The War Court and Lap Pillow, Austria's Mandate of Heaven

Chapter 1231 Fist Wish
In the end, Matsudaira Harugaku, the actual ruler of the Tokugawa shogunate, decided to submit a petition to apologize and ordered the town magistrate in charge of the area near the shrine that day to commit seppuku to apologize.

The shogunate considered this matter to be of great importance. After all, they had built the shrine, and most of the women in the shrine were presented by the daimyo.

Strictly speaking, this incident may also affect the reputation of the daimyo of each domain, so they dare not ignore it.

In fact, it was just a small assassination, and Franz did not take it seriously. However, the apology sent by the shogunate was somewhat interesting. They only briefly mentioned the assassination and the result.

Afterwards, the cause of the incident was emphasized. "Changing rice to mulberry" was the idea Franz gave to the shogunate, but it was the shogunate that made the final decision.

This kind of eccentric writing style is really annoying. What's funny is that they actually want to put the blame on Franz at this time, and even hold a debate in front of the emperor, and say that they can stop this debate from happening.

"threaten me?"

Franz sneered. A group of dead bones in a grave dared to threaten him.

Franz looked up and saw Zoche holding a knife, so he handed the original to her and threw the translated copy into the trash can.

"Read it once."

"Yes."

As soon as Sachi saw the letter from the shogunate, she was shocked, and cold sweat appeared on her forehead after reading it.

Franz confirmed that the translation was correct. It was not that someone wanted to cause trouble deliberately, but that these Japanese devils really thought that Europeans would feel ashamed if they could understand the Spring and Autumn style of writing, and then let them go. Franz was so angry that he almost laughed.

"What do you think?"

Zuo Qi immediately knelt down in a very standard posture of kneeling down, with his forehead touching the ground.

"Your Majesty, I am loyal to you and the Empire, and heaven and earth can bear witness to that. Those shameless people in the shogunate are actually confusing right and wrong, which is truly hateful. I am willing to follow the army to Edo and kill them without a single piece of armor left."

Listening to Zoche's very poor German and watching her touch the ground with her forehead and put her buttocks on her heels, I couldn't help but think of some interesting things.

"Why not have a boxing match?"

"Boxing match?"

Zoche asked with some confusion.

"That's right. Isn't Bushido supposed to be upright? Assassination is really not decent enough. How about a real fight with real swords and guns?"

"You mean the war?"

Franz was very upset. He thought that Austria could defeat Japan's broken ships in California with its national strength.

But if you want to conquer Japan, you will need to mobilize Austria's entire navy and at least 100,000 ground forces to succeed.

Such a trans-hemispheric war was enough to drain the treasury of the Austrian Empire. If the cost of occupation was taken into account, it would be an astronomical bottomless pit.

Attacking Japan was neither cost-effective nor realistic for the Austrian Empire at that time.

"I mean fist to fist, knife to knife, gun to gun!"

This time Zoche understood, but she didn't know what Franz was up to, so she still crawled on the ground and dared not move.

At this time, Franz had already circled behind her.

"An apology should always be sincere."

On the other side, after the shogunate received the reply, the chief elder of the shogunate, Matsudaira Harutake, immediately breathed a sigh of relief and exclaimed, "Yoshi! As expected of a monarch from a superior country, you are really generous. You should all be ashamed of your behavior!"

The elders didn't understand what was going on, but they were a little curious.

"What does the letter say? How much money? How many people? Or how much land?"

"No, the Austrian Empire demands a duel."

"Barbaric Europeans, I have long heard that Europeans have the tradition of trial by combat, but I never thought it was actually true."

"Ignorance! It is this tradition that created that powerful empire. Even the royal family is so martial, how can the subjects be so weak?"

"Yoshi! Our country should also adopt this system."

In the end, Tokugawa Ieharu successfully made his presence felt.

However, when the duel officially began, the officials of the Tokugawa shogunate were dumbfounded.

The so-called duel was a completely one-sided massacre. The warriors of the Ina faction were all wearing helmets and armor, with flags on their backs. At first, the officials of the Tokugawa shogunate could not help but call it despicable, but they were secretly happy in their hearts.

You should know that although the samurai sword is known for its sharpness, its armor-piercing ability is actually very poor, and it can't even penetrate chain mail.

However, they were soon dumbfounded. The warriors of the Ina faction (composed of Japanese who joined the Austrians) were all wearing full body plate armor, holding shields and armor-piercing hammers in their hands.

In the subsequent gunfight, the gap between the two sides' weapons was obvious at a glance, but what was even more hopeless was that the Kaiinashi warriors were wearing plate armor and bulletproof vests underneath, so they could remain unscathed even if they were hit by Japanese hand-made muskets. The outcome of this competition once again became a foregone conclusion.

The final bare-handed fight was meaningless, but both sides still chose to continue. Although it was a competition that would not affect the overall situation, it became the bloodiest fight of the day.

1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 5v5, 10v10, each match was extremely cruel, but it was very enjoyable for the shogunate and the visiting daimyo. They felt that something deep in their souls was touched.
Afterwards, the Isshin-gumi was forced to disband and the five ringleaders were beheaded.

The previous duel made the shogunate feel very embarrassed, especially because the samurai selected by the Austrian Empire were all Japanese, and there was a woman among them who made the shogunate's top officials feel very ashamed.

However, this sense of shame did not last long, and soon Japan's shogunate and daimyo discovered that the benefits of "changing rice to mulberry" were far more than just increasing income.

Farmers and local samurai families without food completely lost the possibility of confronting the government. They could only rely on the shogunate and daimyo, otherwise they would be at risk of running out of food.

The peasant uprisings in the Far East also affected the price of one commodity, that is, porcelain. However, the people of the Qing Dynasty themselves attached great importance to porcelain, and even had a sense of self-admiration for it.

Europeans once called porcelain white gold. In medieval paintings depicting heaven, angels were all made of Chinese porcelain. Even the lowercase letter of the English word "China" means porcelain.

Europe is no longer the Europe of the past. In fact, Europeans have mastered the method of making porcelain since the early 18th century. After more than a hundred years of continuous improvement, the quality of European porcelain is no less than that of Eastern porcelain.

Although some Europeans are still obsessed with buying oriental porcelain to show off their identity and status, more Europeans will choose more down-to-earth European porcelain.

The worst thing is that with the development of the Industrial Revolution, industrialization has also entered the field of porcelain. Soon, low-priced European porcelain will completely kill Oriental porcelain. At this moment, it is really unnecessary to spend a lot of money to hoard Qing Dynasty porcelain.

However, it is still necessary to increase investment in the porcelain industry and seize the market.

Speaking of this peasant uprising, it must be said that it was a huge catastrophe for ordinary people. However, Austria and the Qing Dynasty were half a world apart, so Franz was powerless.

But it was different for the Southern Ming. The distance between the two was close enough, and after so many years of accumulation, the Southern Ming navy had some strength.

It should not be a problem to pretend to be pirates and secretly transport some people back and forth. As for the Qing Dynasty navy at that time, it can really be ignored.

Moreover, once the war breaks out, the Qing Dynasty will probably not be able to care about the small actions of the Southern Ming Dynasty.