While Makimura shouted, he threw the resealed bag filled with Wakasa incense toward Shimada.
His body was stabbed with seven thorns, and there were dozens of people pressing on him at the same time. Although he couldn't stand up from the ground, he could barely throw something to Shimada.
At this time, Shimada had just half pulled out the knife from his waist.
After seeing the officers who suddenly arrived suddenly using all kinds of fishing gear without any explanation and taking advantage of their numerical advantage to pin Makimura to the ground, Shimada was first stunned by this rapid and sudden change and froze in place.
After a brief daze, Shimada came back to his senses and immediately pulled out the knife from his waist with a stern face.
However, before the knife at his waist could be completely pulled out, Makimura's "Shimada! Go on!" came to his ears.
Although he didn't know what Makimura meant by suddenly calling him, Shimada obediently put the knife back, then raised his hands to steadily catch the bag thrown by Makimura.
"Don't worry about me! Go after the bald head!" Makimura shouted at Shimada, "If you can't catch him, just sprinkle the contents of the bag on the bald head! Go!"
"Yes, yes!"
After hearing Makimura's order, a look of hesitation flashed across Shimada's face.
But this hint of hesitation only passed briefly.
The hesitation on his face disappeared, and after he solemnly shouted "Yes", Shimada tightened his grip on the cloth bag that Makimura had just thrown to him, and chased the bald head along the same route that the bald head had taken.
…
…
After Shimada chased the bald man, Makimura struggled hard.
But Makimura's struggle is destined to be in vain.
After all - no matter how strong Makimura is, it is impossible for him to lift the dozens of officials who are pressing on him to the ground when his neck, limbs, and torso are all stabbed and trapped. It is impossible for a human to do it.
at this point.
At this moment, Makimura suddenly heard a series of horse hoofbeats coming from far and near.
Following the sound, Makimura turned his head and looked towards the place where the sound originated - a very familiar middle-aged man was riding a horse slowly towards him.
Looking at the middle-aged man sitting on the horse and looking at him with a strange smile, Makimura's face instantly darkened and he said in a deep voice:
"Abe Leili...!"
"Hey, hey, hey." Abe, the middle-aged man on horseback, said in a sinister tone, "Although you are no longer from Kyoto Prefecture, you should still say it respectfully when you see me.
Say 'Master Dafantou', right?"
"Forget it, I won't talk nonsense to you anymore. Hey, take Makimura Mihachi away and put him in jail."
When turning the horse's head and preparing to leave from Makimura, Abe suddenly tightened the reins of the horse, driving the horse to stop, and then said to Makimura in a mocking tone:
"Makimura Yahachi, this is the first time I find your tall figure so pleasing to the eye."
"There are not many people in Kyoto who are as tall and stalwart as you."
"So it's not that difficult to find you. After a little inquiry, I immediately received a lot of clues about your location."
"Thanks to your conspicuous size, we were able to find you so quickly."
"It's not a good thing to be too tall and conspicuous."
After leaving this taunt, Abe, with a proud look on his face, rode away leisurely and leisurely...
A well-dressed official came over and asked Abe in a low voice:
"Lord Dabantou, Makimura seems to have a companion. His companion escaped just now. Do we need to chase him?"
"No need." Abe waved his hand, "My target is only Makimura, don't worry about Makimura's companions, and Makimura's companions must have fled far away now, and it is impossible to catch up now."
…
…
The flow of people in nearby neighborhoods is no longer as large as in Gion-ku, and Baldhead can no longer rely on the flow of people to slow down Makimura.
When running on flat ground without obstacles, the bald head is obviously not as fast as Shimada.
The distance between the two keeps getting closer - judging from the current situation, it will only be a matter of time before Bald is caught up by Shimada.
At this time, Shimada was already extremely anxious.
He only had one thought now: to catch the bald man quickly and rush back to support Makimura, who was attacked by police officers for no apparent reason.
While chasing the bald head, Shimada pulled open the small cloth bag that Makimura had just thrown to him, and then took a look inside the bag.
The bag was filled with purple powder, and a strong fragrance wafted out of the bag.
