After separating from Makimura, Ogata got up and returned to Yoshiwara.
In order to avoid meeting Hasegawa, Ogata hid not far from the Yoshiwara gate.
After confirming that Hasegawa had left Yoshiwara, Ogata walked slowly towards the Yoshiwara gate, of which only two doors were left open.
Because the Shirobei Club was located next to the Yoshiwara Gate, as soon as Ogata passed through the Sodemon Gate on both sides of the Yoshiwara Gate and returned to Yoshiwara, all the leaders of the club knew of Ogata's return.
Led by Shirobei and Ueo, the crowd hurried out of the club with a "dong dong dong" sound.
As soon as I walked out of the club, I saw Ogata standing in front of the club’s door.
Before Ogata could even utter a word, Shirobei and the others started barging a stream of questions at him.
"Mashima-kun! Just now, Hasegawa Heizo came to our Yoshiwara in person to apologize. Was it you who persuaded Hasegawa Heizo to come and apologize to us?" The person who asked this question was Kawajiro.
"Mashima-kun, why didn't you come back with Hasegawa Heizo just now?" It was Uesugi's voice.
"Mashima, are you friends with Lord Hasegawa Heizo?" Only Keiichiro asked a strange question that was out of tune with the surrounding atmosphere.
Ogata couldn't help but sigh helplessly at the series of questions thrown out by Ueo and others.
Then he answered the questions raised by Guasheng and others one by one.
"I don't know Hasegawa Heizo. I just have a friend who happens to know Hasegawa Heizo."
"I asked my friend who knows Hasegawa Heizo to go find Hasegawa and tell him the truth about what happened tonight."
"Because I didn't see Hasegawa at all, that's why I didn't follow Hasegawa back just now."
"I was waiting somewhere until my friend finished negotiating with Hasegawa."
"My friend just found me and told me that I came back after he had talked to Hasegawa and Hasegawa came to apologize in person."
"It was Hasegawa's idea to go and apologize in person. No one persuaded him."
Ogata answered the questions thrown by Uesugi and others in a concise and clear manner.
What Ogata said just now was half true and half false.
But it is precisely because it is half true and half false that it sounds more credible.
The trick to making a lie sound more realistic is to mix it with some truth and tell a half-truth.
Judging from the expressions of Uesugi and the others, it is not difficult to see that Ogata's words, which were largely true, successfully fooled Uesugi and the others.
"I never expected that..." Kawajiro let out a long sigh, "Tonight's events would end in such a way that I never dared to imagine before..."
As soon as Kawajiro finished speaking, some people around him nodded in agreement.
Many people present had personally experienced the incident of "the thief who set fire to the police and then stole the credit".
When encountering this situation, many people were completely at a loss and had no idea what to do.
They never expected that this incident, which would have been difficult to handle, would end up with such a near-perfect outcome with the help of this young warrior who had just worked in their club for two days.
Hasegawa Heizo, the chief of the fire thieves, came to apologize in person. When he left, he personally promised everyone in the club that Natori, the main culprit of tonight's incident, would be severely punished.
He also stated that Kiku-komon would belong to Shirobei Clan, which had captured Kiku-komon personally, and that the Fire Thief Kai would no longer interfere in anything related to Kiku-komon.
In other words, Kiku-chan is completely owned by their Shirobei Association.
It seems no exaggeration to say that this is the perfect ending that no one had ever dared to imagine before.
"Mashima-kun, you've really worked hard tonight."
The person who spoke was Shirobei.
This was the first sentence Shirobei said after seeing Ogata who had returned.
Although it is just a simple sentence, the emotion contained in it is very sincere.
"Fortunately, I have fulfilled my mission." Ogata smiled, "I just did what I could do."
"Here is your wages for today." Shirobei took out a small cloth bag from his arms and handed it to Ogata.
It was specially packed in a small cloth bag - you can tell at a glance that it was prepared in advance.
Just from the size of this small cloth bag and the weight you feel after taking it in your hand, you can clearly tell that there is a lot of money in this bag.
"Um..." Ogata asked doubtfully, "Is this too much money?"
"40 rou in total," Shirobei said, "the extra part is your bonus."
"I have distributed bonuses to all the servants who participated in the capture of Kiku-chan tonight. I have also helped pay for the medical expenses of those servants who were injured in the capture of Kiku-chan."
"It's all thanks to you that tonight's incident ended in such a peaceful way, so I gave you a little more bonus."
"After I hand Kiku-chan over to the shogunate in the future, and the shogunate gives out the bonus, I plan to distribute it to everyone who participated in capturing Kiku-chan."
"That means I can get a second bonus in the future." Ogata smiled and stuffed the purse he had just received from Shirobei into his arms. "Thank you, I will definitely accept today's wages."
…
…
Originally, when the gates of Yoshiwara were closed, it was time for "temporary workers" like Ogata to go home and rest after get off work.
