The Truth Came Without Warning, Tsunade's Fury

Sarutobi Mishima glanced at the snowflakes mixed into the rain, stepped into the wooden cabin, and shut the door behind him.

Jingyi took out two bottles of fruit wine he had brought from the village and invited Sarutobi Mishima to sit.

"Everywhere else is already buried under heavy snow. Only the Land of Rain has such unusual geography that it has not been covered by snow, but sleet will make the temperature drop even lower."

"I didn't expect you to bring something this good. What a pity it isn't sake."

He took the opened bottle and gulped down two mouthfuls. The only flaw was that the fruit wine tasted rather weak. Calling it alcohol would be generous; it was more like a beverage.

Jingyi took a sip of the fruit wine and joked about himself. "I'm still young. I'm not old enough to drink yet."

Sarutobi Mishima froze for a moment, then burst out laughing a few seconds later.

"If you hadn't mentioned it, I would have nearly forgotten. You're not even fourteen yet. Not bad. When I was fourteen, I was still a Chunin, following my teacher around on missions and getting scolded all the time."

Jingyi laughed as well, then hit him with a direct question.

"Then, Captain Mishima, can you tell me why you've been lingering around nearby?

Were you secretly protecting me, or monitoring me?"

"..."

The laughter came to an abrupt halt. Sarutobi Mishima, who had been drinking fruit wine and eating roasted meat, froze with the bottle suspended in midair.

He looked at Jingyi in astonishment. After hesitating for a moment, he gave a bitter smile. "I didn't expect you to notice."

"Then can Captain Mishima clear up my doubts?" Jingyi did not say how he had discovered it.

Setting the bottle on the table, Sarutobi Mishima sighed helplessly.

"Before I came here, Lord Hokage specifically summoned me and told me to protect you in secret. I wasn't originally on this rotation roster."

"Captain Little Honda also knows about my secret mission, so he personally leads most of the camp's patrols and guard duties. My main responsibility is to remain in the camp and prevent accidents."

That explained why Little Honda, the captain, needed to personally lead patrols and guard duty, while Sarutobi Mishima, the vice-captain, could remain in camp the entire time.

Protection?

Sarutobi Mishima did not seem to be lying, but why would the Third Hokage select a Jonin from his clan, slip him into the rotation lineup, and have him specifically protect Jingyi?

Could it be that the Third Hokage knew he would be assassinated?

After connecting the limited information he had, Jingyi realized that his inclusion on the camp rotation roster had probably been deliberate, rather than simply bad luck.

But the selection of personnel needed the Third Hokage's approval. So why had the Third Hokage put him on the roster and then sent someone to protect him?

Wasn't that just redundant?

If he truly wanted to protect Jingyi, he would not have allowed him to leave the village.

So it was not the Third Hokage who had deliberately placed him on the rotation roster. Someone else had wanted it.

Yet the Third Hokage did not want anything to happen to him, so he had inserted someone to protect him.

Then who was targeting him?

The Elder Council?

Probably not. The Elder Council shared the Third Hokage's stance, and Jingyi had never offended any of its members.

Then it was... Shimura Danzō!!

Having his position as the Hokage's advisor stripped away completely, anyone would be unwilling to accept that, let alone someone as petty and ambitious as Shimura Danzō.

After the previous warning, Shimura Danzō could not possibly make a move against him within the village.

Under those circumstances, if he still wanted revenge, he could only get Jingyi out of the village first.

Thus, Jingyi's name had appeared on the rotation roster.

So how would Shimura Danzō strike?

As the camp's only medical ninja, Jingyi would not leave the camp easily. There were also dozens of ninja in the camp. Killing him under so much protection would not be easy.

"Then I'll have to trouble the vice-captain from now on."

"This is my duty. As long as it hasn't caused any misunderstanding."

He had been secretly protecting someone, only to be caught red-handed after just a few days. Sarutobi Mishima could not have felt more miserable.

A failure. What a failure.

He had been secretly protecting a medical ninja, yet the target had noticed as soon as the mission began. If word got out, Sarutobi Mishima would lose all face.

