I assembled the strongest swordsman group.

That means a total of 7 people did not have time to escape to the roof.

Now was not the time for sentimentality. Quickly composing himself, Katsura Rintaro asked urgently, "How are the fortifications being built? Take me to see them!"

"Yes!"

Umegoro led Katsu Rintaro to the west corridor on the rooftop.

Western military science—this is a subject that Katsura Rintaro has studied for more than ten years, and it is Katsura Rintaro's specialty.

Upon hearing the strange noises coming from the first floor, Katsura Rintarō knew that someone was attacking the police station. He immediately gave orders to Umegoro: remove the doors, tatami mats, and furniture from all the rooms on the roof and build defensive fortifications on the west side of the roof corridor.

Having served Katsura Rintaro for many years, Umegoro also gained some understanding of military science under Katsura Rintaro's influence.

Without much instruction from Katsura Rintaro, just a simple command was enough for Umegoro to understand what kind of defensive fortification Katsura Rintaro wanted to build.

In short, Katsura Rintaro asked him to build several high walls to block the enemy, the more walls and the higher they were, the better.

As they followed Umegoro to the west side of the rooftop corridor, seeing the defensive fortifications now laid out across it, Katsura Rintaro nodded in satisfaction: "Very good... Umegoro, you did a good job."

Umegoro did a much better job than he had imagined.

In such a short time, Mei Goro organized everyone to build three walls, each about 2 meters high. Although none of them were particularly sturdy, they wouldn't collapse with a push.

The three walls gave them a great defensive depth; if one wall fell, they could retreat to the second wall and continue to hold out.

In addition to having Umegoro build defensive fortifications, Katsu Rintaro also had Umegoro make simple spears.

Umegoro disassembled the wooden doors and bookshelves and other wooden furniture, and made four wooden guns with sharpened spearheads.

These four wooden guns are now being carried by the four strongest apprentices, who are all nervously guarding behind the first high wall, with the gun barrels sticking out from above the wall and aiming at the outside.

"Mr. Katsu," Umegoro swallowed hard, then stammered to Katsu Rintaro, "What should we do now?"

"Hold this place to the death! Await reinforcements from the Magistrate's Office!" Katsura Rintarō said, enunciating each word clearly.

"Wait... wait for the Magistrate's Office to come to our rescue?" Mei Goro was dumbfounded. "What if... what if the Magistrate's Office doesn't come to our rescue?"

"...We have no other choice but to hold out for reinforcements now." Katsura Rintarō's expression was gloomy. "We can only hope that the magistrate's office will discover the changes here as soon as possible and send reinforcements to our rescue."

From the very beginning, Katsura Rintaro sent Umegoro to build fortifications and make wooden guns in order to hold out for reinforcements.

The longer the weapon, the more likely it is to allow someone to "defeat a superior opponent".

Even if someone who knows nothing about gunplay were to use a gun, they would still have a chance to kill a swordsman who has studied swordsmanship for years.

With a long gun, one could easily hold off these thugs for a while in this narrow corridor, using these makeshift fortifications as cover.

The outskirts of the Tibetan scribes' office were completely surrounded by these thugs, making escape impossible.

Of the people remaining in the investigation center tonight, apart from Katsura Rintaro who possesses some strength, the rest are purely scholars with no martial arts skills. If they were to confront the thugs head-on, it would be tantamount to suicide.

Unable to fight or escape, all they could do was hold their ground and hope that the magistrate's office would come to their rescue soon...

Katsurin Taro climbed to the back of the first high wall, then took out all the bullets he had in his arms and counted the remaining ammunition.

Including the bullets still in the pistol's chamber... there are only 11 bullets left...

Katsurin Taro's already grave expression turned even more grim.

……

……

Edo, Kagicho —

"Mr. Tachibana, this won't do!" Nagakura shouted to Aoto, who was not far away. "There's nothing left here except fire and charred wood!"

Tōdō, who was standing next to Aōdō, then called out to Aōdō as well:

"Mr. Tachibana, please step back a little! The fire is coming over!"

Bear!

As soon as Toudou finished speaking, a few sparks drifted toward Qingdeng and exploded at the tip of his nose, causing a faint burning sensation.

"Tsk..." Looking at the fire that was getting bigger and bigger in front of him, Qingdeng couldn't help but click his tongue.

Suspecting that the sudden fire was arson, he rushed Nagakura and the others to the fire scene in Kencho in order to see if they could catch one or two suspicious people around the fire.

However, perhaps because they arrived too late, when they reached the vicinity of the fire, they could find nothing but raging flames and charred houses.

The fire occurred on a small shopping street in Kagami-cho.

Tonight was a windless night, and without the help of wind, the fire did not spread very quickly. When Qingdeng and his team arrived at the vicinity of the fire, only four shops had been engulfed by flames.

"Mr. Tachibana! Mr. Tachibana! I've brought the people from the town's fire suppression area!"

Suddenly, Harada's voice, which had been sent by Aoto to notify the town's fire department to come and put out the fire, rang out from behind Aoto.

Qingdeng quickly looked up at the sound, then frowned.

