History VisualNovel / Miburo

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Several Shishi, despite their violent ways, are driven by their determination to reform their country, thinking that replacing the Shogun with the Emperor will allows Japan to stand back against possible foreign invasions. On the other hand, the pro-shogunate forces share the same broad goal of reforming the country to better adapt to the outside world without attacking foreign powers, instead choosing to focus of improving the country with the existing government by cooperating with the Imperial Court.

The '''Tokugawa Shogunate''', having enjoyed two centuries of peace with no significant conflict, suddenly has its authority put into question for "shamlessly accepting unequal treaties to foreign powers". Many daimyos were displeased by the events and began to saw weakness in the government, and the Shishi began to form, loathing it for opening the country without the Emperor's consent, and began a series of assassinations on pro-shogunate people and foreigners, under the Sonnō jōi movement. Edo also was invaded at the time by samurai of the Satsuma clan, causing the shogunate to decentralize its power by creating three new positions: The '''Chief of Political Affairs''', the '''Shogun's Guardian''' and more importantly, the '''Military Commissioner of Kyoto'''.

Within the dying days of the shogunate, Ken's chance encounter with these keepers of the peace, all of whom have their own idiosyncracies, is where our story begins. Plus, he happens to have a mysterious power allowing him to show his enemies' weaknesses...

* {{Conscription}}: Following the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the Imperial Army was mostly composed of samourai from the Choshu and Satsuma domains among many others, up until the removal of the class system which made them obsolete and replaced them with non-samurai.

* DeliberateValuesDissonance: Several of the Shishi vehemently oppose the presence of foreigners in Japan. While there was some ground to this behaviour such as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namamugi_Incident Nanamugi Incident]] involving Satsuma and the British, others moderates prefer to negociate with foreign powers to strengthen and modernize Japan rather than blindly attacking foreigners and pro-shogunate people. The vast majority of the Shinsengumi prefers to stay neutral, although they also express concern for the lack of meaningful response of the Shogunate.

* {{Nepotism}}: One of the major flaws of the Tokugawa Shogunate's class system. Everyone, from the daimyo to the humble merchant, is stuck in their class from birth to death with almost no way of climbing through the ranks, with the very exception of adoption in samurai families.

** The Shinsengumi is also a prime example of this, despite having their own set of strict rules, but very difficult to apply in practice: Since the majority of them are non-samurai or ronin, their attempt to emulate the old-fashioned ways of the samurai comes up as outdated and restrictive, while the country is going through a period of unprecedented turmoil with many individuals acting outside the law without being bound by any rules.

** The Shinsengumi is also a prime example of this, despite having their own set of strict rules, but very difficult to apply in practice: Since the majority of them are non-samurai or ronin, their attempt to emulate the old-fashioned ways of the samurai comes up as outdated and restrictive, while the country is going through a period of unprecedented turmoil.

* CivilWar: Downplayed at first, as only a few clans actively follow the Sonnō jōi movement, carrying assassinations, with loose groups of ronin in Kyoto. However, as the tensions between the Imperial Court and the Shogunate grow larger, conflict eventually escalated into a full blown civil war.

** ''Miburo'' features them as the main anti-heroines, which depict their humble origins as commoners who climbed through the ranks of the Tokugawa Shogunate (known for its strict class system) through hard work and violence, giving more insight to their actions in ''Bushi no Kodou'', especially during the Ikedaya Incident. Though most of their members are portrayed sympathetically, some of them are all too aware of their tendency to violence and their contradictory "honor code".

* WonTheWarLostThePeace: [[spoiler:The Boshin War ends with the victory of the Satcho Alliance. However, when Okubo started her vast plans of reform, many samurai of the Satsuma Domain resigned (including Saigo) in protest for the abolition of the samurai class, claiming that the country was becoming too "western". It eventually escalated with the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satsuma_Rebellion Satsuma Rebellion]] in 1877, which opposed the new Imperial Army against the former samurai of Satsuma, resulting in thousand of deaths, exceeding the Boshin War despite its smaller scale. After the death of Saigo, Okubo herself was killed in the aftermath by either former samurai loyal to Satsuma, or Okada Izou for the assassination of Sakamoto Ryouma.]]