Boom—
As the smoke spread, Yugito heard a faint rustling. A figure was fleeing into the distance.
"Fire Mouse Jade!"
She spat out a blue, mouse-shaped flame. It split in midair into a swarm of tracking projectiles, and she raced after them.
Shinmoku darted through the forest, weaving between the trees. The Mouse Jades were blocked by one tree after another, and in an instant, they set the forest ablaze.
"So fast!" He glanced back repeatedly. Yugito was already right behind him. "But... this should do it."
He skidded to a stop and turned around, letting her short blade pierce his body.
"You...!"
"You really did avoid the fatal blow. Impressive." Shinmoku smiled faintly, reached for the hilt, and clamped his hand tightly around Yugito's.
"Crackle, crackle..."
"Explosive Tags again?"
With a cry of surprise, Yugito wrenched herself free of Shinmoku's grip and flipped onto a branch behind her.
After the explosion, nothing remained but a crater. Another clone.
Where had he gone?
He wasn't in the bushes. She'd checked them herself.
Yugito forced herself to calm down and replayed the scene from the moment they'd met.
She'd knocked him back once, he'd dodged her second strike, then she'd kicked him into the bushes. A Kunai with an Explosive Tag, the Fuma Shuriken...
The Fuma Shuriken?
Their positions!
Their positions had changed during the three exchanges. And the Fuma Shuriken had been aimed...
"Whoosh—"
Chakra surged. Her hair tie came loose, and her chestnut hair rippled in waves. Catlike markings appeared across Yugito's skin, and a second tail grew from her.
She had four forms.
The first was her normal human form, suitable for a head-on fight. The second was Tailed Beast Chakra Mode, good only for keeping an opponent tied up. In the third, Partial Tailed Beast Transformation... run as fast as you can, as far as you can.
The river was just ahead. A blue shooting star appeared on the horizon, and in the blink of an eye, she could see it clearly.
"I give up." Shinmoku sighed, hooked a Kunai with his index finger, spun it, and held it before him. "That was my last ripple."
Boom!
A punch.
A ripple appeared—the air shuddered. Shinmoku flew backward, skipped across the water more than a dozen times, then crashed into a tree on the opposite bank, leaving a crater in its trunk.
"Whoosh—"
Her fury faded. Yugito returned to her usual cool demeanor and crossed the river, stopping in front of Shinmoku.
"Are you still alive, traitor?"
"Cough... I'm not a traitor. I'm..."
"You betrayed me!"
"...All right."
"Any last words?" Yugito once again rested her blade against Shinmoku's neck.
"Um... Is it too late to surrender?"
"Are you serious?"
"Let's be sincere with each other, Captain," Shinmoku said. "As long as you agree to my condition."
"What is it?"
"Come closer." His voice was barely a whisper.
Remaining wary, Yugito leaned her ear toward him.
Shinmoku's lips brushed Yugito's cheek.
"!!!"
Smack! Yugito raised her hand and slapped him.
But the next moment, her expression turned concerned. "You..."
"Clink, clink, clink—"
Cracks spread across Shinmoku's body. He shattered like a mirror, scattering across the ground.
A genjutsu!
Lewd!
Despicable!
Yugito's flushed cheeks grew redder still. She'd been embarrassed before; now, who knew what she was feeling.
Splash—
The sound of something hitting the water broke the silence. The Two-Tails appeared and leaped into the gorge.
The fourth form: Complete Tailed Beast Transformation. When you encountered it, all you could do was lie down and take the beating.
Behind the waterfall, Shinmoku crouched on a ledge with his straight sword stuck into the cliff face, holding two fingers together before him.
The instant Yugito's fist touched his stomach, he'd used the only ocular genjutsu he knew. It made the target see the scene they wanted to see.
Yugito should have taken him away... He couldn't make sense of it... Good thing he'd played it safe.
The thing that fell into the water was a rock. He'd tossed a Kunai tied to an Explosive Tag into a crevice on one side of the gorge beforehand, then ignited it when he sensed something was wrong.
At last... he'd gotten away.
Shinmoku gripped his left sleeve with his teeth and pulled it in front of him.
"Shadow Clone Technique."
The clone grabbed the original by the arm and hurled him out of the gorge with all its might.
The cave was a maze of passageways, its torches flickering.
He was responsible for gathering intelligence. Sifangtai was a vegetable seller who handled its transmission, while Shinna was not in Kumogakure and was responsible for sending the intelligence back to Konoha.
The base was inside the cave. It was practically an intelligence station.
"Who's there?" a clear female voice called.
"It's me, Shinmoku."
The girl stepped out of the shadows. Seeing Shinmoku, she breathed a sigh of relief, then looked behind him.
"I'm the only one... left."
Shinna's eyes trembled slightly, but in the end, she suppressed all her emotions.
"Okay."
Shinmoku said nothing more. He and Shinna had gone years without seeing each other, and their current situation left no room for talk.
First, he changed clothes. They'd been slashed and burned until they were no longer recognizable.
Then he wrapped his wounds with bandages, tearing them open with his teeth and winding them around himself a few times before hanging them around his neck.
By the time he put on his cloak, Shinna had packed the essentials into a backpack.
With a resounding boom, his six-year career as a spy officially came to an end.
The mission had failed. One had escaped, and the other had been so intent on dying that they hadn't managed to capture him alive.
The two Jinchuriki stood beside the waterfall. The people around them had changed completely; of those who'd fought last night, only the two of them were still on their feet.
"Lord Killer B, we found Shinmoku's sword behind the waterfall."
"Give it to me," Yugito said.
"My lady, we found his Forehead Protector downstream."
"Bring it here."
Yugito took the two items. She'd given him the sword when he'd been promoted to Chunin. It was the same as hers, and she slipped it into her own scabbard.
As for the Forehead Protector, she took out a Kunai and pressed it against the metal plate.
"Strictly speaking, he isn't a rogue ninja."
"Scrape—"
No more talking. She'd get hit.
After spending several days evading Cloud Hidden surveillance, Shinmoku and Shinna finally boarded a ship bound for the Land of Fire.
[Mission complete. Please select your reward.]
Inside the cabin, Shinmoku had just lain down when the system's voice sounded in his mind.
"I get to choose?" he asked silently.
[Yes. Here is the B-rank reward pool. You may also choose a random draw, which has a chance of producing rewards of different ranks.]
Better to choose for himself. Who knew what he'd get at random?
The reward pool had several pages. Most of the options were ninjutsu, and a large number of them were unavailable because their natures didn't match.
There was no need, either. Nearly all of them were common techniques. If he needed one, he could just activate his Sharingan and copy it.
After looking through the options, the best value was an affinity. At least it would save him the time spent refining it.
"What are your chakra natures?" he asked Shinna.
"Fire, water, and yin."
Then Water Release it was.