Time goes back to not long ago——
Gourd Ball, on the open deck——
Ogata, Mamiya, and Makimura were all stunned as they watched the mainmast break into two pieces and slide into the sea after being hit by a naval gun.
"Is this lucky or unlucky..." Makura twitched his lips.
Ogata and Mamiya both knew what Makimura meant by this sigh.
If we talk about lucky...they are indeed lucky.
If they had stepped onto the "bridge" a few steps earlier, even if they had not been blown up into the sky by the ship's guns, they would have fallen into the sea along with the broken mainmast.
If we talk about unlucky...they are indeed very unlucky.
The broken mainmast directly cut off their way to Hikari Maru, separating the three of them from Genichi and Hatsumitsu who had gone to Hikari Maru before them on different ships.
Although they were extremely shocked by the sudden accident, the three of them were not mediocre people who would panic because of such a thing.
“Tsk… We have to hurry over and reunite with Master Genichi and the others…!” Mamiya, who was still covering his right arm, frowned.
Toyotomi Nobuhide is now on the Hikari Maru - although none of Ogata and his companions have ever seen Toyotomi Nobuhide in person, based on the various intelligence currently known, it can be concluded that this crazy person is not an ordinary person.
Leaving Genichi and Hatsumitsu alone on a battleship with that demon on board - God knows what kind of accidents will happen.
Mucun crouched on the railing of the boat, looking down with a sullen face at the sea as black as ink under the reflection of the dark clouds: "In the end, I still have to swim across... Damn it..."
Ogata, who was lying on the railing of the ship at the same time as Makimura, looked at the sea below with Makimura for a few seconds, then asked Mamiya and Makimura beside him in a deep voice:
"Mamiya, Makimura, can you still survive such a raging sea?"
Mucun was silent for a moment. "Although I don't want to admit it... I'm not a very good swimmer. Even if I hold a piece of wood, I probably can't cross such a sea."
The wind and rain have become stronger .
Ogata and the others now... felt like they were standing under a waterfall, being splashed with thick drops of water.
Under the influence of stronger winds, the waves became far more violent than when Genichi, Makimura and the others swam over together holding the wooden board.
Some of the waves can even hit the open deck of the warship directly.
Makimura was born in Kyoto, far away from the sea. He was not the kind of person who had contact with the sea since childhood. Although he could swim, he was not very proficient.
He is a down-to-earth person, and he honestly revealed that he found it difficult to cope with such a vast situation.
"Even if I tell you that I can swim with you to the Hikari Maru, you won't believe it." Mamiya smiled helplessly and shook his right arm, which had been strained from cutting the mainmast and had not yet recovered.
"So - I'm the only one who can swim across now..."
Ogata pursed his lips and looked at the dark sea outside the railing again.
"Then... leave the rest to me. I'll go after Genichi and the others. Mamiya, when your arm gets better, work with Makimura to get back to shore. I'll come back with Genichi and the others to reunite with you later."
"You want to go to Hikari Maru alone to support Genichi and Miss Hatsumitsu?" Mamiya asked, "Although you and Genichi can both defeat a thousand men, it is an unchanging truth that two fists cannot defeat four hands."
"There might be unknown enemy forces on Hikari Maru."
"It's too risky to let you go alone to provide support."
"Don't tell me that you are going to ignore your physical condition and insist on swimming with me to the Hikari Maru." Ogata curled his lips.
"...Ogata-kun, you should go ahead and support Master Genichi and the others. Makimura and I will come over later and meet you on the Hikari Maru."
"Meet up?" Ogata was stunned and cast a suspicious look at Mamiya, "How are you and Makimura going to get here and meet up with us?"
Not only Ogata was stunned, but Makimura was also stunned. He didn't know what Mamiya was up to.
"It would take too much time to explain. Anyway - we will come and meet up with you later." Mamiya looked at Ogata with a firm, unflinching gaze.
Seeing Mamiya's gaze, the doubt on Ogata's face slowly dissipated: "...I understand."
Ogata and Mamiya...are old friends.
