Chapter 185: The Monkey is Dead
A few days later, Yuan Ye routinely went to Oda Nobunaga’s residence to be a guest. However, as soon as he dismounted, he felt that the atmosphere was wrong. Several grooms were unfamiliar faces, and their expressions were very grim. The people around were also coming and going in a hurry, and the tension was palpable.
Yuan Ye glanced back at A Man before turning his head forward again, his expression calm. Just like before, he went to report to Oda Nobunaga. As he approached Oda Nobunaga’s living quarters, the security here was tighter than usual. The pre-arranged activities were also temporarily suspended, as Oda Nobunaga had other important matters.
Yuan Ye was not surprised, of course, but he still found an opportunity to grab Maeda Toshiie to verify the situation and asked softly, “What’s going on?”
Maeda Toshiie saw that it was him asking and did not hide anything. He said softly, “Something happened at the stables. Several people were poisoned to death.”
“The stables? Several people were poisoned to death?” Yuan Ye stroked his chin and pondered slightly. He had only ordered the assassination of Monkey, so why did several more people die?
Maeda Toshiie’s expression was very serious, and he said softly, “It’s very strange, but it should have been aimed at Hiyoshi Maru.”
Yuan Ye’s eyelids twitched. He tried to maintain his facial expression and asked calmly, “Hiyoshi Maru is dead? Who is targeting him? Why are they targeting him?”
At this time, Maeda Toshiie was just an ordinary friend of Monkey, and their relationship was not yet that deep. He felt some regret for Monkey’s death but not sorrow. He just shook his head and said, “It’s unclear at the moment, but…”
He paused here, thinking that if Yuan Ye was interested, he would find out sooner or later, and Yuan Ye could never be the murderer. Only then did he continue, “Lord Oda greatly admired Hiyoshi Maru. He met him alone yesterday and seemed to have assigned him a task, promising to promote him to Samurai if he completed it well. As a result, Hiyoshi Maru was poisoned to death that night, along with several friends he had a celebratory meal with.”
“Lord Oda now suspects someone around him of leaking information and is having Lord Takigawa and Lord Ikeda investigate the traitors together. He also… lost his temper greatly, believing that someone deliberately used Hiyoshi Maru’s death to show him defiance.”
Yuan Ye was silent for a moment. This was different from what he had expected. He pondered and asked, “Does Lord Kazusa-no-suke have any suspects?”
Maeda Toshiie opened his mouth but quickly closed it and gently shook his head, saying nothing.
Yuan Ye understood. Oda Nobunaga indeed intended to promote commoners and outsiders to counter and balance the Owari Local Lords, thereby realizing his dream of “unitary rule” in Owari. The first person to be promoted was Monkey. As a result, Monkey was coincidentally killed by people arranged by A Man. Oda Nobunaga began to suspect that the Owari Local Lords had acted, seeing it as a provocation and counterattack against him. Maeda Toshiie was also from the Owari Local Lords. Now that the Lord and the Local Lords were in secret opposition, and the situation had suddenly become tense, he must have been in a difficult position.
For things to turn out this way, it could only be described as a stroke of luck, incredibly coincidental.
Of course, this was not a bad thing.
Yuan Ye also shook his head gently and did not ask further questions. Instead, he said to Maeda Toshiie, “Since something has happened, please convey my apologies to Lord Oda. I won’t be coming for the next two days. Please send someone to call me if there’s anything.”
Maeda Toshiie held his sword and bowed, apologizing on behalf of his Lord for not being able to keep his promise.
Yuan Ye bowed slightly in return and then, with A Man and A Qing, returned the way they came. Only after mounting their horses and leaving the castle did he finally relax, feeling a sense of unreality.
Monkey died, easily and without value, inexplicably. In a sense, he had truly changed history. At least, the future Toyotomi Hideyoshi would never appear.
However, this degree of historical change was probably not enough. Perhaps the general trend of history was unstoppable, and someone would automatically fill Monkey’s void, emerging as another “Monkey” or “Pig,” and so on. To truly achieve his goal, he still needed to continue working hard, find a way to eliminate the root cause of the ideology, and divide Japan into several pieces.
Yuan Ye pondered for a while, then reined in his thoughts. He waved his hand and found that the air was still there, and time was still flowing. Such a major event that changed history… Monkey’s death should be considered a major event, right? With such a major event, the world seemed unchanged, and gradually even the faint sense of unreality in his heart disappeared.
He returned to the separate residence lost in thought, feeling quite good, as if a burden had suddenly been lifted. He even had the leisure to ponder that if he could return to the modern era, he would have to adapt this part, at least to have a battle of wits with Monkey before killing him. Otherwise, making it so simple and crude now would easily make him a disgrace to transmigrators—it was a bit shameful to secretly poison someone to death, completely unfair and very despicable.
A Man, however, was not in as good a mood as he was. Upon entering, she kicked off her shoes and rushed into the inner room to find A Qian and A Yu. She grabbed their ears and scolded them angrily, “You two idiots! You’ve learned from the old man for so many years, how can you be so sloppy at work? Tell me, how exactly did you do it? How can you not even do such a simple task well?”
