I formed the strongest swordsman group.

About 6 minutes later, Shimada Kui finished the race easily.

At the finish line, there were a lot of people standing, leaning, sitting, and staggering around.

The gasping sounds of "Huffing and puffing" were heard together, and the hot air puffed out rose up and turned into thick clouds.

"Hurry up! It's just you! Everyone is waiting for you!"

Under Qingden's encouragement... ah, correction, it should be said that it was under Qingden's stimulation that the person running at the back finally crossed the finish line after spending more than ten minutes, barely finishing. train.

"Haah...! Haah...! Haah...!"

"My flank... hurts so much!"

"Hiss...! My waist...can't straighten up..."

……

It was like following a medical clinic, with moans, wails, and shouts coming and going.

Qingden put his hands behind his back, glanced sideways, and glanced around the group of "patients" in front of him, frowning slightly.

"Your speed is too slow! Extremely slow!"

"However, since this is your first training, I will be merciful!"

"I'll give you half a month to adapt."

"In these half a month, no matter whether you run fast or slow, I will not punish you."

"However, after half a month, anyone whose speed is slower than 7 minutes will have to be punished!"

"For every half-minute overtime, run 2 extra laps! If the time is less than half a minute, it will be counted as half a minute!"

Considering that clocks have not yet become popular in Japan, most people do not understand the concepts of "clock" and "minute".

So Qingdeng took out his pocket watch, opened the cover, and showed everyone how long seven minutes was.

"So, cheer up, y'all!"

"If you are not confident in your physical ability, find more opportunities to practice in private!"

"From now on, I will continue to increase the difficulty of training!"

"Gradually increase from 5 laps to 7 laps and 10 laps."

“From ‘running with empty hands’ to ‘running with weapons’ and ‘running with weights’!”

"If someone cannot adapt to such intensity of training, I will kick him out of the Shinsengumi without hesitation!"

"Don't think that as long as you join the Shinsengumi, everything will be fine and you can eat hardcore crops!"

"The Shinsengumi is an army! Not a health center!"

"Guys who are not strong enough and not determined will die on the battlefield!"

"Weak people are not qualified to stay in the Shinsengumi!"

"You are doing it for yourself!"

As soon as these words came out, many people's faces suddenly turned pale.

Looking at the entire field, there are only a handful of people who have reached Qingdeng's "7-minute" target.

Moreover, after completing the training, most people's cheeks were so red that they seemed to be bleeding at any time, and their breath was so short that they almost vomited out the lungs in their chests.

There are only a very small number of "high-quality warriors" like Shimada Kui who not only successfully achieved the target, but also looked like nothing happened after finishing the race. They were just a little out of breath and sweating.

Shimada Kui's inner shirt was soaked with a waterfall of sweat. Sweating in such a cold weather made him feel comfortable and happy.

While wiping the sweat on his forehead with the lapel of his clothes, he turned his head to the side and observed Qingdeng and the officers not far away.

After a while, he thought to himself with admiration on his face:

——The reason why these people were promoted by Niou-sama is really not because of nepotism! They do have a second thought!
  In fact, when Seito announced the list of officers of the Shinsengumi, there were a lot of complaints within the Shinsengumi.

Among the 10 senior positions, except for the staff officer Hachiro Kiyokawa, the captain of the fourth division, Kamo Serizawa, Except for Nishiki Shinami, the captain of the fifth division, the others are all from the same school as Master Aoshito, the "Taiweikan Faction"!
  The Shoeikan faction - a collective name given to Souji and others who came from the Shoeikan by some busybodies within the Shinsengumi.

This practice of using a large number of one's own people will naturally arouse criticism from others - Shimada Kui is one of them.

Shimada Kui is determined to climb to the high position of the Shinsengumi and establish great achievements that will shock the past and the present. A lofty-minded and pretentious person like him is naturally very disgusted with this kind of "nepotism" behavior.

But now, after witnessing the superb skills of the "Testuekan School" again and again, Shimada Kui and others have experienced a psychological change from dissatisfaction to surprise to admiration.

In the "Kusugi-gumi annihilation operation" a few days ago, Souji's lead, Nagakura Shinpachi's Ikki Tosen, and Saito Kazu's charge... Their bravery was even more impressive than that of Kui Shimada, who considered himself highly skilled. , I can’t help but feel deep admiration.

Even Mai Kinoshita, who looks very weak and seems to make her cry for a long time if she is punched, can complete the arduous task of "infiltration investigation" on her own.

