Finally Arrived

After the New Year ended, Aoba, as one of the village's Jonin, began taking on missions again. However, after the Kumogakure incident, the entire Shinobi World seemed to have entered a period of peace.

The only thing that annoyed Aoba was the news Asuma and the others brought back from outside. The bounty on Aoba in the black market had already reached thirty million ryo.

At the time, Aoba, who was desperately short on money, had even considered selling himself for the reward.

Thirty million ryo was no small sum. And as a recently risen Konoha ninja, he was clearly attracting far too much attention from the outside world.

During one mission, he had even run into that money-grubbing bastard Kakuzu.

To be fair, Kakuzu was one of the toughest enemies Aoba had encountered in the Shinobi World. In his mind, Kakuzu was even more troublesome than the Raikage.

This was not to say Kakuzu was necessarily stronger than the Raikage. In a direct confrontation, Kakuzu probably would not have been a match for the Fourth Raikage. But unlike that reckless brute, the Raikage...

Kakuzu was an all-around ninja. He possessed all five nature attributes, and his chakra reserves were vast enough for him to use himself as a mobile artillery platform.

He was also one of the enemies Aoba disliked dealing with most. When fighting the Raikage, they were both Nintaijutsu users. At the very least, Aoba could make use of what he was good at.

But when fighting Kakuzu, that guy simply stood far away and unleashed a barrage of attacks. Kakuzu had clearly gathered intelligence on Aoba beforehand. He knew Aoba was a Nintaijutsu user skilled at close combat over short to medium distances.

So Kakuzu immediately widened the distance and blanketed the area with long-range firepower. It disgusted Aoba to no end.

Although Aoba's Lightning Release: Flash was an even stronger long-range attack, with his current chakra, he could only use it three times in succession.

And what was even more annoying was that Kakuzu had five lives.

Against anyone else, Aoba could have waited until the other party exhausted their chakra. But against Kakuzu, forget it.

With no other choice, he had used one of his hidden trump cards and escaped Kakuzu's pursuit.

Aoba could fly, or rather, glide. That was right—he could use the wind to lift his body into the air and fly at high speed for a certain distance.

He could not change direction during the entire process, so it had basically no practical combat use. But it was still useful for running away.

At the time, he had two options. One was to enter Sage Mode and fight Kakuzu to the death. But battling a five-lived monster head-on was truly not a wise choice.

So in the end, he chose to leave the battlefield.

Still, Aoba remembered that clash. When he encountered Kakuzu, Kakuzu was already wearing Akatsuki's uniform. Yet he had been alone.

Either he had not found a partner yet, or he had killed his partner for the bounty. But the target Aoba cared about most had not been by his side.

Hidan, the Reaper's follower, possessed an Immortal Body even more outrageous than Kakuzu's. He was a crucial part of Aoba's plans.

Aoba had secretly gathered information on the Jashin Religion long ago. But their whereabouts were even more concealed than he had imagined.

After all, it was a cult, and one that performed living sacrifices. The Five Great Ninja Villages could not possibly tolerate those people. The cult had always developed in secret.

By this time, Hidan had already appeared. But he had not yet partnered with Kakuzu, so Aoba had been unable to track him down.

Kakuzu was famous in the underground world. After all, he was powerful, and none of the targets he set his sights on had ever escaped. At the Bounty Station, he received super VIP treatment.

After returning to the village, Aoba reported his encounter with Kakuzu. Then he was granted a few days of leave.

Naturally, Aoba would not waste his time. He rented a storefront on the commercial street and began selling small gadgets he had developed by combining them with Sealing Jutsu.

There were headphones that could enhance perception. They could also come in the form of earrings, ear studs, and similar accessories. There were bracelets that emitted harsh noise to disrupt an opponent's balance.

Those two were his flagship products.

He had also developed several concealed weapons to assist in battle, such as rings hiding poison needles and repeating sleeve arrows.

Such things did not actually not exist in the Naruto World. But for some reason, they had never become popular.

Aoba had always believed that ninjas were essentially an assassin-type profession. These ninja tools should have suited them perfectly.

Unfortunately, perhaps because chakra existed in this world, ninjas could wield extraordinary power. As a result, they pursued such small tools less and less.

But in Aoba's view, these things were still extremely useful to Chunin and Genin.

Honestly, even a village like Konoha, which valued education, was extremely selfish when it came to nurturing ninjas.

The vast majority of civilian ninjas only learned one or two ninjutsu beyond the Three Basic Techniques in their entire lives. And their chakra simply could not support the use of more ninjutsu.

That was why, in war, these Chunin and Genin could only become cannon fodder. Against powerful elite ninjas, they could not even overwhelm them with numbers.

In battle, most Genin and Chunin still fought with Shuriken and Kunai. At most, they bought a few Explosive Tags as trump cards.

Buying more was impossible. Explosive Tags were extremely expensive, far beyond what ordinary civilian ninjas could afford to use up.

And most ironically, for true Jonin-level ninjas, Explosive Tags became far less important.

The ninjutsu they unleashed was more powerful than Explosive Tags. Their effects were also more complex and varied, far superior to the simple explosion of an Explosive Tag.

Therefore, ninja tools like Explosive Tags occupied an awkward position in the ninja world. Or rather, most ninja tools were somewhat awkward.

After Aoba's ninja tool shop opened, it attracted quite a few customers. But to his surprise, not a single pair of the headphones or noise bracelets he had pinned high hopes on was sold.

Meanwhile, rings containing poison needles, bracelets, sleeve arrows, and similar items sold quite well.

After all that effort, the ninja tool shop could only be considered to be breaking even. After all, making those small gadgets required quite a bit of time and effort.

Aoba's first venture in the Shinobi World was far from a success.

In truth, he had better products that he had not put on the market. If he brought out the Life Potion, it would absolutely sell like crazy. Becoming Konoha's richest man would not be a problem. But for Karin and her mother's sake, he could not bring himself to do such a thing.

During his leave, he went to the riverside as usual to train with Sasuke. By then, Sasuke had nearly mastered the Rasengan. All that remained was training to incorporate Nature Transformation into it.

That training carried a certain degree of danger. Aoba planned to devise an entirely new training regimen.

But that afternoon, just as he finished training, Karin suddenly ran over.

"Brother Aoba, Mom is looking for you."

Aoba's expression changed slightly. This was the code between him and Karin. It meant White Zetsu was approaching the laboratory.

"That guy endured for so long. Has he finally lost his patience?"

My deepest apologies. I came down with a severe cold these past two days and could not hold on, so there is only one update. Once I feel better tomorrow, I will start releasing a lot more chapters.