Book III, Fire Summary

Matahachi is among the many laboring at a public works project at Fushimi and he blames Oko and Takezo for the current state of his life. He is so weak he cannot pick up a watermelon he has purchased to eat. He watches as a young warrior he comes to believe is Sasaki Kojiro is killed after having killed a foreman on the job site. The warrior is actually named Tenki. Matahachi takes the warrior's possessions and runs away, later overhears an old priest bemoaning the fact that he has done his son—Jo—wrong, and learns that the dead warrior was carrying quite a lot of money. Matahachi travels on, continuing to search for the family of Sasaki Kojiro while searching for an opportunity to put himself into service as a swordsman, using the dead warrior's...