For the crime of drawing his sword in the palace, En'ya Hangan was ordered to commit seppuku. Dressed in white, he took his seat for the ritual. Ishido Umanojo and Yakushiji Jirozaemon had come as official witnesses.
Hangan was waiting for his chief retainer, Oboshi Yuranosuke, who was to hurry from the home province. "Has Yuranosuke not come?" "He has not yet arrived." However often he asked, Yuranosuke did not come. At last the hour arrived, and Hangan drove a dagger nine and a half inches long into his belly.
Just then Yuranosuke came running down the hanamichi, out of breath. "Yuranosuke, I have waited for you so long." "My lord." Gasping in pain, Hangan gave Yuranosuke the dagger he had cut himself with as a keepsake, and without words entrusted him with his bitter wish: "Kill Moronao with this blade." Then he breathed his last.
Yuranosuke stared at the dagger stained with his lord's blood, licked the blood from its tip, and vowed revenge in his heart.
After Hangan's body had been sent off, the mansion was handed over. Some retainers insisted, "We should raid Moronao's mansion at once," but Yuranosuke held them back, telling them, "For now, we surrender the castle."
Outside the gate, Yuranosuke looked back at the castle, took the keepsake dagger from his robe, and gazed at it alone. Here the curtain falls.
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In history, when the abolition of the Asano house was decided, fierce debate broke out at Ako Castle in the home province over whether to hold the castle, die with their lord, or surrender it. The chief retainer Oishi Kuranosuke decided to give up the castle without bloodshed, to keep alive the hope of restoring the Asano house. At the same time he secretly resolved to avenge his lord and gathered comrades.
At the site of Ako Castle, the gatehouse of Oishi Kuranosuke's residence still stands, and next to it is Oishi Shrine, dedicated to the forty-seven ronin.