Rise of Japan (Toyotomi)

This is a proposal

The primary POD of this timeline is the death of Yi Sun-sin at some point prior to the Japanese Invasion of Korea.

Without Yi to lead the Koreans, the Japanese invasion is far more successful. Guerilla resistance is fierce enough that Toyotomi declines to invade China (though he appears to have continued to hold that as a long-term goal after the pacification of Korea).

With Toyotomi's death in 1598, a council of regents was established to rule in the name of his 3-year-old son, Hideyori. Unlike *here*, as Toyotomi's strongest supporters were not weakened by the failed Korean invasion, they were able to effectively maintain their lord's family's power, and in 1613, Hideyori came into his own as the second Kwampaku of the Toyotomi dynasty.

The pacification of Korea continued during the regency, and by the time Hideyori came to rule in his own right, Korea was largely pacified. Hideyori's early reign was spent consolidating authority and dealing with the Europeans. Soon afterwards he set his eyes on continuing his father's expansion. He learned from the Europeans of a vast land which they called America and which the Japanese came to refer to as T&#333;bankoku (literally "Eastern Barbarian Land"). Japan drove the Dutch out of Taiwan, and moved into the Philipines, driving Spain from them. A tacit agreement grew between Japan and China that, outside of Korea and North Asia, Japan would leave the mainland alone. Japanese influence, however, continued to expand southward, as the Philipines came under the dominion. Upon the discovery of Australia, some colonization occured, primarily in the form of a penal colony.

In America, Japanese exploration began with Alaska, moving down into *here*'s Oregon Country, and bumping against New Spain.

In North Asia, Japan spread westward, seeking the fur trade and an overland trade route to Europe, eventually bumping into Russia.