...If his goal was to abduct Kekkei Genkai users to his own village, then he had deliberately left those clues for us to follow!
With his strength, even if he had inevitably left footprints and bloodstains while abducting Hirohiko and Yukina, he could have erased them.
And even if Kakashi and the other two had awakened while he was erasing the traces, he had more than enough strength to kill them or put them back into that blank-minded state.
He could have erased all those traces, yet he had not done so.
Moreover, Kakashi and the other two had followed those traces and encountered those two Iwa Ninja. That was suspicious.
From the standpoint of someone who knew the original plot, all this was bound to happen.
But this was a complete world, a world built upon the Naruto World setting. Everything that happened had causes and consequences; nothing happened for no reason.
Kakashi and the others following the trail and running into those two Iwa Ninja was itself a matter of cause and effect.
For example, if in the original plot, Higure and the Camouflage Concealment Iwa Ninja had been carrying out some unshown mission, then Kakashi and the others had merely happened upon them. That was an inevitable coincidence.
But now, with Hirohiko and Yukina involved and the timeline moved forward, this was no longer merely a chance encounter.
It was very likely inevitable—an inevitability brought about by someone.
In other words, that enemy had deliberately left the footprints behind so someone would pursue him, then be ambushed and killed by Iwa!
Half-crouched atop a snapped branch at the edge of the primeval forest, Chiba gazed toward the bamboo grove ahead. Green flames blazed in his eyes, and his brows furrowed tightly as that ominous feeling of "not