He has a handsome appearance, and his smooth black hair is tied behind his head into a smooth and slender high ponytail with a purple ribbon. There is always a soft smile on his cheeks, except that the clothes he wears are different from yesterday. , the rest of the place is not much different from yesterday - it is the handsome young man whom I met in the trial defense hall yesterday: Okita Souji.
When Qingto cast a surprised look at Okita, Okita, who was currently holding a steamed bun in one hand, was also looking at Qingto in surprise.
"Tangerine-kun, why are you here?"
"I was patrolling here just now, and I saw a teahouse here, so I wanted to stop here and have lunch."
"Oh! That's a coincidence!" Okita smiled and waved to Qingto, "I still have an empty seat here. If you don't mind, you can share a table with me!"
The table Okita sat at was a small table that could only accommodate two people.
Okita was sitting alone at this small table, and there was an empty seat opposite him.
It's lunch time now, which is one of the most popular times for places like teahouses and restaurants.
The teahouse where Qingteng is currently sitting has almost no empty seats left.
Seeing that Okita took the initiative to invite him to share a table, Qingto was more respectful than obeying the order. He ran to the opposite side of Okita and sat down in two steps at a time.
"Okita-kun, why are you here?" Aoto asked Okita after ordering a cup of cheap tea with the tea house's hand proxy.
This handsome boy is now stuffing Japanese steamed buns filled with red bean filling into his mouth one by one with one hand, and his cheeks are bulging like a hamster stuffing his mouth with winter food.
[Note: Japanese steamed buns are stuffed buns]
"There's not much work to do in the Trial Guard Hall today, so it's a rare opportunity for me to come out for some air."
"This teahouse is a 'treasure place' I've come to frequently recently." Okita swallowed the steamed buns in his mouth in one go, then smiled and said, "The steamed buns sold in this teahouse are sweet and soft, and they are very suitable for me. .”
"As long as you eat a few pieces of the steamed buns here, all the depression will be gone!"
After saying that, Okita pushed the plate with three steamed buns left in front of him in Qingto's direction.
"Tachibana-kun, do you want to give it a try?"
Qingden also likes sweets.
Facing the steamed bun that Okita pushed towards him, Qingto didn't hesitate much and took a piece of steamed bun from Okita's plate generously.
After putting the steamed bun into his mouth, Qingden's brows immediately raised slightly in surprise.
It tastes really good.
The softness and sweetness are just right.
Okita, who had been paying close attention to Aoto's expression, asked Aoto excitedly:
"Tachibana-kun, do you also like sweets?"
"Huh? Yes, I am the kind of person who will feel uncomfortable if I don't eat something sweet for a few days."
"I also love sweets the most!" Okita showed a bright smile, with two crescents in both eyes. "I'm a little more serious than you. If I don't eat some sweets every day, I feel uncomfortable all over the body."
"So I always carry this with me."
Okita put his hand into his arms and fumbled around, then took out the half-eaten Jinping candy.
Jinpingtang is a small candy grain that looks like a star. It is sweet and can be said to be one of the favorite snacks of children in this era.
"Speaking of which, Tachibana-kun. If you were patrolling here just now, why didn't you see your Okabiki?" Okita looked around with confusion.
"I don't have Okahibiki." Qingden wrote lightly, "Our family owes Yakuza an extremely large amount of gambling debt, so we don't have enough money to hire Okahibiki."
"Gambling debt?" Okita's eyes widened.
The Okabiki System is the second special system that allows the Minami and Hokuban Stations to maintain public order in Edo with only a small amount of police force.
Okabiki, also known as Meimei, has quite a few names, and its function is similar to that of a modern auxiliary police officer.
The shogunate also knew that maintaining law and order in such a large city with only such a small police force was a complete fantasy.
Therefore, with the tacit approval of the shogunate, the colleagues of the "Sanchai" of the Southern and Northern Divisions were able to use their private wealth to hire others to work for them.
These people who were hired by Tongxin with their own money and were responsible for assisting Tongxin in maintaining law and order were called "Okayaki".
