The first half of the notes held little research value. Most of it was just trivial details about his grandfather's life.
But there were some unexpected discoveries. For instance, his grandfather had actually had six children—a fact he hadn't known.
Shiraishi Yoshijo had always thought his grandfather had only two sons, his father and uncle. After all, he'd never met the others.
That was only natural, since they had died back in the Warring States period.
The four relatives he'd never met—three boys and a girl—had all died: one in battle, the other three by suicide.
Between the lines of the notes, Shiraishi Yoshijo saw his grandfather's anguished struggles, as well as some of his more unhinged ideas.
"Rongyan died today. He was killed by those beasts from the Terada clan. I'll avenge him. I'll wipe out the entire Terada clan."
"I killed every last member of the Terada clan, young and old, male and female. But I can't feel happy about it. My second son was injured, so I had my third son take him back to the clan to recover."
"But what I never expected was that, not long after my second son returned home, he and my third son committed suicide together."
"I summoned their Butterfly Seeds. They told me they felt they were no longer human, so they didn't want to be human anymore."
"I have only one child left now, my five-year-old daughter. What the hell is wrong with this world?"
"I can't see a glimmer of hope. I can't even feel despair anymore. All that's left is numbness."
"We kill day after day, and the fighting never stops. The world of shinobi is simply too cruel. I want to enter Butterfly Habitat Valley and sleep forever, too."
"When I was about to kill myself,