My Gang of Swordsmen

Chapter 11: Chapter 7: Kiryu Kazuma

”Learn swordsmanship?”

Kyūbē blinked in confusion.

”Young Master, why do you suddenly want to learn swordsmanship? Haven’t you always been uninterested in it?”

”The ’Anti-foreigner Faction’ is just too unreasonable and terrible, so I’ve decided to seriously practice sword from today onwards. Next time they try to ambush me, I’ll give them a good beating,” Aoto said half-jokingly.

Listening to Aoto’s words, Kyūbē was stunned for a moment, then looked excited.

”Young Master, well said! That’s the spirit! That’s what a samurai should be like! Yes, that’s right! Please wait a moment, I’ll go get the accounting book and the money.”

Kyūbē turned and quickly walked towards the back room.

It didn’t take long before he returned to Aoto’s side.

Upon his return to Aoto, he carried an accounting book, an abacus, and a bag of money in his arms.

Aoto looked at the bag of money in Kyūbē’s hand with a bit of a bitter expression—this bag of money, which wasn’t very full, was all the savings the Tachibana family currently had...

The Original Tachibana Aoto didn’t understand accounting, so the family’s money and accounting book were usually managed by Kyūbē.

Kyūbē moved a low table from the corner of the hall, spread the accounting book on it, placed the abacus beside it, and swiftly started calculating the accounts.

In no time, Kyūbē stopped working the abacus, then opened the bag containing all the Tachibana family’s savings, taking out some silver coins and a large string of copper coins.

”Young Master...” Kyūbē said with an awkward smile, ”After deducting the necessary expenses for food, clothing, and shelter... we now have only 11 monme of silver and 6,000 wen copper coins available.”

In Edo Era Japan, gold, silver, and copper were the three types of currency in circulation.

ryo of gold ≈ 64 monme of silver ≈ 6,400 wen copper coins.

Upon learning that the family only had such a small amount of money available, Aoto’s jaw nearly dropped to the ground.

”Is that all the money we have?”

”Young Master...” Kyūbē let out a long sigh, ”The leftover assets... have mostly gone to repaying debts...”

Hearing Kyūbē’s words, Aoto couldn’t help but twitch the corners of his mouth.

—Truly, a hero can be overwhelmed by a penny...

After silently reflecting on this, Aoto let out a long sigh.

”Well... never mind, a little less money is still fine. Kyūbē, with what we have, which is the best Sword Dojo I can attend?”

The original owner of this body was not interested in swordsmanship, so there wasn’t much information about Edo’s Sword Dojos in his memory, hence Aoto could only turn to Kyūbē for help.

”Ah...” Kyūbē looked troubled, ”Young Master, you’ve stumped me with that question... How would I know about Sword Dojos? The number of Sword Dojos I can name can be counted on one hand...”

”I figured as much...” Aoto sighed lightly, ”There’s no choice... I’ll have to ask some of my friends later...”

”Ah!” Kyūbē suddenly slapped his forehead, ”Young Master, I just remembered, how about checking with the Thousand Affairs House?”

”Thousand Affairs House?” Aoto raised an eyebrow, ”What’s that?”

”It’s a vocational agency,” Kyūbē explained. ”Young Master, our family has been short on money recently, so I thought of finding a job that I could do to help supplement our household expenses. It was through someone’s introduction that I learned about this vocational agency.”

Aoto: ”A vocational agency?”

Edo, as the administrative, political, and economic center of the Edo Shogunate, was the largest city of the Edo Era.

As the largest city of this era, Edo naturally attracted young people from all over the country who dreamed of getting rich quickly.

A large number of young people came to Edo to find work, and since this era lacked newspapers and the internet, which facilitate convenient information exchange, it was challenging to find a job in this city of millions by oneself.

Thus——vocational agencies specializing in helping people find jobs emerged to meet the demand.

The vast majority of vocational agencies during the Edo Era were privately run. In Edo, there were over twenty such agencies, big and small.

”Kyūbē, I’m looking for a Sword Dojo, not a job.”