In modern terms, they are a group of non-staff personnel without formal establishment.
No... not even the non-staff personnel. To be more precise, they are just a group of wage earners who receive salaries from Tongxin.
Because he is not a member of the government, Okabiki can be either a samurai or a civilian.
After becoming a certain Okahibiki of the same mind, you can receive a Juju from the government as proof of your Okahibiki identity.
There are no restrictions on Okabiki's recruitment, it all depends on the personal preferences of the members.
If you want, you can hire a beggar on the roadside as a guide.
Although occasionally there will be a few extremely powerful Okabiki who can assist in investigating and solving cases, but such Okabiki are only a handful.
Most Okabiki can basically only do some chores and backbreaking work. The main case-handling work still depends on Tongxin himself.
The "Okahiki System" that helps share the workload, and the "township residents' self-government system" that helps reduce the workload - Edo's "Sankai" relied on these two major systems to successfully protect Edo with just a few police officers. of security.
The night before yesterday, during the annihilation operation against the "Benevolent People", the large group of people who rushed into the house along with Arima, Aoto, Inotani, and Ushiyama were Ino and Ushi's Okabiki.
If Seitou remembered correctly - Ushiyama raised 5 Okahiki, and Inoya raised slightly more Okahibiki, and there were a total of 9 Okahiki employed by Inoya.
When Ainoto took over his father's position and entered the Sadachi Kai, their Tachibana family was already in debt. Therefore, Ainoto naturally did not have the extra money to hire Oka Hiki to do odd jobs for him. He had to do all the big and small work himself. Do it yourself.
When Domachi Hui's Toshin patrols his area of jurisdiction, he often lets several Okahiki under his command accompany him. That's why Okita just asked Aonto "Why don't you see your Okahiki?"
After telling Okita concisely and concisely about his current family situation, which was dragged down by his late father's gambling debts, Okita apologized to Qingnobo in embarrassment:
"Sorry... I seem to have accidentally mentioned something that I shouldn't have mentioned..."
"It's okay, no need to apologize." Qingden smiled freely at Okita, "I don't care."
The tea that Qingdeng ordered just now has been served.
Accompanied by this slightly inferior tea, Qingden began to nibble on the three rice balls that Kubei gave him this morning.
"Okita-kun, why do you have time to come here to eat steamed buns?" Qingto, who was munching on rice balls, asked casually, "Don't you need to monitor the trial defense hall?"
"No need." Okita smiled slightly, "Because Brother Kondo has come back. With Brother Kondo in charge, I no longer need to help look after the trial defense hall."
"Kondo-kun is back?" Qingto was surprised.
"Tama is very close to Edo. Brother Kondo returned to Tama smoothly yesterday afternoon."
"After visiting Mr. Hijikata and confirming that Mr. Hijikata was fine, he traveled all night and returned to the trial defense hall smoothly this morning."
"Kondo-kun rushed back all night..." Qingto asked puzzledly, "Why are you in such a hurry? Can't you just spend the night at Tama's place and come back after dawn this morning?"
Night roads in this era are very dangerous.
One is because there are no lighting facilities such as electric lights.
Second, because of the public security situation in this era, it is not suitable to travel at night.
Not to mention those remote areas, even around Edo, there are often thieves and bandits.
"There's no way... Now is a critical period for Brother Kondo. If you leave the training hall for too long, you will easily be gossiped about."
"Critical period?" Qingdeng asked, "What do you mean?"
"Master, he is very old..." Okita looked a little disappointed between his brows, and raised his hand to play with the slender ponytail on the back of his head, "Whether it is natural Rishin-ryu teaching work or the daily operation and management of the trial academy, The master is already a little overwhelmed."
"So Master has been preparing to pass this imperial examination hall to Brother Kondo in the next few years, and let Brother Kondo succeed him as the fourth generation head of the Tenurishin-ryu clan."
"Therefore, at this moment when you are about to become the new owner of the Trial Guard Hall, if you leave the Trial Guard Hall for too long without any reason, it is easy for some people to gossip and gossip."
