"Ohhh..."
"Impressive... what a beautiful technique..."
"What martial art is this? Doesn't look much like jujutsu."
...
Just as Suzu had said earlier—in this era, samurai skilled in unard combat were rare.
Samurai of this ti generally focused enthusiastically on practicing swordsmanship, spearmanship, archery, and other weapon skills, placing little importance on empty-handed techniques.
After Aoto subdued Kondō with his crisp movents, the apprentices sitting around the edges of the dojo, who rarely witnessed such high-quality unard combat, erupted in exclamations of amazent and discussion.
While the surrounding apprentices were marveling, Aoto was also marveling—internally marveling.
Holy crap, hit the jackpot again!
After the system voice faded in his mind, Aoto hurriedly summoned his personal system interface.
【Na: Tachibana Aoto】(?)
【Currently Possessed Talents:】
【Night Vision, Sword Prodigy, Sleep God, Lone Courage】
At the very end of the talent list, two large Chinese characters for "Lone Courage" had clearly appeared.
The more nurous and stronger the enemies, the more it ignites fighting spirit, enabling extraordinary performance... another talent that sounded incredibly powerful just from its description.
When the "radical Expel the Barbarians faction" committed murder, they often attacked in groups.
They would send several people at once to gang up on a single person, rarely engaging in one-on-one combat.
Obtaining this talent that allowed Aoto to grow stronger when facing stronger opponents was truly like receiving tily help in a snowstorm.
Before Aoto could fully savor the joy of hitting the jackpot again and gaining a new powerful talent, Suzu's aged voice reached his ears.
"Beautiful technique!"
Suzu, his face full of warm smiles, stood up from the head seat of the dojo while applauding and slowly walked toward Aoto.
"Tachibana-kun, what martial art did you use just now? It looked sowhat like jujutsu, but also feels quite different from jujutsu."
"This is a combat technique passed down through generations in my family," Aoto smoothly lied.
"Hohoho..." Suzu raised his hand to stroke his smooth chin. "Your family passes down quite an outstanding unard combat technique..."
"If I'm not mistaken... this unard combat technique your family inherits specifically targets human joints, pressure points, and vital areas, correct?"
"Exactly." Aoto's eyebrows jumped in surprise.
Suzu continued with a smile:
"Yū just now lost because you exploited the weaknesses of his joints."
"Both arms were locked in positions where they couldn't exert force, so no matter how much strength he had, he couldn't use it."
Watching Suzu speak so knowledgeably before him, Aoto's eyes continuously shone with astonishnt.
This old man had simply watched his spar with Kondō once and imdiately pinpointed the characteristics of the grappling techniques he used and exactly why Kondō had lost to him...
"Hohoho... Tachibana-kun, you're much more impressive than I imagined."
After saying this, Suzu clasped his hands behind his back.
"Yū, help
get two bamboo swords."
Kondō was still massaging and relaxing his arms that Aoto had just locked up, which still ached sowhat.
Hearing Suzu's command, though confused, Kondō imdiately respectfully responded "Yes," then quickly fetched two bamboo swords and handed them to Suzu.
Taking the two bamboo swords from Kondō, Suzu briefly weighed them before tossing one to Aoto.
"Co, Tachibana-kun."
Suzu smiled as he raised his sword into a ready position.
"Next... let
see your swordsmanship level."
...
...
At this very mont—
"Hey, did you hear? The murderer who killed Granny Apple was caught by the 'Three Squads' of Kita Bansho in less than two hours!"
"Less than two hours?"
"Yeah, I heard it was solved by a constable from Teimachi squad nad Tachibana Aoto."
...
Due to limited forensic technology, it was extrely common for cases to take one or two months, or even several months, to solve.
Solving a case in less than two hours—such a thing was completely considered sensational news in the Edo Period.
...
"The killer has been captured by the 'Three Squads' of Kita Bansho. Granny Apple should be able to rest in peace now..."