——This is... fragrance powder...?
Shimada didn't know why Makimura gave him the fragrant powder, and told him to sprinkle the fragrant powder on the bald head if he couldn't catch it.
After thinking for a while and unable to figure out the reason, Shimada simply stopped thinking about it, withdrew his attention and focused all his attention on chasing the bald head.
The distance between Shimada and Bald Head is getting closer and closer.
Just when there was only about 4 steps left between Shimada and the bald head - the bald head suddenly turned around.
While turning around, Baldhead threw the object he had been holding in his right hand towards Shimada's face.
The object held in the bald right hand is a handful of dust.
This is when the bald head got out from under Makimura, he grabbed another handful of dust on the ground.
Baldhead has been waiting for this moment - waiting for Shimada to enter the range where the dust can hit him.
Shimada obviously lacked the experience to deal with this kind of underhanded move, and the distance between the two was extremely close, leaving Shimada with too little time to react until the dust thrown by the bald head hit him in the face. , he belatedly raised his hands to defend himself.
A bit of dust got into his eyes, causing Shimada to moan in pain.
Seeing that he had successfully blocked Shimada's sight with dust, a proud smile appeared on his bald face.
But the proud smile of the bald man did not hang on his face for too long.
Because he saw Shimada throwing a small gadget at him.
And this gadget is exactly the cloth bag that has been torn open and filled with Wakasa incense.
The small cloth bag that had been torn open hit the bald head accurately on his shining head, and all the powder in the bag was poured onto the bald head.
The bald head that originally only smelled like sweat suddenly became full of fragrance, and the fragrance was strong enough to make people feel choked.
The body was covered with the smelly powder, and the bald head couldn't help but let out a scream.
Listening to the bald man's scream, Shimada secretly said happily:
——Did you hit him?
While thinking this secretly in his mind, Shimada tried his best to open his eyes a little and check the current condition of the bald head.
After seeing his bald head covered with Wakasa incense from head to toe, the big stone hanging in Shimada's heart finally fell to the ground.
There was dust in his eyes, and now even if he opened his eyes even a little bit, Shimada would feel a sharp pain.
Therefore, after checking the current condition of the bald head, Shimada had to close his eyes again immediately.
When Shimada threw out Wakasaka just now, he was actually trying his luck.
Because there was dust in his eyes, his eyes were temporarily blind, so Shimada could only rely on his feeling to throw out the cloth bag filled with Wakasa incense.
Fortunately, Shimada had good luck. The cloth bag filled with Wakasa incense successfully hit the bald head, and the Wakasa incense contained in the bag successfully spread all over the bald head.
After successfully throwing the bag filled with Wakasa incense onto the bald man, Shimada still rushed forward persistently, intending to catch the bald man.
However - because his eyesight had not fully recovered, Shimada couldn't even see the way forward clearly.
After rushing forward a few steps, Shimada felt that he bumped into someone.
Shimada and the passerby who was hit hard by him fell heavily to the ground.
"hateful……!"
After cursing under his breath, Shimada ignored the curse from the passerby who was knocked down and quickly took off the bamboo tube hanging from his waist.
This bamboo tube is the kettle that Shimada carries with him.
Shimada, who was kneeling on the ground, poured the water in the bamboo tube over his eyes. After briefly washing his eyes, his eyes were finally able to open and he could see.
After the vision in both eyes recovered, Shimada quickly moved forward and looked in the direction where the bald head had just escaped.
In the direction where the bald head just ran away, there was no sign of the bald head.
He might have fled far away, or he might have turned into a nearby alley while Shimada was out of sight.
"Bastard!" Shimada gritted his teeth in annoyance and punched the ground beneath his feet.
The person who was knocked down by Shimada just now was a young man who, like Shimada, was in his prime.
After being knocked to the ground hard by Shimada, the young man wanted to say something more to Shimada, but after seeing Shimada's facial expression that became quite scary due to anger, he couldn't help but spit out what he wanted to say.
He swallowed the words of rebuke back into his stomach, and then silently left Shimada's side.