Although he didn't know how Mamiya was going to catch up with them and meet up with them on the Hikari Maru when he couldn't swim, Ogata, who had never seen Mamiya fail at a critical moment, slowly put away his doubts about Mamiya.
Believe in Mamiya——that’s what Ogata thought in his heart.
Time was running out, and the longer it dragged on, the higher the possibility of something unexpected happening to Hikari Maru, so Ogata said nothing more.
He simply nodded vigorously, said "I understand", and then jumped into the dark ocean below.
After Ogata jumped into the sea, Mamiya and Makimura quickly leaned over the railing.
As soon as they stuck their heads out from the railing, they saw Ogata's head popping out from the sea. After forcefully spitting out the seawater that he had accidentally drunk just now, he broke through the waves and swam towards the Hikimaru on the opposite side in a freestyle posture.
No matter how the rough waves beat against him, he remained motionless.
"Under such waves, she can swim like she is on a calm lake... Is this the 'power of immortality'..." Makimura's mouth twitched again, "It seems... Miss Atachi will have a hard time in the future... I wonder if Mr. Ogata's fertility will be enhanced by the 'power of immortality'."
After whispering a joke that he would never dare to say in front of Ogata and Atachi, Makimura looked at Mamiya.
"So - how are you going to get to Hikarimaru when you can't swim?"
Mamiya did not immediately respond to Makimura's question.
Instead, he turned his head and looked at the lonely foremast and mizzenmast on the Huluwan after he cut off the mainmast.
"…Makimura, I once learned Dutch from Master Genichi."
"Huh?" Mucun tilted his head, looking puzzled.
"Thanks to my Dutch experience, I once learned how to sail a Europa sailboat from some Dutch merchants in Nagasaki."
Mamiya slowly lowered the hand that had been covering his right arm.
"Although this battleship is much larger than those merchant ships in Nagasaki... they both use wind power as their power source, so the driving principles should be similar."
…
…
Time goes back to the present——
Nikki Maru, on the open deck——
After Ogata appeared and blocked his sword, Toyotomi Nobuhide's face immediately changed.
Without much hesitation, he took several steps back to increase the distance between himself and Ogata.
Ogata did not launch a pursuit. He just stood there, silently holding Daishiten and Daishizai in front of him, and quietly asked Genichi behind him:
"Master Genichi, where is Miss Hatsumitsu?"
"Chu Guang she..."
Genichirō gave Ogata a general idea of ​​Hatsumitsu's situation.
"Did he fall into the water with that Yoshihisa..." The expression on Ogata's face darkened uncontrollably.
Since falling into the sea, Hatsumitsu's whereabouts are still unknown, which naturally makes Ogata worried.
But the demon before him made him dare not move his eyes away from it at all.
"...Bellow-flower..." Toyotomi Nobuhide, who was holding Yoshimitsu's bone food in front of him in a middle-level stance, looked at the bell-flower family crest on the Ogata haori and raised his eyebrows, "...I guess you are Ogata Ittosai, right?"
Toyotomi Nobuhide's sentence is clearly in the form of a question, but the tone is that of an affirmative sentence.
"Oh, the portrait on your wanted poster is really amazing. It actually makes you look so like me that I, who have never seen you in person before, can recognize you at a glance."
When Ogata heard Toyotomi Nobuhide mention the wanted poster portrait that had always bothered him, the corner of his eye twitched slightly uncontrollably.
"…Are you the Toyotomi Nobuhide?"
"That's right." Toyotomi Nobuhide admitted with a fake smile, "Nice to meet you, Ogata Ittosai. I am the ninth head of the Toyotomi clan - Toyotomi Nobuhide."
"You kid are the Toyotomi Nobuhide..." Ogata narrowed his eyes slightly and slowly tightened his grip on the knife.
"Be careful... Ogata-kun..." At this time, Ogata heard Genichi, who was still kneeling on one knee behind him, whispering to him weakly, "Nobuhide... is not that easy to deal with..."
"Just now... I had hoped to kill him..."