In the long-distance run just now, Qingdeng and the officers who accompanied him did not miss a single lap and completed the training together with the team members.

If you look carefully, you will be surprised to find that one of them - including the girls Sanako and Mai Kinoshita - after running the entire 2500 meters, they only feel a little short of breath and sweating. Not even a few drops were shed.

This is incredible!

The most exaggerated thing was Qingdeng - not only did he not sweat at all, but his breathing was still steady and not messy at all, as if he had just finished a walk!

A glimpse of the leopard... Just from this detail, you can see how big the strength gap is between the officers of the Shinsengumi and the ordinary soldiers.

——Is this the strength of Nioh...!
  Thinking of this, Shimada Kui lowered his head and glanced at his sweaty clothes.

After intuitively feeling the distance between himself and the top warriors, he was amazed and at the same time felt a sense of frustration in his heart.

At this time, Qingdeng's voice brought him back to reality:
  "That's all I have to say! Now, let's all go have breakfast!"

Breakfast - upon hearing this word, a pair of eyes lit up immediately.

……

……

Under Qingdeng's personal leadership, the officers and soldiers lined up in four columns and strode towards the canteen.

The canteen of the station was directly transformed from the old tea room of the residence.

The original owner of this mansion was also a cultural man. He not only built a courtyard covering an area of ​​more than [-] square meters, but also built a teahouse of more than [-] square meters inside the mansion.

A standard Japanese teahouse is a room surrounded by paper sliding doors, with no real walls.

The entire tea room adopts light green tones.

Tatami is the highest quality Hiroshima-produced "bingo watch".

Every paper sliding door surrounding the tea room is painted with exquisite pictures.

It has to be said that the original owner of this mansion was really generous. Not only did he abandon the huge and luxurious mansion, but also abandoned the quite high-end tatami mats and paper sliding doors in the tea room. Here, it was not taken away, just packaged and given to Qingdeng.

People have to sigh again: the level of luxury of the powerful class in feudal society can always make people jaw-dropping.

This kind of room, which is spacious and has no complicated layout, is perfect for transforming into a canteen!

There is no need for drastic changes, just remove these high-end tatami mats and paper sliding doors, and then replace them with ordinary style paper sliding doors.

Why does a mere canteen need such high-end decoration?
  You mean tatami? What kind of tatami is needed in the cafeteria? Too polite! If you sit on the tatami and eat, within a month, the tatami will be stained with oil!

Qingdeng did not waste these dismantled tatami mats and paper sliding doors. He dragged them all to sell them for a total of 35 taels of gold, which was more valuable than the broken trees in the courtyard.

The money earned from selling tatami mats and paper sliding doors was also used to subsidize military expenses.

When he was a "traitor" in Qingdeng, Qinghe Hachilang came to him and suggested that he keep the original appearance of the teahouse.

"Master Tachibana, this teahouse is quite beautiful, why not keep it and use it as a special venue for receiving distinguished guests in the future!" - These are the original words of Qinghe Hachiro.

Faced with Qinghe Hachilang's suggestion, Qingdeng rejected it without hesitation.

The army's combat effectiveness has not yet been formed, so they are first thinking about entertaining the guests... Qingdeng couldn't help laughing when he thought of this.

The Shinsengumi is now in a state of exhaustion, and there are too many places where money needs to be spent.

Instead of keeping this teahouse as a facade, it is better to demolish it and sell it, keep the ground as a canteen, and sell all the dismantled items - in Qingdeng's eyes, this is the best way to treat this teahouse. The most effective way to use it!
  Just when the group of people were getting closer and closer to the canteen... Suddenly, the sound of noses twitching suddenly sounded in the queue, becoming more and more numerous, denser, and louder.

"Sniff...sniff...it smells so good! It smells so good!"

"What does it taste like?"

"I smell it! It seems to be the smell of meat!"

"Meat? Is it chicken?"

"It doesn't seem like it! Chicken doesn't taste that good!"

The rich aroma blew towards everyone's face like wind, lingering in everyone's noses.

Shimada Kui sniffed wildly, greedily swallowing the aroma, and his mouth secreted a large amount of saliva uncontrollably, and he couldn't finish it no matter how hard he swallowed.

Smelling this aroma, a bold idea came to his mind:
  ——Such a nice aroma... Could it be that... today's breakfast will be rich?

Looking back at the meals we had during the past few days in Kyoto, they were all very simple.

They eat dry rice at noon and porridge in the morning and evening. The side dishes for all three meals are pickled radish, taro and other common and cheap dishes.

