The magistrates interrogated the men who attacked them. Apparently they had been directed to target a group of samurai accompanying Bayushi Kachiko with the thinking that they would be easy prey returning from the Licensed Quarter.
Placing their prisoners into the jail at Civil Hall, they went to the sake house in the Fisherman Quarter where they had been hired in an attempt to learn more. Asking around nobody involved appeared to have made much of an impression on anyone. The bartender also seemed relatively unsurprised at the situation as a whole. Apparently it's not uncommon for someone to hire local thugs as patsies and then vanish before they can collect on any payment.
The next day the Poppy Invitational began.Early in the morning Doji Yogoso
came by the compound to report that he had been assaulted by some
unknown persons the previous evening. They had apparently given him some
vague threats and roughed him up enough to frighten him significantly.
Yet looking him over, Kasuga Osamu could not find any obvious indications of injury.
Reaching the Scorpion Garden where the competition was being held, Iuchi Michisuna was distressed and looking haggard and poorly-rested. Leaving the reception, he suspected he was being followed and ended up spending the night in the Licensed Quarter where he felt safer due to a lack of weapons and not being alone. He only returned shortly before the competition.
During a break Ide Asamitsu approached the magistrates, quite angry. He requested being allowed to have some time alone with Doji Yogoso in order to issue him a formal challenge to a duel. One of the poems he presented, "Fruit of the Spurned Love Tree", having been a thinly-veiled reference to his friend Shiba Shonagon and her death, which the poem implied to be suicide as a direct result of an unrequited affection for Iuchi Michisuna. He claimed that it was an insult to her spirit and the Crane must be held accountable for his words.
Towards the end of the day as the sun was setting Yogo Osako was speaking to Bayushi Kachiko in her private box. As she stood up and approached Mirumoto Tetsuzae, who was sitting nearby, she was struck by black arrow. Rushing to her aid, Mirumoto was struck as well. Kasuga, noticing that the arrows had come from the west, rushed to intercept the culprit, but was unable to find them. Searching the western side of the gardens, the pond, and the ground near the bath house, he was unable to find any clues or indications that anyone had been in the area all day.
However, upon inspecting one of the arrows, Kasuga noticed that they bore all the hallmarks of an infamous underworld figure, the deadly female assassin Sayonara Koneko.