Samurai: Asai Kyou

Battle Task #1

Kyou stared over the walls of Suirō-jō. A narrow, winding path into the mountains made traversing the space up to the castle difficult, but that was the point. It was why he had come here in the first place. Oda-kun won't pass up a chance to attack me when he thinks I'm weakest. Retreating to the mountains not only fortified a position that was, admittedly, weak like Oda-kun assumed, but it turned what had previously been a weakness into a strength. If I ration, I can keep my army and people fed for two months. And with Oda-kun four weeks away, I can hunt, store food, and prepare.

Beyond the fact that his army would be well rested when Oda-kun's wasn't, Oda-kun would have a tough time finding a place where he could successfully bring siege weapons to bear. The rocky terrain made any such attempt practically impossible. However, he expected Oda-kun to at least try, and that was likely to waste a great deal of time and effort. Secondly, up here, it was difficult to get supplies. The army would have to forage on the way here, and that would require both time and energy they couldn't afford to waste. Kyou intended to use that to his advantage as well. If he cut them off from food sources and water, they wouldn't be able to hold out a long siege.

He stepped away from the wall and headed for the stone staircase beside him. One of his men was standing nearby, watching for Oda-kun's approach. When he noticed Kyou, he bowed deeply, his palms pressed together in front of his chest. Kyou gave the man a shallow bow of acknowledgement and continued on his way.

***

Kyou looked down the path that had been cleared to the castle. Pine trees surrounded him and the working men, giving off a fragrant, fresh scent as trees were chopped down to create a free line of sight down the mountain. This would serve two purposes.

First, it would allow the catapults Kyou had mounted on the castle towers a clear line of sight. He would've preferred trebuchets since they had a further range, but for his plan, the catapult would work too. Anyway, he'd modified some of the catapults' design to make it a little more ranged, so he didn't think it would be a pitfall for him. He also had the advantage of height, which meant the debris he would be firing from the catapult would be able to travel further thanks to the steep slope.

Secondly, the clear path would allow his archers to pick off men as they came up the mountain.

That was where things became a little trickier. First of all, he had to find a way to force his opponents into the path. In order for that to happen, he had to give Oda-kun no other options. Kyou smirked. That wouldn't be hard. This was a pine forest. Where there was pine, there was plenty of pitch. Where there was pitch, there was the very high risk of a fire should any flames be brought near the resin.

Since he had catapults, he was going to launch flaming loads of material out into the forest to start a massive forest fire. He'd had his men clear a large section of forest all around the castle and burn that carefully so the fire wouldn't spread. It also left Oda-kun's army wide open to his attacks if they were to make it out of the forest to start a siege. They would be disoriented by the smoke, unable to use siege weapons or arrows due to low visibility, and many would likely succumb to the smoke.

His men had been working for nearly two weeks prior to his arrival. After he and Naoki-kun had discussed his strategy back at Odani-jō, he had sent messengers to the mountain castle to tell them to get ready for a siege. He had sent special instructions on what to do in preparation, so the men had already taken care of cutting most of the path, clearing the area around the castle, and gathering supplies. Now they just had to burn this path to be sure that the fire wouldn't spread, thereby rendering his plans useless.