Doi No Fugu

Doi No Fugu, or the Inn of the Globefish, was a famous inn in Maeshi Province in Kozakura. It was owned and run by members of the Sumitomo family and was under an imperial decree protecting it from attack, making it a sanctuary and neutral ground.
==Geography==
It stood in the center of the coastal plain of Maeshi Province, which lay in the north of the island of Shinkoku, at the crossroadsPage 45 of Night of the Seven Swords says the inn lies just south of the crossroads, while the maps place it to the north. connecting various points in the province: the Sun Temple and Korimori Castle in the north, the ruins of Ito Castle in the west, the village of Choike in the south, and Fusan and Michimori Castle in the east, only a day's journey away. The surrounding land was rolling and studded with low brush, with the occasional copse of trees or thicket of bamboo, which were cleared to a distance of away from the roads and the inn. Thus there was little in the way of a stealthy approach.
The inn itself was surrounded by an orchard and an inn pond, or doi-ike. It had a depth of around to about from the shore, before maximum depth of . The area saw snow in the winter so the pond would ice over. Cattails grew around the pond, their susurrus a soothing sound at night, and lily pads floated upon the water. The orchard grew dozens of fruit trees of different kinds over a grassy field.
==Structure==
A walled compound, it comprised four main buildings: the large inn house itself along the northern side, the stable in the southwest corner, the small master's house in the south, and a pavilion, or izumi-dono, which stood in the doi-iki in the southeast. Rather than being built of wood as was common, the inn was constructed largely from sturdy stone, with the former two buildings built of stone, the latter two of wood. All sported red clay tile roofs and ceilings high, while the stable had a ceiling .
The inn house, stable, and master's house were linked by a curtain wall of dressed limestone in height and in thickness, while the pond provided a water barrier in the northeast, with the curtain wall ending in stone pillars standing in the water. It had two gates: the main inn gate and the small orchard gate. The main gate was fashioned from iron bars set into two thick wooden baulks that were mortared into the curtain wall. The whole gate and baulks were painted bright red, several charms were pasted onto the sides, and a golden bell was mounted on the right baulk. A thick yew hedge around the western, northern, and eastern walls and shrubs along the southern provided an additional barrier. Beyond them the inn was surrounded by orchards.
The main gate led into a courtyard, some 30×40 feet (9×12 meters) in size, from which the other buildings were accessed: the broad porch and main entrance to the inn house in the east, the stable in the south, a flagstoned terrace backed by a bed of jade plants in the west against the curtain wall, and more generally the gardens.
The gardens featured trees, shrubbery, and beds of flowers, with occasional statues, with a statue of Emperor Mori on the right side of the inn house porch and a fountain on the left. The gardens were traversed by tidy paths of crushed stone. Four open verandahs with removable lattice-work panels for screens looked out onto the garden from the inn house and master's house. These were raised off the ground, while the one in the west was on an earthen bank against the curtain wall along the courtyard. This terrace was paved with flagstones and the sloped banks sprouted jade plants. A small garden shed was tucked away in the northwest corner.
A tile-roofed covered walkway led over the pond to the izumi-dono. Both were built on wooden pylons standing in the pond. The pavilion was surrounded by a porch.
==Interior==
===Inn House===
Inside the inn house, the floors were covered with brown straw mats, or tatami. The interior walls were covered in maple paneling, while doors and sliding walls were double-walled balsa wood screens. Although light and sturdy, these screens were easily breakable. Closets had camphor wood paneling.
The inn house included four sitting rooms and seven sleeping chambers for guests, a large reception area furnished with a shrine, and one bath. It also included a kitchen and a concealed cellar and secret chamber. A staircase led up to an attic.
;Receiving Room:
:Entered from the outside porch at the main entrance, the Receiving Room was a place for people to leave their shoes, sandals, or other footwear on a straw mat by the north wall. There was also a sculpture of a globefish that could be turned to uncover a hidden cache in its base; Toyo kept a crossbow and 20 quarrels in here. The door out could be barred.
;Main Corridor
:From the Receiving Room, the main corridor led through the rest of the inn house, branching at different points. The western south end led into the "Green Rushes" Room and the eastern south end into an alcove with a strong maple-wood door that could be barred. This opened onto the covered walkway leading over the pond to the pavilion. In the eastern corner was a privy.
;Changing Room & Bath
:Just past the Receiving Room was the bathroom and changing room. The former had two big wooden tubs that could be fill with hot, scented water, while the latter had benches and ready towels.