There were only about thirty firefighters following closely behind Harada.

"Why are there only so few people here?" Qingdeng asked loudly.

Before Harada could answer, an older man, who looked to be a captain, running behind him, answered first with a bitter expression:

"We are severely understaffed! It's not just Kencho that's on fire, but also Tencho, Tsukimachi, Nishiyama-cho... in short, many towns and cities are on fire! We simply can't spare any more manpower to fight the fires!"

—Was it not just Kagamachi that caught fire?

Qing Deng paused for a moment, then his face darkened.

—This fire is definitely strange!

If only one place caught fire, it could be explained as "it's currently the season when fires are more likely to occur" or as a coincidence.

But so many places catching fire at the same time... this can't be explained away by just the word "coincidence"!

It has been confirmed that these fires were all man-made, but many mysteries still linger in Qing Deng's mind.

The intelligence is still far too scarce.

Were these fires caused by members of the Exile Group?

Why set fires everywhere? Is it to distract us and prevent us from paying attention to other things?

If arson was just a cover for them... then what was their real purpose?

Should we ask our superiors for instructions on what to do now?

……

Qing Deng frowned, deep in thought about what to do next.

Suddenly, Qingdeng heard a series of "slap slap slap slap" sounds coming from behind him...

The sound... sounded a bit like someone running on the wooden walkway.

However, the problem is that Qingdeng is currently outdoors, not indoors... Where is this strange running sound coming from on the wooden corridor...?

Before Qingdeng could turn around to see what was going on with these strange sounds, the peculiar "running sound in the wooden corridor" came to an abrupt end.

Immediately afterwards, a deep, neutral voice, indistinguishable by gender, rang out from the direction where the running sound had stopped—

"Ju Qingdeng! Catch!"

……

……

Edo, the Office of the Bureau of Foreign Documents —

As Kanno slowly ascended the stairs to the top floor of the investigation center, he expressionlessly turned to the one-armed samurai beside him and asked:

"So...the surviving people are all hiding on the top floor now?"

The one-armed warrior, whose face was grim, nodded: "The first and second floors have been cleared."

"The survivors are now gathered in a corridor on the west side of the top floor."

"They built three walls using doors, tatami mats, and furniture, and even made a few wooden guns. It seems they intend to hold that corridor to the death."

“There is only one entrance and exit in that corridor. I have already sent people to block that only entrance and exit. If they want to escape, they can only jump out of the corridor window.”

“But if they try to escape by jumping out of the window, there will be an ‘encirclement team’ waiting for them to surround the detention center.”

“That Katsura Rintaro has a barbarian short gun. In order to minimize the losses, I have sent people to find a large enough iron object that can be used as a shield.”

Kanno nodded: "Yes, you did a good job."

After giving the one-armed samurai a brief compliment, Kamino sneered.

"Katsu Rintarou is actually here... What a pleasant surprise!"

Tonight, Jinno and his men have a very simple goal: to destroy this brothel that they find disgusting and that houses a large number of "traitors."

Jinno never expected that Katsura Rintaro would happen to be inside the Banshu Institute tonight.

We can't let such an unexpected surprise slip by.

Anyway, since Katsura Rintaro is a "traitor" with such a despicable character, he is one of the targets of their Extermination Group. Since they have run into him tonight, they might as well kill him as well!

Led by the one-armed samurai, Kanno arrived at the top floor of the investigation center and at the entrance of the corridor where Katsura Rintaro and the others were guarding.

The members of the Extermination Group responsible for blocking this corridor are now hiding behind the walls on the east and west sides outside the corridor entrance, in places where Katsura Rintaro's bullets cannot hit them.

Kanno stood sideways behind the west wall outside the corridor entrance, peeking half of his head out of the wall and looking into the corridor.

Inside the corridor, Katsura Rintaro, holding a revolver, along with his apprentices and staff wielding various weapons, hid behind the first wall.

Upon spotting Kanna craning her neck to look in their direction, Katsura Rintaro immediately raised her revolver and aimed it at Kanna.

Jinno quickly pulled his head back behind the wall.

"It seems that only Katsura Rintaro has a short gun," Jinno said calmly. "As long as we can take care of Katsura Rintaro, the others will be no threat."

“Mr. Jinno, why don’t we just set it on fire and burn Katsura Rintaro and the rest of the investigation station to the ground? We should have used up most of our kerosene.”

Under Kamino's command, the troops attacking the settlement were divided into two groups. One group was responsible for killing all living creatures inside the settlement, while the other group was responsible for spreading oil everywhere, preparing to burn the settlement to the ground afterward.

Thanks to the tireless efforts of the "kerosene team," the air on the first and second floors of the investigation office was successfully filled with the unpleasant smell of kerosene.

“No way,” Kamino retorted without hesitation. “If we set them on fire, the flames would slowly rise, which would be too slow.”

"Although the magistrate's office is currently focused on the fires we've set off indiscriminately throughout the various castles and towns of Edo, to be on the safe side, we should still kill these traitors as quickly as possible."

"So we still have to launch a strong attack."