After coming out of Yae Township, Shuangxie continued to head east towards their destination.
As for Hayato...after experiencing several previous incidents, he has undoubtedly gained the trust of Shuangxie; so Sun and Huang discussed it, directly revealed their mission to Hayato, and asked the latter if he was willing to act as A guide accompanies them.
Hayato thought about it for a moment and agreed; after all, he was just wandering around looking for "jobs" to do, and as long as it wasn't something that was harmful to nature, who could he work for? What's more, based on what he knew about Shuangxie when he was in Guangzhou, at least Sun Yixie was very generous in his actions. If he acted as a guide for "Sun Bancheng", he would never treat him badly after the matter was accomplished.
After seeing this, someone may want to ask, Hayato, as a Japanese, didn't he feel entangled in taking this job?
Of course, there is nothing to worry about, because the purpose of Sun and Huang's trip is just to "go to a certain daimyo to get back a treasure that the other party stole from the Central Plains"; if the roles of the two parties were reversed, it would be When Hayato came to the Central Plains, it was like he wanted to get back a piece of jewelry that the prefect of the Central Plains had stolen from the imperial family... This kind of thing did not rise to the level of being entangled over nationality.
Hayato is not a subordinate of any daimyo, he is just a Japanese charlatan. What the hell does it have to do with those daimyo being stolen, robbed or even killed? It would be better if a group of these big names died early and the war ended as soon as possible.
What can really make Hayato struggle with his Japanese identity is something bigger. For example, Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai said to him today: "We are ordered to assassinate the Emperor of Japan." Then Hayato must be in friendship and Apart from interests, let’s first consider the issue of national stance.
Of course, if it were that kind of mission, no matter how much Sun Huang trusted Hayato, he would not confront him, a Japanese.
To make a long story short, after Hayato agreed to be the guide, the three of them immediately set off together.
And the speed of their travel has also made a huge leap as a result.
First of all, Hayato is not the kind of admirer like Keijiro who is "the most handsome guy in the room" wherever he goes. He usually keeps a low profile in both appearance and behavior, and will not cause extra trouble unless necessary.
Secondly, although Hayato's "combat ability" is average, his yin-yang divination and feng shui secrets are all good skills. In Japan, where there are mountain roads everywhere, as long as he puts a few small paper figures or cranes, ...You can know roughly which direction is easier to walk and when the journey will start smoothly.
With such a person as their guide, the journey of the three of them would be easier and smoother.
In the next few days, their advance speed was at least three times as fast as before, and they passed through the confrontation zone between the Mori clan and the Nizi clan without encountering any danger, and arrived at the boundary of Kobe.
Kobe is an important gateway to the south of Hyogo Prefecture and is called "Hyogo Tsu"; it faces Osaka Bay and Osaka Castle to the east. A little further northeast from Osaka, Kyoto is next to where the emperor is. .
It is obvious that this is a battleground for military strategists.
And because it is a contested area, it has become a "terrible place."
In Kobe at this time, there are Asai and Rokkaku competing in the east, the Miyoshi clan in the southwest is eyeing it, the Matsunaga clan and the Hatakeyama clan in the southeast should not be underestimated, and in the west there is the Urakami clan who is weak but is closest to here and values it the most. Staring.
This kind of area, sandwiched between a bunch of large and small forces, is basically the place that best fits the description of "hell on earth" in Japan's Warring States Period.
The villages and ports that used to be home to many residents are now just deserted houses and fields.
Every inch of soil here seems to have become a battlefield stained by blood. The air is filled with the smell of corruption and blood. Bodies of varying numbers and varying degrees of decay can be seen everywhere on the roadside. Some of them are wearing armor. , there were weapons dropped from their hands, and some were in rags, or even half-clothed; and the genders and ages of these deceased were all men, women, old and young. Some of the deaths were so miserable that people couldn’t bear to look at them, let alone imagine them. What happened during his lifetime.
It can be said that Kobe in the winter of the second year of Yuanhe was a veritable dangerous place of death and a killing jungle.
The people who are still active in this land are either crazy, or they have to come, or have ulterior reasons...
The situation of Sun Yixie and Huang Donglai obviously belongs to the latter, because the names of places and people written on the notes they got from Kogoro were: "Kobe" and "Xiaomei" respectively.
Of course, they had no idea that Kobe was like this before. According to the impressions of two modern people, Sun Huang, this place should be a good place to eat beef, and you can also try delicious food when you visit.
As a result, after leaving Yaego and letting Hayato be his guide, when Hayato asked where you were going, Sun Huang replied that he was going to Kobe, which shocked Hayato... Seeing Hayato's shocked look at that time, Shuangxie got it There is something fishy about the governor.