;Place of Bountiful Welcome
:A sitting room paneled in polished cherrywood. Here, tea ceremonies were held to welcome guests, so it was stocked with everything required. A low, inlaid cherrywood table stood in the center, flanked by eight cushions, while off to the side in the south was another table with a brazier, kettle, and tea caddy on one table. The caddy was an antique and family heirloom, valued at 3 ch'ien. Accepting and drinking the tea signified a guest's acceptance of the inn's hospitality.
;Dancing Light Room
:This room had a one tall, narrow window with a latticework screen and a roof panel that could be opened by means of a long forked stick to admit light and fresh air in good weather. It had a cabinet containing twelve cushions, six futons, and a few sleeping silks
;"Green Rushes" Room
:This southern end of the main corridor had a screen of black lacquered wood with bright yellow rice paper, behind which was an empty storage area. A door led out into the garden.
;"Blue Serenity" Room
:In the southeast corner of the main inn, this room held blue and silver cabinets containing cushions, futons, and sleeping silks. The sliding screen gave a view of the pavilion.
;Kitchen & Pantry
:In the far eastern end was the kitchen, which had a stone fire pit, two large chopping blocks beside it, hooks on the walls holding pots, and two cabinets by the entrance holding utensils and pots of spices. The pantry was lined with shelves bearing a variety of sealed clay pots holding condiments and cabinets holding bins of barley, millet, rice, and dried fruits. Turning one of the hooks opened a secret door and a passage leading down to the cellar.
;Children's Room & Sleeping Chambers
:On the north side of the inn house, opposite the kitchen, was a play area for children. It had a chest holding children's attire and old toys. Lacquered balsa wood wall panels led to sleeping chambers each with a futon bed raised on a platform, cushion, and sleeping silks. Drawers below the bed held personal possessions, clothing, and footwear. These rooms were used by young members of the Sumitomi family: Toyo, Miko, and Myoko.
;Sleeping Chambers
:Further down the inn's north side were the four sleeping chambers for guests, some small and some large, some furnished with cabinets, futons, cushions, and silk sheets.
;Attic
:Reached via a staircase leading off the main corridor, the attic held much dusty disused items: chests, lacquered boxes, old furniture, old silk sheets, worn tatami mats, broken wall screens, and assorted other mundane things.
;Cellar
:Accessed via the secret door in the kitchen, a stone stairway led down to the cellar. The area was dry and had a gravel floor. Here, illumination was provided by a lantern. The area was used to store three casks of beer and barrels of plum wine and sake. In one corner, a small waist-height stone hatch opened inward to allow access to the catch chamber beneath the privy, enabled the unpleasant task of cleaning. On the other side, a hidden catch on the east wall opened another secret door to the family bolthole.
;Bolthole
:From the cellar's secret door, a short tunnel led to another door and a chamber, both built from rough brick. This was a place for the family to hide in the event of crisis. The door was secured by a deadbolt. It had beds with straw pallets, shelves of preserved food in sealed pots, a barrel of drinking water, and a chest of sleeping silks.
===Pavilion===
Reached by a covered walkway, the pavilion, izumi-dono, stood in the center of the pond, all raised on wooden pylons driven into the lakebed. Used for parties, the pavilion had a party room with a low black lacquered table and six black silk cushions. Balsa wood screens could be slid open so guests could look over the pond. On one side was a serving area with counter and shelves holding serving trays, dishes, crockery, condiment bottles, half-a-dozen sashimi knives, and a jug of oil. Finally, there was a privy in one corner.
===Master's House===
The master's house was the separate residence of the innkeeper and his wife, Koji and Haru. It contained a living room, a privy, and a bedroom for the couple, the latter with a platform bed and sleeping silks and a large lacquered cabinet for personal possessions. The floor panel concealed a false bottom and a cache storing the family's wealth, some 200 ch'ao, 10 chi'ien, and two strings of 100 fen. There was also a family shrine with an altar, which houses dozens of urns holding the ashes of their ancestors.
===Stable===
The stable included stalls for guests' mounts and pack animals, as well as the two light horses owned by the Sumitomos. Some stalls accommodated two animals, and their tack was hung on the sides of the stalls. The floor was earth and the loft stored hay. An adjoining tack room held spare pieces for riding or hitching, as well as a small forge suited to making minor repairs to harness.
==History==
====Founding====
The story of Doi no Fugu started in another famous inn, Nami No Hana, or the Crest of the Wave, where the newly ascended Emperor Akimatsu Mori decided to stay on the night following the battle of Kyoki in the . However, the master chef there was brother to a slain soldier of the army defeated at Kyoki and wanted revenge. The chef prepared the first emperor's celebratory dinner—the house specialty, raw tiger fugu and daikon (radish) sculpted to resemble a flying crane—with the poisonous fugu liver mixed in with the radish sauce on the crane's crest. But an apprentice chef, Sumitomo Tomy, spotted something off with the food as it was served, rushed past the guards, and stopped Mori before he could take the deadly bite. The would-be poisoner was invited to dine with the emperor, and forced to eat his own cooking.
