The 5th Selected Works
TITLE
Punk Samurai and the Cult
(Panku Samurai Kiraretesoro)
(Panku Samurai Kiraretesoro)
AUTHOR
Translator
ENGLISH / Wayne P. Lammers
Originally Published by:
Magazine House (2004)
Kadokawa Shoten (2006)(pb)
KEY POINTS
- A fast-paced masterpiece novel, which is totally unexpected and redefines the historical novel.
- Fabulously preposterous historical novel, in which vulgar but lovable characters create a big fuss and tangled relationships.
SYNOPSIS
One fine day in the Edo period, a ronin (masterless freelance samurai) was sitting on a bench outside a small tea house, on one of the Edo-period highways. There came an old man on a pilgrimage, guiding his blind daughter with her hand in his own. Alas, all of a sudden, the ronin slashed down the old man with his samurai sword, in a flash of lightning: too fast to see him neither draw nor sheathe the sword. Asked by another samurai named Shume Nagaoka, who worked for the Kuroae Clan, why on earth he killed the innocent old man, the ronin who identified himself as Junoshin Kakari, answered that the old man and his daughter were members of a religious cult called "Harahuri Tou" (Belly Shaking Party), and as it would cause a disastrous situation if this bad religion were to spread, he had cut him down to prevent such a thing from happening. Being anxious about the expansion of the religious cult, Shume went to talk to his boss, Tatewaki Naito, and asked to hire Junoshin to take care of the Harahuri-tou problem. The Kuroae Clan was actually divided into two groups : One group was led by Tatewaki Naito who was excellent at studying but completely useless at martial arts; the other by Shuzen Oura who was a natural at martial arts but utterly hopeless academically. The antagonism between the two leaders caused political polarization of the clan. Capable of spotting the fact that all Junoshin wanted was to be hired for reward money, and having no idea how to deal with Harahuri tou, Naito decided to use Junoshin against Oura to topple him from power.