Mist Village.
Araki and the other two wasted no time after returning to the village, immediately heading to the Anbu to report back to Karatachi Yagura.
"Hm? You're back?"
When they entered, Karatachi Yagura was bent over his desk writing some documents. He looked up at the sound and immediately frowned.
"Why... are there only three of you?"
His baby face creased at once, and a sense of foreboding rose in his heart.
Could it be... that the other six Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist had all been wiped out?
At the thought, Karatachi Yagura felt his head spin. That was nearly half of Mist Village's high-end fighting force!
Just like that, gone?
Fortunately, Hozuki Sengetsu explained the next moment. "We split into two groups midway through. The six of them should be fighting Konoha's Anbu on the eastern coast right now, buying time, while we completed the mission."
"Phew..."
Yagura immediately breathed a sigh of relief. "That's good, that's good."
Only then did he have the time to carefully examine the three before him. They looked somewhat travel-worn, and their clothes bore faint bloodstains, but the smell of blood on them was very light. It did not seem to be their own blood.
"You don't seem to have suffered any serious injuries. I take it the mission went rather smoothly?"
Facing Karatachi Yagura's question, the three exchanged glances. In the end, Hozuki Sengetsu decided to speak.
His voice carried barely restrained excitement. "You'll never guess how much we gained this time!"
Karatachi Yagura: ...
What was going on? Was this still the calm and wise Hozuki Sengetsu he had always regarded as his strategist? Why was he speaking in riddles now?
Still, seeing how excited they all were, and as someone who had thoroughly read the classic Self-Cultivation