Afterward, Emperor Mori offered to elevate Tomy to noble status in recognition and gratitude, but he explained that all Sumitomos were master chefs and changing his status would be a dishonor to the previous generations. He only wanted to finish his training as a chef and maybe one day own his own kitchen, as the founder of the Sumitomo family had dreamed for one of his descendants. The emperor understood and departed but later still wanted to give a recompense to the valorous and modest Tomy.
Therefore, the very day that Tomy finished his training, he was surprisingly arrested by a company of imperial soldiers at the emperor's command. They escorted him to Maeshi Province, Tomy's home, where the emperor had decreed the construction of two new roads and a grand new inn at their crossing. Outside, the captain of the company gave the keys to the bemused Tomy and explained the emperor had granted him proprietorship of the new inn and marked him as a master chef. Moreover, the inn would be always protected by an imperial decree punishing anyone who harmed the owner or violated its hospitality with a death sentence, and the Sumitomos would not have to pay taxes. Tomy named his new inn Doi no Fugu after the incident and went to work.
A year after, on the anniversary of the battle of Kyoki, Emperor Mori went to eat a dish of fugu prepared by Tomy. The tale of Tomy and Mori was related in a stylized noh play titled "The Reward of Tomy", which would later be performed at the inn.
===Later History===
Since that time, Sumitomo Tomy endeavored to establish Doi no Fugu's reputation as a place of peace and the inn prospered, always protected by the emperors. He became one of the greatest chefs of Kozakura and even nobles of court followed the emperor's example in journeying to Maeshi Province simply to dine at Doi no Fugu. Only a few dared violate the peace and risk the wrath of the emperor or shogun, and were easily taken care of by the inn's security.
After Tomy's death, ownership of the inn was passed from father to eldest son down through the centuries and the generations. Tomy had instituted a rule that the eldest son and any family member who would become a chef must be sent away to undertake his apprenticeship elsewhere, not with their parents at the inn. This was so they would learn and bring back new cooking techniques, saving the menu at Doi No Fugu ever growing stale.
===Modern History===
This pattern was interrupted around when Sumitomo Koji sent his son Yoichi off to an apprenticeship, and he disappeared. Seven years passed, in which time Sumitomo Toyo took his brother's place as successor but the growing threat of war now in Kozakura meant he could not yet go on his apprenticeship. For the same reason, Koji took on a ronin, Haka Kinnori, for security. Later, Kinnori instructed the children Toyo and Skoshi in karate and told them stories of adventure and war, taking something of their lost brother's place in their hearts.
In , with the Michimori and Korimori families engaged in a blood feud, the influential Sun Temple promised its support to the family that could retrieve certain relics of the extinct Seven Swords clan. Thus, Michimori Uemon arranged a band of adventurers who were his guests to travel to Ito-jo, recover them, and meet him at Michimori Castle, after passing through Doi No Fugu. Meanwhile, the Korimori tried to stop them by various means. The adventurers were successful and Uemon's messengers bade them to make haste for Doi No Fugu, where they hoped to rest in safety. However, the Korimori even hired the Ono Kumi ninja yakuza to Doi No Fugu to intercept the band and steal the relics, contravening the custom that the Inn of the Globefish was neutral ground. Among them was the wayward son, Sumitomo Yoichi, now a yakuza of the Ono Yumi going by Ono Arieki, who was instructed by his boss Ono Noburo to use his inside knowledge to take control of Doi No Fugu and ambush the adventurers. Yoichi was assured none of his family would be killed. But Noburo also ordered Chomei to leave no witnesses, and thus kill them all.
That summer, seven men of the Ono Kumi infiltrated the Inn of the Globefish posing as a traveling merchant (Yoichi in heavy disguise) and his retainers, guards, and servants. They rented a room for the night and asked for a meal and a party with companions, during which they quickly surprised and subdued the Sumitomo family, imprisoning them in their own secret chamber, which gave Koichi away to his parents. They kept the women hostage there to ensure Koji's and Toyo's cooperation and Skoshi and Kinnori staying confined in their rooms. Fourteen more ninja lay in wait outside.
