Mission

Winter gave way to spring, and before anyone knew it, it was Konoha Year 49.

Within the Land of Hot Water, the trade road leading to the Land of Fire wound between the mountains.

Asami Ri was like a piece of deadwood, his breath held and his presence suppressed, his figure perfectly concealed in the shadows of the dense canopy.

His calm gaze surveyed the people and horses moving slowly along the road below.

Just then, a faint sound stirred on a nearby branch.

"The mission target has appeared. Southwest, two kilometers away."

The newcomer lowered his voice as he reported.

With his Byakugan activated, veins bulged at the temples of the handsome boy's face. His pure-white eyes reflected distant silhouettes obscured by the Dense Forest.

His name was Hyuga Shin, a member of the Hyuga Branch Family and Asami Ri's current teammate.

Asami Ri did not turn around. He merely raised his right hand and gave a crisp tactical signal.

As his hand lowered, the shadows beside another tree trunk spread like ink across what had appeared to be empty space.

Uchiha Tekka's stern face slowly emerged. A short sword rested on his back, and his One-Tomoe Sharingan was already active, glowing with a cold, murderous light.

The three exchanged glances, needing no further words.

"Move."

Asami Ri quietly uttered the word.

The next instant, the canopy trembled slightly. Before the dead leaves could reach the ground, three figures had become afterimages almost impossible to see, vanishing into the Dense Forest toward their target in a triangular formation.

Two kilometers away, at a bend in the trade road.

The pungent smell of blood had already spread through the air. More than a dozen wandering ninja wielding sharp blades had surrounded a sizable caravan.

Crates lay scattered across the ground, and the guards had already fallen in pools of blood. The surviving civilians huddled together, trembling in despair.

The middle-aged merchant leading the caravan knelt in the mud, holding up a heavy purse with shaking hands as he begged the burly, one-eyed wandering ninja before him.

"My lord... this is one million ryo for passage. It's everything we have. Please, have mercy and let us live!"

The one-eyed ninja sneered. Without even glancing at the purse, he lashed out with his leg, driving the heavy sole of his boot into the merchant's chest.

With a sickening crack of bone, the merchant flew several meters like a kite with its string cut.

"That little bit of money will be mine once I kill you anyway." The one-eyed ninja licked his lips, a cruel smile on his face and savagery filling his lone eye. "Kill them all. Leave no survivors."

Just as the wandering ninja raised their blades to slaughter them, three ghostlike shadows silently arrived in the Dense Forest beside the road.

Hyuga Shin's eyes pierced the obstructions as he quietly reported his Intelligence.

"The Intelligence was wrong. Judging by the strength of their Chakra flow and the activity in their chakra pathways, all three leaders have Chunin-level strength. They're deliberately suppressing their presence."

Asami Ri sheltered behind a thick tree trunk, his eyes exceptionally calm in the shadows.

He quickly identified the three high-value targets on the battlefield, his voice crisp and direct.

"Targets confirmed. Follow the tactical plan. One Chunin each, then clear out the remaining Genin. Finish this quickly. Don't give them a chance to send a signal. Understood?"

"Understood." Uchiha Tekka's voice was low and firm, the red light of his Sharingan flashing briefly.

"Understood," Hyuga Shin replied succinctly.

"Begin."

Before Asami Ri had finished speaking, a ring of air burst outward where he stood.

The tip of the one-eyed ninja's blade had just pressed against a girl's throat. He was about to savor the sight of spraying blood when he suddenly felt a chill at the back of his neck that pierced straight into his bones.

For that instant, the air seemed to freeze.

Asami Ri appeared behind the one-eyed ninja like a phantom, as though he had stepped out of nothingness.

The Chakra-coated kunai in his hand traced a deadly arc.

Faced with this near-instantaneous attack from behind, the one-eyed ninja displayed extraordinary combat instincts. With a beastlike roar, he twisted at the waist, his heavy sword whipping through the air to meet Asami Ri's kunai.

He was a rogue ninja from Kirigakure.

In the hellscape known as the Bloody Mist Village, he had lost his reason and compassion, but gained a beast's keen instinct for slaughter in return.

That instinct had saved his life countless times on the brink of death.

Clang!!!

The kunai and sword slammed together, a piercing metallic screech ringing out amid flying sparks.

Yet the expected deadlock never came.

The one-eyed ninja's expression changed drastically.

The force transmitted through that tiny kunai was not something a boy should possess. It was an immense power like a collapsing mountain.

In less than a second, a sharp crack rang out, and the steel sword that had accompanied him for years was cleaved clean through!

The kunai continued unchecked, passing through the one-eyed ninja's waist and abdomen as easily as slicing fermented tofu, cutting his entire body diagonally in two.

Yet there was no joy in Asami Ri's eyes. Instead, a flicker of cool mockery crossed them.

The severed body did not spurt blood. Instead, it dissolved into two masses of liquid that splashed onto the ground.

"Water Clone?"

"Die, brat!"

