I Was a Swordsman in Ancient Japan

Edo, Shiranui--

The impact of Balrog's sudden death on Shiranui has not subsided until now.

The Balrog died of poisoning. And it is very likely that when eating and drinking, they ate food or drinking water mixed with poison.

For a while, everyone in Shiranui was in danger.

Whether only the Balrog's food and drinking water are poisoned - no one is sure about this.

Everyone is afraid whether what they eat or drink today is also mixed with poison.

Fortunately—up to now, no second person has been poisoned and died tonight.

However, the atmosphere of panic still enveloped the entire Shiranui.

In a rather grand mansion, an old man and a young man sat facing each other.

The older one is called "Tutaro", and he is considered a very old senior in Shiranui. He is 58 years old this year.

When Balrog was still alive, he was the second oldest person in Shiranui.

At the moment when the 65-year-old Balrog died suddenly tonight, he is now the first senior in Shiranui.

When he was a young boy, he was already one of the backbone of Shiranui.

Now that he is older and more experienced, he has gained a good status and voice in Shiranui.

The status in Shiranui is probably second only to the "Four Heavenly Kings".

The younger young man sitting in front of Wu Tailang is named "Bun Tairo" and is Wu Tailang's disciple.

Although he is still just a ninja, in terms of talent, he is considered the best among the younger generation in Shiranui.

The body of the Balrog has just been moved to their mourning hall in Shiranui. This mourning hall is dedicated to enshrining those who have made outstanding contributions to Shiranui.

Taketaro and Buntaro, master and apprentice, just went to this mourning hall to take a look at the deceased Balrog, and just returned home—that is, the magnificent mansion where the two of them are currently living.

The two of them were very heavy at the moment, and neither of them spoke during the journey from the mourning hall to home.

After lighting the lamp in the living room and the two of them sat down on the tatami, Buntaro asked Taketaro in front of him softly in a whisper-like tone:

"Master... the person who killed Lord Balrog... who is it?"

The leader who had been leading them died suddenly-this change came so fast that many people have not been able to adapt to this fact in time until now.

"...I don't know." Taketaro sighed, "There are too many people who have the motive to kill Lord Balrog."

As a veteran of Shiranui, Taketaro is only 7 years younger than Balrog, and he is almost the same generation as Balrog.

Although he and Balrog are considered to be of the same generation and have served Shiranui for decades together, the two of them are not friends, and their relationship can only be said to be mediocre.

For Taketaro, if other people who had a mediocre relationship with him died, his mood would not change much.

But it's different for Balrog.

Like him, Balrog has witnessed Shiranui's decades of history with his own eyes. Even if the relationship is mediocre, Taketaro still has a special feeling for Balrog.

Suddenly receiving the news of Balrog's death tonight, an indescribable sense of sadness welled up in Taketaro's heart...

Therefore, Wu Tailang's current mood is far more complicated than that of his disciple Wen Tailang.

"I haven't even seen the face of Lord Yanmo, Lord Yanmo died..." Buntaro smiled wryly.

Buntaro is only 15 years old this year, and he officially became a ninja half a year ago.

"The only impression I have of Lord Yanmo..." Buntaro continued, "The only thing is that he is a gray-haired old man, and he is not a friendly and kind person..."

Wen Taro's words made Wu Tailang smile a little more: "Your impression of the Balrog is actually not wrong."

"He really wasn't a very nice, nice guy."

"But he hasn't always been like this."

After all, Taketaro turned his head and looked at the wick emitting a faint light beside him. Under the light of this faint light, the light of memories reflected in Taketaro's pupils.

"The name Balrog used before succeeding him as the 12th Balrog was 'Ichitaro'."

"He showed amazing ninjutsu talent and swordsmanship talent at a young age."

"Extraordinary strength, coupled with qualified leadership, made him quickly appreciated by the 11th generation of Balrog."

"The 11th generation of Balrog also started to train Ichitaro as the next generation of Balrog."

