My Gang of Swordsmen

Chapter 405: Chapter 150: Shiwei Hall Is Flourishing with Members!

That night——

Edo, a certain restaurant——

To celebrate Aoto’s victory in the Swordsmanship Competition, following the "Red and White Battle" of the Plum Blossom Festival, Zhouzhu once again generously booked a room at a certain restaurant and hosted a lively celebration banquet.

Since Zhouzhu is footing the bill, everyone let loose, eating heartily, drinking heartily, and enjoying themselves together without restraint.

Glasses clinking and laughter abound.

Aoto has been very busy lately, with the ongoing campaign against the "Radical Anti-foreigner Faction," making official matters seem endless, resolving one issue only for another to appear, and truly has not relaxed properly for quite a while.

Thus, tonight Aoto temporarily unloaded all burdens, completely emptied his mind, and joined Kondo, Hijikata, and the brothers in a bit of revelry.

Hijikata has a great tolerance for alcohol, and after a few cups of sake, aside from slightly flushed cheeks, everything else seemed normal.

When the atmosphere of the celebration banquet reached its peak of merriness, Hijikata suggested inviting some geishas to liven things up.

Geishas are female performers who sell art, not themselves.

Of course—this "selling art, not themselves" is just nice talk.

Initially, geishas indeed only sold art.

But no industry can avert the competitive spiral of its practitioners!

The constantly competing geishas eventually led someone to cross that bottom line—to display other unspeakable talents while performing for their patrons.

Once someone breached this line, naturally more geishas followed suit to survive and began imitating.

Finally, amidst this unending industry competition, those geishas who sold only art found their survival soil increasingly squeezed by those who sold both art and themselves.

Thus, to survive, many geishas have been forced to lay down the last shred of pride and dignity as artists, also starting to play the koto with one hand and undress their patrons with the other.

To this day, geishas still able to uphold "selling art not themselves" are almost superstar-level figures that can’t be hired even with a lot of money.

After all, only those whose talents are exceptional or exceedingly beautiful have the confidence to insist on this bottom line of "never selling themselves."

Because geishas now generally follow a "selling both art and themselves" path, the overall employment costs have increased considerably.

Sitting at the head seat, Zhouzhu carefully retrieved his purse from his bosom, glanced at the savings inside, and righteously returned it to his bosom.

"Hijikata, as martial artists, we shouldn’t be overly indulgent in beauty."

"Being indulgent in beauty often leads to a sluggish spirit, weakened vitality, and is extremely harmful to the pursuit of martial arts."

...

Zhouzhu went on tangentially and at length to Hijikata.

He rambled on so much, but the central message was just one sentence—let’s just eat and drink tonight, geishas can wait for another time.

"Hmm... why is there no wine..." Chokata, sitting next to Aoto, picked up the empty bottle beside his table and shook it vigorously.

"Mr. Chokata, you can’t drink anymore." Aoto, slightly tipsy himself at this point, seized the bottle from Chokata’s hands and snatched away the wine glass from Chokata’s table, "If we aren’t careful, you’ve already drunk this much... hey, are you still conscious?"

Aoto waved his hand vigorously in front of Chokata’s eyes.

The wine-lightweight Chokata’s cheeks were blushing like ripe apples, as if about to drip dark red blood at any moment, his eyes half-closed and gaze muddled.

After looking at Aoto waving his hand before his face, Chokata broke into a radiant smile, exposing a crescent-moon-eyed grin towards Aoto.

"Mr. Tachibana... your performance in the competition these past couple of days was so cool... clearing all obstacles, unstoppable..."

Hmm, he can still speak coherent human language, looks like he’s not too drunk... confirming Chokata hasn’t drunk to the point of incomprehensibility, Aoto nodded reassuringly.

Since Aoto forbade him from drinking, Chokata simply substituted wine with soup.

"Heh heh heh..." Chokata cupped his hands around the miso soup on the table and took a small sip, blissfully, "Mr. Tachibana won the championship in this competition... in the future, the number of apprentices coming to Shiwei Hall for study should increase, right..."

Previously, the prominent victory in the "Red and White Battle" at the Plum Blossom Festival successfully boosted Shiwei Hall’s reputation significantly. Since then, the number of apprentices enrolling due to hearing about Shiwei Hall’s fame has surged greatly.

Today, Aoto winning the attention-grabbing, large-scale Swordsmanship Competition will undoubtedly further enhance Shiwei Hall’s prestige.

It’s not hard to imagine—more apprentices coming to Shiwei Hall for study in the future is a certainty!

As Chokata finished his murmur, Zhouzhu sighed heavily at the main table and then echoed:

"Ho ho ho, Shiwei Hall has finally turned around after so many years since its establishment."

Hijikata, seated side by side with Kondo, paused his hand holding the wine glass as he heard Chokata and Zhouzhu’s sentiments.

He raised his gaze, glanced at Zhouzhu, then at Kondo beside him, and silently placed his wine glass back onto the table.