The Eve of the Mission

The next morning, Orochimaru's team advanced toward the Land of Ash. Their guide was the father and daughter Ye Zi had encountered the night before: Bōjiān Shenmu and Bōjiān Yán Yè. The moment the latter saw Ye Zi, her eyes once again gleamed with eagerness. If Shenmu had not kept glaring angrily at her, she might have gone straight to Ye Zi for a match. She was a complete battle maniac.

Along the way, Kotoha kept glancing at Ye Zi, her eyes burning with enthusiasm. Ye Zi, however, acted as though he saw nothing. This strange behavior caught Kushina and Bei Xingye's attention. They secretly observed Ye Zi and Kotoha, even guessing that something had happened when Ye Zi went out the previous night to cause this situation. They were right.

Faced with Kotoha's not-so-subtle provocation, Ye Zi could only ignore her helplessly. He was puzzled. Even if Kotoha was a complete battle maniac, she should have gone after Kushina, who was also female. Instead, she kept staring at him. What he did not know was that Kotoha had chosen him because he was the first great-nation shinobi she had ever fought.

"At this speed, we should reach the Land of Ash's alert line by the Xu hour today." Shenmu looked ahead as he spoke to Orochimaru, who was leaping alongside him.

Orochimaru nodded slightly. From the corner of his eye, he glanced at Kotoha, who showed not the slightest seriousness toward the mission. A trace of obvious displeasure appeared in his eyes, and Shenmu easily noticed it.

Seeing this, Shenmu pulled out a faint bitter smile. This mission was extremely important. For Kotoha, who had never undertaken a high-difficulty mission, it was also a crucial trial—one that could completely transform her attitude. That was why he had gone to such great lengths to bring her along. Yet he had never expected her to deliberately challenge Ye Zi on the eve of the mission. Challenging him would have been one thing, but she had not even won decisively. As a result, her frivolous attitude that morning had displeased Orochimaru.

As fellow mission operatives, a lack of trust was an extremely dangerous source of instability.

Orochimaru understood this. He acknowledged Shenmu's strength, but not Kotoha, who looked as though she had come out to play.

Shenmu understood this as well. Thus, even as he smiled bitterly, he was already considering how to make Orochimaru see Kotoha's usefulness as soon as possible and eliminate his distrust.

The trees on either side of their vision rapidly fell behind. Shenmu continued staring ahead, his eyes faintly solemn. After thinking for a long while, he finally decided to have Kotoha lead the way and eliminate the first batch of critical sentries in the Land of Ash.

They traveled in silence. Only after night fell and the crescent moon rose did Orochimaru's team arrive at the location they had chosen from the beginning—a place far from the Land of Ash's sentries where they could take a brief rest.

Although this place was still quite far from the sentries scattered throughout the Land of Ash, lighting a fire at night remained an unwise choice. Everyone found a place to sit, began a brief rest, and ate dry rations to replenish some energy.

Shenmu and Orochimaru used the faint moonlight to examine a map showing the sentries' distribution. Comparing it with the terrain, they roughly determined where the sentries were positioned. The intelligence map was not completely accurate, so it could only serve as a reference. Many sentry locations had not been marked on it.

"There are only seven fixed sentries whose positions can be confirmed. The areas guarded by the rest are uncertain, and there are roughly thirty undiscovered sentries." Shenmu pointed at the seven colored dots.

Orochimaru stared intently at the crude terrain intelligence map. His gaze lingered especially on the dotted lines between the circles. After a long while, a sharp glint flashed in his eyes. He pointed at the right side of the map, where the sentries were somewhat more densely distributed, and said in a low voice, "We'll use this point as our breakthrough. This is the weakest link connecting the fixed sentries."

Shenmu was slightly stunned. That side of the map was clearly the most difficult point to break through, yet he did not understand why Orochimaru had chosen it.

Ye Zi and the others, who had rested sufficiently, gathered around as well.

Hearing Orochimaru's words, Kotoha clenched her fists and said with slight excitement, "Now that's interesting."

Orochimaru cast her a cold glance before turning back to his students. All of them looked thoughtful, as though they had grasped something.

A closer look revealed that the sentry positions on the crude terrain map were actually centered around the seven fixed sentries, forming a tightly woven alert network. That much could be seen from the intelligence map. However, there was no detailed information about how long it took the sentries to relay messages. Thus, if they casually touched even one small point in the network, it could easily trigger the whole system.

They chose the point on the right that appeared the most difficult to breach because it was farthest from the fixed sentries. However, with an assassination mission, they had to prepare themselves mentally to face numerous enemies after completing the task before they even began the infiltration. That was unavoidable.

The only difference was that every second the sentries remained undetected after being eliminated would give them one more second to carry out the mission. That single second might even allow them to retreat in time.

Shenmu was the first to understand. He nodded and said, "I understand."

Put simply, infiltrating enemy territory to assassinate a nation's ruler was itself a perilous road from which one might never return. It was unrealistic to expect to sneak in and simply kill the target. No matter what, they would have to face a large number of enemies after the mission succeeded.

This was a mission with only one chance.

The time they needed to seize in the first step was not meant to increase the likelihood of completing the mission, but to increase their chances of returning safely.

Before the mission even began, Orochimaru had already gained a general understanding of Shenmu and Kotoha's abilities. He looked at Shenmu and said calmly, "My team happens to have people with strong reconnaissance abilities. They'll locate the sentries. After that, I'll leave it to you."

Shenmu nodded heavily. He suddenly looked at Kotoha and said seriously, "When it comes to silently killing enemies with poison, Kotoha is better at it than I am."

His words contained no recommendation. He seemed merely to be stating a fact.

Orochimaru glanced at the excited-looking Kotoha in surprise and fell into thought. He truly did not trust her, especially in her current state. It was difficult for anyone to have confidence in her.

"I'll do it, I'll do it!" At this, Kotoha suddenly raised her hand, her face filled with excitement and confidence.

"Can she handle it?" Orochimaru stared at Shenmu instead of looking at Kotoha.

Before Shenmu could say anything, Kotoha had already turned seriously toward Orochimaru and said angrily, "I can."

Shenmu rubbed his forehead in distress. At that moment, it was difficult for him to say that Kotoha really was capable of handling the mission.

"Orochimaru, she might be able to do it." Ye Zi suddenly spoke, and everyone else present looked at him in surprise.

Kushina and Bei Xingye glanced at Ye Zi, then at Kotoha. In truth, after thinking it through, they were more inclined to have Shenmu take on the mission. After all, this was the most important step.

After speaking, Ye Zi looked at Kotoha again. His gaze was sharp as he said solemnly, "The time gained by silently eliminating the sentries may become the shield that lets us retreat in time. If the mission fails, die here."

When it came to assassination, Ye Zi did not consider himself inferior to Kotoha. However, if he wanted to assassinate at high speed, he would inevitably make some noise. Especially when lightning wrapped around him—the sound aside, the radiance alone would be like a beacon in the darkness. Thus, he could not shoulder this crucial first step.

The excitement on Kotoha's face slowly faded. She gradually turned toward Ye Zi, her expression shifting slightly. A moment later, she said seriously, "I understand. If the mission fails, I won't return alive."

Orochimaru, who had not spoken, heard this and the corner of his mouth lifted slightly. A guarantee that staked her life was enough to give him a preliminary measure of trust in Kotoha.

When Shenmu heard Kotoha say this, he showed not the slightest concern. Aside from feeling somewhat helpless about Kotoha's behavior, he had absolute confidence in her in every other regard.

"She's the future star of our Grass Shinobi. Just wait. One day..." Shenmu thought silently.