"I remember it was about 30 years ago. In the year when Ichitaro was 35 years old, the 11th generation of Yanmo died of a sudden illness. He handed over the position of Balrog to Ichitaro. Ichitaro took the name of Balrog and became the present The 12th generation of Balrog."

"In my impression, Ichitaro was a fairly cheerful and approachable person before succeeding as Balrog."

"But after taking over as Balrog, Ichitaro wanted to make Shiranui bigger and stronger in order to live up to the expectations and training of the 11th Balrog and others."

"Then he slowly became less cheerful and less friendly."

"Unfortunately……"

Taketaro smiled helplessly.

"Ichitaro seems to lack some related talents."

"In the 30 years since he took over as the Balrog, he has only done two major things."

"The first major event was the all-out war with Fuma no Sato 10 years ago in order to reduce competitors."

"The second major event is to go to the shogunate, cooperate with the shogunate, and become the royal ninja of the shogunate."

"Let's not mention the first major event. In the battle with Fuma Village, we suffered heavy losses. In the end, Fuma Village was not wiped out by us by force, but Fuma disbanded by himself."

"Although we managed to make Fuma no Sato disappear in the end, our situation in Shiranui has not improved accordingly, and the number of high-quality tasks we can receive is still decreasing year by year."

"That's the second thing Lord Balrog did, and it has achieved certain results."

"After becoming the royal ninja of the shogunate, the shogunate will now allocate a certain amount of funds to us on a regular basis, making us richer than before."

"It's just that we have lost our freedom now, and we have to follow the instructions of the shogunate when making decisions on some major issues."

Speaking of this, Taketaro sighed heavily.

A slight dissatisfaction began to appear in his tone.

"Ichitaro has worked hard for 30 years to revitalize Shiranui, not only failed to revitalize Shiranui, but Shiranui's strength is getting worse and worse..."

"Thirty years ago, when Ichitaro first took over Shiranui, there were seven or eight people in Shiranui that were as strong as Gokutaro and Shintaro."

Buntaro, who had been quietly listening to Taketaro's story just now, smiled wryly and interjected:

"Master, you seem to have a big opinion on Lord Balrog."

"Hehe..." Taketaro smiled softly, "I still have some dissatisfaction with Ichitaro."

"After all, under his rule, Shiranui's strength is getting worse and worse. It is a fact that he failed to revitalize Shiranui."

"But I still have a lot of respect for him."

"He may be a little lacking in ability."

"But his determination to revitalize Shiranui is real."

"I have witnessed several times that Ichitaro, who is very old, has not closed his eyes for several nights in order to deal with various urgent matters."

"However, his determination is quite terrifying."

The corners of Taketaro's mouth were pulled down, showing an expression as if recalling some terrible memory.

"I have always felt that 'Revitalizing Shiranui' has become a deep obsession of Ichitaro."

"Sometimes... the obsession is too deep, but it is very painful."

"So from another perspective, it's good that he's dead now..."

"He no longer has to worry about how to revitalize Shiranui."

"Right now he……"

Taketaro took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled the air in his lungs:

"I'm free..."

...

...

Edo, Shiranui, Shuntaro's residence——

Shuntaro had already planned to go to bed first.

So much happened tonight.

First, he spent a long time in Edo in order to catch that traitorous ninja.

Then he suddenly heard Balrog's death sentence, hurried back to Shiranui, and then tossed for a long time.

Not only the body is tired, but the mind is also very tired.

And now he can't do other things besides sleeping first and nourishing his mental and physical strength.

At present, even when and why the Balrog was poisoned has not yet been found out, and there is no clue to trace it. It is simply impossible to find the person who poisoned the Balrog.

Shuntaro himself knows nothing about poisons, and he can't even deduce what kind of poison caused the death based on the appearance of the poisoned person.

Even if you want to help with the investigation, there is no way to help.

There is nothing to do now, sleepiness and tiredness are slowly coming up, so Shuntaro plans to take a good rest tonight.

He had already planned to sleep.