A Qian and A Yu had been in Wanjin for over a year. They ate well and slept soundly, and had grown significantly taller, now being a bit taller than A Man. However, facing the head of their clan and their direct superior, they dared not resist. A Man lifted them by their ears, their faces contorted in pain. “What’s wrong? You old beast… What are you going crazy about again? We just followed your plan, didn’t we? Didn’t the person die?”
“He died, but there were several more! Is this how you do things? No discipline at all. Believe it or not, I’ll send you back to the old man!” A Man had originally intended to lure Hiyoshi Maru out of Oda Nobunaga’s residence and kill him. However, considering that this would be too risky and too easy to trace, she thought it would be better to act directly within Oda Nobunaga’s residence. Her plan was meticulous, but these two, A Qian and A Yu, were careless and couldn’t even poison properly.
It was fortunate that nothing went wrong. If one of the people eating had eaten first and been poisoned, not only would the target not have been killed, but it would have alerted them!
Just thinking about the possibility made her furious!
A Qian was very unconvinced. Although she didn’t dare to fight back, her mouth was very stubborn. “You say it’s simple, but the time was so tight. It’s good enough that we found a place to poison, how could we worry about so much else! Who knows where the other dead people came from!”
“Where did you put the poison?” A Man was not afraid to mention this here. This inner room was specially made, so sounds would not be transmitted. It was a dedicated place for discussing confidential matters, and the outer guards were the most reliable internal security forces in Wanjin. It didn’t matter if they argued loudly.
A Qian was still unconvinced and didn’t think she was wrong. She said angrily, “We found some wine and put it in the wine. Where else could we put it? We searched that room, and that was the only place we could poison.”
“Why didn’t you report back?”
“You didn’t ask!”
“Does such a small matter as poisoning require me to ask? You were supposed to do it yourselves and ensure it was foolproof. Otherwise, what’s the point of keeping you?!”
Yuan Ye came in at this moment and quickly mediated, “It’s fine, it’s a small matter. They are new to the job and lack experience. You can teach them more in the future.”
Actually, it didn’t matter if the first operation had an accident, as long as it couldn’t be traced back to him. He had plenty of time to organize a second or third assassination. As long as the person was killed, the process was not important.
A Man glanced at Yuan Ye. It was because of him that she let go, but she was still somewhat dissatisfied. “We definitely need to teach them properly. These two idiots have been with the old man for over a year, and I think they’re almost spoiled.”
Although she didn’t understand why Yuan Ye wanted to assassinate a mere stable head, since Yuan Ye had attached extreme importance to this matter and given a very serious order, she had executed it with all her might. To prevent leaks that could worsen relations between Wanjin and Oda, she even used the excuse of sending urgent intelligence to bring in the most reliable personnel—A Qian and A Yu, who had completed their training in the “Life Preservation Style Yin Technique.” They were to carry out the assassination personally to ensure that only five people knew about this matter from beginning to end.
As a result, these two little rascals had the skills. They disguised themselves as attendants and entered Oda Nobunaga’s residence with Yuan Ye. They then slipped into Hiyoshi Maru’s room while resting in the stable hall and administered the poison, before slipping back. The entire process was undetected by anyone, but the place of poisoning was wrong, almost causing a major blunder.
Fortunately, nothing went wrong. Otherwise, A Man estimated she would not have been able to face Yuan Ye for several months. At that time, it wouldn’t just be a matter of pulling A Qian and A Yu’s ears; she would have hung these two idiots up and beaten them.
Yuan Ye did not object to A Man properly cultivating A Qian and A Yu’s discipline. He routinely browsed various historical books, notes, and travelogues. His “assassination list” was already two and a half feet long. Such operations would be carried out many more times in the future, and it was very suitable to cultivate an assassination unit now.
Therefore, he only comforted A Qian and A Yu, saying that they had worked hard this time and would receive a bonus later. He encouraged them to continue improving their skills and strive for a more perfect action next time, preferably by devising a method that made the death look like an accident.
A Man became impatient after listening for a few sentences. She felt that such brain-intensive matters still required her to handle them. She directly instructed A Qian and A Yu, “Alright, the mission is complete. Prepare yourselves and leave on the next ship!”
A Qian was unhappy, and even A Yu was unhappy. They both said in unison, “We’re just arriving and we have to leave? Why?”
A Man’s Dou Dou eyebrows twitched, about to retort and let them know who was boss, but Yuan Ye didn’t want to listen to them argue anymore. He said directly, “Alright, alright, everyone is going back. We have nothing else to do in Kiyosu Castle, and it’s time to go home.”
The eight counties of Owari had been unified, and the spoils of war had been divided. Monkey had also been killed. He felt that staying in Kiyosu Castle held little significance. After Oda Nobunaga held the tea party in the next couple of days, he planned to take his leave and return.
If nothing unexpected happened, the next event would be Okehazama. He needed to go back and prepare so that he could seize more territory when the Imagawa Family was eliminated.
The assassination of Monkey was just a small node in changing history. There were still many things he needed to do. Without strength, it would be impossible. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be him dividing Japan, but others chewing him up and swallowing him whole.
In short, keep up the good work!