"But when he was about to win... he ate something... which greatly increased his strength... and enabled him to turn defeat into victory..."
"Did you eat something..." After hearing this valuable information provided by Genichi, Ogata's expression became more serious, "...I know."
"And... he's even less human than I thought..."
Minamoto briefly explained the whole process of how Toyotomi used Korin to seriously injure him.
In addition, Genichi also told Ogata about Toyotomi's swordsmanship and fighting styles.
As Ogata was listening carefully to the information that Genichi had just obtained after a hard battle, he heard Toyotomi suddenly sneer and then said to him in a strange tone:
"Ogata Ittosai, I'm glad to finally see you... I've been wanting to meet you for a long time."
"You want to see me?" Ogata sneered, "You want to see my chopped-off head, right?"
"Last night in Osaka... No, I have been 'taken care' of by you all this time."
Ogata emphasized the words "all along".
"Thanks to the 'blessing' you gave Junroku Kunieda that allowed him to disguise himself as a human skin mask, that night in Kyoto last year was so long that I will never forget it."
"As for last night in Osaka, it was because of you that it was so long that I came to settle the score with you at all costs."
"It seems that you have a lot of misunderstandings about me." Toyotomi showed a strange smile and shrugged, "In the beginning, I really liked you. I liked you so much that I dreamed of recruiting you."
"When I learned that Hirose Domain had a man who could defeat a hundred enemies at once and kill his lord, I was very excited."
"I feel like this country has finally produced an interesting man."
"He is a man who is powerful and has a deep grudge against the shogunate. This is exactly my ideal subordinate."
"So when your name first spread throughout the country, I began to send people to look for you, try to recruit you, and bring you under my command."
"The reason why I gave the human skin mask made according to your portrait on the wanted poster to Junroku Kunieda, who was being supported and helped by me at the time and preparing to blow up Kyoto, was also so that I could better recruit you in the future."
The smile on Toyotomi's face became a little weirder.
"Let Junroku Kunieda kill people in Kyoto with your face, ruin your reputation, and make it difficult for you to find a place to stay in Japan under the rule of the Edo Shogunate. But it will be a great advantage for me to recruit you in the future."
Ogata's face darkened: "...I see...you are using the trick that Song Jiang in "Water Margin" often used to deal with me..."
To put it bluntly, Liangshan in the classic novel "Water Margin" is a den of bandits.
As the leader of this gang of bandits, Song Jiang often used tricks that broke the limits of human ethics to force people to go to Liangshan.
For example, one of Song Jiang's favorite tricks is to force someone into a desperate situation, making sure that if he doesn't go to Liangshan, he will have no place to stay in this world.
The most typical victim is "Thunderfire" Qin Ming.
In order to force Qin Ming to join the gang, Song Jiang sent people to pretend to be Qin Ming to burn, kill and loot. As a result, Qin Ming's family was executed by the government. He had no place to stay in the court, so he had to become a bandit and join Liangshan.
"Ah, that's right. It's the same move that Song Gongming often used in The Water Margin."
"It seems that you, Ogata Ittosai, are not only good at swordsmanship, but also have a good knowledge of literature."
"I also admit that this move is quite despicable, and it is far from Liu Xuande's level of 'conquering others with virtue'."
"But - no matter how despicable it is, this move is very useful. It is just right for dealing with people like you who are wanted by the shogunate and whom I only intend to recruit as useful thugs."
"What a pity - that idiot Junroku Kunieda not only failed to complete the mission of blowing up Kyoto, but also helped you complete the feat of 'taking down Nijo Castle' in disguise, further increasing your fame."
"Until then, I still want to take you under my wing."
"Until... Shiranui was suddenly destroyed."
Toyotomi Nobuhide, who had been showing a strange smile just now, slowly put away the smile on his face, and his expression gradually became terrifying and horrifying.
"After Shiranui was destroyed and I sent people to round up the remnants of Shiranui, I found out what had happened."
"Ogata Ittosai, do you know how long I have been planning in Shiranui?"