When the adventurers with the relics finally arrived, the villains posed as the inn staff and welcomed them in, though male ninja made for poor geisha girls. They planned to distract them with a banquet, lull them with a biwa of calm and pearl of persuasion, and even have one of their number, a shukenja named Toshiro mislead by prophesying an ambush after leaving the inn, before ambushing them with thrown shuriken and poison-gas egg grenades and attacking. This would be complicated by the Sumitomo family's attempts to escape and alert the adventurers, the guard Kinnori seizing the chance to strike back, and Yoichi's own crisis of conscience. The exact outcome of this terrible situation is unknown and the fate of the Sumitomos and others involved is unknown, but Michimori Uemon ultimately received the relics.
==Atmosphere==
Thanks to the imperial decree, Doi No Fugu was customarily treated as neutral ground and a place of sanctuary. It seemed a serene and even enchanted place. It typically saw more business in the summer with visiting nobles and travelers from far-off lands, and less in the cold winter.
==Services==
On arrival, guests would ring the bell at the gate and staff would let them in, taking their horses and baggage. The innkeeper or his wife greeted them and escorted them into the inn house. In the Receiving Room, guests removed their shoes and were provided with tabi, socks, to wear indoors. In the Place of Bountiful Welcome, a hospitality ritual incorporating a tea ceremony was practiced to signify accepting the inn's hospitality, while refusing the tea was considered improper by Kozakuran custom. Next, guests were treated to a bath in the bathroom and were given fresh kimonos; again, refusing either was improper. Finally, they were served meals and beds were set up for them in one of the rooms.
A typical breakfast was a pot of strong green tea, a bowl of cold umeboshi (sour pickled plums), and bowls of rice with sheets of nori (dried seaweed) to be eaten with the rice. A banquet meal included as appetizers bowls of gingko nuts and quail eggs, followed by clam soup with mushrooms, deep-fried shrimp coated with rice, fish and rice, and duck steamed in sake. These were in a sequence of small bowls, served individually. The geisha served guests and poured drinks. They would also make fugu that was safe to eat.
Drinks included tea, beer, plum wine, and sake.
After a banquet, the geisha would entertain guests by playing music or performing a noh play such as "The Reward of Tomy".
==Staff & Inhabitants==
A family business, the inn was traditionally owned and run by the head of the Sumitomo family and inherited by the eldest son. Other members of the family would live and work there, some for a little time, others all their lives. They cooked, cleaned, carried luggage, entertained like geisha, and tended to livestock and guests' mounts. Circa , the inn was staffed by the father Sumitomo Koji and mother Sumitomo Haru and their children Miko, Myoki, Toyo, Skoshi.
==Defenses==
In times of strife, the inn usually employed a single ronin for security. With the tension around , the Sumitomos hired the ronin Haka Kinnori for this purpose. In fact, Kinnori was secretly a samurai, not a ronin, and was charged by Emperor Akimatsu Gonijo with watching over the inn, protecting the Sumitomos, and monitoring affairs in Maeshi Province.
In addition, the inn included secret doors and passages, with one leading to the cellar and another leading from the cellar to a hidden chamber that served as a refuge in the unthinkable event someone would assault the inn. The cellar was known only to the Sumitomos and the original builder of the inn, and the hidden chamber only to the Sumitomos, for they had installed it afterward.
Otherwise, only the inn house had locks and bars for security, with bars on its exterior doors, while the inn gate had a lock and padlocked chain and the orchard gate a lock. Both were locked at all times, with entry granted to visitors by ringing the bell at the gate. Oddly, the small delivery window in the kitchen's north wall was shuttered, barred, chained, and padocked.
A charm of protection from theft, a charm of protection from fire, a charm of protection from disease, and a charm of protection from spirits were all aaffixed to the main gate; these could be altered by the innkeeper to cancel their power. These warded the building against catching alight, hindering and slowing any flames that should spread; protected the occupants against catching or spreading an infection; prevented spirits from entering the establishment; and hindered would-be thieves from sneaking about and picking locks.
==Appendix==
===Background===
Night of the Seven Swords possibly gives two different accounts of the founding of the inn. The primary one is above, while the other is a very brief entry in the timeline on page 4 involving Emperor Akimatsu Reijo much later in , who visits Maeshi Province to inspect the defenses of the strait when an innkeeper saves him from an assassination attempt. In return, the emperor raises the innkeeper's family to samurai status and confers protection on the inn. However, neither the inn nor the savior are named, it is an innkeeper rather than an apprentice chef, the raise in status is not declined, and the assassination is not detailed. The story may have been rewritten or changed at some point during writing. Therefore, it is presumed these are unrelated but similar events, and possibly the later event has been conflated with the one of legend.
===Notes===
===Appearances===
===References===
Category:Buildings
Category:Inns
Category:Restaurants
Category:Locations in Maeshi Province
Category:Locations in Shinkoku
Category:Locations in Kozakura
Category:Locations in Kara-Tur
Category:Locations on Toril