyoshi was no fool.
Just by looking at the goods from the Dutch merchants, it was easy to see how far ahead Europa was compared to Asia.
It was obvious what would happen if they opened their ports and engaged in unrestricted trade with such an advanced nation.
All the silver in the country would be drained away through trade, and the thirty million people of this nation would be reduced to mere livestock, consuming Europa’s products.
Of course, if they were to undertake drastic reforms to prevent that, there was a possibility that the nation could achieve wealth and military strength within a few decades.
But that was nothing more than a gamble with an unknown outcome.
Moreover, simply saying, “We’ll open our ports, so please come,” would likely be ignored.
They would have to offer something more on top of opening the ports, but if they gave away too much, the provincial daimyo might use it as a pretext to rise up.
“...No matter which path I choose, it’s a dilemma. Hmph….”
Though he said that, Ieyoshi had already made up his mind.
As his aides said, if he had to choose, he had to take the lesser of two evils. Choosing the worst path made no sense.
“For now, we must bring Killian here, even if we have to grab him by the trousers and beg. And if his visit truly comes to pass, we must be absolutely meticulous with his security. They will be on high alert as well, but we must deploy soldiers along every route and at every location to prevent any accidents, no matter how unlikely.”
“Understood. If His Highness Killian truly comes, we will prepare with the mindset that we will all commit seppuku if even a single scratch appears on his person.”
The aides in the room nodded their heads vigorously, their resolve hardening.
It was unthinkable, but if anything happened to Killian while he was a guest of the Shogunate, the Shogunate would be finished in that instant.
What kind of country was Igirisu? They were the strongest nation in Europa, the one that had laid waste to the vast Celestial Empire, the Great Qing, raiding its entire dizzying coastline from Hainan to Tianjin as if it were their own backyard.
If provoked, laying waste to this nation’s entire coastline would be child’s play for them.
“Mark my words. Now that it has come to this, we must use any means necessary to become Igirisu’s closest ally in Asia. Joseon? They are fools who failed to recognize such a brilliant man and chased him away. Killian, too, will surely see that it is more beneficial to align with us than with those idiots.”
Once you’ve jumped on the back of a running tiger, you have no choice but to ride it to the end.
When you thought about it, both were island nations, a commonality they shared.
Now that things had come to this, he would aim to make this country the Igirisu of Asia and mobilize every possible resource to achieve it.
At that very same moment, a secret meeting was taking place elsewhere in the archipelago.
“Do you really think General Killian will visit this country?”
“That’s impossible. Igirisu isn’t a neighboring country like Joseon or the Qing Dynasty. He won’t make that long journey.”
“Then it won’t be long before the Shogun’s lies are exposed to the world.”
“Even if he does come, it doesn’t matter. If we inform him that the Shogun is trying to use Igirisu to bolster his own prestige, they will naturally fall out.”
Taking this incident as an opportunity to weaken the Shogun’s power, the influential figures of the Satsuma, Chōshū, and Tosa domains were rapidly closing ranks, setting aside their ideological differences.
***
Japan wasn’t the only country flooring the accelerator and hurtling into chaos.
The small ball Killian had tossed into the air had grown uncontrollably large as it crossed the Atlantic and Pacific, becoming massive enough to crush the Qing Dynasty and Joseon.
Joseon, having decided to sign a non-aggression pact with Russia by bringing in Britain, had flatly ignored the Qing’s request for troops.
Of course, given Joseon’s adherence to the Sinocentric order, they didn’t ignore the Qing completely.
That would be a perfect violation of the Confucian order.
—We wish to dispatch reinforcements, but circumstances in our own country make it difficult to send troops. As for food supplies, a great drought has struck the eight provinces of Joseon, leaving us with no surplus, making aid difficult. The production of gunpowder has also recently run into problems, making it difficult to export….
It wasn’t an outright "get lost," but it was tantamount to showing them the door, a clear message that they had no intention of helping, not even with a single grain of rice, and that they should stop talking nonsense and go home.
Naturally, the Qing envoy who received this reply was furious, but Joseon simply repeated their polite apologies and did not reverse their decision.
The envoy even threatened that this was an act of defying the Son of Heaven’s command, but it wasn't as if Joseon had no one to rely on.
*‘What can you do if we refuse to help? Are you going to stop your war with the Russians and attack us?’*
Even if the Qing lost their minds and sent an army, their war with the British had already exposed that the current Qing military was in no state to do anything to Joseon.
They would still treat them with the respect due to the nation of the Son of Heaven, but that was as far as it went.
Unbeknownst to many, Joseon’s perception of the Qing was steadily hitting rock bottom.
And this wasn’t just an external view.
“Sons of the Central Plains! Why do you think the Great Qing is in its current state? Because of greedy officials? Of course, that is true! But the fundamental reason is that the false truths this nation has long revered have reached the end of their life. The feudal ideology that ranks people by status and allows the rich to oppress the poor can no longer navigate the modern era!
Do you remember the recent war with the British? That war, which ended in defeat, was not our defeat at the hands of white men. For the leader of the enemy army was of mixed blood, with the same blood as us flowing through his veins. This was a warning sent by the Supreme Lord in Heaven, who borrowed their hands to give us a wake-up call!”
Hong Xiuquan, who had been working as a teacher in a village near Guangzhou after repeatedly failing the civil service examinations.
One day, he stumbled upon a copy of *Good Words to Admonish the Age*. Based on this, he created a new pseudo-religion, inserting his own claim of being the second son of Yahweh and the younger brother of Jesus into Western Christian ideology.
At first, the number of his followers did not grow quickly. But when he added the bluff that he was an acquaintance of Killian Gore—the man from Britain who had brought the Qing Dynasty to its knees—it proved surprisingly effective.
For the destitute people of the provinces, the narrative of casting the Qing establishment as evil and framing Killian Gore, a man of Asian blood who had defeated them, as good, was unexpectedly persuasive.
Initially, he had no intention of calling for the overthrow of the government, but as his influence grew beyond expectations, Hong Xiuquan naturally had no choice but to define the Qing Dynasty itself as a corrupt entity that must be destroyed.
“Awaken! If we shatter the old, false order with our own hands, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom will dawn upon this land!”
The followers of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom swelled like snow in the Guangdong and Guangxi regions where government control was weak, but the central government had no capacity to deal with them.
At almost the same time the Son of Heaven was raging at Joseon's refusal to send reinforcements, Russia declared war and sent its troops across the border.
A great spark had finally landed in the ever-growing powder keg.
While no one was paying attention, Asia was becoming a great crucible where the interests of the European powers converged and melted together.