On the afternoon of April 9, Kuroda Castle Tenshou Pavilion.

"Oh?" Yu Qiuping smiled slightly at the 800 guan placed on the table instead of the 4,000 guan as imagined. The messenger had been asked by him to rest at the bottom, and now he summoned all the high-level officials to the third floor of Tianshou Pavilion for discussion.

"Those four wealthy families are not angry." Masayuki Sanada saw the trick at first sight. "They each of them gave 200 guan this time, and they also asked to put important figures back home. They must have discussed in advance and planned to join forces to put pressure on His Highness."

"Are they crazy?" Mimaezaki Nakahide sarcastically said: "They have more than 900 hostages here! Their sons, the second head, or the head of the family are all here! Why do they bargain!"

"They obviously saw that His Highness was not strong enough," Naoe Tadaehipei whispered, "and therefore unwilling to pay the money so easily."

"Then let's just execute some of these people first and show them!" Ji Gang Shengzheng said viciously, "Look at whether they dare to bargain!"

"No, this is too immoral. No matter when, I will refuse to kill prisoners!" Yu Qiuping immediately shook his head and refused, "First of all, killing them will not do us any good. Secondly, killing prisoners will be innumerable! Moreover, killing prisoners will hurt people's hearts. Not only will our own brothers, we will be confused by me, but the leaders will also be afraid of me. No one will be willing to surrender in the future when fighting. How bad it is!"

"What should you do if you say, your highness," Ji Gang Shengzheng was also a little angry and spread his hands. "It seems that those families have agreed to see that your good intentions will not kill the prisoners. They don't give money, just waste it. We are too few to see, and it is impossible to release the prisoners to work. It is equivalent to helping them raise people in vain! Is this what?" Although Ji Gang Shengzheng's words were a little rough, everyone understood the core meaning. The subordinates nodded and turned their eyes to Yu Qiuping.

"Don't worry," Yu Qiuping looked at the nervous expressions of his subordinates and smiled relaxedly: "Your Highness has no ability, and there are still many tricks."

"I want to break up their cooperative relationship and let them fight each other distrustfully." Yu Qiuhei analyzed, "Because only if they are not united, we kidnappers have a chance to take advantage of it. Just like Yukizuna Nonomura and the other four, if it weren't for Kato Mitsutaki and Hara Nagata who were too soft and refused to be on the same side as the other two, we wouldn't have blackmailed money."

"So, I want to introduce—" Yu Qiuping looked back proudly, and snapped his fingers towards the north bank of Kisogawa: "Competition mechanism!"

·

On the morning of April 10, the Yuan family waited for most of the day and finally waited for the Yuqiu family's reply. However, what surprised the Yuan family was that the Yuqiu family actually sent their subordinates as envoys. After the previous two communications, the Yuqiu family released the captives from the Yuan family as envoys and asked them to bring Yuqiuping's handwritten letters.

The envoy of the Yuqiu family was also very strange. After arriving at the Yuan family, he refused to meet Yuan Laifang, but waited outside and refused to come in. This made the Yuan family angry and panic, fearing that his behavior of only 200 yuan would anger Yu Qiuping, which led to the abnormal behavior of the envoy. If any envoy from any family dared to disrespect him so much and did not have to speak, the samurai under his command would have already broken him into pieces. But at present, hundreds of his subordinates were in Yu Qiuping's hands, and he would not dare to do anything to anger Yu Qiuping's family.

The original Laifang also sent someone to communicate with other families in the morning, but learned that the messengers sent by the Yuqiu family were all saying nothing, which made the original Laifang panic.

However, just four o'clock in the afternoon, the guards suddenly came to inform the messenger of requesting an audience.

"He is finally willing to speak?" Yuan Lai Fang was surprised, "Please invite him in!"

After entering the house, the messenger did not say much. After saluting the original Lai Fang, he immediately said, "I would like to ask Your Highness to atone for your sins. The reason why I refused to speak before was that my three companions would tell the four His Highness the request at the same time. However, due to the different distances, it is impossible for us, the four messengers who went to meet you to meet you, could not reach your territory at the same time, so we must inform you of Your Highness's request at the same time--that is, at four o'clock in the afternoon."

"Please speak with you!" Yuan Lai Fang said hurriedly.

"That's right, Your Highness regrets you for not being able to pay compensation as required." The envoy said with a humble and arrogant attitude: "But, in order to release your sincerity, your Highness is willing to release your eldest son and the important hostage designated by the other families."

"That's great! Thank you very much for Your Highness Hongye! We were so cautious before, so don't blame Your Highness!" The former Lai Fang said hurriedly.