”Young Master, listen to me,” Kyūbē shook his head. ”That Thousand Affairs House doesn’t just introduce jobs, they also introduce Sword Dojos. It’s one of their major features.”

”Oh?” Aoto’s eyes immediately sparkled with interest, his body subconsciously leaning toward Kyūbē.

”I’m not entirely sure about the specifics. I only know that besides helping those looking for jobs, the Thousand Affairs House can also introduce suitable Sword Dojos to those wanting to learn swordsmanship in Edo.”

”Hey... a Thousand Affairs House, huh...” Aoto rubbed his chin, ”Can introduce Sword Dojos, you say... that sounds pretty good.”

”Alright, it’s decided!”

Aoto clenched his right hand into a fist and gently knocked it against his left palm.

”There’s a day off tomorrow! Tomorrow morning, I’ll go check out that Thousand Affairs House.”

Act quickly and decisively—this is one of Aoto’s most beloved qualities.

As a reward for successfully defeating the ’Righteous Group,’ the magistrate granted all participants a day off tomorrow, allowing Aoto to make the most of this holiday.

”Kyūbē, do you know where this Thousand Affairs House is?”

Kyūbē nodded: ”It’s quite near us.”

...

...

The next day (January 13), early morning——

After hastily eating the breakfast cooked by Kyūbē, Aoto put on his clothes and wore the tachi and wakizashi symbolizing his samurai status on his left waist, and hurriedly rushed out of the house.

The entrance of Aoto’s house faced a medium-width dirt road.

It was now slightly past 7 a.m., and after turning onto the dirt road opposite the house entrance, Aoto saw a few, either lounging idly or looking anxious, likely rushing to ’work’ samurai.

In Edo Era Japan, to signify different social statuses and to avoid disputes, samurai and civilians generally did not live together.

The samurai concentrated in the ’Samurai Residence Area,’ while civilians lived in the ’Civilian Residence Area.’

The Hachidori-bori, where Aoto lived, was one such Samurai Residence Area. Thus, it was common to see sword-wearing samurai in Hachidori-bori.

In terms of quantity, samurai in Edo were far fewer than civilians, yet samurai housing occupied most of Edo. Moreover, the lands they occupied were among the best in Edo, forcing the majority of civilians to crowd into the least favorable geographical areas.

This kind of unfair resource distribution makes one want to lament the ’despicable ruling class’ with a heavy heart.

Without time to admire the street scenes of Ancient Japan, after leaving the house, Aoto headed directly for the Thousand Affairs House at the address Kyūbē mentioned last night.

Kyūbē spoke the truth—the Thousand Affairs House was, indeed, quite close to the Tachibana family home.

Aoto jogged the entire way, taking just over 10 minutes to see a relatively plain-looking wooden house at the end of his field of vision.

This wooden house had a sign with the words ”Thousand Affairs House” prominently displayed above the door.

Like Ancient China, buildings in Ancient Japan were mostly made of wood.

After the Great Transformation in 645 AD, when Japan thoroughly learned from the advanced culture and systems of the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Japan adopted Chinese characters directly since it had no writing system before this.

After the Great Transformation, the use of Chinese characters in Ancient Japan remained high. A formal document from the government may be entirely written in Chinese characters.

”So this is the Thousand Affairs House...” Aoto stood in front of this shop’s door, observing the plain-looking employment agency.

”I wonder if they’re open...”

Aoto muttered as he quickly walked towards the door.

As he reached out to grab the door handle and prepared to open the door——

”Wow~ Kiryu Kazuma, you can even repair Gofuku?”

”Yes, I once studied the making and repairing of Gofuku in the Muromachi Region.”

”Kiryu Kazuma, you truly can do anything! That’s amazing!”

”You flatter me; these are just minor skills.”

Two simple lines of dialogue reached Aoto’s ears from behind the door.

Swoosh——

Aoto pushed open the wooden shop door.

What first caught Aoto’s eye was an elderly woman with somewhat thick lips.

This elderly woman was kneeling in front of a low counter.

Behind the counter sat an elderly person who seemed to be 80 or 90 years old, wearing glasses on his nose, with a gentle smile, looking quite poised and elegant.

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