A tale of the early Shogunate

1. Nemandawara-Jo
a samurai slaughter from ‘Bayko Baron’

2. • Toranaga Isi has been tasked to take the castle

3. • His first attempt at negotiation having failed…

4. • … Toranaga must besiege the place – but that won’t take long with the new-
fangled cannon the Portuguese have given him

5. • Built largely of wood the keep will not resist for long

6. • Word arrives that the famed Takeda cavalry are on the way to break the siege

7. • Toranaga lines up his men, they are ashigaru, inferior to true samurai – but
they are also teppu-tai (matchlock men)

8. • The Takeda arrive

9. • Seeing the inferiority of their enemy they launch into an immediate
charge

10. • Across the field the ashigaru sweat and wait as the ground
thunders under them

11. • Their terror disappears in a sheet of acrid smoke

12. As the smoke settles the ashigaru watch their enemy and
their fears run for their lives – the code of bushido has
finally met the Age of Gunpowder

13. • Crisis over the cannon go back into action

14. … and shortly Nemandawara begins to burn

15. • Refusing to be burned to death the castellan –
Hideaki – leads his men in a last banzai charge

16. Taken alive before he can commit seppuku, Hideaki takes his place in
the final ceremony – the headcount. While Toranaga congratulates
himself that the endless in-fighting is now over.