Konoha Could Never Cut Off Its Own Arm!

Deep in the border mountains between the Land of Earth and the Land of Fire.

No. 7 Underground Hidden Warehouse.

Inside the dim stone chamber, four Elite Jonin wearing Iwagakure forehead protectors stood around a stone table, staring fixedly at the black scroll lying atop it.

The scroll had arrived half an hour ago.

The moment they turned their heads, a scroll had appeared on the table.

At that moment, the atmosphere in the stone chamber was somewhat strange.

The scroll recorded the White Fang of the Leaf squad's marching route, infiltration time, and tactical intentions.

It even clearly listed the Chakra attributes of the accompanying shinobi in black and white.

It was precise down to which hour they would take which mountain path.

The intelligence was so thorough that it was like Konoha had been stripped bare.

None of the four spoke first.

A few minutes later, the first to crack was the burly bald Jonin on the left.

He slammed his palm onto the stone table, knocking over a candlestick.

"Fake! Complete bullshit!"

He pointed at the scroll, his face full of scorn.

"This is definitely bait planted by Konoha! Have those Konoha politicians lost their minds? They're showing us their village's top fighting force?"

The other two immediately chimed in.

"Exactly."

"Konoha is the foremost of the Five Great Ninja Villages. No matter how badly its leadership fights among themselves, they wouldn't do something as brain-dead as cutting off their own arm."

"Who knows where this scroll came from? Maybe it's just a prank by some other shinobi stationed here?"

"Still, we should report that the warehouse's location may have been exposed, then wait for orders from above."

The bald Jonin snorted and reached for the scroll, intending to toss it into the brazier.

"Wait."

The squad captain, who had remained silent until then, suddenly raised a hand and clamped down hard on the bald Jonin's wrist.

He did not look at his teammates. His eyes were locked on the four characters: Hatake Sakumo.

The squad captain swallowed, lowering his voice.

"What if... it's real?"

"If it's real, Sakumo will be here tomorrow, and we'll all die!"

As soon as he said that, the bald Jonin's hand froze in midair.

A dense layer of cold sweat instantly covered his forehead.

That was right.

What if it was real?

That was Hatake Sakumo, the White Fang of the Leaf!

Everyone present understood the weight those words carried.

On the southwestern front of the Second Shinobi War, that man had single-handedly torn through three Sunagakure defense lines.

With a flash of his blade, Granny Chiyo's elite puppet formation had been reduced to firewood.

That god of slaughter had once carved through half the Shinobi World in the Land of Wind. Against four Elite Jonin guarding a warehouse?

Forget fighting back. They probably would not even see the afterimage of him drawing his blade before lining up for the Pure Land within three breaths.

Extreme terror exploded in the hearts of all four men.

"Better to believe it than not. The stakes are too high. We can't afford to gamble."

The squad captain snatched up the scroll, stuffed it tightly into his robes, rose to his feet, and kicked his chair aside.

"I'll personally take this back to the village and leave it to Lord Tsuchikage to decide!"

The remaining three exchanged looks, unable to force out even a single word of objection.

Two days later, Iwagakure, Tsuchikage's office.

The Third Tsuchikage, Ōnoki, floated in midair, clutching this intelligence report stained with cold sweat. His old, orange-peel face twisted into a knot.

He keenly caught the stench of Konoha leadership using a borrowed knife to kill.

"Are you sure this isn't Konoha's counterintelligence scheme?"

Ōnoki's voice was hoarse.

The squad captain kneeling on the floor pressed his forehead against the cold stone slabs.

"This subordinate cannot confirm it."

"But Hatake Sakumo's name is written on it. This subordinate did not dare gamble."

Ōnoki remained silent for a full ten seconds.

The strategic importance of the No. 7 Explosive Tag Warehouse was too great.

The explosive yield inside was enough to blast half the Land of Fire's defensive line into the sky. There could not be the slightest mistake.

"Investigate!"

Ōnoki shattered the broken corner of the desk with one strike, savage light blazing in his eyes.

"Immediately activate every high-level covert agent lurking around Konoha!"

"Spare no cost! Even if you have to fill the gap with lives, find out Hatake Sakumo's movements!"

The price of that order was extraordinarily brutal.

In just three days, undercurrents surged outside Konoha.

The high-level spies Iwagakure had spent more than a decade cultivating were successively purged by Konoha's ANBU with bloody efficiency.

