. , I was a swordsman in ancient Japan

"Here we are." Makimura pouted towards an ordinary-looking hotel in front of him, "This is where we are staying now."

Ogata glanced at the hotel in front of him. The three Chinese characters "Kadadaya" were written on the door plaque of the hotel. Then he glanced at the surrounding environment. Although this place is not far from Shinmachi, it is quite desolate and crowded.

Traffic is low.

In a nutshell, this place is a fairly inconspicuous area in Osaka.

"Have all of you in the Calabash House come to Osaka?" Ogata asked.

Makimura shook his head: "No. The only ones coming to Osaka right now are me, Mamiya, and Asai. The rest will have to wait until later. I will tell you the details later."

This Kadoda House only has two floors. Makimura led Ogata and Atachi to the second floor in one breath, and then stopped in front of a room in the corner.

As soon as he stood in front of the sliding paper door of this room, Oconi heard a very familiar voice and a very familiar sentence pattern from behind the door...

"Mamiya, you can actually repair this kind of Southern Barbarian pocket watch..."

"Well, I once learned the repair of this kind of clock in Nagasaki. I told you that it is cheap but not good. Nanban's pocket watch only sells for 500 Wen? This kind of watch will definitely break down in a few days. You see, it is true.

Right? Okay, it’s barely repaired, but if it breaks again, I might not be able to do anything about it.”

"While I was working so hard to negotiate with Yukimura, you two were so leisurely..." Makimura twitched the corner of his mouth and opened the door unceremoniously.

"Oh, Makimura, are you back... huh?" Mamiya's eyes widened, and he stared blankly at Ogata and Atachi standing behind Makimura, "Ogata-kun... Miss Atachi..."

Asai, who was sitting opposite Mamiya, holding a silver pocket watch in his hand, was also stunned and speechless.

"Long time no see. Mamiya, Asai." Ogata smiled at the two people who had not seen each other since their farewell in Edo at the end of last year, "We and you... really have a wonderful fate."

…

…

The Kadadaya where Mamiya and the others stayed was an ordinary hotel with no special features. In such an ordinary hotel, the rooms in it were naturally ordinary. The rooms for the three of them could not be found except for being "big".

It's hard to say anything good about it, but in such a big room, there is basically no furniture, just a few cushions.

Five people, Ogata, Amachi, Mamiya, Makimura, and Asai, sat in a circle. Makimura took the lead in telling the story of his encounter with Ogata and Amachi.

"...Just like that, I met Brother Ogata and Miss Atachi." Makimura said slowly, "Then, I brought them here."

After listening to the story of "Ogata and Omachi's Encounter" explained by Makimura, the first person to express his thoughts was Mamiya.

"...Ogata-kun, it's as you just said. We really have a wonderful fate with you..."

Mamiya let out a long breath and looked in disbelief.

"I didn't expect that when we went to Osaka, we would meet you by chance."

"I thought you were still in Ezochi..."

"Some time ago, when we had just left Edo and were preparing to come to Kansai, we had already heard about your feat of defeating the 10,000-strong army of the shogunate in Ezo."

"When we heard the news, we couldn't believe our ears. We really couldn't imagine that this was a feat that a warrior could achieve."

"Looking at all the swordsmen in ancient and modern times, let alone Miyamoto Musashi and his ilk, even Ueizumi Nobutsuna and Tsukahara Fuden are probably no longer as good as you."

Having said this, Mamiya smiled and raised his hand, patting Ogata's shoulder who was sitting next to him.

"I'm really... getting more and more curious about how people in future generations will judge you..."

Ogata only smiled at Mamiya's words, which contained no strange emotions and only expressed the simplest appreciation.

"As long as the Edo shogunate is still there, the official evaluation of me will probably not be much better." Ogata said in a joking tone, "Now... those who are die-hardly loyal to the shogunate are probably eager to defeat them.

I'll cut it into pieces in Ezo land."

"As for my affairs, let's talk about this first. Now let's talk about your affairs."

Ogata moved his eyes and let his eyes pass over the faces of Mamiya, Makimura, and Asai one by one.

"Why are you three here?"

"Well..." Mamiya looked at Ogata with eyes that seemed to want to see through Ogata's body, "...we are here to track down the 'Immortal'."

"After parting ways with you, we got new clues related to 'immortality' in Edo."

"We followed this clue and came to Osaka."

Listening to Mamiya's words, Ogata's eyes showed uncontrollable surprise.

At this time, Mamiya continued:

"Ogata-kun, what did you and Miss Atachi gain when you went north to Ezo to look for Genmasa and Gennao, their masters and disciples?"