"Granny Apple was so kind! A few years ago, my son was seriously ill and we had no money for treatnt. It was Granny Apple and her husband who treated him for free and saved my son! Which beast could have killed Granny Apple?!"
"I heard it was her childhood friend: Xun Sanlang."
"Xun Sanlang? Wasn't that guy always very honest? How could he kill soone?"
"Who knows? You can know a person's face but not their heart."
...
Granny Apple enjoyed considerable prestige; even in just Kiyayanagi Town alone, more than half the people had received help from her and her husband. They simply couldn't remain indifferent to her murder.
In modern terms, Granny Apple's homicide case was what many would call a "high-profile event."
Since the Arican black ships forced open Japan's doors seven years ago, hardly anything good had happened in this country.
The 12th shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi died of illness, his successor the 13th shogun Tokugawa Iesada was ntally incompetent, the Nanki faction and Hitotsubashi faction fought endlessly over who would succeed as the 14th shogun, and just when their struggle finally ended, Chief Minister Ii Naosuke's authoritarian style began greatly displeasing many, led by Lady Tenshō-in...
Even setting aside these court matters, the troubles among commoners were too nurous to count.
The increasingly depressed economy, disturbances by the "radical Expel the Barbarians faction," the surge in unemployed people due to social instability...
In short: these past few years, the atmosphere perating Edo had been unprecedentedly oppressive.
The "Three Squads" of Kita Bansho solving such a high-profile major case in less than two hours—this counted as rare "positive news" that could lift people's spirits in recent years.
This rare "positive news" provided an outlet for the long-suppressed emotions of the populace.
Thus—the sensational news of solving a case in under two hours
the high attention on the solved case
the populace's long-suppressed emotions urgently needing release = a peculiar chemical reaction, with enormous numbers of people spontaneously joining discussions on related topics.
Over these two days, centered around Kiyayanagi Town, more and more people began discussing this recently concluded homicide case.
Due to insufficient basic education in this era, the general populace wasn't very bright and lacked judgnt—therefore, all sorts of chaotic rumors spread at an almost eerie rapid speed over these two days...
...
"Hey, did you hear? That constable who caught the beast who killed Granny Apple apparently hadn't been very impressive at Kita Bansho before. They say he even had the nickna 'Idiot Aoto.'"
"Then how did he suddenly beco so capable?"
"Who knows? Maybe he buckled down and worked hard to improve himself."
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto apparently studied the cri scene inside Granny Apple's house for a while and imdiately knew who killed her."
"What? How did he do that?"
"Who knows! The Magistrate’s Office should announce how that Tachibana Aoto caught the person later."
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto is quite a man of principle! He was apparently a terrible Teimachi squad constable before, so people gave him the nickna 'Idiot Aoto,' but he kept studying hard and honing his mind and body until he finally caught up. That's how he solved today's case so brilliantly."
"Ohhh! Amazing! Who would have thought there'd still be such principled and driven samurai in this day and age!"
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto apparently just glanced at the cri scene after entering Granny Apple's house and imdiately knew who killed her. He was only in Granny Apple's house for less than half an incense stick's ti from start to finish."
"Huh? I heard that Tachibana Aoto didn't even enter Granny Apple's house?"
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto apparently didn't even enter Granny Apple's house! He just stood outside the cri scene listening to jishinban officers report the case details and deduced who the culprit was."
"Right, right, that's what I heard too. He solved the case without even entering Granny Apple's house!"
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto..."
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto..."
...
"Hey, did you hear? That Tachibana Aoto..."
...
Edo, so castle town, outside a certain confectionery shop—
Okita hated that kind of behavior where people crowd around cri scenes... especially murder scenes.
Gathering around cri scenes like watching a play, standing on tiptoes, craning their necks to look...
What's so interesting about that?!
Have they considered the feelings of the victims' friends and relatives...
So annoying... this kind of behavior that disregards the feelings of victims' loved ones...
