Two hours later, at the Mission Office.
"Mr. Onoda, please give me last month's personnel assignments. I need to know how everyone was arranged last month."
Chiba's respectful, polite voice rang through the staff-only office area of the Mission Office.
"Yes!"
Very quickly, a relatively young voice responded amid the bustling office, where people came and went and an air of frantic activity hit one head-on.
"Sister Natsume, these are today's assignment forms for village D-rank missions. You can take them and post them. I've also had Shao Si notify the lower offices and the assigned ninja."
Before that "yes" had even faded, Chiba spoke again.
"Yes!"
This time, Chiba received a response in the sweet voice of a young woman.
"Deputy Director Noda, here is the roster of newly arrived Hyuga Clan and Uchiha Clan personnel. They will mainly be responsible for covert sentry and alert missions. They all need to be split up and reorganized, so I'll leave this to you."
Almost at the same time as that "yes," Chiba spoke again.
"Understood."
A steady middle-aged man's voice promptly answered Chiba.
"Also, there's a problem here and here. This cannot be used by the C-rank mission assignment group."
"As for the B-rank mission assignment group, this B-rank mission already involves wartime operations. We need to wait for the Hokage's decision."
"A-rank missions are not for us to consider. Send them directly to the Hokage!"
With each response, Chiba almost immediately issued a second or third order. His voice added an even more race-against-time urgency to the already busy office.
This...
This really was...
Truly...
At that moment, Tanaka Shin sat in the office reserved for the department head and looked outside. His eyes widened as he stared at the boy seated amid piles of documents at the very