But just when he was about to untie the two sabers on his back, he suddenly heard a "dong" sound from outside the room that Shuntaro had to pay attention to.

After hearing this sound, Shuntaro's pupils shrank suddenly.

The reason why this sound made Shuntaro have to pay attention is because this sound is so familiar to Shuntaro who has experienced many battles.

This is the sound that the arrow will only make after it is deeply pierced into the wood.

Almost like a conditioned reflex of the body's instinct, Shuntaro pulled out a knife on his back, and then quickly hid in a blind spot where the archers outside the room would never be able to shoot.

Moving within the shooting blind spot.

After coming to the door, Shuntaro didn't rush out rashly, but opened the door a gap first, observing the situation outside.

Shuntaro's house is like a lonely cactus in the desert.

Because he likes to live in a quiet place, Shuntaro's home is located in a relatively remote place in Shiranui, and there are no neighbors around.

At this point in time, there is nothing but wind, moonlight, and darkness outside Shuntaro's house, not to mention archers, and there is not even a shadow of a Taoist.

——Have you left already...

There was no human breath outside.

According to Shuntaro's guess, the archer left quickly after firing an arrow at his house.

Shuntaro pulled the door open to allow him to enter and exit alone, and walked outside the room.

As soon as he stepped out of the room, Shuntaro saw an arrow that had penetrated half an inch into the wood on the wooden post next to his room door.

A small cloth bag the size of an adult's fist was tied to the arrow shaft.

Since it can be shot directly with an arrow, it means that the things contained in this small cloth bag are absolutely not heavy.

After pulling out the arrow and untying the small cloth bag tied to it, Shuntaro saw that there were only two things inside.

A letter folded squarely, and a kimono sleeve.

When he saw this sleeve, Shuntaro's first reaction was that it looked familiar.

After unfolding it for a closer look, Shuntaro finally understood why he felt so familiar.

While figuring out why he felt familiar, Shuntaro felt as if his heart skipped a beat out of fear.

Shuntaro quickly put away the sleeves, then spread out the neatly folded letter, and looked at the words and sentences on it at a glance.

...

...

Pasha, pasha, pasha...

Without any reason to dodge, Shuntaro with a gloomy face stepped on the dead branches and rotten leaves on the ground, holding the kimono sleeve in his left hand and the letter in his right hand, and walked straight towards the darkness in front of him.

Shuntaro is currently in a forest in the northwest of Shiranui-ri that has no name and where no one usually visits.

There is only wind, trees, moonlight, and darkness without light to illuminate it.

After walking all the way to the depths of the woods, there finally appeared something incompatible with the surrounding wind, grass, trees and other things - a figure hiding in the shade of the trees.

As soon as Shuntaro saw the figure in front of him, the figure walked straight towards Shuntaro, and said softly one step ahead of Shuntaro:

"Master Shuntaro, you are finally here."

When the voice of the figure just fell, he just walked out from the dark shade of the tree and came under a beam of moonlight.

The bright moonlight shone on this figure, illuminating a face that Shuntaro was fairly familiar with.

Looking at this face, Shuntaro's face, which seems to be tense with every inch of skin, has many deep shadows.

In the shadows, there was a bit of astonishment.

"Keitaro... When did you come back? Where is Kyutaro? Are you the one who sent me this letter?"

The figure standing in front of Shuntaro is none other than Keitaro.

Standing in front of Shuntaro with a short gun on his back and a big cloth bag containing something unknown.

Shun Taro knew that Ji Taro and Keitaro led a group of ninjas to perform a certain task tonight-although he didn't know what task they were going to perform.

Up to now, there has been no news of Jitaro and the others coming back.

Shuntaro thought that they were still performing their task right now, but now Keitaro was standing in front of him alive.

Shuntaro's biggest impression of Keitaro is that he is a follower - Ji Taro's follower.

He and Ji Taro are inseparable, no matter what Ji Taro does, he will follow.

Ji Taro went to Yoshiwara to have fun every night, and Keitaro also accompanied Ji Taro to have fun every night.