But even if they know the situation in Kobe, they still have to come. After all, this is their only intelligence line. If it is broken, it will be gone.
Furthermore, the name "Xiao Mei" also made Sun Yixie have a little fantasy. He thought: What if the contact person is a beauty? Is that...
Do you need someone to protect you?
As a "chivalrous man", it is his duty to do so.
So, the three of them came to Kobe, a land that had been ravaged beyond recognition by war, and randomly found an empty house that was empty and lived in it that night.
Before entering the house, Sun and Huang placed a pile of "stone codes" on the ground outside the house that Eunuch Wei had taught them before leaving, and then they just waited.
Hayato thought that they would have a more specific way of contacting each other, but he didn’t expect that it would end up in this form of placing a code on the ground and waiting for the answer. Therefore, after entering the room and resting for a while, Hayato asked with doubts: "Sun Brother, Brother Huang, are you sure that what you are looking for this time is just 'one person'?"
Sun Yixie had not yet reacted to his question, but Huang Donglai quickly understood: "Hmm... I'm also confused." He paused, "I thought Kobe was crowded and lively before. If this is the case, then we only need to find the busiest inn in the area to stay, and then place a sign for the joint near the inn. It should not be difficult to be discovered; but now when we come here... there are deserted houses and wasteland everywhere. , there is not even half a person... So if there is only one person connecting with us, where can we find us? Kobe is so large, how do they know where we will stay? This 'Xiaomei' doesn't necessarily come every day Can you go around all the houses in Kobe?"
"Oh?" Sun Yixi followed Huang Donglai's words and followed the train of thought, "In this case, the other party may not be just one person, but a small organization composed of several people. Each person in the organization is responsible for Kobe In a certain area, if anyone discovers the situation, he will try to inform his companions. It seems more reasonable to think like this..."
"Indeed." Hayato continued, "But as far as I know, such an organization usually does not work for just one party. They generally act as neutral intelligence dealers and maintain cooperative relationships with multiple forces at the same time, and... The organization that dares to stay here in Kobe will definitely not be composed of good men and women..."
"Ha...that's nothing." Sun Yixie smiled evilly, "Aren't they just some 'bad women'? I can handle it."
"Uh..." Hayato heard this and looked confused, "Brother Sun, how do you know the other person is a woman?"
"Isn't that nonsense? Can someone named 'Xiao Mei' still be a man?" Sun Yixie said.
When Huang Donglai saw Sun Yixie's virtue, he knew that this kid didn't hold it in well, so he immediately said Yin and Yang from the side: "Huh... According to Sun Geyou's wishes, if there are Xiaolan, Xiaozhu, and Xiaoju on the other side, then... Better, isn’t it?”
"Hahaha..." Sun Yi laughed for a while, but immediately asked with a question mark on his face, "Huh? What does this have to do with Xiaolan? Is there something about Conan here?"
Obviously, Brother Sun doesn't know the term "plum, orchid, bamboo and chrysanthemum".
"Forget it, forget it..." Huang Donglai was troubled when he saw that the other party was immune to his ridicule due to his illiterate power.
But at this moment, Hayato's sudden words gave Brother Sun a big blow: "Brother Sun, although I don't know what you are talking about about Conan and Xiaolan, but there is something I feel You have misunderstood..." He continued in a tone that was not joking at all, "In the Central Plains, 'Xiao Mei' is a girl's name most likely, but in Japan, it may just be a surname, for example Said, there is probably a man named Xiaomei Gozaburo, then he can also be called Xiaomei."
"What?" When Sun Yixie heard this, his voice suddenly shrilled, "What the fuck..." Then the scolding man came out, "Why do you have so many evil names in Japan? Too much It’s so damn easy for people to misunderstand!”
It can be seen that he is greatly disappointed, and it is obvious... In Brother Sun's perception, "harming people" is also a "bad name".
"Hahahaha..." Huang Donglai couldn't help but laugh out loud while listening to the conversation between the two people, "Brother Sun, is it possible that it's not the problem of the name but your problem? Hahaha... Oh no, I feel so sick that I have a stomachache from laughing. You guys chat first while I go take a dump."
Huang Donglai's way of saying goodbye to the toilet while chatting and laughing was extremely smooth, and his transitions were smooth. When the words fell, he had already turned around and left the room.
As we said before, the outside of the house is also desolate. Huang Donglai can solve it wherever he wants, even in the middle of the road. Of course... In this winter, as the saying goes, the cold wind blows, and the wind blows and cools the buttocks. Huang Donglai Anyway, I went to find a small forest nearby and dug into it. After solving it this way, it would be convenient to grab a few leaves.
