A New Mission

That morning, Uchiha Yuan arrived at the meeting point to prepare for the day's training.

However, 8:00 AM came and went, and Hyuga Asana had not yet appeared. Since she was never late, Uchiha Yuan felt a sense of unease.

After waiting for half an hour, Uchiha Yuan and Yamanaka Kizuki grew anxious and decided to head toward the Hyuga Clan's camp to investigate.

Halfway there, they happened to run into Hyuga Asana, who was jogging toward them.

Her clothes were covered in dust, and there was a bruise on her face; it was clear she had encountered some trouble.

"Asana, what happened to you?" Yamanaka Kizuki asked with a tone of concern.

"Did someone from the Hyuga Main Family in your camp do this to you?" Uchiha Yuan asked, his face cold.

Hearing this, Hyuga Asana waved her hands quickly and said, "No, you've misunderstood. This isn't the place to talk; let's go somewhere more secluded."

Led by Hyuga Asana, the three arrived at a quiet spot. After Hyuga Asana activated her Byakugan to confirm they were alone, she explained, "It happened like this: this morning, as I was walking to our meeting point, I encountered an Earth Clone of Lord Orochimaru.

He must have been waiting for me on purpose. Lord Orochimaru said he wanted to test my strength, so he fought me using that Earth Clone.

I was no match for his clone. Even using Rotation was useless; Lord Orochimaru easily spotted the flaw in my technique and shattered it with a single strike. The injury on my face is from when he broke through my defense."

"Lord Orochimaru intercepted you just to test your strength?" Uchiha Yuan asked.

"Of course not. After defeating me, Lord Orochimaru's clone said I had the strength of an average Chunin and was ready to carry out this mission. After saying that, he tossed this mission scroll to me and dispelled the clone."

After hearing her out, Uchiha Yuan took the scroll from her and opened it.

He quickly scanned the contents. The gist of the scroll was that Lord Orochimaru had received intelligence that Kirigakure Shinobi intended to contaminate the water sources near the Konoha Camp.

Lord Orochimaru had already dispatched guards to the two primary water collection points, but he hadn't assigned anyone to the smaller ones.

However, these smaller sources were connected to the main river, and if the enemy poisoned them, it could gradually affect the water quality.

To prevent the enemy from tampering with these smaller sources, Lord Orochimaru ordered their squad to depart immediately and patrol the surrounding water points.

The mission wasn't far from the Konoha Camp, and it was even at a distance from the front lines; the only potential threat was the possibility of encountering Kirigakure Shinobi.

The three of them returned to organize their gear and set off half an hour later.

There were six water sources near the Konoha Camp. Since the two larger ones were already guarded, they were responsible for patrolling the four smaller ones.

Following the map, they traveled for about twenty minutes before arriving at the first source, a small pond formed by mountain spring water.

Hyuga Asana collected a sample and knelt to perform a basic test for toxins, finding none.

"Asana, you can do this too?" Yamanaka Kizuki asked, surprised.

"I studied some Medical Ninjutsu in the past, and I learned basic poison identification along the way," Hyuga Asana replied.

"Studying Medical Ninjutsu? Asana, are you aiming to become a Medical Ninja?" Yamanaka Kizuki continued.

"Yes, I've dreamed of becoming a Medical Ninja to save lives since I was a child," Hyuga Asana lied with a straight face.

"So that's your dream! Yuan, what about you?"

"My dream? To live a good life, I suppose," Uchiha Yuan replied after a moment of thought.

"What a plain dream."

Uchiha Yuan smiled slightly at this. His dream was anything but plain. With the Third Great Ninja War still raging, the first step was simply surviving it.

Then, he would have to make it through the Nine-Tails' Rampage and the Uchiha Clan's night of slaughter.

But merely surviving wasn't enough; to live well, he would have to eliminate certain eyesores, such as the high-ranking officials of Konoha.

"You only asked us; what is your dream, Kizuki?" Hyuga Asana asked as she stood up.

"My short-term dream is the same as Yuan's: to survive the battlefield of the Third Great Ninja War.

As for a long-term dream, I hope to lose some weight, get promoted to Chunin soon, and find a beautiful, gentle, and obedient wife. Then my life would be complete."

"You have quite a list of demands. If there were someone beautiful, gentle, and obedient, would it really be your turn?" Uchiha Yuan retorted.

"If a ninja isn't an option, I can marry a civilian! There are plenty of civilians who fit my criteria. Actually, come to think of it, Asana is quite nice—she's beautiful, has a refined air, and comes from a great clan. It's a pity the Hyuga Clan doesn't allow intermarriage.

Besides, Asana's personality is too cold for me; I'd prefer someone gentler."

"I don't meet your requirements, and I've disappointed you. My apologies," Hyuga Asana said expressionlessly.

Yamanaka Kizuki shrank his neck, realizing he had been too carried away and had forgotten Hyuga Asana was right there. "Cough, cough. Asana, I was just speaking off the cuff. I didn't mean anything by it. Don't be angry."

"Don't worry, Asana isn't that petty," Uchiha Yuan said with a laugh.

"Is that so? I'm actually quite angry right now. If we weren't in the middle of a mission, I would have—"

"Someone is coming!" Yamanaka Kizuki suddenly turned his head to the right.

Under the torture of Uchiha Yuan's Genjutsu over the past few days, Yamanaka Kizuki's sensory range had reached nearly 50 meters, and he had kept his senses active even while they were chatting.

Hearing this, Uchiha Yuan and Hyuga Asana instinctively activated their Sharingan and Byakugan, respectively, and looked to the right.

"Just two ordinary people. There is no Chakra in their bodies," Hyuga Asana said.

"Why would ordinary people appear here? This is close to the battlefield; they should be staying as far away as possible," Uchiha Yuan noted.

"Yuan, are you suggesting their presence might be related to the Kirigakure Shinobi?"

"I don't know, but it never hurts to be careful." With that, Uchiha Yuan created a Water Clone and headed toward the two figures.

As he approached, Uchiha Yuan realized that the two were not very old, looking about the same age as him. The boy was taller while the girl was shorter, and they shared a certain resemblance; they were likely siblings or related in some other way.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" Uchiha Yuan asked.

(ps: Sharing an interesting anecdote, since I'm writing this directly into the main text during the free period. Yesterday afternoon, I went to the pharmacy to buy medicine and ran into an old lady. She was paying with her medical insurance card and, for some reason, she remembered having 640 Ryo left on it. She picked out 600 Ryo worth of medicine, but when they went to swipe the card, the pharmacy staff told her there was only 330 Ryo left, which wasn't enough.

The old lady got anxious and started throwing a tantrum in the pharmacy, insisting that the staff had secretly swiped her card. No matter how they explained it, she wouldn't listen.

They had no choice but to call the police. When the officers arrived, they checked the transaction history of her card and told her, "You bought 300 Ryo worth of medicine on November 19th." The old lady refused to admit it, claiming she hadn't.

The police had to help pull up the surveillance footage, which clearly showed her buying the medicine on November 19th.

Even with the evidence laid out, the old lady still wouldn't accept it. She cried and made a scene, accusing the police of colluding with the pharmacy to steal the money from her insurance.

Helpless, the police had to contact her family. Her son arrived a while later and had to physically drag her away.

I was speechless. The old lady spoke clearly and logically; she definitely didn't have any symptoms of dementia. She was just being unreasonable. It really goes to show that bad people just grow old!)

I'm posting an extra chapter today to reach the 100,000-word mark.