After losing his bald head, Shimada could only go back to the place where he had just said goodbye to Makimura, and where Makimura had been attacked by the officers.
After returning home, as expected - the officials were nowhere to be seen.
At the same time, Makimura is nowhere to be seen.
Looking at the ground that still had traces of the struggle but was now deserted, Shimada's hands that were naturally hanging down tightened and released, and released and tightened again.
Finally, he gritted his teeth, turned his head resolutely, and ran toward the end of the street...
…
…
"Lord, we are here." Asai said to Lin beside him, "This should be the place where Makimura asked us to come."
Lin and Asai are now in a sparsely populated area of Kyoto.
Looking around, I couldn't see many passers-by.
Among the not too many houses around, there were very few with candlelight coming out.
When parting with Makimura and the others, Makimura told Lin a request of his: he hoped that Lin and Asai could go somewhere in Kyoto and bring a message to his only acquaintance in Kyoto.
This was not a very troublesome task, so Lin readily agreed.
Because Lin and Asai were not familiar with Kyoto, they finally arrived at the place Makimura mentioned after asking for directions several times.
Lin looked at the private house in front of her.
It's just an extremely ordinary private house that can be seen everywhere in Kyoto. From the outside, there is nothing special about it.
After looking at the private house in front of her several times, Lin said softly:
"How dare you live in such a sparsely populated place... It seems that this acquaintance of Mihachi is definitely not an ordinary person..."
There were almost no passers-by around. Since no one lived or passed around here, there were not many lanterns hung around for lighting, making the surrounding area pitch black.
In a word - this is the perfect place to commit crime.
No one can see murders and robberies in a place like this.
Ordinary people would definitely not dare to live in such a place.
Lin walked forward and said loudly towards the paper sliding door in front of her:
"Good evening! Is anyone here?"
As soon as Lin finished speaking, a middle-aged male voice with a hint of vicissitudes of life sounded outside the sliding door:
"Open the door yourself and come in."
After the male voice finished, Lin and Asai beside her both raised their eyebrows.
"...Lord." Asai lowered his voice and whispered to Lin beside him, "It seems that this acquaintance of Makimura is really a weirdo..."
When a stranger comes to visit, he would just let the door open without stepping out to see who the visitor is - this kind of behavior is not even qualified to describe this behavior with the word "weird".
Lin slowly opened the sliding paper door, led Asai slowly through the sliding paper door, stepped onto the dirt floor of the house, and entered the house.
Behind the paper sliding door - no one came to greet them.
"Lord, do we need to take off our shoes?"
"Of course." Lin said without hesitation, "We are not here to fight, of course we have to compromise."
When they were outside the house just now, Lin and Asai heard the middle-aged male voice with a hint of vicissitudes of life coming from the second floor of the house.
So after taking off their shoes in Doma, the two of them took out the swords and scabbards from their waists, held them with their right hands, and walked straight towards the stairs not far away.
After walking up the stairs to the second floor of the house, Lin and Asai both noticed a special sweet fragrance permeating the air on the second floor of the house.
Asai frowned slightly:
"What does this smell like...?"
"...It's aromatherapy." Lin responded, "The smell is really strong... How much aromatherapy do you need to light up to have such a strong fragrance..."
At this moment, the middle-aged male voice sounded again:
"I'm here, come here."
The voice originated from the deepest room in the corridor in front of Lin and Asai.
The two walked slowly along the corridor towards this room.
The closer you get to this room, the stronger the aroma becomes.
When they stood in front of the door of this room, the smell of the incense was so strong that Lin and Asai couldn't help but hold their breath.
Blah blah blah...
Lin slowly opened the paper sliding door of the room.
After pulling the door to the end, the first thing that caught Lin and Asai's eyes was a piece of ukiyoe.
This rather spacious room is covered with various ukiyo-e paintings.
There are Ukiyo-e paintings everywhere on the floor and on the walls.
The tatami in the room was splattered with various paints, making it impossible to see clearly what the original color of the tatami was.
The sharp-eyed Lin first noticed that the ukiyo-e paintings in the room basically all had the same theme: women.