An icy, furious shout erupted from the shadows directly behind Asami Ri.

The one-eyed ninja's real body lunged out. The remaining blade of his broken sword gleamed with deep-blue water Chakra as he thrust it straight toward Asami Ri's heart from behind.

But at that critical moment, Asami Ri acted as though he had eyes in the back of his head. He did not even turn around.

His body shifted slightly at an uncanny angle, avoiding the blade.

"A decent tactic... but useless."

Asami Ri murmured softly. As he turned, a ball of violent lightning had already gathered in his right palm.

He did not throw the Lightning Ball. Instead, as though it had been waiting there all along, he pressed it squarely against the one-eyed ninja's chest.

Bzzzt—crack!

The blue arcs instantly became countless savage silver serpents, burrowing wildly into the one-eyed ninja's chakra pathways and bone marrow.

"Aaargh!!"

The scream cut off abruptly.

The intense heat unleashed by the lightning snuffed out the one-eyed ninja's life in an instant.

By the time Asami Ri withdrew his hand, the once-ferocious Kirigakure rogue ninja had become a charred, carbonized corpse trailing wisps of white smoke. He toppled heavily into the mud.

Asami Ri lowered his gaze slightly and held his right hand just above the blackened corpse, which had yet to cool completely.

Celestial Pivot, begin extraction, he commanded in his mind.

An invisible ripple spread outward. The enemy's remaining Chakra was forcibly drawn out through his fingertips, flowing into Asami Ri's brain like streams returning to the sea.

Even as he absorbed the energy, his gaze remained on the battlefield, assessing his two teammates' performances.

Not far away, Uchiha Tekka's battle resembled an elegant, cold-blooded slaughter.

His One-Tomoe Sharingan traced red streaks through the air, precisely catching every tiny twitch of his opponent's muscles.

Tekka darted left and right. Every attack struck exactly in the gap between his opponent exhausting one motion and beginning the next, forcibly disrupting every attempt the wandering ninja made to fight back.

Shhk.

With a soft sound, Tekka stepped aside to avoid the spraying blood. The short sword in his hand drove upward into his opponent's heart without the slightest resistance.

He smoothly withdrew the blade. Before the corpse could fall, he impassively wiped the blood from the blade on his opponent's clothing and sheathed it with a backhand motion, every movement seamless.

On the other side, Hyuga Shin's fighting style was far more savage.

The boy from the Hyuga Branch Family now resembled a beast that had broken its shackles. The veins around his Byakugan looked ready to burst.

He did not maintain the Hyuga Clan's customary elegance. Instead, he turned the Eight Trigrams Thirty-Two Palms into a brutal barrage.

"Two palms, four palms... sixteen palms!"

Every strike carried a surge of Chakra, not merely sealing chakra points but destroying his opponent's internal organs.

Under the dense flurry of palms, his opponent shook violently like a rag doll, his Chakra becoming completely paralyzed in an instant.

For the final strike, he did not aim at the chest. Instead, he pressed his fingers together like a blade and chopped viciously into his opponent's neck.

With a sickening crack, the Chunin-level wandering ninja's head drooped at an unnatural angle, his spine broken by the blow.

Through killing, he was venting emotions he had suppressed for far too long.

The three finished their respective battles almost simultaneously. Their gazes briefly met across the blood-reeking trade road, and they nodded slightly to one another.

Then they scattered.

The next thirty seconds were a merciless cleanup.

Faced with overwhelming power, the remaining wandering ninja could not even finish their screams.

When the last corpse fell into the mud, the three regrouped at the center of the caravan.

Asami Ri glanced down at his watch. The hand had just completed half a revolution.

"All wandering ninja eliminated. Mission complete," he announced calmly. "Shin, stay alert. Tekka and I will collect proof."

"Understood."

The savagery in Hyuga Shin's eyes ebbed like a receding tide, and his breathing steadied.

He became the quiet, reserved member of the Hyuga Branch Family once more. His Byakugan swept back and forth through the dense forest around them, checking for ambushes or anyone who had escaped.

"No enemy signs of life within a one-kilometer radius."

With that confirmation, Asami Ri and Uchiha Tekka exchanged a glance. They drew the kunai at their waists and cut off the heads of the three Chunin rogue ninja.

Several faint puffs of white smoke rose as the three heads were neatly sealed inside the Sealing Scroll.

From the outbreak of battle to the cleanup of the battlefield, the entire operation had been frighteningly efficient. There had not been a single wasted movement or unnecessary word.

"Withdraw."

Asami Ri uttered the word coolly.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Three dark figures shot upward and vanished into the gloomy depths of the Jungle in the blink of an eye, leaving only a road littered with corpses and a caravan whose people had yet to recover from their terror.

Only after those three suffocating figures had vanished completely did the rescued merchants collapse to the ground, staring blankly in the direction where the three young men had disappeared.

To them, these three masked Konoha ninja seemed even more like otherworldly ghosts come to claim lives than the wandering ninja had.