"..." Ogata thought for a moment and said, "...The harvest is quite fruitful. It is a big step forward in curing my body that contains the 'immortal poison'."

"That's it..." Mamiya murmured softly, "In this case, both of us hold important information related to 'immortality'..."

"...Ogata-kun, let's exchange information."

"I will tell you the information we know so far, and then you will tell us your information. We can exchange information for mutual benefit."

As soon as Mamiya finished speaking, Asai on the side said urgently:

"Hey! Mamiya! How are you doing? You don't even say hello to my lord, but you have to exchange information with Ogata."

"I still have this bit of autonomy." Mamiya smiled at Asai, "Ogata-kun is no longer a stranger to us."

"Exchanging information with him is of great benefit to both them and us."

"If my lord were here, he would definitely choose to exchange information with Ogata-kun and the others without hesitation."

After finishing speaking, Mamiya turned his attention back to Ogata.

"Ogata-kun, what do you think?"

"...Okay." Ogata nodded without thinking for long, "Then let's exchange information. I'm also curious about what new information you have in Edo."

As Mamiya said just now, there are many benefits to exchanging information with Calabash House. Ogata can't think of any reason to reject Mamiya's proposal.

Maybe Mamiya and the others really have information that he and Atachi don't know about.

"Then let's talk first." Mamiya cleared his throat and began to talk.

After they experienced the battle with Shiranui, they recuperated quietly in Edo, and they talked about how they recently rescued the poor girl who was imprisoned in the Yamada Asaemon family: Atake.

Ogata and Omachi, who had been listening quietly, saw their expressions change several times as Mamiya narrated.

Ogata's expression suddenly changed twice.

The first sudden change was when he learned that Mamiya was actually a descendant of the famous Yamada Asaemon family.

The second sudden change was when he learned that the girl named Azhu actually had strong resilience that allowed her organs to repair themselves even if her organs were removed.

Such strong resilience made Ogata almost subconsciously recall the monsters on Butterfly Island...

"Ogata-kun, Miss Omachi." Mamiya suddenly asked them both, "Do you know about the recent frequent disappearances in Kansai?"

The two of them shook their heads at the same time in a tacit understanding. Because they were busy on the road, they rarely went to izakayas, teahouses and other places to listen to "implementation news."

"We have briefly heard about this matter in Edo before." Mamiya said slowly, "Recently, there have been frequent disappearances in Kansai. Regardless of men, women, old and young, samurai and common people, people have disappeared. We will report this

The disappearance is referred to as the 'Kansai Missing Persons Incident'."

"When we heard the rumor at the time, we didn't pay much attention to it."

"It wasn't until Atake was rescued that we discovered that the 'Kansai Missing Persons Incident' didn't seem to be simple."

"As a native of Osaka, Atake was kidnapped on the streets of Osaka. It is difficult not to connect Atake's kidnapping with the Kansai Missing Persons Incident."

"We suspect that the initiators of the 'Kansai Missing Persons Incident' are those who are researching 'immortality'."

"They kidnapped people for experiments. A Zhu was the victim of this experiment."

"So we followed this clue and came to Osaka. We are going to launch an investigation centered on Osaka."

At this time, Makimura interrupted:

"Brother Ogata, the Yukimura you met just now is an old friend of our Calabash House."

"My lord was once kind to him. A large part of the reason why Yukimura was able to achieve such great achievements in such a short period of time was because my lord was helping him."

"You can think of Yukimura as half of our Calabash House."

"I went to him just now to ask Yukimura to mobilize his forces to help investigate the 'Kansai Missing Persons Incident'."

The speaker again switched to Mamiya:

"It would be too dangerous to bring Atake to Osaka."

"After all, A-Zhu was kidnapped in Osaka. There may still be many eyes and ears 'researching the undead group' hidden in Osaka. If they discover A-Zhu, it will be troublesome."

"Until we find out the true identity and strength of the 'Research Immortal Group', we must try to avoid confrontation with them."

"And if we don't try to restore A-Zhu's body to its original condition first, then it would be really dangerous for her to go home directly to reunite with her relatives."

"If her relatives discover the abnormalities in her body in the future, she may be handed over to the government as a monster, or she may be subjected to even more extreme things."

"So, based on the above, my lord, she decided to send me, Makimura, and Asai to Osaka to make advance preparations for investigating the 'Kansai Missing Persons Incident'."

"And she, Genichi-san and Shimada are taking Atake to Nara. They plan to entrust Atake to a trustworthy old friend of Gendai-san to take care of him. After entrusting Atake to him, she will come to Osaka to meet us.
To be continued...