Disgusted with all the confusion, Honda Heihachiro stood up indignantly. "Is this a discussion? People who like discussions are just prattlers. Personally, I can't just sit here idly.  P'ardon me for leaving first."

Honda was both a poor talker and a man of strong character. Both Tadatsugu and Kazumnasa had been insisting on the validity of their own arguments and engendering a controversy. They now looked in shock at Honda's indignant departure.

“Honda, where are you going?" they asked hurriedly.

Honda turned around and spoke as though he had come to some deep conclusion. "I have been my lord's retainer ever since I was an infant. Considering the situation he's in, I can do nothing but go to his side."

“Wait!" Kazumasa appeared to think that Honda was simply being hotheaded, and raised his hand to restrain him. "We were commanded by our lord to defend Mount Komaki in his absence, but we were not commanded to do just as we pleased. Calm down a little."

Tadatsugu also tried to calm him down. "Honda, will it achieve anything if you go out alone right now, of all times? The defense of Mount Komaki is more important."

Honda's mouth curled up in a thin smile, as though he pitied their narrow thinking, but he spoke politely, as the two other men were superior to him in both rank and age.

“I'm not going with the other generals. Each of you can do as he pleases. But Hideyoshi is leading a fresh army toward Lord Ieyasu, and as for me, I can't just stand here without doing anything. Think about it. Our lord's forces must be exhausted from fighting last night and this morning, and if the twenty thousand men Hideyoshi is leading join the rest of the enemy in an attack from both the front and the rear, how do you suppose Lord Ieyasu will get away safely? The way I see it is, even if I am wrong in rushing off to Nagakute alone, if my lord is killed in battle, I am resolved to die with him. That should not trouble you."

At those words, all murmuring stopped. Honda led out his own small force of three hundred men and dashed away from Mount Komaki. Infected with the man's spirit, Kazumasa also collected his two hundred men and joined the determined party.

Their joint forces numbered fewer than six hundred men, but Honda's spirit enveloped them from the time they left Mount Komaki. What was an army of twenty thousand men, after all? And who was this Lord Monkey, anyway?

The foot soldiers were lightly armored, the banners were rolled up, and as the horses were whipped, the dust from their little force flew up like a tornado hurrying toward the east.

As they came out to the southern bank of the Ryusenji River, they found Hideyoshi's army moving along the northern bank, troop after troop.

"Well, there they are!"

"The commander's standard with the golden gourds."

"Hideyoshi must be surrounded by his retainers."

Honda and his men had ridden up without stopping, and were looking over at the opposite bank, noisily pointing and holding their hands over their eyes. All of them shook with excitement.

It was such a short distance that if Honda's men had yelled out, the enemy's shouts would have reached right back to them. The faces of the enemy soldiers were visible, and the footsteps of twenty thousand men mixed with the clatter of innumerable horses' hooves crossed the river and reverberated against the chests of the men who were watching.

"Kazumasa!" Honda yelled behind him.

"What is it?"

"Do you see that on the opposite bank?"

"Yes, it's an immense army. Their line looks longer than the river itself."

"That's just like Hideyoshi," Honda laughed. "It's his skill to take an army of that size and then move it as though the men were his own hands and feet. He may be the enemy, but you have to give him credit."

"I've been looking at them for a while. Do you suppose Hideyoshi is over there, where you see the commander's standard with the golden gourds?"

"No, no. I'm sure he's hidden somewhere in the middle of another group of men. He's not going to ride out in the open where he'd be the target for someone's gun."

"The enemy soldiers are moving quickly, but they're all looking over here with suspicion."

"What we must do here is delay Hideyoshi on the road along the Ryusenji River, even if just for a few moments."

"Should we attack?"

"No, the enemy has twenty thousand men, and our own forces only number five hundred, so if we attacked them it would take only an instant for the surface of the river to be dyed red with our blood. I'm resolved to die, but not pointlessly."

"Ah, so you want to give our lord's army in Nagakute enough time to be fully prepared and waiting for Hideyoshi."

"That's right," Honda nodded, striking his horse's saddle. "To buy time for our alliesin Nagakute, we should do our best to get a firm grip on Hideyoshi's feet and slow down his attack—even if just a little—with our own deaths. Act with that in mind, Tadatsugu."

"Good. I understand."

Kazumasa and Honda turned their horses' heads to the side.

"Divide your gunners into three groups. As they hurry along the road, each group can alternately kneel and fire at the enemy on the opposite bank."

The enemy moved quickly along the opposite bank, seeming almost to keep pace with the quick-running current. Honda's men had to do everything with the same rhythm but in double-time and constantly on the run—whether it was an attack or the reorganization of their units.

Because they were close to the water, the musket fire echoed far more loudly than it ordinarily would have, and the gunpowder smoke spread over the river like a vast curtain. As one unit leaped in front and fired, the next unit readied its muskets. Then that unit jumped forward, taking the place of the first unit, and immediately fired toward the opposite bank.

A number of Hideyoshi's troops were seen to tumble over in rapid succession. Very quickly, the line of marching men started to waver.

"Who in the world can that be, challenging us with such a tiny force?"

Hideyoshi was surprised. With a look of shock on his face, he unconsciously stopped his horse.

The generals riding around him and the men close by all shaded their eyes with their hands and looked at the opposite bank, but no one could give a quick answer to Hideyoshi's question.

"To act so bravely toward an army of this size with a little force of less than a thousand men, that must be a daring commander! Does anybody recognize him?"

Hideyoshi asked the question repeatedly, looking around at the men in front and behind him.

Then someone at the head of the line said, "I know who that is."

The man who spoke was Inaba Ittetsu, the commander of Sone Castle in Mino. In spite of his venerable age, he had joined this great battle for Hideyoshi's sake and had been at his side as a guide from the very beginning of the campaign.

"Ah, Ittetsu. Do you recognize the enemy general on the other side of the river?"

"Well, from the antlers on his helmet and the white braid on his armor, I'm sure it nust be Ieyasu's right-hand man, Honda Heihachiro. I remember him clearly from the battle at Ane River years ago."

When Hideyoshi heard this, he looked as though he were about to shed tears. "Ah, what a brave man! With one small force he strikes at twenty thousand. If that is Honda, he must be a stalwart fellow. How touching that he would try to help Ieyasu escape by nomentarily obstructing us here and by dying himself," he muttered. And then, "He's to be sympathized with. Our men are not to shoot a single arrow or bullet in his direction, no matter how much of an attack the man might make. If there is some karmic relation between us, I'll make him one of my own retainers one day. He's a man to be loved. Don't shoot; just let him go."

During that time, of course, the three groups of gunners on the other bank busilycontinued to load their muskets and shoot relentlessly. One or two bullets even came close to Hideyoshi. Just then, the armored warrior upon whom Hideyoshi had beenstraining his eyes—Honda, the man wearing the helmet adorned with deer antlers—went down to the water's edge, dismounted, and washed his horse's muzzle with water from the river.