"However, because Your Highness is very dissatisfied with your actions," the envoy changed his mind, "thus, among these four important hostages, His Highness agrees to release one of them."

"One person? What does it mean? Whose family is put? Why?" Yuan Lai Fang was stunned for a moment, and his voice couldn't help but increase a little.

"The calculation starts at this moment," the envoy said in a deep voice: "The four of us messengers inform you of your highness at the same time. Whoever can deliver the remaining 800 guan to His Highness's Kuroda City as soon as possible will indicate which family is the most trustworthy, and His Highness will release the hostages from which family. If the money is not sent before sunset, His Highness will hand over the important hostages to the Oda Hall in Qingzhou City."

Yuan Lai Fang was stunned, and after a moment, he immediately reacted and whispered: "This! This! It's too much! Then this! Why did Your Highness Hongye make such a request!"

"These are not something that can be answered by the next person." The envoy bowed without being humble and arrogant, "I will finish my words here, please hurry up your highness." After that, he retreated and left the Tianshou Pavilion.

As soon as the envoy left, the panicked former Lai Fang immediately summoned all his retainers to discuss.

"What does this rain autumn red leaves mean?" Yuan Lai Fang shouted loudly: "Why are you going to send my son to Qingzhou City suddenly? What should I do?"

"Your Highness, please calm down!" An old man advised, "I think Yu Qiuping just wants to get the money as soon as possible. When our money is delivered to him, I probably won't let anyone go. We should continue to insist on not giving money and force him to make concessions!"

"Can you guarantee it?" Another retainer retorted dissatisfiedly: "If all the other three families gave money, we didn't! Yu Qiu Hongye was so angry that she sent the young master to Oda Nobunaga! Can you be responsible!"

"Impossible, think about it yourself, how could Yu Qiu Hongye be willing to let the young master go away! Don't think too much!" The old man retorted.

"I think you want to kill the young master because you are close to the second young master!" The other retainer was a little anxious, "Say! What are your intentions!"

"What's the use of saying this now? Don't make arguing!" The Bitou family at home came forward to preside over the overall situation. "The key is to discuss with the other companies first! How to deal with it! As long as the four of us work together and don't give money, Yu Qiu Hongye can't get any benefits, so naturally he dare not treat the young master as a hostage!"

"But!" Yuan Lai Fang, who was deeply licking the calf, said anxiously: "This time Yu Qiu Hongye said! He will only release one hostage! Only the hostages from the one that sends the money the fastest can be released back! We went to inform them and wait for their news! I don't know how long it took to go back. If no one family rushes to redeem the hostages first, my son will not be able to come back! Even the hundreds of people we detained there may not be able to come back!"

"Your Highness! Don't fall into a trap!" The old man from the Bitou family said calmly: "There are four hostages, and Yu Qiuhongye deliberately lets only one of them, obviously to sow discord, so that the four of us cannot unite to deal with him! He is just afraid that the four of us will be united before! If we give money one by one according to his wishes, we will suffer a loss in the end!"

"I know! I know!" Yuan Lai Fang raised his voice and said, "But can you guarantee that everyone thinks the same as you! I have always been disgusted with the bandits of Chuan Bingzhong. This time I worked with them with my nose pinched! Now that there is such a good opportunity, they will not discuss it with us. Maybe they have sent people to take the money to redeem them!"

"This..." The old man from the Bitou family suddenly had nothing to say. Indeed, the wealthy families of their families also jointly sent troops when they saw that there were advantages to take. Usually, the relationship between us was not very good, and there were constant small frictions. At this moment, how can we believe that other families would communicate with us first? "Yu Qiu Hongye set the requirement that whoever can redeem the hostages sooner is obviously not giving us time to communicate!"

This is the famous prisoner's dilemma in later generations: two people who conspired to commit crimes were imprisoned and could not communicate with each other. If neither of them exposed each other, each of them would be in jail for one year due to uncertain evidence; if one person exposed and the other was silent, the person exposed was immediately released because of the meritorious service, and the person who was silent was imprisoned for ten years due to non-cooperation; if one exposed each other, the evidence was true, both were sentenced to eight years in prison. Because the prisoners could not trust each other, they would tend to expose each other rather than keep silent together.

Time passed by minute by minute, and everyone was anxious.

"Your Highness, make a decision quickly!" Another confidant couldn't wait and urged: "When we discuss here, maybe some family has sent people there! We can't hesitate!"

When Lai Fang heard this, he took a deep breath. "Stop saying anything, prepare the money quickly! Send the money here!" He stood up anxiously and urged, "Nothing is as safe as my elder! Anyway, they probably will give money too! Instead of giving the bandits in Sichuan and Gang, they should think about redeeming my elders as soon as possible!"
Chapter completed!