Chapter 339 - New Weapon
The waters of the palace baths were so warm that they almost put a man to sleep. Through the fog of steam, it was hard to see and soon their eyes stopped trying at all and they began to close, attempting to sleep.
They did not know quite how tired they were until they'd entered into its waters. With towels around their waists, the men leaned against the tiled sides, bearing their scarred muscular bodies for everyone to see.
The vigour that they had fought with and the vigour that they had arrived with had completely vanished. None of them said a word. They were far too tired for that now. They craved the soft support of a warm bed, but at the same time, none of them wished to part with the soothing heat of the bathwater for anything at all in the world.
Morojo had done well in predicting that. Maids arrived with trays full of food. They put them atop wooden floats and sent them sailing out on top of the bath. They didn't near to worry about the little food sh.i.p.s capsizing, for none of the tired warriors even moved, and so no waves were caused.
"Your food, Lord Miura," a pretty young maid said, waking Gengyo from his trance. She blushed as he met her gaze, averting her eyes from his body.
"Thanks…" He said drowsily, taking the tray from her hand.
Holding it in front of him, he didn't know quite what to do with it. All the fatigue had caught up with him all at once. Not just from their night of sleeplessness or their day of battle, but from their entire campaign into the Takeda lands, from their battles with the Uesugi and from their frantic march back. It had taken a harder toll on him than he had expected and it was only in the warm waters of that bath did he finally loosen himself up enough to face it.
"Still… no hand?" Sasaki asked, now that Gengyo's stumped arm was out in the open for all to see.
"Hm?" It took a few moments for Gengyo to even notice. He had grown rather used to the loss of it. "Ah… No hand indeed… I might think about it… about getting a new one… I think Akiko would be happy if I did."
"I would," Akiko said, hearing him through the paper wall that separated the women's and the men's bath areas.
"Oh, hello," Gengyo said, tapping the wall where he thought her to be.
"Hello," Akiko said back. "I think Rin might be drowning…" she didn't say that with any particular worry.
"Oh," Gengyo said mildly, oblivious.
"At least show some concern, Nii-san!" Rin complained in a huff when her ploy for attention completely backfired.
"Sorry… I'm…" He did not even have the energy to finish his sentence, distracted by the pipes that ran alongside the bath. The water must be getting pumped up from below. He thought he might have suggested such a thing at one point. A fresh stream of boiling liquid left the pipes, keeping the temperature of the baths nice and high.
All his wounds ached with a numbness as the water cleansed them. All the little cuts and scratches that he didn't know he had. Especially those from the battle with the Uesugi. The difficulty of that fight had left a sour taste in his mouth – he knew it shouldn't have, for rightly, the battle should certainly have been a struggle… but he still did not like how close to the edge his came, even now that he had power.
He clenched his fist in the bathwater, vowing not to let anything like that happen again, no matter how large an army he faced, or how skilled the general. It was the missile units that he struggled most to deal with. If there was a way to remove them from battle before they could be used to their full effectiveness, then he was confident enough to believe they could face any foe, but, for that kind of superiority, they needed cavalry.
That one action of clenching his fist was enough to tire him. He fell deeper into the water, dreaming of where he might go next. They could walk straight into Owari and take it now, with Nobunaga gone, and that would give them a clear marching line towards Kyoto, where the Emperor and Shogun dwelled. It was tempting merely to attempt to take Kyoto immediately, before the name Miura Tadakata could truly begin to make the rounds.
"What are you doing… with that frown on your face, Miura-dono?" Matsudaira asked with a smile, already guessing what he was thinking. "Still with war on your mind."
"It won't ever leave…" Gengyo admitted. It filled every moment of his thoughts. It was what gave him his fire. It was the most exciting and rewarding game he had ever played. "The way I see it, we have four fronts we need to fight on now. We need four separate armies, headed by men of your capabilities and only then could we pretend some kind of stability."
"One to be posted in Owari, another in the Uesugi lands, another in the Takeda and a final one with the Hojo?" Matsudaira asked. "It is the only way to ensure against surprise attacks… but we would need a good amount of time to build armies large enough to be useful at those points."
"Or maybe effective enough…" Gengyo mused, "argh, I do hope they hurry up with our Takeda cavalry. That will be a game changer for us. With the right training, facing five times our number should not be a problem."
"Perhaps it's time to consult Takeshi for a new weapon?" Matsudaira asked.
"It might well be," Gengyo nodded, wondering what else he could bring to the table that would give them more of an advantage than they already had. Something to deal with troublesome bowmen while they waited upon cavalry. Various ideas popped into his head and he fell to quietly thinking them over.