Swish, swish, swish.
Amid a rush of wind, four Konoha ANBU scattered into an inconspicuous grove outside Konoha's walls.
The one in the lead asked, "Is this the place?"
One of them nodded. "Yeah, this is where the Barrier Squad's information pointed! Look, someone just passed through here!"
The four quickly came to a footprint.
It was a faint print. Clearly, its owner had taken care to avoid leaving tracks. If not for the moss on the ground, the footprint wouldn't have been visible.
They searched the surrounding area, but apart from that accidental footprint, there were no other traces in the grove.
As for the owner of the footprint, they were long gone.
The lead ANBU was both furious and frustrated. "Damn it, that guy got away again!"
There was no doubt about it.
The four ANBU hadn't appeared here by chance. This was a carefully planned capture operation by ANBU and the Barrier Squad.
Their target was the mysterious figure who had been frequently entering and leaving the village in recent days.
The abduction of the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki from within the village by the Akatsuki Organization was still reverberating.
To eliminate hidden threats and prevent anything similar from happening again, Konoha had launched an unprecedented internal investigation.
In the end, they hadn't caught a single Akatsuki spy.
Instead, the investigation had uncovered quite a few spies from other villages who had been planted in Konoha.
The Five Great Shinobi Villages were currently cooperating, so Konoha handled the matter quietly. They didn't launch a massacre; they simply sent the spies back peacefully.
During the investigation, the Barrier Squad had unexpectedly discovered a mysterious figure frequently passing through Konoha's barrier.
That's right, all of Konoha was covered by a sensory barrier!
In theory, no enemy invading Konoha could escape the