Tokugawa Ieyasu

"You do not honestly believe that a peasant such as yourself could actually become the wife of Lord Nobunaga, do you?""

- Tokugawa Ieyasu to Tsubasa Miyuki

Tokugawa Ieyasu (Japanese: 徳川 家康; 26th day of the 12th month, Tenbun 11) was born as Matsudaira Takechiyo (Japanese: 松平 竹千代), the son of Matsudaira Hirotada and Odai-n-kata. In order to cement the ties between the Imagawa clan and the Tokugawa clan, Imagawa Yoshimoto arranged his marriage to Tsukiyama-hime, whose mother was a former concubine of Imagawa himself, when he was thirteen years old; to whom he has two children, Nobuyasu and Kamehime. Through his second wife, Saigō-noTsubone, he has three children: Tokuhime, Hidetada and Tadayoshi. Ieyasu fought battles for Imagawa until the clan's defeat by Oda Nobunaga at the Battle of Okehazama, in which Nobunaga bestowed him the name "Tokugawa Ieyasu", and in return, Ieyasu remained faithful to him until the very end.

Early Life
Tokugawa Ieyasu was born on 26th day of the 12th month, Tenbun 11 at Okazaki Castle in Mikawa, Japan as Matsudaira Takechiyo, the only son of Matsudaira Hirotada, the daimyō of Mikawa of the Matsudaira clan, and Odai-no-kata, the daughter of a neighboring samurai lord, Mizuno Tadamasa. His parents were originally step-siblings and were just 17 and 15 years old, respectively, when Ieyasu was born. Two years later, Odai-no-kata was sent back to her family and his parents never lived together again, leaving Ieyasu to come with his father instead. His parents soon remarried and both went on to have further children; Ieyasu, in the end had eleven half-brothers and sisters.

The Matsudaira family was split in 1546: one side wanted to be vassals of the Imagawa clan, while the other side preferred the Oda clan. As a result, much of Ieyasu's early years were spent in danger as wars with the Oda and Imagawa were fought. This family feud was the reason behind the murder of Ieyasu's paternal grandfather, Matsudaira Kiyoyasu. Unlike his father and the majority of his branch of the family, Ieyasu's father, Hirotada, favored the Imagawa clan.

In 1544, when the Oda clan invaded Mikawa, Hirotada turned to Imagawa Yoshimoto, the head of the Imagawa clan, for help to repel the invaders. Yoshimoto agreed under the condition that Hirotada send Ieyas to Sunpu as hostage. Oda Nobuhide, the leader of the Oda clan, learned of this arrangement and had Ieyasu abducted from his entourage en route to Sunpu. Ieyasu was just five years old at the time.

Nobuhide threatened to execute Ieyasu unless his father severed all ties with the Imagawa clan. Hirotada replied that sacrificing his own son would show his seriousness in his pact with the Imagawa clan. Despite this refusal, Nobuhide chose not to kill Ieyasu. One of the major reasons to this is that Nobuhide's heir, the young Oda Nobunaga, found killing a child senseless of a threat. It was during this time that Ieyasu met Nobunaga and was amazed by how he is everything that Ieyasu's own father wanted him to be. Instead, Ieyasu was held for the next seven years at the Mansho Temple in Nagoya.

In 1545, when Ieyasu was six, his father Hirotada was murdered by his own treacherous vassals, who had been bribed by the Oda clan. In 1551, when he was twelve years old, Oda Nobuhide died during an epidemic. Nobuhide's death dealt a heavy blow to the Oda clan. An army under the command of Imagawa Sessai laid siege to the castle where Oda Nobuhiro, Nobuhide's eldest son and the new head of the Oda, was living. With the castle about to fall, Sessai offered a deal to Oda Nobunaga, Nobuhide's second son. Sessai offered to give up the siege if Ieyasu was handed over to the Imagawa. Nobunaga agreed, and so, Ieyasu was taken as a hostage to Sunpu. He lived a fairly good life as hostage and potentially useful future ally of the Imagawa clan for a year.

Service to the Imagawa Clan
In 1552, he came of age and was set to be married to Lady Tsukiyama, whose mother was a former concubine of Imagawa Yoshimoto himself. His marriage with Lady Tsukiyama had resulted to a son, Nobuyasu (1554), and a daughter, Kamehime (1557). At that, he changed his name from Matsudaira Takechiyo to Matsudaira Motoyasu. He was finally allowed to return to his native Mikawa, and the Imagawa ordered him to fight the Oda clan in a series of battles. He fought his first battle at the Siege of Terabe, and succeeded in delivering supplies to a Yoshimoto fortress in 1559 Siege of Odaka.