In the next ten minutes or so, we used the word "spring breeze once" to omit some indescribable things between men and women, and the word "comeback" to omit what Huang Donglai did.
Let's say that his cat was in the woods. When he was finishing up, he suddenly saw a person coming near the house where Sun Yihe and Hayato were.
Moreover, it was really a woman.
Huang Donglai had seen this woman before. She was the female ninja that Shuangxie met at the port of Xiaguan before, namely A Zhi, Namasugi Chongzang's subordinate.
At this moment, A Zhi was walking alone in this desolate place. Not only did her expression and steps look hurried, but her right hand was always covering her left rib... It looked like she was injured.
Although he didn't know what she had gone through, or whether her appearance here was a coincidence, Huang Donglai could guess based on experience that there might be pursuers behind this woman.
…………
At the same moment, three miles away.
Two monks in white clothes stood on the edge of a cliff, looking at A Zhi's tiny figure in the distance, with unhappy expressions on their faces.
"Because she is a woman, I am careless." After a moment, the slightly taller monk in white was the first to speak, "I didn't expect that she is the most powerful one among the three."
"Hmph..." the monk in white who was shorter than him snorted coldly, "Isn't it because you had lustful thoughts that you let her get the chance to escape?"
"Hey..." The tall monk became even more irritated when the other party said this, "It's all because that man tried his best to hold me back, and that's why it happened... Otherwise, no matter how careless I am, this woman won't be able to fly out of my arms. The palm of your hand..."
As he spoke, he turned his head and looked behind him with his peripheral vision.
At this time, under the slope behind the two of them, there were ten monks in black, or ten "corpse puppets" controlled by the two of them.
Among the ten corpse dolls, five were standing still at the moment, and one of them was carrying an unconscious little boy on his shoulders.
The other five corpse dolls were gathered around one place, using their naginata to chop wildly at a man who was already lying on the ground motionless.
"Whatever you say..." The short monk seemed not to be surprised by this cruel scene, and just continued in a calm tone, "But the woman's escape has become a fact. Now even if you cut the man's body into pieces, It's useless to break up and vent your anger, it's better to catch up quickly, do what you failed to do just now, and then silence that woman too, and then go back to meet everyone." He said, turned around, and took a step forward He was about to leave, "Anyway, I'll take that kid back first. This kid should also be a ninja and a good prospect. I think the sect leader will be very happy to see him."
"Wait!" When the tall monk heard this, his expression immediately changed. He turned to stop the short man and said, "We obviously arrested the person together, do you want to take the credit alone now?"
"Haha..." The short man sneered when he heard this. Although he paused, he said without looking back, "I told them when we caught them this morning. As a rule, the children are kept alive and taken back, and the other two are on the spot. Just kill it.
"But you insist on saying, 'These two are not ordinary people, and leaving them alive may yield some valuable information.'
"Actually, I already guessed what your plan was at that time, but I just didn't expose you. When I thought that you deliberately left the man behind to hide your little thoughts, I felt funny...
"Originally, I didn't want to talk to you about this kind of thing, because I know that you will silence those two people immediately after you are done, and there will be no difference in terms of the result.
"I didn't expect that you would let someone run away just after I left for a while... Fortunately, I was in charge of that kid. If he also ran away, then your responsibility would be much greater than it is now.
"I didn't report this matter to the sect master, and I punished you because of our friendship. You still want to share the credit... Isn't it a bit too much? Xuan Gen?"
Xuan Gen was speechless and could only grit his teeth and swallowed: "Okay... Yong Gen, I have you, and I will remember your 'kindness'."
"Hmph..." Yonggen didn't take the other party's gritted "thank you" seriously, and just replied, "Then I'll take the first step."
After saying that, he took steps again and left along the slope.
After Yong Gen left with the five corpse puppets under his control and the ninja assistant on his shoulders, Xuan Gen, who was standing on the edge of the cliff, turned his eyes back to the distance and landed on the deserted house that Azhi walked into. He also muttered: "Woman, today I will let you know the methods of my Lord Xuan Gen..."
Before he finished speaking, the five corpse puppets controlled by Xuan Gen quickly gathered around him, and then... followed him and jumped off the cliff together.
This cliff is not that high, it is about ten meters away from the ground below. Xuan Gen and his corpse puppets fell from this height, and they all stood firm and seemed to be able to do so with ease.
After landing, they immediately spread out in a "human" formation and rushed forward like a line of wild geese on land, quickly approaching the place where Shuang Harmony and Hayato would stay.
(End of chapter)
