"If I said I was just dusting, would you believe me?"
Maruyama Qifeng withdrew his hand and lightly wiped it on himself.
For once, Kakashi's stiff face showed wariness. Combined with his earlier movements and that question...
Believe you? My ass!
Kakashi knew Maruyama Qifeng. Though they had not been in the same class, they had crossed paths a few times at the Ninja Academy. But that was not the point. After all, Kakashi had only spent half a year at the academy.
More importantly, after becoming a Chunin, Kakashi had finally qualified to lead a squad on his own. The squad under his command had an extremely high mission completion rate.
As for the death rate... heh.
He was practically a regular at this morgue.
"Qifeng, you... sigh. I understand." The Medical Ninja patted his shoulder.
The pressure was just too great.
Under the oppression of blood and death, everyone bore immense pressure, which gave rise to all sorts of little quirks. It was not something difficult to accept.
Especially for Maruyama Qifeng, whose work involved dealing with dead people every day. A twisted personality was inevitable.
At most, others became alcoholics or violent. His particular quirk was truly rather unusual.
What the hell do you understand?!
Maruyama Qifeng raged helplessly inside.
"Right, Qifeng. Lord Hokage has ordered Chunin Kakashi to retrieve his companions' bodies for burial."
Back to business.
"Oh."
The Medical Ninja patted his shoulder again. "Handle the handover."
Then he leaned close to his ear and softly added something.
"Qifeng, the deceased are to be respected."
Most of the dead ninjas had families in the village. If word reached them, they might come knocking at his door.
"..."
Maruyama Qifeng rolled his eyes lifelessly.
After saying that, the man simply left.
That left only him and Kakashi staring at each other.
As Kakashi, the once-renowned genius of the village, Maruyama Qifeng naturally knew him, and knew him very well—perhaps even better than Kakashi knew himself.
But when facing this genius known for "always ending up evenly matched," what interested him more was the location where Kakashi's father had been buried.
Konoha White Fang's corpse should yield something surprising, right?
"Ahem, let's follow procedure."
Kakashi glanced at him again, tossed down a scroll, and walked into the tent.
It would have been strange if he had shown a pleasant face to someone coveting his father's corpse.
Maruyama Qifeng could not be bothered to explain further.
So what if they thought he was a necrophiliac? Judging from the cheat he had received, he would probably have plenty of dealings with corpses in the future. The more he explained, the more it would look like he was covering something up.
He gave the scroll a quick look. It was a Martyrdom Order bearing the Hokage's seal.
Half an hour later.
Looking at the morgue, Maruyama Qifeng felt somewhat lost.
Among the remaining corpses, there were either white light spots or no light spots at all. Having enjoyed the excitement of yellow and green corpses, his first experience with a white corpse had not felt particularly good.
He sat back down in his chair.
Suppressing the faint disappointment in his heart, he began to examine the system again, along with the things he had obtained earlier.
There was nothing much to study about earrings or underwear. The important things were those cards.
Name: Random Single Attribute +2 Boost Card Description: As a qualified Chunin, every one of his attributes is worth learning from Effect: Randomly increases one attribute by 2 points Note: Believe me, you need more
"Of course I know I need more, but that assumes there are that many corpses."
He took out a completely green card with a large "2" covering its front. It had a metallic feel to it, with slightly raised, rough patterns, as though it possessed some miraculous power.
Maruyama Qifeng's eyes lit up as he looked at the card.
He knew perfectly well how poor this body's talent was. Cards like the one before him were his capital and starting point for becoming stronger.
Following the system's prompt, he used it correctly.
A hexagonal roulette wheel appeared before him, engraved with the six categories "Body, Essence, Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Control, Seals," representing a ninja's six attributes: taijutsu, Chakra, ninjutsu, genjutsu, Chakra Control, and hand seals.
In the end, the needle stopped on "Body."
Body +2!
A massive current of heat suddenly erupted from somewhere within his body, flowing into his meridians and scattering outward before gradually sinking into every cell of his body.
Maruyama Qifeng clenched his fist.
He could clearly feel his body becoming lighter and his arms stronger. His entire body felt so comfortable, like he had drunk a refreshing soda, that he wanted to groan.
He opened the panel again.
Character: Maruyama Qifeng Age: 13 Attribute: Fire Strength: Genin Body: 12 Essence: 12 Ninjutsu: 12 Genjutsu: 5 Control: 15 Seals: 15 Ninjutsu: Three Basic Jutsu Items: Konoha Jonin Miura Ikkō Experience Card (Rare) ×1, Uchiha Clan Thin Bloodline Card (1/3), Standard Kunai ×1, Exquisite Earrings ×1, Lady's Underwear ×1
A mere increase of 2 points in taijutsu might not have seemed like much, but his base value had only been 10. It was a full one-fifth increase, so the difference was extremely obvious.
"I really do need more. Not for enjoyment—I'm doing this purely to improve my strength. Yeah, that's right!"
He turned to look at the other special card, which bore Miura Ikkō's likeness.
Name: Konoha Jonin Miura Ikkō Experience Card (Rare) Description: This is an exceptionally rare Experience Card that allows you to temporarily unleash abilities beyond your body's limits Effect: Combines your own attributes with the card's attributes to temporarily improve and alter your abilities, attributes, ninjutsu, awareness, and more Note: As a Jonin Experience Card, it is recommended that you use it only before death
This was a good thing.
After merely reading the description, Maruyama Qifeng was certain that this was absolutely a good thing.
Using himself as the foundation, it could combine the various abilities of Jonin Miura Ikkō and allow him to temporarily surpass his current strength.
Used in special circumstances, it would definitely produce unexpected results.
It was undoubtedly the best choice for a trump card.
As for exactly how much his strength would rise after using it, he had never tried it, so he did not know.
But Maruyama Qifeng estimated that even if he could not reach Jonin level, temporarily attaining the level of a Special Jonin should not be a problem.
His job was to hide in the rear and collect corpses, which looked quite safe.
But on a battlefield, nowhere was truly safe.
Even a base camp could suffer a sudden attack.
If someone dropped an AOE attack, he could easily lose his life.
Even without large-scale AOE attacks, seizing corpses, stealing intelligence, and even taking bloodlines were things every Great Hidden Village pursued tirelessly.
Every side had corpse collection squads, and naturally, there were also squads that seized corpses.
Even obtaining a tiny scrap of crucial intelligence could greatly alter the course of a battle to a certain extent.
Thus, corpse collectors had never had a high survival rate. It could even be described as low, only slightly higher than that of the ninjas fighting bloodily on the front lines.
However, it was peacetime now, so he was still quite safe.
He silently watched the morgue, where shadow after shadow swayed with the candlelight.
Fortunately, there were no ghosts in the Naruto World. Otherwise, he would eventually be scared into developing a mental illness.
But he had to admit that he was addicted to opening blind boxes. Looking at those cold corpses, he actually felt full of affection.
He was already impatient to touch a few more corpses, even if they were White Corpses.
But that would not do. He had used up today's chances and could only wait until tomorrow.
He got up unwillingly, closed the door, and locked it tightly with a chain as thick as his arm. Everything inside was precious wealth.
Holding an umbrella and stepping into the night, he went home!
Oh, home was not far away. It was right next door.
Before you continue