After traveling for several days, Ren has arrived in the Land of Iron.
This time, Ren came out alone and was disguised.
He went from a sunny and handsome young man to an ordinary-looking young man.
At this moment, Ren was in a small town on the coast of the Land of Iron, and went into a lively tavern.
The moment Ren entered the pub, the noisy chatter in the lobby paused for a moment before returning to normal.
Dressed in an expensive and luxurious outfit, with striking eyebrows, bright eyes, red lips, and white teeth, his face was even more handsome than a woman's, making him seem completely out of place in the tavern.
Ren was somewhat misunderstood as unremarkable, attracted most of the attention in the hall.
Ren sensed that there were no fewer than a dozen ninjas in the several private rooms, clearly spies from various ninja villages.
Ren, who was used to being watched, felt no discomfort at all. He even deliberately raised his head and scanned the gazes directed at him.
People are not used to making eye contact with strangers, so they all looked away and stopped looking at Ren.
Everyone resumed their previous conversation, and the tavern quickly returned to its former lively atmosphere.
Ren also booked a private room and ordered a pot of wine, then sent the waiter out. He then activated his Mangekyō Sharingan to sift through information about the entire town.
The town is located on the coast of the Land of Iron, and its natural harbor makes it quite prosperous and large.
But can a small town, where ordinary people live, be any bigger than a village?
As the village chief of Konoha, Ren's Mangekyō Sharingan Shinato, making it incredibly easy for him to cover the entire town.
Ninjas, especially when on intelligence-gathering missions, speak in extremely low voices and with great caution.
However, everything was revealed under Ren's Dōjutsu.
Judging from their conversations, apart from a few wandering ninjas, everyone in the town is officially employed.
All Five Great Shinobi Villages were included.
That's right, Konoha has also dispatched forces to monitor this matter.
It's normal to have one; if not, then Konoha's intelligence system has too low a sense of smell and sensitivity, Ren should consider replacing him.
The Kumogakure, the main protagonist of this story, also has a large number of teams in this town.
Besides the publicly visible squad wearing Forehead Protector, there are two other squads operating covertly.
Of course, Darui wasn't there; he was, unsurprisingly, at sea at the moment.
Capturing Tailed Beast isn't something that can be done by Darui, the Raikage, simply by fighting it and then having the Tailed Beast obediently follow him back.
Without the Amber Purifying Pot, the Kumogakure faces at least double the difficulty in capturing the Tailed Beast.
Combat teams, support teams, logistics teams, intelligence teams, sealing teams, and backup temporary Jinchūriki —not a single one can be missing.
The search, battles, and sealing are all extremely important, but the return journey is even more crucial.
After the Hidden Cloud Village successfully retrieves the Eight-Tails, if anyone else has ideas, it would be best to make their move on the return trip. If successful, they can not only reap the benefits but also avoid attracting too much attention.
In Ren's estimation, no village should be interested in the Eight-Tails, or even if they were, it wouldn't be worth the effort to scheme at this time.
If Ren can think of it, Darui can naturally think of it too; even if he can't, there are always people around him who can.
After years of wandering the Shinobi World, Ren has come to understand one thing: perhaps the people in the Shinobi World are not as knowledgeable as he is, but there are countless intelligent people among them. Those who treat others as fools are definitely fools themselves.
The Kumogakure knew that it was highly unlikely that anyone would try to steal their territory, but they couldn't completely rule out the possibility, so they naturally had to make corresponding arrangements.
Therefore, although it was just an operation to capture Tailed Beast, the Kumogakure could already be considered to have entered a state of war.
The Land of Lightning Land of Iron, and the Land of Moon Land of Iron, the Land of Hot Water, the Land of Rice Paddies, and even the Land of Waterfalls beyond the Land of Iron— the Kumogakure ninjas are everywhere.
This was achieved after agreements were reached with various small countries and ninja villages, and after paying a price; it is still visible and distinguishable.
There were also a large number of ninja squads secretly following behind these groups, hiding in the shadows.
This is the stance taken by a major ninja village that has no ninjas beyond their limits when facing a wild Tailed Beast.
After all, this isn't about fighting Jinchūriki, and the goal isn't to kill them but to capture and seal them alive. Hidden Cloud Village might not use the full strength of the entire village, but it would certainly use half of it.
*******[written request for leave]********
[I have exams on October 29th and 30th, so updates on the 29th will be affected. Updates will resume normally on the evening of the 30th. Please bear with me, dear readers. (Just kidding!)]