Kou continued, his tone disdainful:
"The people who are truly rich and powerful wouldn't come to a little shop like this.
The ones these guys target are people who come to shops like this, have a bit of money, and can be robbed without causing too much trouble.
For us, these people aren't even a nuisance. They're more like pests by the roadside, easy enough to deal with.
But they always work in groups, so if anything happens, it's bound to cause a commotion."
His gaze fell on Mei Terumi's face, and he lowered his voice in warning:
"For the sake of keeping our mission covert, it's best to avoid this kind of trouble whenever possible."
Kou propped his face on one hand and watched Mei Terumi fall silent. He added with a hint of teasing:
"These are all basic things they teach at the very beginning of the Ninja Academy curriculum in Konoha."
He paused, and his tone took on a slightly "reassuring" quality:
"But it's only natural that you wouldn't know. This sort of knowledge is useful for intelligence-gathering missions where you need to disguise your identity without causing a disturbance.
As far as I know, most of the missions Mist Village gets are exhausting jobs like assassinations and massacres, with low pay, too.
It's no wonder the school doesn't teach this stuff. It wouldn't be much use even if they did. They'd be better off spending that time practicing ninjutsu or something, so they can survive their next mission."
Mei Terumi lowered her head in silence.
Her gaze rested on the wood grain of the tabletop. Something stirred in her emerald-green eyes.
It wasn't anger or shame, but something deeper... bitterness.
Her fingers curled slightly, and her nails scraped faintly across the tabletop.
The gap.
Kou's words had made her feel just how vast the gap was between Mist Village and Konoha.
She knew that Mist Village lagged far behind Konoha in the quality of its ninja education.
More precisely, Konoha's basic education was far ahead of that of the other great nations of the Ninja World.
After three consecutive Ninja World Wars, the other four great hidden villages had all suffered, to varying degrees, from a shortage of new talent. Konoha, however, had never faced that problem.
To be sure, the Nine-Tails Incident seven years ago had left Konoha weaker than ever before, but only in comparison to its former glory.
Everyone knew that within ten years, Konoha's new generation would mature, and the village would recover its strength.
The foundation for all this, besides Konoha's deep-rooted legacy and powerful ninja clans, was above all its education system, which covered every ninja from an ordinary background.
The ninjas Konoha produced were, by common consensus, superior to those from every other hidden village in almost every respect.
That was the bedrock of Konoha's strength, and the key to its lasting prosperity.
Mei Terumi understood this perfectly.
She might envy them, but she didn't find it hard to accept. After all, this was acknowledged throughout the Ninja World.
What truly hurt was the other implication in Kou's words.
Mist Village could only take the jobs Konoha didn't want: assassinations, massacres, and all sorts of other thankless work.
It stung. It really... stung.
Since Mist Village could only get missions involving assassinations and massacres, its ninja academy naturally focused on teaching related skills, and its training methods reflected that.
That was the only way to complete missions more effectively and earn rewards.
And since these missions—apart from high-ranking S- and A-rank assignments—were often difficult but poorly paid, the lower-ranking ninjas had very few resources at their disposal.
To cut costs and make better use of its resources to cultivate exceptional talent, Mist Village had no choice but to adopt a survival-of-the-fittest approach to education.
It funneled more resources toward its elite and focused on high-risk, high-reward missions.
The world-famous Seven Ninja Swordsmen were, in a sense, Mist Village's "showpiece," meant to attract more mission contracts.
Mist Village had certainly succeeded in this approach.
In the Ninja World, whenever people spoke of gray-area missions involving assassinations and massacres, the first image that came to mind was that of Kirigakure Ninja.
But at what cost...?
This overly extreme path had left Mist Village with an extremely narrow range of missions. The entire village had practically become a factory for carrying out gray-area jobs as efficiently as possible.
The principle that missions came first, comrades killing one another, an increasingly oppressive atmosphere, ninjas driven mad by extreme conditions, and village leaders who profited from the system and clung to their power, obstructing change at every turn...
The Village of the Bloody Mist.
Mist Village's twisted path had ultimately led to the tragedy known as the "Blood Mist."
To bring about change, the old order had to be destroyed. But once it was gone, a new order had to be built in its place.
But without the Village of the Bloody Mist, how could Mist Village survive if it no longer relied on taking those gray-area missions?
Once it lost the "brand" of the Village of the Bloody Mist, what could the new Mist Village rely on to compete with the other hidden villages for mission contracts?
It all seemed to form a circle, a dilemma with no easy solution.
Mei Terumi didn't think she had what it took to solve it.
At least, not yet...
But there was someone who could.
Sora. Shiina Sora!!
The comrade she trusted and admired, and their leader, too.
That man, who had come from the Mist Anbu and earned everyone's respect, had already led them through one seemingly impossible dilemma after another.
If it's him, he can do it. If we work together, we can do it.
Mei Terumi murmured softly to herself, a small flame flickering in her emerald-green eyes:
If we all work hard together, one day, the children of Mist Village will be able to choose their own paths, too.
Her fingers slowly relaxed. Her clenched hands now lay flat on the tabletop.
Mei Terumi straightened her back, and the light in her eyes grew resolute once more.
We can do it. We... can.
Outside, the mist continued to churn. Inside the restaurant, the din rolled on like a tide.
Kou watched the silent woman across from him, a complex emotion flashing through his dark eyes.
He knew what she was thinking.
He knew everything.
But Kou simply lifted his glass, took a sip, and said nothing.
Steam from the ramen swirled between them on the tabletop, slowly swallowing all the words they couldn't bring themselves to say.
Before you continue