"It's not easy to be the young master of the sword hall..." Qingdeng said with emotion.
"Yes." Okita nodded slightly as if he had the same feeling, "So in order to make Kondo-san feel more relaxed, I have to work harder on arithmetic."
"Arithmetic?" Qingden was stunned, "Okita-kun, why are you learning arithmetic?"
"If you want to run a sword gym, you don't need to know how to keep accounts." Okita put his hands on his hips, puffed out his flat chest, and looked confident, "Kondo-san's arithmetic has never been very good."
"So, in order to be able to help Kondo-san in the management of the trial gym in the future, I am now working hard to learn arithmetic!"
"Oh...!" Qingden's eyes flashed with admiration, "You and Brother Kondo have a really good relationship."
"After all, Kondo-san is just like my elder brother to me." After Okita smiled shyly, the smile on his face slowly turned into melancholy, "But... although the words are beautiful, but I do But it’s not that beautiful…”
"I have always had trouble learning arithmetic..."
With an aggrieved look on his face, Okita pulled his neck and shoulders inward, making his body look much smaller.
"Last time I asked Mr. Hijikata to teach me arithmetic. After he taught me for a while, he immediately scolded me: Idiot! Why can't you even do this? Have you eaten gold flat candy until your head turned into gold flat candy..."
Hijikata?
After thinking for a moment, Ayoto remembered who Hijikata was - Toshizo Hijikata, one of the "Five Great Vajras" of the Imperial Guard Hall. He had a very close relationship with Kondo and Okita. Kondo hurried back to Tama yesterday just to go back. Visit him who is injured.
"That's too much." Qingden frowned slightly, "Isn't it normal for beginners to make mistakes during the learning process? How could you scold someone so harshly?"
"That's right!" Okita puffed up his chest and flattened his lips in agreement, "Didn't I just calculate 9 plus 23 as 107? Why are you scolding me like that?"
…
quiet……
…
The atmosphere between Qingto and Okita suddenly became extremely quiet...
My mind went blank.
It was like someone took an iron rod and hit him hard on the back of the head.
It wasn't until an unknown amount of time passed that Qingden finally felt his consciousness return to his body.
"...You calculated 9 plus 23 as 107...?"
"Hmm... I'm not very good at calculating calculations where the sum of the numbers exceeds 10 fingers..." Okita raised his hand to play with the ponytail on the back of his head and smiled, "As long as it's a calculation that I can't count with my fingers. , I can easily make miscalculations..."
"But as long as my fingers can count the calculations, I can calculate them very accurately!"
Okita continued hurriedly as if he wanted to prove that his arithmetic skills were not bad.
"For example, calculations like 4 plus 2."
Okita raised 4 fingers on his right hand and 2 fingers on his left hand.
"I can calculate such calculations correctly 100% of the time!"
"4 plus 2 equals 6!"
After that, Okita seemed to want to take credit from Qingneng, and pushed the six raised fingers into Qingneng's face.
Aoto, whose face was expressionless... or rather didn't know what expression to put on, raised his eyes and glanced at Okita, who was smiling, as if to say that his arithmetic skills were not too bad...
Although this child is extremely talented in swordsmanship... he seems to be not very smart in other areas!
Aoto doesn't even know what expression to put on now, what to say to Okita who looks so proud...
Just when Qingdeng was struggling with this——
"Hey! Shichiro! I've been waiting for you for a long time! Why are you here now?"
A loud shout suddenly came from the table next to Aoto and Okita - three uncles dressed as carpenters sitting around this table vigorously shouted at a middle-aged man with a beard who had just entered the teahouse. Waving hands.
"Oh, sorry, I kept you waiting for so long! I just went to watch the fun!" The middle-aged man with a beard said in a loud voice and sat down next to his three friends.
"Busty? What's the buzz?" asked a bearded friend.
Bearded: "Someone was killed in Koyanagi Town next door! It is said that the death was so miserable! I wanted to go to the place where the body was found to join in the fun, but when I got there, it turned out that the scene had been sealed off by my own people. What? I can’t even see it!”
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