After seeing Keitaro, Shuntaro subconsciously thought that Jitaro was nearby, so he looked around and squeezed the letter in his hand.

"Master Shuntaro." Keitaro said calmly, "I am not the one who wrote this letter. It's just that the person who sent this letter to your door with a bow and arrow just now is indeed I."

Just when Shuntaro was about to yell "Then who wrote this letter", he suddenly heard two unhurried footsteps coming from behind Keitaro.

At the same time, there was a voice that was also quite familiar to Shuntaro, and it sounded along with the two footsteps.

"Good evening, Shuntaro. This seems to be the first time we've met in the middle of a night like this."

After the voice fell, two figures walked out from the dark shadows, and their figures and appearances were gradually outlined by the light.

Looking at the two people who appeared behind Keitaro, Shuntaro couldn't control the expression on his face anymore.

The muscles on his face seemed to be out of control, and he began to show doubts and surprises uncontrollably, and with a somewhat hoarse voice, he called out the names of these two people: "Shintaro... Hannosuke..."

Shintaro is usually taciturn and doesn't have much expression on his face.

In Shuntaro's impression, he has never seen "Smiling Shintaro" a few times.

At this moment, this extremely rare picture appeared in front of Shuntaro.

Shintaro, with a gentle smile on his face, walked towards Shuntaro little by little.

Walking beside him was Hannosuke who led the group of Iga ninjas.

Hannosuke was also carrying a cloth bag like Keitaro at this time, but the cloth bag he was carrying was smaller than the one on Keitaro's back.

After Shintaro and Hannosuke came to Keitaro's side, Keitaro bowed respectfully to the two, and then stood behind Shintaro.

After a brief period of doubt and surprise, Shuntaro's face returned to seriousness.

Before Shuntaro could make a sound, Shintaro spoke first:

"The letter in your hand was written by me."

"I know you must be very worried about your husband's safety now."

"But don't worry, Taifu is safe now. There is not even a broken skin on his body."

Shintaro's words made Shuntaro squeeze the sleeve and the letter even tighter.

Just now, after looking closely at the sleeve of this kimono, Shuntaro immediately recognized that it was the sleeve of Furin Taifu's kimono that he would only wear when receiving guests.

This set of kimono is expensive, the whole Edo... no, it should be only Taifu in the whole world can have this set of kimono.

Because Shuntaro joked with Taifu more than once, saying that Taifu wearing this suit is like wearing a quilt on his body, so he was very impressed with Taifu's suit.

Recognizing that the sleeve was a fragment of Taifu's kimono, Shuntaro immediately opened the letter.

The content of the letter is very simple.

To briefly summarize, let Shuntaro go to the forest in the northwest of Shiranui.

At the end of the letter, they reminded Shuntaro very "intimately" that Taifu Fuchi was in their hands. Let Shuntaro go to the woods designated in the letter now, and at the same time let Shuntaro only go there by himself without making any public announcements.

Although the letter did not contain any hostile words, the lines between the lines were full of threats.

"In order to make you believe that Taifu Fengchi is really in our hands now, we specially brought this thing here."

While saying this in a half-joking tone, Shintaro glanced at Hannosuke beside him.

Hannosuke, who understood the meaning of Shintaro's eyes, nodded, then put the cloth bag on his back on the ground, and opened it.

Inside the cloth bag was a set of exquisite kimono without the right sleeve.

It was Taifu Fengling's outfit that he would only wear when receiving guests.

Perhaps it was because from just now, the news that was enough to shake Shuntaro's brain appeared one after another, making Shuntaro numb, but now he calmed down.

"...So that's how it is."

Shintaro said softly.

"Shintaro, the Balrog... was poisoned to death by you, right?"

This sentence is obviously a question sentence, but the tone is that of an affirmative sentence.

"That's right." Shintaro admitted without hesitation, very straightforwardly, "The Balrog was indeed killed by us."

"We poisoned the wine that the Balrog drank tonight."

