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Volume 1 Chapter 5 Part 1

Chapter 5: The Oda clan’s internal rebellion

In order to prevent further intensification of the stand-off between Nobuna and her younger brother, Nobukatsu, Inuchiyo absconded from Kiyosu castle.

However, even then, they weren’t able to stop the internal rebellion within the Oda clan.

Just three days after Inuchiyo absconded, Nobukatsu’s chief retainer, Shibata Katsuie visited Nobuna at Kiyosu castle and gave a melancholic sigh.

Shibata Katsuie, nickname 「Riku」.

From a young age she was known as the strongest and fiercest general of the Owari province, a girl commander who if given a spear would show such prowess with it that it would earn her the reputation of being invincible with it across the whole of Japan.

However, because she has a straight forward personality, she wasn’t good at handling difficult and sensible topics like politics, or anything that was even remotely related to it.

There is a saying that says that God doesn’t bestow two gifts upon a single individual, and he was a prime example of how that saying worked in practice.

Also, while her position is that of Nobukatsu’s chief retainer, Katsuie was Nobuna’s fan from way back in the past. Although her blunt, foul mouth and her quirky and eccentric actions definitely stood out as odd among the entire Oda clan, there had been rare occasions before her father, Nobuhide, died when Nobuna would let out a sigh while showing a lovely smile like that of a genuine girl.

In fact, Nobuna doesn’t just have pretty looks, she also has cute expressions which would make you want to adore her while playing with her cheeks.

However, after losing the one who understood her the most: her father Nobuhide, she obstinately closed off her heart to others, made her tongue sharper than ever before and started getting irritated and displeased with her retainers for even the most trivial of reasons.

That’s why, the people around her became arrogant and thought to themselves: wouldn’t it be better if instead of her we had a lord who would not only be sociably acceptable, but also had much more reasonable opinions about matters?

And with that, some of Nobuna’s retainers started planning an internal rebellion.

Katsuie always wanted to completely remove the friction between Nobuna and Nobukatsu…… but although she sincerely thought like that, she didn’t know what she should do to accomplish that.

This time, once again Nobukatsu and the young samurai around him, having not learnt from their past mistakes, planned a rebellion saying :This time we will chase the Foolof Owari from Kiyosu castle for sure!. Their pretext for the rebellion was the incident where Inuchiyo had no choice but to cut down one of Nobukatsu’s retainers.

Katsuie shouted at Nobukatsu and the people surrounding him countless times to make them reconsider their actions, it was all to no avail.

Conversely, the people surrounding Nobukatsu replied to her:

「Katsuie-dono, didn’t you more or less run back here without fighting in the battle with Nobuna-dono before? 」

「I guess that means that your reputation as the best spear-wielder of Owari was nothing more but a lie, huh? 」

「Could it be you had an understanding with Nobuna, and that’s why you ran away? 」

They were clearly trying to put all of the blame onto her.

(I can’t draw my sword against Nobuna-sama. This is troubling, why are there so many idiots around me…although I am an idiot as well for not being able to think of a plan on how to solve this mess!)

Although Katsuie is the chief retainer assigned to Nobukatsu, at the end of the day, the ruling daimyo of Owari is still none other than Nobuna, and there’s no way that she could bring herself to fight against the daimyo of the entire province.

But even though she was thinking like that, there’s no way she could give Nobukatsu a death penalty as well, because hat too will become an act of rebellion towards the Oda clan. And for Katsuie, who was as straightforward of a person as could be, 「Rebellion」was not a word that she possessed in her personal dictionary.

For her, it was either to be loyal, or not to be loyal.

She’s from the warrior class where her ancestors had been fighting generation after generation for the Oda clan, and because of that connection, the mere thought of her having to confront the Oda clan in battle was a bitter one.

(If I cut down all of these stupid people surrounding him, will Nobukatsu-sama’s eyes will finally open? After all, since Nobukatsu-sama is always quick to act on his emotions, maybe he’s just being used by his retainers who use flattery to wrap wool around his eyes?)

She thought of doing that, but if she were to start a purge because of something like that, there was a possibility that Nobukatsu, who was easily afraid and would start panicking, and that panic could very well push him to do something that wouldn’t be able to be undone. Also, the people surrounding him may be idiots with a narrow outlook, but they aren’t that bad of a bunch that they need to be killed.

While she was still on the fence about what she should do, Nobukatsu gave the order that made her head erupt into a migraine.

「Oi, Katsuie. Could you try having a negotiation with sister by suggesting her to hand over Inuchiyo to me? If sister doesn’t agree to my demands, then this time I’m going to have a battle with her for sure! 」

「Haa~ Why did things had to end up the way they did? 」

That Katsuie was right now in the main citadel of the Kiyosu castle. There are only 3 people in the room, including her: Nobuna, and Sagara Yoshiharu serving in replacement of Inuchiyo. The exact location is Nobuna’s private tea room.

Tea ceremony was very popular in the cultural center of Japan, Kyo or Sakai right now, and Nobuna, who was sensitive to fashion had ordered for a tea ceremony room for her personal use to be prepared in Kiyosu castle and had started gathering various tea utensils in there, but, but now that she was alone in the room with just her followers around her, she didn’t have any intention of following proper etiquettes or anything close to them. Today too, she was sitting in a cross legged position on the cushion, because if she were to sit in the proper seiza position all them time, her legs would go numb sooner rather than later.

Today, Nobuna’s way of preparing tea also couldn’t be called appropriate, but with the self-taught way she had put a large amount of matcha in the bowl and had poured the seething water into it and stirred it vigorously, and while it was still hot, she drank it in one gulp.

Finally, while muttering that her stomach was empty, she started chewing on the specialty from Nagoya, Tebasaki.

Since there are bones in Tebasaki, there’s a method to eat it too but Nobuna was eating it her own way, as expected. She stuffed the Tebasaki with the bone into her mouth and crunched it between her teeth with a low noise, and then she spat out the cleaned bones without any flesh remaining on them while letting out a satisfied sigh.

「Fuu~, no matter when I eat it, the Tebasaki from Nagoya is as delicious as always! 」

She really doesn’t look like an important daimyo now.

The person in question herself spouted that rather than eating it bit by bit, it was faster to swallow it whole. It’s the same reason as a watermelon, it’s a waste of time removing the seeds of it before eating it, she claimed.

Another one not knowing any etiquette, Yoshiharu, who was called Monkey by everyone was
working hard to do a sham of a tea ceremony, but no matter how hard he tried, Nobuna was still better at doing that than him.

(Although during the time when she was having tea with Saito Dosan she had done it properly, it was more of a ‘putting one’s best clothes on’, after all.)

Yoshiharu sighed
.
「You really are haphazard. If you’re going to ignore the etiquette of preparing hot water for the tea, then don’t build a tea ceremony room in the first place. 」

「Shut up. Tea is a drink. Isn’t it fine drinking drinks while just savoring it? Rotating your tea cup and saying things like “It’s well made” is what withered old men do, not my hobby. While drinking it so slowly, won’t the essential tea cool down? 」

「Also…if you sit cross legged with that short kimono, I-I’ll be able to see them… 」

「No problem. In this tea room, there’s no one else except me, Riku and my pet Monkey. There’s no man here. 」

「If you’re going to say that, I’ll look as much as I can….Gya?!! 」