The Saint of Thieves

Yuhara, who was singled out, followed Orochimaru to the command tent of the camp. His teammates, less than half an hour after entering the camp, had already departed on another mission.

Upon arriving at the tent, Yuhara casually surveyed the surroundings. How to describe it? It was certainly a place fit for a person. If possible, he would have preferred to go with his teammates on that reconnaissance mission. Although reconnaissance missions were always high-risk, he genuinely didn't want to be alone with Orochimaru. Normal people simply couldn't comprehend what Orochimaru was thinking or planning to do.

Besides the two of them, there was no one else in the tent.

Orochimaru didn't waste any time and spoke directly, "Yuhara, I have a mission for you."

This opening was a little better than Yuhara had expected. He had thought Orochimaru might say something like, "Don't say anything else, let's draw some blood first."

"Please, tell me. I'm listening."

Although Yuhara felt that as a background character, he should do things befitting his role, as a "Konoha Ninja," he couldn't refuse an order from the highest commander on the front lines.

"..."

Yuhara's attitude struck Orochimaru as a bit odd, but he couldn't quite pinpoint why.

"The requirements are simple. I want you to go to a certain place and search for a certain item. Based on the intelligence I've gathered over the years, there are a few suspicious locations. You will be responsible for one of them," Orochimaru stated directly.

As he spoke, he handed Yuhara a detailed map with marked points.

Yuhara examined the map and realized that the area marked by Orochimaru required crossing through a zone where Konoha and Kumogakure frequently clashed. Furthermore, the location was actually within Kumogakure's sphere of influence. By this point alone, the mission was already quite dangerous.

"Lord Orochimaru, shouldn't such an important mission be entrusted to someone more reliable?"

After some thought, Yuhara decided to subtly remind Orochimaru.

"Due to a small misunderstanding that occurred not long ago, the village is keeping a close eye on me. In reality, I'm a bit short-handed. Under these circumstances, you are someone I can trust," Orochimaru explained.

Yuhara: "..."

What did he mean by a "small misunderstanding"? Now Yuhara understood. Orochimaru was doing private work behind Konoha's back, and the so-called search for an item was undoubtedly for his various anti-human experiments.

Orochimaru was truly relentless when it came to such matters.

"Lord Orochimaru, if you send someone like me, who has no ties to Konoha, to carry out this mission alone, what if I never return?"

Yuhara was curious why Orochimaru would entrust such a clandestine matter to him, wasn't he afraid Yuhara would just run off?

Trust? Did Orochimaru trust anyone else?

"The brutal Ninja World War is still ongoing. The situation for the Five Great Shinobi Villages is dire, but even more tragic than the great villages are the smaller ones. As for rogue ninja? They can only be described as a sight for sore eyes. There is simply no place in this small world to escape the flames of war... Where do you want to go?"

Orochimaru's words were like a critical hit. He chuckled softly, then continued, "Yuhara, have no doubt, you are a Konoha Ninja right now."

As he spoke, he handed Yuhara another item.

Yuhara stared at the item for a few moments before reluctantly reaching out and taking it... It was a Konoha headband. Although they were commonplace, Yuhara had never owned one before.

"The specific mission requirements and the characteristics of the item you need to find are all written on this scroll. However, you can only open it once you are near the mission location.

Also, if by chance you are very lucky and do find the mission item, you can use this other scroll for storage."

Orochimaru presented two more scrolls: one for the mission and one for storage.

Yuhara took them. "A storage scroll... Is it useful? How do I use it? Can I have a few more?"

"..." These three questions of "freebie" left Orochimaru stunned.

"You really don't know the meaning of politeness," Orochimaru said, explaining to Yuhara how to use the storage scroll while reluctantly shoving a few empty scrolls into his hands.

After finishing his instructions and paying a small price, Orochimaru urged Yuhara to depart as soon as possible and waved him away.

Orochimaru seemed to truly trust Yuhara with the mission, but Yuhara himself lacked confidence. As for whether he would undertake the mission, of course he would. A ninja had no right to refuse a mission, but that didn't mean Yuhara couldn't drag his feet.

Orochimaru had mentioned there were several suspicious locations, and the one Yuhara was assigned might not even have anything. Even if there was something... who could prove it?

In short, he had to put on a show when necessary.

With Orochimaru's mission order in hand, Yuhara resupplied some items from the camp's logistics. After wandering around for quite some time and finding no valid reason to stay any longer, he finally left the camp and began moving towards the northeast.

Once he had roughly escaped the surveillance radius of the Konoha camp, Yuhara immediately stopped. Without a word, he took out the mission scroll and unrolled it.

Open it only when you reach the mission location? We're all reliable adults here. Where's the trust between people?

Then, Yuhara understood what Orochimaru was looking for... corpses.

The corpses of Konoha's Second Hokage and Kumogakure's Gold and Silver Brothers.

Upon seeing this, Yuhara's first reaction was, "Weren't the Second Hokage cremated in time?" Then he thought, that seemed to be a mistaken impression.

His second reaction was...

"I've been tricked."

After understanding Orochimaru's objective, Yuhara suddenly lost the desire to procrastinate. He genuinely wanted to search that suspicious location now. The Second Hokage, who had left all the good stuff to Konoha and made his dying wishes clear, was a stingy old man. If Yuhara remembered correctly, the Gold and Silver Brothers should have dropped a pile of equipment when they died.

After the deaths of the Gold and Silver Brothers, Kumogakure's only remaining divine tool was the "Amber Jar," which meant the rest of their belongings were taken by them at the time.

Yuhara wanted to pick up loot. After all, there was a living example: a certain Sunagakure puppet master became a winner in life by adhering to the principle of "teammates fight, I loot the bodies."

Without much hesitation, Yuhara made up his mind. He decided to give it a try, because this matter was indeed worth trying. The fact that Orochimaru and his subordinates could simultaneously perform Impure World Reincarnation on the Second Hokage and the Gold and Silver Brothers indicated that someone had indeed found their corpses.

As for why Orochimaru didn't obtain the Gold and Silver Brothers' ninja tools, the reason was easy to guess... they were stolen, just like what Yuhara intended to do.

In any case, Orochimaru only wanted the corpses; he didn't have any intelligence regarding the ninja tools.

So, the question was, how could he quickly reach that location and then withdraw immediately, whether he found any loot or not?

Doing this kind of job definitely calls for a quick in-and-out.

And soon enough, a certain idea surfaced in Yuhara's mind.

He decided to be a bit bolder and borrow (steal) something to cross the front lines.

What should he borrow? Naturally, it would be the "prestigious reputation" that could intimidate Kumogakure ninja when necessary.

So, what could make battle-hardened Kumogakure ninja wet themselves in fear? The answer was four words:

Yellow Flash.

From this, one could see that the Three Basic Jutsu are indeed divine techniques, after all, Transformation Jutsu equals Flying Thunder God Technique.

No one had likely ever done this ridiculous thing before. Firstly, it would cause too much confusion on the battlefield, easily creating chaos for both friendly and enemy forces. Secondly, it could easily backfire, trapping him in enemy encirclement. Thirdly, it would be difficult to explain to the involved parties. Fourthly, it was too classless...

Therefore, he had to be extremely careful about how he operated. Yuhara's best course of action was still to sneak to the mission location without anyone noticing.