Three spies were killed on the spot, their bodies dragged into the morgue;

After sending out his final message, the fourth bit down on a poison tooth and committed suicide.

Four lives bought a single final piece of intelligence.

Hatake Sakumo had indeed led a team out of the village. Direction: the Land of Earth border.

Seeing those words, Ōnoki braced both hands on the desk and remained still for a long while.

Then he raised his head, and killing intent solidified in his cloudy old eyes.

"Well, Konoha. You handed over the hilt of the blade yourselves."

Ōnoki laughed in fury and decisively issued a death order: Hatake Sakumo had to be left behind.

Ōnoki's methods were exceptionally vicious.

He did not arrange the ambush on the unavoidable route a hundred miles from the warehouse.

White Fang's instincts were too sharp. An interception from afar would only alert him and make it easy for him to retreat unscathed.

The best hunters often laid the simplest traps.

"Recall every outer patrol around Warehouse No. 7."

Ōnoki's shriveled finger stabbed heavily into the sand table.

"Pull all heavy forces inward!"

"Press the core killing formation to within three hundred meters of the warehouse perimeter!"

"Also pull two Elite Jonin companies from the interior to reinforce it!"

The strategist beside him was startled.

"My lord, packing all our forces around the warehouse? If White Fang notices the abnormal lack of defenses..."

"He won't retreat."

Ōnoki's voice was icy and piercing.

"I've studied Hatake Sakumo for fifteen years."

"His only weakness is that he takes missions too seriously, and values his comrades' lives too highly."

"No matter what happens, he'll try to complete the mission. Only when he realizes it is absolutely impossible will he withdraw."

"So we need to let him come in."

"When his blade touches the warehouse gate, shut the door and unleash the hounds!"

"We'll catch the turtle in the jar!"

At the same time.

In a concealed mountain hollow less than half a day's journey from Warehouse No. 7.

Hatake Sakumo, covered in dust from travel, crouched on a rocky tree branch. He raised his right hand and made a simple gesture.

Behind him, three Jonin instantly fell silent, turning into afterimages as they blended into the shrubbery.

Sakumo gazed at the watchtowers faintly visible amid the distant mountains, his breathing steady.

"We'll rest here tonight."

His voice was quiet, as though he were merely making casual conversation.

"At dawn tomorrow, we begin the raid."

The clouds parted, and the cold moonlight fell upon the white-bladed Short Sword on Sakumo's back.

The Konoha hero gripped its hilt, repeatedly running through tomorrow's tactics in his mind.

He knew nothing of the certain-death trap ahead, already gaping open like a bloody maw.

Dense forest at the Land of Fire border.

Ye raced through the treetops alongside Nohibi.

After two days of forced marching, with Nohibi, an Elite Jonin, leading the way, they had miraculously avoided every bit of trouble along the route.

Nohibi's battlefield instincts were terrifyingly sharp.

He only had to sniff the air to detect where traps lay and which patches of forest bore traces of human passage, allowing him to detour in advance.

As Ye traveled, he was still reviewing the Chakra circulation path of the Great Fireball.

Just then, Nohibi's figure abruptly stopped.

He reached back and clamped down hard on Ye's shoulder with tremendous force.

The two instantly concealed their Chakra, their bodies completely hidden among the dense branches and leaves.

Ye said nothing and peered down through a gap.

In the clearing below, two middle-aged shinobi in their thirties were squatting on the ground.

They wore no forehead protectors, and their faces were thick with flesh.

Their shabby leather armor was stained with dark-red clots of blood, while the Kunai at their waists were rusted with blood.

They exuded the thick, fishy stench of people who had spent their lives living by the blade.

They were most likely wandering shinobi with Chunin-level strength.

The two were dividing their spoils on the ground. Bloodstained banknotes and a cut-open merchant caravan package were scattered between them.

Nohibi released the hand pressing down on Ye.

At this moment, there was no trace left on Nohibi's face of the hearty, simple-minded "big brother."

It was as though someone had flipped a switch. His expression instantly shifted into the extreme coldness belonging to an Uchiha.

This was the true captain of the Security Force.

Nohibi tilted his head and looked at Ye.

His lips moved, his voice lowered to the utmost, delivering an emotionless command.

"Kid."

"Ninja Academy playtime ends here."

He pointed his chin toward the clearing below.

"Go down there and kill those two."