Prejudice is like a mountain, no matter how hard you try, you can't move it

"...You old bastard, what the hell are you babbling about?"

Kosaka was stunned for a moment, then burst into laughter, the blood smeared across his face making him look even more ferocious.

He seemed to be trying to intimidate the old man before him.

But his eyes kept darting around restlessly, taking in the room's layout and spotting the torture instruments.

Barbed whips, flesh-hooks, branding irons, braziers...

"Ha!" Seeing those things, Kosaka instead let out a relieved breath, staring hard at the old man and saying in a frigid tone, "That brat actually thought you and these antiques could crack me open?"

Kirigakure Anbu's anti-interrogation training was brutally harsh. He'd experienced these common tools countless times before. With his resolve to die, he could easily hold out for ten days or half a month.

But besides the usual implements, there was also a "bronze bull" about the size of a live cow, and an iron human-shaped barrel.

Kosaka couldn't figure out what those two things did—at least on the surface, they didn't look threatening.

Yet Baiyu still didn't answer his question. He simply opened the ninja tool pouch on the wooden table and searched through Kosaka's belongings.

Kunai, shuriken, Soldier Pills, some everyday tools, and two bottles of medicine.

Baiyu sniffed one of the bottles and immediately identified several anesthetic herbs, though many other ingredients were unrecognizable—clearly a specialized anesthetic concocted by Kirigakure Anbu.

In the other bottle, he detected the scent of "Coca Leaves," a herb that stimulates the central nervous system, suppresses appetite, and relieves fatigue.

"Are these specially made external and internal injury medicines?" Baiyu turned to look at Kosaka, as if appraising a priceless treasure, and smiled. "It seems you're a ninja of no low rank in Kirigakure."

Kosaka's face twitched almost imperceptibly. "Who the hell are you people? And that brat—why can't I sense his chakra..."

Baiyu had been watching him closely. Seeing that slight twitch of the skin, he nodded to himself.

That unconscious, tiny movement proved Kosaka truly feared Lord Yun Chuan—fear mixed with dread of the unknown.

As long as he could still feel fear, things were manageable. The worst were those who feared neither death nor pain, who wouldn't utter a word even when tortured senseless.

With that thought, Baiyu walked up to Kosaka and said in a low, rumbling voice, "I'm just an old man with not many days left, who never had the talent to become a ninja, and wants to burn himself out before death."

"As for why you can't sense Lord Yun Chuan's chakra..."

He paused there, then smiled. "Because he's like us—what you people call someone with 'no ninja talent.'"

No... ninja talent?

Hearing this, Kosaka froze, as if trying to grasp what "someone with no ninja talent" meant.

Gradually, his eyes, blurred by dried blood, widened. Everything before him was a haze of red.

Kosaka finally understood why his Hidden Mist Technique had never detected that brat from start to finish.

Even if the "answer" to the problem was so unbelievable, now that he thought about it, only that one conclusion was possible.

"That brat... isn't a ninja at all? Doesn't know any ninjutsu?!"

That's right! That was it!

The "Hidden Mist Technique" wasn't a special jutsu that sensed enemies through physical form—it detected enemies through the fluctuations of "foreign chakra."

But Yun Chuan had never used ninjutsu, hadn't even refined chakra, and had no chakra fluctuations whatsoever!

Add to that his speed, which was no different from the Body Flicker Technique—maybe even a bit faster.

His special method of concealing all presence, and that bizarrely extreme Assassination Art...

If Kosaka hadn't used the Hidden Mist Technique, he might have been able to stall with other jutsu.

But he'd been clever and chosen the Hidden Mist Technique, instead giving the brat the perfect assassination environment.

"Damn it! Damn it!! I lost to a brat who can't use any ninjutsu?!" Kosaka growled, fury reaching its peak.

Yet amid his rage, a deep shock took root.

To achieve that level without using ninjutsu?

Truly...

"Unbelievable?"

Baiyu nodded and laughed heartily. "If you find it unbelievable, that's right. I find it unbelievable too."