By 1560, the leadership of the Oda clan had passed to the brilliant leader Oda Nobunaga. Imagawa Yoshimoto, leading a large Imagawa army (perhaps 25,000 strong) attacked the Oda clan territory. Motoyasu, with his Mikawa troops, captured Marune and then spent the night in Odaka. As a resulte, Motoyasu and his men were not present at the Battle of Okehazama where Yoshimoto was killed by Nobunaga's surprise assault.

Alliance with Oda
With Yoshimoto dead, Motoyasu decided to ally with the Oda clan. Nobunaga was said to be extremely merciful of him for knowing him far back before finding themselves at the opposite sides of the war. A secret deal, however, was needed because Motoyasu's wife, Lady Tsukiyama, and their children, were held hostage in Sunpu by the Imagawa clan. In early 1561, Motoyasu openly broke with the Imagawa and captured the fortress of Kaminogō. Motoyasu was then able to exchange his wife and children for the hostages thus gained, and publicly pledged his alliance with Nobunaga by changing his name to Tokugawa Ieyasu. But, Lady Tsukiyama was viewed to be a spy of the Imagawa by countless retainers of Nobunaga. In order to maintain his alliance with Nobunaga, Ieyasu ordered the exile of his wife and his children, never seeing to bother them again. It was once hinted by Ieyasu that he had never loved Lady Tsukiyama, seeing their marriage purely political, and though he loves his children, his wife had twisted their children's mind to bury hatred against him.

Death of Nobunaga
During the Honnō-ji Incident, Ieyasu was near Osaka and far from his own territory when he learned that Nobunaga had been assassinated by Akechi Mitsuhide. Like countless other retainers, Ieyasu was unaware of the truth about the pact between Nobunaga and Mitsuhide. Ieyasu managed the dangerous back to Mikawa, avoiding Mitsuhide's troops along the way, as they were trying to find and kill him. One week after he arrived in Mikawa, Ieyasu's army marched out to take revenge on Mitsuhide. But they were too late, as Hideyoshi—on his own—defeated Akechi Mitsuhide at the Battle of Yamazaki; the latter died few days afterwards.

Ieyasu received a letter from Hideyoshi and learned that Nobunaga's children were in Kyoto with their maternal grandmother and uncle, protected by loyal retainers. The two arranged a meeting with Nobunaga's children to inform them that neither from them should no longer seek revenge for their father's death because the man who've betrayed and was responsible for the death of their father was no more. Ieyasu offered the siblings to change their name from Oda to Tsubasa in order to protect them from other's eyes, and as per agreement, Nobunaga's eldest son, Ichirou married Hideyoshi's daughter, and Ieyasu had set the engagement of his infant son, Hidetada, with Nobunaga's daughter, Yuki. With Hideyoshi, Ieyasu sees the engagement a must in order for them to keep up with their families' role in ensuring the protection of the Oda clan as a favor for everything that Nobunaga had done for them.

Personality
Ieyasu has an extremely sharp tongue and is insulting. He is very brutal in his opinions and words, having no qualms of how hurtful they can be. In fact, he does not even care if he'd hurt another person's feelings and will consider the person to be weak and useless. Before meeting Miyuki, he saw that changing in his ways was for those who are weak, and did not care at all about his comrades safety.

Ieyasu hides his true cruel personality underneath a facade smile that appease the lord he is allied with. He hates doing things that he finds stupid but will oblige to them if it is necessary or is beneficial.

Though a cruel person, beneath all of this lies a deeply broken man, whose horrible attitude towards life and people stemmed from his cruel treatment within his own family. Their horrible treatment towards him left him scarred and distrusting. And although he tries to hide it under his brute tongue, he is very sensitive, especially to those who have personally expressed they great displeasure on his treatment of others.

Ieyasu has great difficulty in expressing his true feelings, especially to the ones who he truly loves and cares for. He often will say the opposite of what he is really feeling, but will not hesitate to protect the ones he is close to. He pays close attention to a person's likes and dislikes while still being rude about it. When Ieyasu is unsure of what to do in settings he is not used to (e.g. a warm family gathering) he expresses it in a mild yet polite manner.

Ieyasu is already incredibly possessive of the people he loves, respects Nobunaga (and Miyuki, later on) among anyone, but shows it by insulting both Nobunaga and Miyuki, or who they're interacting with.

When dealing with enemies, he is heartless, cruel and enjoys toying with them.

He is so faithful of Nobunaga after the latter defeating him in battle to the point that when Nobunaga died, he started heading in hunting down Mitsuhide to kill him for the latter's betrayal. When he heard that Hideyoshi successfully killed Mitsuhide, he starts his way to Kyoto wherein Nobunaga's children are with their maternal grandmother. Along with Hideyoshi, he vowed to the children that he'll always keep them safe and be faithful to them in order to continue his respect for their father.