Therefore, two days ago, when he learned about the homicide case in neighboring Kiyayanagi Town, Okita didn't go to spectate like those busybodies.
After seeing Aoto off, Okita stayed at the teahouse, continuing to enjoy his favorite red bean paste stead buns.
After finishing the buns, he quietly returned alone to Shieikan and didn't follow up on Granny Apple's case afterward.
Okita was a severe sweets addict.
If he went a day without konpeitō, he felt completely uncomfortable.
Last night, seeing that his household's konpeitō reserves were running low, he excitedly rushed to his regular confectionery shop first thing this morning to purchase his "daily necessities."
But his luck today seed rather poor.
When Okita arrived at his usual confectionery shop, all the konpeitō had sold out.
Okita only loved the konpeitō baked at this particular shop, so he could only wait patiently in the store for the shopkeeper to bake a new batch.
To pass this boring waiting ti, Okita stood outside the confectionery shop and pulled out a small stack of papers from his robe.
Let's study arithtic!
The small stack of papers Okita pulled out was covered in dense handwriting—all arithtic problems he had previously asked the reasonably skilled Hijikata Toshizo to prepare for him.
Hijikata Toshizo had once told him: To learn arithtic well, plenty of practice is necessary.
Therefore, to get extensive practice, Okita pestered Hijikata Toshizo for quite a while before he finally agreed to prepare suitable practice problems.
When Okita first asked Hijikata Toshizo to help prepare problems, the man was extrely reluctant, saying things like "What a bother."
But after finally agreeing to Okita's request under persistent pestering, he beca exceptionally serious, helping Okita write a full several pages of arithtic problems.
Okita flipped through the small stack of papers to problems he hadn't done yet.
The mont his eyes landed on a new problem, Okita's delicate eyebrows imdiately furrowed, his expression becoming like this: (????ω??｀)
【Soji, you currently have 39 konpeitō. I have 27 konpeitō. If I give you all my konpeitō, how many konpeitō do you have now?】
Both the problem's tone and content were filled with Mr. Hijikata's style.
39 konpeitō... hmm... one pair of hands has 10 fingers, so 39 is 3 pairs of hands plus 9 fingers!
27 konpeitō is 2 pairs of hands plus 7 fingers!
Perhaps because he was standing right next to the confectionery shop and could continuously sll quite pleasant sweet aromas, Okita felt his mind was exceptionally sharp right now! His thinking was remarkably smooth!
His condition was excellent!
Hmm! Good! Feeling great now! This ti I should get it right!
A smug smile curling at his lips, he continued his ntal calculations.
39 plus 27... that's 3 pairs of hands plus 9 fingers plus 2 pairs of hands plus 7 fingers...
Thus—the sensational news of solving a case in under two hours
the high attention on the solved case
the populace's long-suppressed emotions urgently needing release = a strange chemical reaction, with enormous numbers of people spontaneously joining discussions on related topics.
(≧??≦) 103 total!
Okita smugly turned his gaze to the next problem...
Just then—
Due to insufficient basic education in this era, the general populace wasn't very bright and lacked judgnt—therefore, all sorts of chaotic rumors spread at an almost eerie rapid speed over these two days...
"Yeah, heard, heard. A Teimachi squad constable with the nickna 'Idiot Aoto' solved it in under two hours, right? What was that constable's na again?"
"Tachibana Aoto."
"Oh, right, Tachibana Aoto."
Suddenly, a conversation ca from beside him that Okita couldn't help but notice, hard to ignore...
The speakers were two middle-aged n who stood not far from the confectionery shop, each chewing on a rice dumpling, looking like idle mbers of society.
After one man stuffed his entire rice dumpling into his mouth, he lowered his voice and said to his companion opposite him in a tone like he was sharing a little secret:
"Hey, did you hear? They say that Tachibana Aoto has mastered Zhuge Kongming's finger calculation techniques!"
...Zhuge Kongming?!
Okita's expression after hearing these two n's words beca like this: Σ(°Д°;)...
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