"In order to find the right time to poison, it took a lot of our minds."

"Because it was too late to find a chance to poison, the poisoning of the Balrog almost failed tonight."

"...When did you guys work together?" Shuntaro's eyes slid across the faces of Shintaro, Keitaro, and Hannosuke one by one.

"It's been from the beginning," Shintaro said.

"Before Iga's ninjas arrive... Shintaro..."

"No." The smile on Shintaro's face became more intense, "Before that..."

"Before I don't know how long ago, Keitaro and Hannosuke were my companions!"

"You killed Balrog and kidnapped Ah Chang... What are you going to do?" Shuntaro gritted his teeth, "Is it to seize power and become the next generation of Balrog?!"

"Seizing power..." Shintaro's expression was full of satisfaction, "It's for seizing power."

"But I have no interest in becoming the next generation of Balrogs."

Shintaro looked at Keitaro beside him.

"Keitaro, bring that thing here."

"yes."

Keitaro took down the big cloth bag he was carrying on his back, and handed it to Shintaro.

After Shintaro took it, he threw it to Shuntaro again.

"Shuntaro, open it and take a look."

The thing that Shintaro threw was not heavy.

After Shuntaro untied it, he found that what was contained in this cloth bag was a thousand-tenths gourd.

Shuntaro is a rough man who can't even write Chinese characters very well.

But even a rough man like him knows what a thousand gourds represent.

"Shintaro, what are you doing with Toyotomi Hideyoshi's horse seal?" Shuntaro tightly clutched the thousand-tenth gourd in his hand.

Even a rough man like Shuntaro has heard of the legendary stories created by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who held a thousand gourd and horse seals in the troubled times of the Warring States Period 200 years ago.

"Don't worry, Shuntaro."

Shintaro turned and walked towards a big rock next to him.

After sitting down on this big rock, Shintaro continued to put on a satisfied expression:

"Would you like to find a place to sit, too?"

"I'm going to tell you a story...you might think I'm lying."

...

...

Edo, Nihonbashi, Shinagawa-juku.

Naito Shinjuku is one of the most famous post stations in Edo.

Starting from Edo, there are 5 important traffic arteries.

The 5 traffic arteries are respectively - Donghai Street, Zhongshan Street, Sunlight Street, Aozhou Street, and Koshu Street.

These five traffic arteries are collectively referred to as the "Five Streets". Because they connect various important places in Japan, the "Five Streets" are of great significance both politically and militarily.

When the Edo shogunate built the "Five Streets", it built many post stations along the "Five Streets".

Take Sunshine Street as an example.

Taking Edo as the starting point, there are 21 stations in Nikko Kaido from the starting point to the ending point.

This is also one of the reasons why there are so many ronin in Edo - there are a large number of post stations along the "Five Streets", which are convenient for ronin to stay.

Shinagawa Su - the first dormitory in Donghai Street.

Because Tokai Street connects the two big cities of Kyoto and Edo, Tokai Street can be said to be the busiest and most popular street among the "Five Streets".

As the starting point of Tokai Street, "Shinagawa Judo" has been full of rooms for a long time.

While the tenants in the other rooms are asleep, the tenants in one room are still asleep.

In this unlit room, a young man was leaning against the window, and by the moonlight outside the window, carefully looked at a knife in his hand.

This is a pretty dapper knife with a purple handle.

The shallow arc, the cold light, looks majestic and majestic.

Under the illumination of the moonlight, the light refracted by the blade is a little more warm.

Wow...

The door next to the young man was slowly opened.

An extremely burly man walked slowly to the young man's side, then knelt down on one knee.

"Gao Qing." The young man said in a young voice, "What's the matter?"

"Lord Toyotomi, the Balrog is dead. Shuntaro's relatives and friends have been brought under control." The strong man called "Gao Qing" by the young man summed up the latest information he had just received into a short sentence.

As soon as the strong man finished speaking, a smile appeared on the expressionless face of the young man.

