Toranaga inspects; Buntaro lodges

Ten days after Jozen's death, Toranaga lands at Anjiro unannounced with three galleys of troops and, beside him, Buntaro. Toranaga demands an attack exercise at once, announces nine battalions under Buntaro, and offers to second Yabu's seppuku since the new Council will surely want his head: "Choose!" In the galley cabin Mariko hands over her nightly diary and gives her assessments: Yabu, extortionate and dangerous; Omi, the real adviser; Naga, Yabu's puppet; the Anjin-san, ruled by a Christian conscience and "as defenceless as a doll". Toranaga hunts at dawn and sends Blackthorne a hare and a pheasant. Blackthorne skins the hare in the kitchen with the sushi chef's knife; maids flee, Fujiko vomits in the privy, then faces down the cook's threat to resign. Buntaro arrives to lodge in the house and, drinking heavily, talks of Korea, traitors, adulterers and liars.

Toranaga arrives to inspect, and the chapter is an audit: Mariko's diary assessments of every character are the author briefing the reader through a spy. The hare in the kitchen is comedy of manners with a body count coming. Buntaro's lodging in the house loads the next chapter.