Therefore, it is no wonder that everyone had expressions of surprise and incomprehensible expressions after smelling this rare fragrance.

Just like that, Shimada Kui swallowed hard with strong expectations and couldn't wait to step into the spacious cafeteria.

At a glance, the dining table has been set up in the canteen, and the bowls and chopsticks on the table are neatly arranged.

Just after everyone sat down in their respective seats, a dozen aunts wrapped in cutting and cooking clothes—all of them were skilled cooks hired by Qingdeng for a large sum of money—carried a big pot and walked in. canteen. At the moment when the cooks... to be precise, at the moment when the cauldron appeared in everyone's sight, the whole place was silent, and you could hear a pin drop.

Shimada Kui opened his eyes wide and stared straight at the large iron pot that was spitting out steaming steam. His lips moved and he murmured to himself unconsciously:
  "what is this……?"

Plump pieces of meat, crystal grains of rice dyed dark red by the meat juice - this is what everyone sees at this time.

The generous portion of meat porridge almost overflowed from the pot!
  After a brief moment of dead silence, the whole place began to uproar in a low-key manner, and then turned into a violent commotion.

"I'm not dreaming, am I?"

"It's rice! Not millet and tares! It's rice!"

"There's a lot of meat in it!"

"Is this really our breakfast?"

"Isn't it possible? This should be specially for Niou-sama and his friends! How can we little pawns be qualified to eat such good food?"

"How many people are there, Niou-sama? How can they possibly eat so much porridge!"

Qingdeng smiled slightly, as if he expected such a reaction from the soldiers, and looked calmly at the faces full of shock and suspicion.

After a moment, he said quietly:
  "quiet."

The commotion slowly died down.

"There is no doubt that this is your breakfast today."

The cafeteria, which had been quiet for a short while, became noisy again - gurgling, gurgling, gurgling - the sound of swallowing saliva was everywhere.

"Everyone, sit down and sit down. The cooks will fill everyone's bowls. Don't be anxious. No fighting is allowed. No one is allowed to use their chopsticks before I say, 'It's time to start.' Anyone who violates the above requirements will be punished today." No food allowed all day long!”

Before Qingdeng finished speaking, the soldiers hurriedly put their legs together, put their hands on their legs, and sat calmly, like children who "sit in rows and eat fruits."

Under Qingdeng's instructions, the cooks walked slowly to everyone's table, picked up large spoons... and one empty bowl after another was filled with meat porridge.

The soldiers stretched their necks and looked at the cooks with eager eyes.

If Qingdeng hadn't issued a strict order of "no fighting, just wait in line", these greedy soldiers who were almost starving because they had just completed long-distance running training would definitely rush forward and grab them.

The cooks are absolutely deft when filling the porridge, and it only takes one second to fill a bowl.

However, under the influence of Einstein's theory of relativity, the soldiers only felt that the process of "waiting for the cook to come to them" was particularly long and extremely painful.

Finally...the meat porridge was distributed.

Looking at the delicacies so close in front of him, Shimada Kui's eyes widened again, as if the corners of his eyes were about to be torn apart, and his expression was full of intense disbelief.

The alluring aroma is like the catkins of a peerless beauty, frequently caressing her skin, teasing her senses and stimulating her nerves.

Suddenly, he felt a chill at the corner of his mouth - it turned out that his mouth was full of saliva, and he forgot to swallow because he was so shocked that the saliva dripped out from the corner of his mouth.

In fact, from the moment this big pot of meat porridge appeared, Shimada Kui could not help but suspect that he was dreaming several times.

The porridge is so thick that it will stand up straight after inserting chopsticks into it!
  It's embarrassing to say that this is the first time for him to see such porridge thick enough to stand up chopsticks!
  Although he has had complex experiences of "losing his parents", "being adopted by relatives", "entering into a businessman's family", and "being adopted by the Shimada family", every family Shimada Kui has visited is quite ordinary. Middle class home.

In the Edo period, the definition of middle class was not going hungry. As for the quality of food, there was no need to worry about it. The most eaten thing on weekdays was porridge, and it was made from millet. It was only eaten during festivals. Serve rice.

Only wealthy businessmen, rich farmers, and middle- and upper-level samurai from well-off families could eat rice without any scruples.

However, even for an upper-class family of this level, the daily side dishes are so simple that they are basically pickled radish, pickles, taro, tofu... One fish is considered a gluttonous feast.