In other words, Ogata could have left work long ago.
The reason why Ogata made a special trip back to Yoshiwara was just to say hello and say goodbye to everyone in the club, and to collect today's wages.
Now that the greeting had been made and the money had been received, Ogata, who had no reason to stay here any longer, said goodbye to everyone in the club and strode out of Yoshiwara.
Shirobei originally wanted to keep Ogata and let him stay.
He planned to hold a small party in the club to thank Ogata for everything he had done for the Shirobei Club tonight.
But Ogata declined.
Seeing that Ogata declined, Shirobei and the others felt embarrassed to try to persuade him to stay.
He politely declined Shirobei's attempt to keep him, strode away from Yoshiwara's Ogata, and after turning onto a road with few pedestrians, he took out from his arms the small cloth bag that Shirobei had just given him, which contained his wages for the day.
Ogata opened the small cloth bag, and with the faint light from the lantern hanging outside the door of a nearby teahouse, he could barely see what was inside the bag - a large pile of silver coins lying quietly inside.
Ogata counted it and found that it was exactly 40 pieces of silver in total.
Tonight is Ogata's second day of work in Yoshiwara.
Excluding the special situation tonight, Ogata's daily salary is 6 taels of silver.
In other words - including the standard salary received last night, Ogata has earned 46 taels of silver in the past two days.
After tying the small bag tightly again and stuffing it back into his arms, Obi smiled wryly and sighed softly in a voice that only he could hear:
"Now that I think about it... this seems to be the first time I've earned money through labor in more than a year..."
In Ogata's memory, the last time he earned money through his own labor seemed to be before he participated in the "Shinto Worship Competition" in Hirose Domain last year.
Before participating in the "God Worship Contest", Ogata would work as a security guard at the izakaya opened by Asaki and Afuku every night to earn extra money.
After the "God Worship Contest" ended, I didn't go to work at Asaki and Afu's izakaya because I had to recuperate from my injuries.
After finally healing from his injuries, the "master's sect was massacred" incident that changed Ogata's life happened.
So the last time Ogata earned money through labor was in June last year.
For more than a year, Ogata has been living on the large sum of money that Kuranaga family elder gave him when he escaped from the domain.
When he thought about the fact that it had been more than a year since he last worked properly and earned money, he felt a little weird.
Ogata walked very quickly, and even though he was walking at a leisurely pace, he still quickly returned to the hotel where he was staying.
After returning to the hotel, Ogata first greeted Atachi who was staying in her room.
Then he opened the door of the large room where he, Mamiya and others lived.
Mamiya, Shimada, Asai, and Genichir were gathered in the room.
Yuan Yi was sitting in the corner as usual, drinking his wine very comfortably.
Asai has changed back into men's clothes.
Judging from his appearance, he seemed to have just taken a shower.
After not seeing Makimura, Ogata frowned slightly:
"Where's Makimura? Didn't he come back?"
"We should be the ones asking you this question, right?" Asai asked, "Where's Makimura? Why didn't he come back with you?"
"He was kept by Hasegawa Heizo." Ogata said, "Hasegawa Heizo said he had something important to say to Makimura, so after helping me negotiate with Hasegawa, Makimura stayed at the Fire Thieves Headquarters. It seems that he hasn't come back yet..."
"Important things..." Shimada asked in confusion, "What important things could Lord Hasegawa tell Senior Makimura?"
"I don't know about that." Ogata shrugged. "When Makimura comes back, we can slowly ask him what Hasegawa said to him."
After saying that, Ogata sat cross-legged on the tatami and looked around.
"Where's Ms. Kinoshita?"
"My lord, she is reading in her room now." Mamiya replied.
After answering Ogata's question, Mamiya paused.
Then he said to Ogata in a helpless tone:
"Ogata-kun, we just heard from Asai about what happened to you in Yoshiwara tonight."
"How should I put it... you and the Fire Thief Kai really have a great affinity."
"Ah, I feel the same way." Ogata smiled helplessly, "Maybe there really is some kind of wonderful fate between Mr. Hasegawa and I... "
"This is the third time I've run into Mr. Hasegawa this year."
"The first time was at the beginning of this year, when I met Mr. Hasegawa at Tatsuno Domain."
"The second time was this summer, when I met Mr. Hasegawa in Kyoto."
"The third time is now. I met Mr. Hasegawa for the third time in Edo..."
"How is the negotiation with Hasegawa Heizo going?" asked Asai on the side.
"The negotiations were successful," Ogata replied. "Hasegawa went to Yoshiwara in person to apologize. This unexpected incident tonight ended perfectly."
"That's good." Mamiya nodded gently, "Then... now all we have to do is wait slowly for Makimura to come back."
"By the way." Ogata turned his head to look at Asai, "I haven't had time to ask you yet. You and Makimura sneaked into the Four Seasons House tonight. Did you hear any interesting information from Gokutaro?"
