Rainy Night

The next few days were unexpectedly peaceful.

Lin Ke had assumed that after entering the Land of Rivers, attacks would become even more frequent than before. Yet, to his surprise, there had not been a single incident for several days, and the caravan safely reached its destination—

A somewhat bustling town.

The streets teemed with people, and cries of vendors rang out without end. Pedestrians wearing conical hats could be seen everywhere.

Because it was close to the Land of Rain, were there so many people from the Land of Rain?

Lin Ke swept his gaze over the pedestrians approaching the caravan, fulfilling the duty expected of a bodyguard.

"Don't be so tense." Nara Yan Shui spoke casually. "For a B-Rank Mission, once we get here, it's already more than halfway over. No one would carry out an assassination in broad daylight in a city."

"That would break the rules."

The wealthy and powerful allowed private assassinations, but that did not mean they were willing to accept the unchecked destruction of order.

No matter how rotten the Land of Rivers was, it was still a resource-rich country. Other nations would give it at least some respect.

The caravan paraded through the streets and soon arrived at a hotel. As usual, Lin Ke took Yuan Wei and Xia on a security patrol of the nearby area when he suddenly sensed someone watching him and turned his head.

That was a female ninja from Sunagakure. She was quite pretty, with short golden hair tied into four small ponytails. She wore a light purple long-sleeved, form-fitting short dress over a one-piece mesh bodysuit, and carried an enormous fan on her back.

Her height was roughly... one meter fifty-five.

Due to his sensitivity toward height, Lin Ke swiftly determined her precise height.

Their gazes met from afar for a moment before they each looked away.

That appearance, and a ninja from Sunagakure... Temari? he guessed. If the target really was Temari, then that meant Sunagakure's jonin sent to secure the Gold Mine would be Baki—

The elite Sunagakure jonin who had one-shotted the protagonist of Shippuden.

If they ended up fighting...

Lin Ke considered countermeasures. As a transmigrator, he knew the information on all sorts of famous characters like the back of his hand. It would be difficult for any named character to be killed on their first encounter, and he could naturally conduct a certain degree of battle simulation based on the information from his previous life.

Sure enough, Sunagakure placed great importance on the Gold Mine.

Moreover, at this very moment, Sunagakure should have already prepared the Konoha Crush Plan. After all, according to the databooks, both Temari and Kankuro had graduated at the age of twelve, then waited to go to Konoha for the Chunin Exams as part of the Konoha Crush Plan rather than advancing in rank early...

So even though Konoha and Sunagakure were still allies at this time, he could not let down his guard.

After making a round of the area around the hotel, Lin Ke returned to the hotel entrance at the agreed time to meet up with his teammates. Only then did he learn that Sunagakure was not the only village that had come; Amegakure had come as well.

Officials of the Land of Rivers had assigned the merchants from the three countries to three adjacent hotels, which was why they had run into one another.

The three of them gathered their information and reported it to Nara Yan Shui, who was guarding the Land of Fire Merchant.

"I understand." Nara Yan Shui nodded. "Everyone, work a little harder tonight." —That night, the moon was hidden and the wind howled. Perhaps because they were too close to the Land of Rain, a light drizzle began to fall after nightfall.

"Drip, drip, drip."

Raindrops continuously struck the ground, spreading ripples through the puddles.

"Hm?!"

Lin Ke, who had been leaning against the wall and silently waiting for time to pass, suddenly straightened. He felt his stamina drain a little more than usual.

That meant his shadow had detected something unusual and changed from two-dimensional to three-dimensional. The increased consumption from standing upright was its way of warning him.

He refined chakra, formed hand seals, and released—

Clone Technique.

Lin Ke gripped a kunai, opened the window, and climbed onto the rooftop. His clone stood at the edge, looking toward the hotel opposite them.

That was the hotel where the merchants from the Land of Rain and the Amegakure ninja were staying.

From the rooftop, he could not tell what exactly was happening over there. He gathered chakra at the tip of his nose and twitched his nostrils. A blood scent diluted by the rain flooded into his nasal cavity.

His gaze lowered. The water in the drainage ditch of the hotel opposite had already turned dark red.

Something had happened... Lin Ke did not rush over. He merely raised his guard in silence. If the Amegakure people died, then they died; it had nothing to do with him. But he had to worry that after killing the Amegakure ninja, the murderer would turn around and attack them.

Crash! A window shattered, and an Amegakure ninja wearing a respirator flew out and landed by the street. His face was bluish, and a bowl-sized hole pierced through his chest and back. After hitting the ground, he swiftly showed no further signs of life.

Lin Ke could not help glancing toward the window. In the faint light, he saw the ninja inside—

An adult man wearing a conical hat, with an Amegakure Forehead Protector hanging around his neck. He was not wearing Amegakure's most iconic respirator, and there was a scar on his right cheek. When he noticed a Konoha brat watching him, he returned a provocative look.

A rogue ninja? No...

Lin Ke stood calmly where he was. Under the cover of the rainy night, the shadow beside him silently slipped from its two-dimensional plane to beneath the hotel, ready to spring up and attack at any moment.

In their four-man team, jonin Nara Yan Shui was responsible for the most crucial protection and would not leave the merchant's side for even a step. Of the other three, Lin Ke was the chunin who needed to make decisions and give orders.

A corpse had hit the ground. Even with the rain concealing the sound, Yuan Wei and Xia, who were standing guard downstairs, had surely heard it.

Even if he had been provoked, he could not make any move to attack.

For the mission, he could not create unnecessary complications.

"Drip, drip." Rainwater dripped from Lin Ke's sleeves. As though petrified, he watched from above in the increasingly heavy rain as this group of Amegakure "rogue ninja" slaughtered everyone in an entire hotel before calmly withdrawing.

Only after those ninja had gone far away did he withdraw his gaze, return to the hotel, dispel the Clone Technique, endure his soaking-wet clothes, and silently guard the high ground.

He did not sleep all night.

In the morning, the Land of Fire Merchant headed to the Gold Mine bidding site, and Lin Ke followed behind in clothes that were still somewhat damp.

"Good job." Nara Yan Shui deliberately fell back a few steps and walked parallel to him—those who understood why they could not walk side by side, understood—without stinting on his praise. Then he quickened his pace and returned to the middle of the group.

Could the jonin have noticed the abnormality at the hotel opposite? There was no doubt about it. He might even have discovered it earlier than Lin Ke had.

Lin Ke felt slightly pleased. No matter what, at least up to this point, all of his performances as a chunin promoted beyond the usual standard had been satisfactory.

Otherwise, he would not have earned a word of praise from a jonin.

But... an Amegakure ninja without a respirator made him think further. According to the manga's timeline, Amegakure should still have been in the midst of civil strife at this time.

Salamander Hanzo should not have fallen yet. After all, the Amegakure ninja in the Chunin Exams still wore respirators...

In other words, the ninja who attacked the hotel last night were very likely from Akatsuki. Then would Akatsuki give up on this Gold Mine?