"Good work, Lord Chiba."
"Lord Chiba."
"Welcome back, Lord Chiba."
As Chiba stepped into the dim stone chamber used to house Anbu Ninja, a shift had just come off duty, and there were already five or six Anbu Ninja inside. Noticing Chiba enter, they all nodded in greeting.
"Good work, everyone."
In response, Chiba temporarily set aside the growing doubts in his heart and nodded back to each of them.
These Anbu Ninja also supported Kushina and Minato Namikaze. Setting aside all those messy positions surrounding the major matter of a Nine-Tails Jinchuriki giving birth, these people were risking their lives to protect Kushina. They were also the people supporting him. From a personal standpoint, Chiba had quite a favorable impression of these Anbu Ninja whom he had never met before and did not truly know even now.
Besides, they were now comrades striving toward the same goal, so Chiba felt rather close to these Anbu Ninja.
Moreover, from their voices, this batch of Anbu Ninja seemed fairly young, probably in their twenties or thirties. The age gap was not too great, leaving little of the barrier that came with a generation gap. In terms of mental age, Chiba was actually about the same as them.
Therefore, Chiba felt quite close to them at this moment. Yesterday, he had exchanged a few words with the Anbu Ninja from another shift as well, and they had gotten along fairly well.
"No! It wasn't hard at all."
Seeing Chiba return their greeting, the Anbu Ninja hurriedly shook their heads. Some even began waving their hands, looking rather flattered.
"Then I can't say I had it hard either."
Chiba smiled faintly as he spoke.
The moment those words came out, all the Anbu Ninja froze. Then they looked at one another, unsure how