As long as you understand the dietary standards of the Edo period, it is not difficult to understand the violent reaction of the Shinsengumi soldiers after seeing this pot of meat porridge.

Not only is it rice porridge, but it is also meat porridge with many pieces of meat added... This kind of food will make even Mr. Hatamoto with a family fortune of thousands of koku make his mouth water when he sees it!
  A bunch of eyes fell on Qingdeng - under the eager anticipation of everyone, Qingdeng said the words they wanted to hear most now:
  "Okay, let's all eat!"

In an instant, the whole place was in chaos!
  Click click - this is the sound of chopsticks hitting the wall of the bowl.

Crack-crack-crack-this is the sound of soldiers gobbling like pigs.

Huh-huh-huh - this is the sound of soldiers being burned by the boiling hot porridge, but they are reluctant to spit it out or stop, and continue to eat happily.

Kui Shimada grabbed the chopsticks immediately.

However, as if he remembered something, he suddenly froze, a look of hesitation on his face.

He is not the only one who behaves in such an unusual manner.

Many people were like him, looking hesitant on their faces and not moving their chopsticks to start eating.

"This meat... seems to be peony."

"Yes, this is peony!"

"Can peonies be eaten?"

Influenced by Buddhist culture, in ancient Japanese traditional concepts, the meat of four-legged animals is unclean.

Even to avoid taboos, the meat of four-legged animals has been given various nicknames.

Pork is called peony, horse meat is called sakura, and venison is called maple.

Although with the gradual introduction of Western culture, more and more people are able to accept meat, there are still many people who stay away from the meat of four-legged animals - Shimada Kui is one of them.

Although there was strong resistance in my heart, but...but...

He turned his head and looked at his friends who were eating deliciously and seemed to wish they had more mouths... After a brief ideological struggle, he gritted his teeth:

——Forget it, no matter what kind of meat it is!

After making up his mind, he grabbed the bowl and chopsticks and took a big bite.

The moment the meat porridge entered his mouth, he was stunned again.

Really fragrant!

So is peony such a delicious thing? !

The meat is well cooked and falls apart with just one bite, and the rich umami flavor spreads from the tip of the tongue to the entire mouth.

The clear-grained rice grains have a sweet taste, and the moist gravy blends with the rice grains. You don't even need to bite it, just hold it lightly and you can feel the shocking rich taste.

It was so delicious!

The unprecedented delicious taste directly broke Shimada Kui's will... When he came to his senses, he had eaten the entire bowl of meat porridge, not even a grain of rice was left.

This is the most delicious meal I have ever had in my life!

Shimada Kui wiped his mouth and turned to look at the cook not far away.

Can I still have a second bowl?

As soon as he had this thought, Shimada Kui heard a voice that sounded like the sound of nature to him:

"Take your time! Don't eat too hastily, or you may choke!"

Qingdeng smiled and continued:
  "There is still a lot of meat porridge, you can eat as much as you want! Just don't waste it!"

His words immediately caused a new round of sensation!

"one more bowl!"

Kui Shimada quickly handed the empty bowl in his palm to the cook not far away.

"Okay!"

The cook shouted enthusiastically, and gently stretched the arm holding the long-handled spoon - the hot meat porridge fell accurately into Shimada Kui's bowl.

Then, the scene reappeared - Shimada Kui lost consciousness, and when he came back to his senses, the rice bowl in his palm was empty again.

"one more bowl!"

With that said, he handed the empty bowl to the cook again...

……

……

Souji quietly stretched out the elbow of his right arm and lightly poked Qingto's side, who was sitting side by side with her.

"Ji Jun, cooking such a big pot of meat porridge must cost a lot of money, right?"

"That's for sure."

Qingdeng nodded slightly.

"Ignore the rice for now, peonies are really expensive."

After hearing this, the general manager couldn't help but said urgently:
  "Is it really okay to spend so much money on cooking? Aren't we very tight on money?"

Qingdeng shrugged, and a calm smile appeared on the corner of his mouth:

"Supplies are combat power, and some money cannot be saved. I would rather sell my orange juice and Dingguishen than let my subordinates go hungry."

********
  ********
  Ju Shui/Ding Guishen: "Sell us, what about Vairocana?"

Although it still failed to reach the 6000+ goal, it still has 5700 words. Bao Baozi has really worked hard! (Crying leopard head.jpg)

Seeing how hard Leopard has worked, please be sure to vote for this book!
  Ask for a monthly pass!Ask for a recommendation ticket! (Leopard Head Crying.jpg)

(End of this chapter)