Even without learning those ninjutsu, one could still capture a powerful ninja alive—how incredible was that?

But that lord was exactly such a miracle-maker, such an unbelievable person!

"Tch!"

Seeing Baiyu's "smug little man" expression, Kosaka gritted his teeth, his face darkening.

But soon, a smile crept onto his face.

"Hahaha, you think you've won?"

Kosaka's lips slowly curled into a sneer. "Those old-fashioned torture tools are useless on me."

"I know." Baiyu smiled.

"You won't get any information out of me. If you've got the guts, just kill me!"

"I know." Baiyu kept smiling.

"What do you know?!" Kosaka's forehead bulged with veins as he roared. "You don't know anything!"

"There's no need to shout so loudly. This interrogation room is specially made—no matter how loud you yell, no one outside can hear a thing."

Baiyu shook his head, then laughed heartily. "I said it before, didn't I? Compared to you ninja, I'm just an ordinary person with no talent whatsoever."

"Before I met Lord Yun Chuan, I made a living gathering herbs and practicing medicine. I saw too much suffering, and I nearly got killed myself by Amegakure ninja who mistook me for a spy."

"So, to be able to help Lord Yun Chuan, I sought out the methods of ordinary people."

As he spoke, the expression on his honest, simple face began to shift little by little.

His eyes grew brighter and brighter, as if gleaming with light, gradually turning somewhat manic.

"When they suspect you're a spy, you'd better damn well be one! So—medicine merchant, intelligence agent—that's the path I chose."

"And death by a thousand cuts is a technique I only recently learned from Lord Yun Chuan."

Baiyu picked up a scalpel from the table beside him. While sterilizing it, he lowered his head and explained, "I hear the highest level of death by a thousand cuts is a thousand slices, but I'm really not talented, so at most I can manage a hundred and twenty-four."

As he spoke, he squinted one eye, pinching the scalpel and aiming it at Kosaka.

"First cut, the brows; second cut, the shoulders; third cut, the chest; fourth cut, the arms; fifth cut, the elbows; sixth cut, the flesh of the thighs; seventh cut, the calves; eighth cut..."

Watching the old man gesture with the knife over his own body, Kosaka's heart began to flood with uncontrollable fear.

From brows to shoulders, from chest to arms, from elbows to thighs, and finally...

"The hands."

Baiyu's words suddenly stalled. He held the sharp blade over Kosaka's hands and said apologetically, "Sorry, I forgot you don't have hands anymore."

"Ah, what a shame. I won't be able to break my record."

Hearing his voice grow fainter, almost like a mutter, Kosaka began to tremble and gradually couldn't hold on.

"Y-you bastard... you're just an ordinary person, a weakling no better than a pig or a dog..."

Kosaka's face twitched uncontrollably, his body shaking involuntarily, his expression caught between rage and utter terror as he murmured, "You must be trying to bluff me... you just want information, that's it..."

"Hahaha, you don't believe me? No matter, no matter."

Baiyu laughed loudly, then squinted his eyes and gradually withdrew his smile. "Like Lord Yun Chuan says, the prejudice in people's hearts is a mountain—no matter how hard you try, you'll never move it."

"Don't worry. You prepared medicine to keep yourself from passing out."

With that, he picked up a medicine bottle from the side and smiled. "To thank you, I have plenty of time. I'll take my time playing with you."

"..."

"Ah!!"

Amid the hoarse screams and wails of agony, the candlelight in the entire room flickered and dimmed.

Meanwhile, in the guest room next door.

"...This story teaches us that what hinders us from discovering and creating is nothing more than the psychological barriers and stubborn stones in our minds."

Yun Chuan lay on the bed, his gentle voice like a lullaby beside a cradle. He looked down at Shigure, who had just fallen asleep in his arms.

As if he had heard something, he suddenly smiled and whispered, "Sweet dreams."

With that, he slowly closed his eyes and soon drifted into sleep.