After hearing their leader's words, the others finally stopped entertaining those thoughts. Several of them stood back to back, looking around with trembling hands.
The leader snorted a few times. He kept shouting and cursing, not caring what target he might expose. His voice echoed back and forth through the woods, shaking even the leaves and branches.
Those who heard those loud, forceful shouts immediately came to their senses and grew bolder. They followed their leader in shouting, ready to rush forward and fight for their lives the moment the enemy appeared.
Seeing them shout like that, Mirai knew they must have been terrified just now. That was why they had not hesitated to expose their position, even shouting loudly to encourage themselves...
But the more impatient they became, the less Mirai could reveal himself. He wanted to frighten them when they were exhausted.
Sure enough, after shouting dozens of times, they all fell silent. Some even let out eerie chuckles, frightening their companions so badly that they were thrown into a panic!
"You... what's wrong with you?"
The man with the strange smile clutched his stomach and laughed for a while before saying, "I'm laughing... I'm laughing at all of us. We're all shinobi of Kumogakure. How could we believe in ghosts and gods? Don't you think all that shouting just now was funny?"
At first, the crowd was angry upon hearing this, but after thinking it over carefully, they realized he was right. More than a dozen of them had gathered together—were they really afraid of ghosts? Even if there were ghosts, so many of them could still scare the ghosts away!
The crowd exchanged awkward smiles, and the leader said, "Good laugh! Now that no one is afraid anymore... proceed according to the plan. Whether you encounter