"After 200 years, Shiranui has finally returned to the control of our Toyotomi family..."

The young man's words carried a bit of self-deprecating air.

"Master Toyotomi, do you need to give Shintaro instructions for the next step?" the brawny man asked.

"...Gao Qing, pass the order to Shintaro for me later." The young man seemed to have had enough fun, and slowly retracted the beautiful sword in his hand into its sheath, "Let him complete the thorough grasp of Shiranui as soon as possible." .”

"yes."

...

...

Edo, outside Yoshiwara, weaving teahouses——

There is a tea house outside Yoshiwara, quite close to the gate of Yoshiwara.

In the past, this tea house was originally a shop specializing in selling bamboo hats.

In the past, samurai were more concerned about face. When they came to places like Yoshiwara to have fun, they would cover their faces with bamboo hats in order to avoid being seen by acquaintances.

This store specializes in the business of these samurai.

But with the passage of time, the samurai gradually let go of themselves and no longer considered it a shameful thing to go in and out of Yoshiwara. There were fewer and fewer samurai who would wear bamboo hats to go in and out of Yoshiwara, and the business of this shop became more and more difficult.

In order to survive, the shop had to be transformed into a tea house.

While doing ordinary tea house business, I also continue to sell bamboo hats.

Because of this, people now refer to this shop not far from the gate of Yoshiwara as "Wei Kasa Tea House".

Kasa tea house belongs to the kind of shop that is open 24 hours a day, which is quite rare in this era.

Because it is very close to Yoshiwara, from time to time, officials from Shirobei Club who is on night shift tonight will come to him to have a few drinks and eat something, and the number of people is not small.

Relying on this unique topographical advantage, even in the middle of the night, the Kasa Tea House still has a pretty good business.

In order to earn more money, the owner of Kasa Tea House has been operating 24 hours a day for several years.

Business was exceptionally good tonight.

Because a fire broke out in Yoshihara.

In order to extinguish the fire, a large number of local officials rushed to Yoshiwara, and successfully controlled the fire just now, preventing the fire from raging.

After controlling the fire and breathing a sigh of relief, some town firefighters who were exhausted and thirsty from the fire, as well as officials from the Shirobei Clubhouse, took advantage of the opportunity to this knitting tea house, which was still open in the middle of the night. Drink some tea, eat something, and restore your strength.

With so many officials coming to patronize, it is a great opportunity to make money-but the owner of the Kasa Tea House does not want to make this money.

His boss, he has always respected these heroes who dare to face the terrifying flames.

So I specially kept the prices of all the food and tea tonight to the lowest, basically only earning a cost price.

Because there are many guests tonight, it is naturally quite busy.

Even the owner, who is usually only responsible for housing behind the scenes, had to personally carry the tea trays and deliver snacks and tea to each table.

call……

When the owner was placing the two cups of tea on a Chinese plate on a table near the door of the store, he suddenly heard the sound of the curtain being lifted from the door of the store behind him.

"welcome!"

After putting all the tea and water on the plate on the table of the guests, the host immediately showed a well-trained polite smile and looked towards the door of the store.

There is only one new customer entering the store.

There is a straight knife that is slightly shorter than the Da knife stuck in the waist, and a bamboo hat is worn on the head.

Because the brim of the bamboo hat is very wide, and because the guest lowered his head slightly, the host couldn't see his appearance clearly.

"Are there any free tables?" The person asked the host in a concise manner.

The voice is very old, and it is a voice that only old people can make.

"Yes!" The owner immediately said, "Excuse me, is there only one?"

"Yes." The old man nodded.

"please follow me!"

The host made a gesture of "please" to the old man, and the old man also slowly approached the host, and under the leadership of the host, he walked towards the empty table.

Because the owner is much shorter than the old man, he can barely see the old man's face just by looking up.

So when the old man approaches, the owner can vaguely see that the old man's hair is almost all gray.

There are many wrinkles on the face.

The most notable thing is - he has only one eye.

There is a vertical scar covering the old man's left eye.

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