Azuma ended up being more difficult than I’d initially expected. His way of speaking is very masculine, but also slightly archaic. It’s not as archaic as Saiga and Koga, and I recognized most of the grammar, but his masculine-yet-formal-yet-dated way of speaking took me longer to process, as did some of the interactions he had with other feudal lords where there was a lot of archaic formal/humble Japanese going around. Also because of the state his country is in at the time of this story, there was a lot of exposition and words I was unfamiliar with, having to do with political factions, war, and other topics I’d not come across before. But that definitely made for an interesting story! And there’s probably some errors in my translations, so if you catch anything off, please let me know.
You may be able to tell from the outfit he wears, or from his country name, but Azuma is from a quasi-Japan setting. Specifically, we can tell this from the name for his country: 承和. These two kanji together can be read different ways. For Azuma’s story, it’s being read as “Soga”, however it is also read as “Jōwa” or “Shōwa”. If you know your Japanese history, Jōwa/Shōwa is a real era in Japan that spanned from 834 to 848 within the Heian Period. A whole bunch of stuff happened during this time, which you can research if you’d like, but of particular importance that I’ll point is this was when Chinese influence was declining and the warrior class rose up as a power factor in Japan. Azuma fits the image of that ideal warrior that was on the rise during this time: skilled at combat yet striving for peace, stoic and brave, concerned with the safety of others, etc. Also he’s got ninjas, which were very popular in the Sengoku Period but theoretically made their first appearance in Japanese history in the Heian Period.
This is not the period of Japan many of us may be familiar with as being depicted in media. I think the Sengoku Period (also called the Warring States Period) and the Meiji/Edo Periods gets a lot more attention in popular culture, especially what’s brought over to other countries, but there are times when the Heian Period has been depicted in anime and video games if you know what to look for. For example, the spirit in Hikaru no Go is from the Heian Period. I did not know this prior to looking it up for writing this post, but I figured it gave some context if you’re familiar with the series.