Of course technically the Kyoto still had the main power, by going far away it limited this and allowed for more regular leadership. Japan, like most empires at the time, inevitably had to deal with the spread of the Mongolian empire. The Mongols launched two attacks on the Japanese, and the first one was easily stopped. Then a second fleet, which was much larger than the first was stopped before it could even make it japan to start its attack. “In 1281 a much larger second fleet was smashed by a typhoon, known ever after by the Japanese as kamikaze, ‘the divine wind’” (Von Sivers 434). So although Japan’s islands were hard to live on due to the volcanic activity, their location of their islands actually played a large role in protecting them from the Mongolian empire. If it wasn’t for their location that Mongolian fleet could have made it to the islands and who knows what could have happened once they arrived. Luckily for the Japanese that was never an issue they had to face. Islands to the east of Japan had their own culture and way of life they were building and they were known as the Vietnam