Uchiha Chisen turned around and saw a girl with long, straight black hair standing behind him, hesitation written all over her face.
"Chisen, sir, I... I..."
Izumi suddenly faltered. Uchiha Chisen's stare made her nervous despite herself.
When I faced other senior officers, even Patriarch Fugaku, I could always muster the courage to talk to them.
Yet in front of this senior officer, Uchiha Chisen, I'm so nervous I don't even know what to say!
"Speak."
Uchiha Chisen spoke up.
Izumi jolted and hurriedly introduced herself. "My name is Uchiha Izumi! I took part in this year's Recruitment Assessment for the Konoha Military Police Force. When Patriarch Fugaku asked me to choose an examiner, I... I chose you, Chisen, sir."
Yet under the senior police officer's piercing scrutiny, her voice grew quieter and quieter.
By the end, she did not even dare raise her head to meet Uchiha Chisen's eyes.
"Your examiner? You chose me?"
Uchiha Chisen looked at the girl and remarked expressionlessly, "You look frail, but at least your courage is commendable."
Uchiha Chisen forced a smile that never reached his eyes. "Passing my assessment is simple. Go one month without making me want to kill you, and you pass."
"Oh, wait. A rat is trying to escape."
Izumi: "???"
Huh?
While Izumi stood bewildered, she watched in shock as Uchiha Chisen suddenly drew the Ninja Sword at his waist.
The Ninja Sword traced a silver arc through the air, and a splash of scarlet entered Izumi's field of vision.
The next second.
She watched a short man suddenly topple headfirst to the ground.
His left leg had been severed!
"Aaaaah!!!"
The short man's agonized screams and the smell of blood filling the air tested the limits of what Izumi could endure.
She instinctively stepped half a pace back.
Sweat beaded on her forehead from sheer nervousness.
"Uchiha Izumi." Uchiha Chisen flicked the blood off his blade.
"Huh?" Izumi, who had been worrying that the man on the ground might bleed to death, hurriedly looked up in alarm.
Uchiha Chisen frowned. "When I call your name, you say 'Here.'"
"Oh... ah, here!"
Izumi hastily corrected herself.
"You expect to join the police force with a voice that quiet?" Uchiha Chisen said coldly. "I can't hear a word you're saying. Is that all the resolve you have to join the police force? Can someone like you uphold [justice]? You might as well crawl home and be a good little girl!"
Patriarch Fugaku was right. Chisen really is strict. We've only just met, and he's already torn into me.
Izumi could only muster every ounce of strength.
Her little face flushed red with the effort.
"HERE!!!!"
Only when the coldness in his eyes eased a little did Izumi breathe a small sigh of relief.
"Um..." Izumi hesitated.
"Speak."
She hurriedly reminded him, "Sir, if the man on the ground doesn't receive treatment soon, he might bleed to death."
"How much longer can he live?" Uchiha Chisen calmly asked a question Izumi had not expected.
She answered rapidly, "He could go into shock within ten minutes."
"Plenty of time." Uchiha Chisen told Izumi, "Rookie, I have a task for you."
Izumi swallowed. "Sir, I haven't learned Medical Ninjutsu. Why don't... why don't we take him to Konoha Hospital?"
Uchiha Chisen glanced at her. "Who said anything about getting him treated?"
"Huh?" Izumi had lost count of how many times she had been left bewildered today.
She stammered, "You mean..."
Uchiha Chisen held out the Ninja Sword, and Izumi instinctively reached out to take it.
Uchiha Chisen's expression remained utterly impassive. "Prove your resolve to join the police force. Take this sword and interrogate him. Ask him where the child's body is. You have only ten minutes. If you can't get an answer, go home. Don't bother coming to see me tomorrow."
Inter...
Interrogate?
Izumi was dumbfounded. She could not help looking around. This was one of Konoha's busiest streets. As her gaze swept over her surroundings, she could not even count how many people were there!
Interrogate a civilian with a severed leg right out in the open?
And why ask about a child's body?
Is this how the Konoha Military Police Force always operates? Or is this just how Uchiha Chisen does things?
She tried to steal a glance at Uchiha Chisen's eyes.
She found his gaze growing steadily colder.
Izumi suddenly jolted.
The warnings from Patriarch Fugaku and that female police officer flashed through her mind.
"Do not disobey his orders if you want to survive."
"Good luck. Sometimes survival is a matter of luck, too."
Izumi was frightened.
She tightened her grip on the Ninja Sword, its hilt still warm, as cold sweat continued to seep from her smooth, pale forehead.
An overwhelming will to survive drove her a few steps forward. She questioned the short man, who was clutching his severed leg and wailing. "Y-you... where did you hide... hide that child's body?!"
A flicker of panic crossed the short man's anguished, despairing eyes.
"Hurry... hurry and take me to Konoha Hospital! Aaaaah!"
Instead of answering Izumi's timid questioning, he shouted in terror, "I'm getting dizzier and dizzier! There's more and more blood! Am I going to die? Save me! I don't want to die! Hurry... hurry and save me!!!"
I don't want to die either! Izumi screamed inwardly.
"Where exactly did you hide the child's body?"
Izumi tried to calm herself. She believed Chisen would never make her ask this question without a reason, and pressed on. "I can only take you to Konoha Hospital if you answer me right away. You won't last more than a few minutes!"
The short man kept shouting in terror. "I don't know anything about a child! I don't know anything! Please, save me!"
"Sir..."
Izumi tried to turn to Uchiha Chisen for help, only to find him standing with his arms folded, watching coldly.
She could not read even the slightest trace of emotion in those indifferent eyes.
Suddenly, she felt as though she were suffocating.
That feeling...
Izumi knew it well.
On the Nine-Tails Night several years ago, she had experienced that same sensation when she encountered the enormous Nine-Tails monster: the desperate, suffocating feeling that her life was about to end!
Once again, Izumi's will to survive overcame her sympathy. Hardening her heart, she gripped the Ninja Sword and pressed it against the short man's neck. Through gritted teeth, she said, "Last chance! Where is the child's body?"
The sharp blade had already drawn a thin line of blood across the short man's neck.
The short man's eyes widened in terror. The faint pain at his neck sent him into a panic. "I... I didn't mean to... I never meant to kill her. You have to believe me! You really have to believe me! She... she was my daughter, after all..."
"I was only playing with her. I... I didn't think she'd die... I threw her into the dry well in the yard."
Izumi froze.
The short man's broken words revealed something that shook her to her core: the man Chisen had ordered her to interrogate in public had actually killed his own daughter! He had even thrown her body into a dry well!
He was a murderer!
"Rookie. This is your first lesson in enforcing [justice] as a member of the Konoha Military Police Force." Uchiha Chisen's voice slowly rose behind Izumi. "Always carry out the orders I give you."
"No questioning them."
"No resisting them."
"No mistakes."
Before you continue