After eating and drinking his fill, Sarutobi Mishima left the medical room dejectedly, his stomach full of frustration.

Jingyi walked over to the fire and looked out at the pitch-black night sky through the crack in the door.

After a long while, Jingyi withdrew his gaze, went to the table, took out a sealing scroll, and removed a number of materials along with a dead crow.

This was prey Jingyi had caught on the way to the camp. He intended to turn the crow into a puppet for transmitting intelligence.

Jingyi had originally planned to make the puppet during the New Year and send Tsunade and Kushina a few words of blessing, but it seemed he needed to put it to use early.

After preparing the materials and taking out various tools, Jingyi skillfully began working on the crow's corpse.

Once the crow's body had been processed, he stuffed various components and a puppet core into it, then infused it with the Tenseigan's unique chakra.

"Caw!!"

The crow, which had originally been stiff and motionless, suddenly blinked. It hopped off the table and began bouncing back and forth across it.

Jingyi took out a pen and a special intelligence-transmission scroll, wrote down several things that had happened in the camp, then set a special password before tying the small scroll to the crow's leg and ordering it to fly to Konoha and deliver the intelligence scroll.

The Puppet Crow carrying the intelligence scroll flew into the dark night sky, braving the heavy rain as it headed for Konoha.

Jingyi controlled both the crow's flight direction and route, ensuring it would not make mistakes such as flying the wrong way, finding the wrong place, or delivering the message to the wrong person.

The Puppet Crow flew swiftly. In only a few hours, it traveled from the border of the Land of Rain to Konoha, flapped down onto the Senju ancestral residence, then hopped toward Tsunade's location.

Having found the correct place, the Puppet Crow pecked twice at the glass.

Tsunade woke from her sleep. With a flip, she sprang up, opened the window, and grabbed the puppet crow standing on the windowsill.

"Whose summoning beast delivered an intelligence scroll to me?"

Fortunately, Tsunade had not used much strength. Otherwise, if she had squeezed hard, she would have realized that the crow in her hand was not a summoning beast at all, but a puppet.

She removed the hair tie from her head and tied up the Puppet Crow's wings. Tossing it aside, Tsunade turned on the light and began examining the intelligence scroll in her hand.

The scroll needed a password to open.

Tsunade felt inexplicably irritated. She did not even know who had sent the intelligence scroll. Without the password, how was she supposed to open the thing?

"Jing?"

Turning the scroll over, Tsunade noticed the character Jing written on it.

Could this be a scroll sent back by Jingyi?

Then the password...

Suddenly, Tsunade thought of something. Her delicate, pretty face instantly darkened as she clenched the scroll and cursed through gritted teeth, "Hyuga Jingyi, you'd better watch yourself when you come back!"

Two hundred and fifty!

The password was correct.

"Fuck!"

Tsunade successfully cursed.

She had previously lost all her money at the casino, leaving only a few coins in her pocket. When she counted them, there had happened to be exactly two hundred and fifty, and Jingyi had laughed at her over it several times.

Yet Jingyi had used that number as the password. Wasn't he rubbing salt into Tsunade's wounds?

Hyuga Jingyi!

Even when sending an intelligence scroll, you had to take a roundabout way to call me an idiot, huh?

You're dead when you get back!!

Tsunade opened the scroll with a bellyful of anger. After reading two lines, the fire in her heart vanished—or rather, her anger toward Jingyi vanished.

Shimura Danzō, however, had successfully stirred up Tsunade's fury.

"Danzo, you're really something."

After cursing under her breath a few times, Tsunade took the scroll to Mito Uzumaki.

Having been woken up in the middle of the night, Mito Uzumaki was not in the best spirits. After reading the scroll her granddaughter handed over, she knew her granddaughter would not simply stand by.

"Little Tsunade, what do you want to do? Do you need Grandma's help?"

Tsunade said, "Grandma, I need a letter delivered to the Daimyo's Court. I want to pay the Daimyo a visit."

"That would be appropriate. With the New Year approaching, it is indeed time for a visit." Mito Uzumaki voiced her support.