"I sent my trusted aides to infiltrate Shiranui, and it took several years before I finally achieved complete control of Shiranui."
"Because of you, all the hard work I put into Shiranui over the years has gone to waste."
"The plans to overthrow the Edo shogunate also had to be extensively revised."
"All of this is thanks to you... and Xiaolin who followed you to destroy the Shiranui...!"
Having said this, Toyotomi glared fiercely at Lin, who was still leaning on the mainmast not far away and was still unconscious.
"When I learned from Kikutaro and the others that among the people who attacked Shiranui, besides you, Ogata Ittosai, there was also a petite girl holding a black knife, a man with glasses, an old man, and a strong man holding a large sword, I knew who the people who attacked Shiranui with you were."
"…Is it because I participated in the attack on Shiranui that you decided to get rid of me as soon as possible?" Ogata asked.
Toyotomi shifted his gaze from Korin to Ogata.
"That's right." He shook his shoulders and sneered exaggeratedly, "What I hate most is someone ruining my plan and causing it to not be implemented as expected."
"Especially for a major project like this that I have spent a lot of effort, invested a lot of manpower and material resources, and have been planning for several years."
"You're not an indispensable talent anyway."
"If I don't kill you, I will never be able to get rid of the anger in my heart."
"I have sent a large number of Iga ninjas to search for you."
"Finally - I finally found you in Osaka recently."
"I thought that even Ogata Ittosai, who could defeat the 10,000-man army of the shogunate, would not be a match for the musket troops that I spent a lot of money to train."
"I never thought that you are my 'kind'."
When Toyotomi mentioned the word "same kind", he deliberately used a sarcastic tone.
Then——
Bang!
There was a sound of footsteps on the deck.
Toyotomi didn't take any running steps, but just leaped straight towards Ogata.
When he leaped to the highest point, he switched his knife-holding stance to an upper stance.
Facing the sudden attack from Toyotomi, Ogata's pupils shrank slightly.
Although the enemy's attack came suddenly, Ogata was ready to fight in a split second.
With his feet sliding, Ogata moved his body half a step to the side, leaving his original position, and turned the tip of Daishikatsu's sword, thrusting the sword at Toyotomi who was falling.
Toyotomi changed his knife-holding stance and blocked Ogata's sword in mid-air.
Snap—Toyotomi's feet fell back to the ground and landed in front of Ogata.
The sounds of swords being swung and blades cutting through the air surrounded the two of them.
Toyotomi waved Yoshimitsu Bones, creating a bright silver "silver net" that covered Ogata.
Facing the "silver net" covering him, Ogata countered Toyotomi's moves, broke through Toyotomi's offensive, and launched a counterattack that was no less intense than Toyotomi's attack.
After the two exchanged fierce attacks and defenses for a while——
clang!
Toyotomi swung his sword, blocking Ogata's attack and blocking his counterattack. He then turned the blade and slashed towards Ogata's chest.
Toyotomi's attack this time was not only extremely fast, but also had a very good timing.
Although Ogata tried his best to lean back quickly and dodge Toyotomi's move, the tip of Yoshimitsu Boneshoku's knife still scraped some of his flesh on his chest.
At almost the same time when a small cut was made on Ogata's chest——
laugh……
The low sound of flesh being cut rang out again.
However, this time the voice came from Toyotomi.
The moment after dodging Toyotomi's attack, Ogata wielded Dajizai and immediately launched a counterattack.
Facing the attacking Daijizai, Toyotomi did not dodge, allowing the tip of Daijizai's knife to leave a cut on his left wrist.
After cutting a small wound on Ogata's chest, Toyotomi did not launch a pursuit or stay where he was to continue fighting with Ogata, but instead quickly stepped back to distance himself from Ogata.
"...Heh. It's been a long time since I fought with 'the same kind'." Toyotomi stared at the wound on Ogata's chest and sneered.
All I saw was that the wounds on Ogata and Toyotomi grew red flesh threads at the same time, and then almost at the same time they recovered as before...