"There is still some," Asai said softly, "Gokutaro is going to participate in the 'Gozen Trial'."
"'Gozen Test'?" Ogata raised an eyebrow. "That's really surprising... What motive does he have for participating in the 'Gozen Test'? Since he can come to Yoshiwara every night, he shouldn't be short of money, right?"
"Maybe it's to be able to compete with other masters." Shimada on the side suggested a possibility, "Although many people participate in the 'Gozen Kiyoshi' for the money."
"But among those who participate in the 'Imperial Trial', there should still be many who simply want to compete with different masters and improve their own skills."
"Haha." Genichi, who had been drinking silently from the beginning, suddenly chuckled a few times, "I actually want to participate in the 'Gozen Test'. It's a pity that I have never studied seriously before."
"So I definitely won't be able to pass this 'Imperial Examination'."
Even if they gathered here to discuss, it would be impossible for them to figure out what motivated Gokutaro to participate in the "Imperial Trial".
So after a few brief chats, everyone stopped talking about this topic and didn't discuss it in depth.
All that was left to do tonight was to wait slowly for Mucun to come back.
In order to kill the time, Ogata picked up the Daishakuten placed on the tatami beside him, left the large room where he and Mamiya and others lived, and walked towards Atachi's room next door.
During this period, due to various reasons, I have less time to spend alone with Ating.
Although Atachi never said anything, Ogata still felt a little guilty.
With the mentality of "seizing the opportunity and time to make up for myself and A-Ming", Ogata opened A-Ming's door.
When Ogata came back just now, he greeted Atachi first, so Atachi was not surprised by Ogata's sudden visit. He just said "You're here" and continued with the work at hand.
"A-Ming, you are folding clothes."
As soon as he entered Atachi's room, Obe discovered that Atachi, who was wearing a loose white yukata, was folding clothes.
"Yeah. Since I didn't know what to do, I just sorted out my clothes."
Ogata sat cross-legged next to Atachi.
In front of Ating, there were pieces of clothes that had been neatly folded by her.
Ogata took a look at the neatly folded pile of clothes, and then found a very familiar set of clothes in the pile.
“I really miss this dress…”
As Ogata spoke, he picked up the black suit.
This set of black clothes is the exclusive uniform for the female ninjas in Shiranui.
That was the same piece of clothing that Atachi was wearing when Ogata and Atachi first met on Choujima Island. The top was a ring-neck, backless piece that revealed a large area of ​​snow-white skin on her back and shoulders.
Not only the skin on the back and shoulders is exposed, but also a lot of skin on the front collar is exposed.
The lower body clothing is a bit like leggings, but much looser than leggings.
Compared to the upper body clothes that reveal a large area of ​​skin, the lower body clothes are not as revealing, with almost no area exposed.
This female ninja uniform is also one of Ogata's precious memories.
Because this kunoichi uniform was the one she was wearing when A-machi and Ogata first met on Choujima Island.
After betraying Shiranui, A-Machi has been wearing ordinary clothes to hide her identity.
But A-Machi never threw away this set of ninja uniform.
The reason is that this set of female ninja uniform is Atachi's "combat uniform".
Because the lower part of this female ninja suit is designed like tights, and the upper part does not even have sleeves, it is very convenient to move.
In addition, he was very used to this set of clothes, so when wearing this set of clothes, A-Cheng's combat effectiveness would be more or less increased. Therefore, A-Cheng did not throw away this set of clothes, but kept it for emergency use.
"Please don't mess it up." Ating said unhappily, "I folded it with great difficulty."
"It won't make a mess."
After carefully examining the kunoichi uniform in his hand for a while, Ogata put it back where it belonged.
Ating didn't have too many clothes, and in a short while, she folded all of them.
A-Ming doesn't have many clothes. One reason is that the types of clothes she has are less than those of ordinary girls.
Because, in the words of modern Earth, Ating is a "vacuum party" who neither wears underwear nor bras.
Although there were no underwear or panties in the modern sense in the Edo period, there were similar clothing.
In the Edo period, there was a kind of women's clothing called "waist roll", which was similar to the women's underwear in the Edo period.
There is a close-fitting undergarment that is similar to women's underwear from the Edo period.
But Ating doesn't like wearing a waist roll or this kind of tight-fitting undergarment.
According to A-Machi, this was a habit she developed from wearing that kunoichi uniform for so many years.
Because the clothes I wore most in the past were the ninja uniform, I didn't have the habit of wearing a waist roll or this tight-fitting undergarment.
In this era, people who have the same dressing habits as Ating are actually not uncommon.
In this era, many women actually neither wear "underwear" nor "underwear".
And the proportion of such people is not small.
Therefore, Ating, who has this dressing habit, is not only not considered an outlier, but is also one of the mainstream people.