The strategist's calculations

The moment Shisui said that, Jin Uchiha's expression faltered.

Fuck, was Shikaku Nara here for me?

He really couldn't think of any other reason.

To put it bluntly, the Hidden Mist Front was hardly a place of any importance.

The Hidden Leaf's real focus was still the Land of Rain.

The Hidden Cloud Village and Hidden Stone were the two great powers besides the Hidden Leaf. Hidden Mist was only a little tougher than Hidden Sand, and its declaration of war against the Hidden Leaf was nothing more than an attempt to fish in troubled waters.

Who was Shikaku Nara? The Hidden Leaf's strategist, one of its sharpest minds.

Why wasn't he staying put in the Land of Rain? What was he doing on the Hidden Mist Front?

Nothing earth-shattering had happened here!

Jin's gaze darkened, his eyes flickering slightly as his nerves pulled taut.

But all that thinking got him nowhere.

He had too little information to draw any conclusions.

Still, whatever.

He would deal with whatever came his way. With those few scraps of leverage, they wanted to use him as their weapon?

They had another thing coming.

"Jin, what are you thinking about?" Shisui asked with a frown.

Jin Uchiha snapped out of it and forced a bitter smile. "I'm just an ordinary ninja, shoved into your Elite Squad. Honestly, the pressure's giving me a splitting headache."

Shisui rolled his eyes at that.

He hadn't personally seen what Jin Uchiha could do, so he couldn't claim to know the full extent of his abilities.

But he knew perfectly well that Jin was far from weak.

Otherwise, the man would have died a hundred times over. He wouldn't still be standing here.

"All right, spare me the act."

"You're smarter than I am. You don't need advice from me."

"It's hard to keep hiding forever. There aren't many fools in this world, and there aren't any on a battlefield."

Jin Uchiha nodded.

Of course he understood what Shisui was saying.

He only hoped he could put off the day his cover was blown a little longer.

But with things as they stood, that seemed unlikely.

Even without meeting Hiruzen Sarutobi face-to-face, he knew that old fox must already have his eyes on him.

After all, only the few of them had crawled out alive from that last batch of cannon fodder.

Elsewhere, Kazama Nara lifted the flap of a somewhat larger tent and stepped inside, addressing the man before him respectfully.

"Clan Head."

Shikaku Nara, who was reviewing battle reports behind his desk, set them down at the sound of his voice and smiled.

"Oh, Kazama."

"Sit, sit. There's no need for formalities between uncle and nephew."

"It's only been a few days, but you're starting to look like a man."

"Looks like this trip to the battlefield wasn't wasted."

Shikaku rose with a smile, led Kazama to the guest table, and poured him a cup of tea himself.

His tone was gentle and easy, as though he were speaking to his own nephew, without the slightest air of a superior addressing a subordinate.

Naturally, Kazama Nara looked overwhelmed by the attention.

The two sat down and chatted for a while.

Shikaku asked how his injuries were healing, then remarked on how close their two families were.

Only once the atmosphere had warmed enough did Shikaku steer the conversation toward business.

"Oh, right."

"What do you think of the teammate your uncle found for you?"

"I didn't saddle you with a bad one, did I?"

Kazama Nara's expression didn't shift.

Truthfully, he hadn't expected to run into this "dear" uncle of his on the Hidden Mist Front. He hadn't been prepared for it at all.

But it didn't matter.

He knew he was no match for his uncle when it came to brains, but if Shikaku wanted to pry information out of him?

Ha. Dream on.

He pondered for a few seconds before slowly speaking.

"Jin Uchiha, right?"

"He's a good partner, certainly. With his abilities, he'd qualify for an elite group like Class A."

"I honestly can't figure out what goes on in that guy's head."

"He's an oddball Uchiha."

By the time he said that, Kazama Nara had fully slipped into his role.

He had pointed out Jin Uchiha's oddness, shown just the right amount of confusion, and even "let slip" a little about the man's strength.

In reality, though, revealing that much made no difference.

The fact that Shikaku had arranged for him to be there meant he had already noticed something.

Whether Kazama said it or not changed nothing.

What mattered was that he used these scraps of trivial information to keep the truly dangerous secret tightly under wraps—the secret alliance between him and Jin Uchiha.

"I see." Shikaku's expression remained calm. He smiled before adding, "So Jin Uchiha sounds quite formidable?"

At Shikaku's question, Kazama gave a slight nod.

"Yes. Very."

"Leaving aside the Three Basic Jutsu, his Fire Release is solid too. But his real trump card is his Taijutsu."

"One reason we managed to hold out for three days in Hidden Mist's home territory was our clan's Shadow Techniques. They let us get some idea of what lay ahead."

"The other reason was Jin Uchiha."

"We escaped Hidden Mist's encirclement several times, all thanks to his Taijutsu. He dragged the two of us along and outran our pursuers."

Well, great. There went another bit of information.

But Kazama Nara had no choice.

A little squad like theirs surviving so long in Hidden Mist's stronghold was hard enough to explain as it was.

Failing to offer a plausible explanation would be asking for death.

So he could only lay it out openly.

Of course, Jin Uchiha probably wouldn't mind him sharing this much.

Abilities he had already shown were nothing he needed to keep secret.

"What else?" Shikaku pressed. "Have you figured out what Jin Uchiha is after, or why he's hiding his strength?"

Clearly, this was what he really wanted to dig out.

By now, he was almost certain those three Uchiha had died at this man's hands.

He had no interest in the Uchiha's internal mess.

What concerned him most was that Hidden Cloud ninja's corpse.

As Jonin Commander, he also controlled the Intelligence Department. He had verified that the Hidden Mist corpse that had suddenly appeared outside the Forest of Death that day belonged to the Hidden Cloud ninja who had mysteriously vanished two years earlier, when the Hidden Cloud Village had come to abduct Kushina.

So what exactly was going on?

What had happened that day?

With both the Hidden Cloud Village and the Nine-Tails Jinchuriki involved, he had to get to the bottom of it.

That was why he had placed Kazama in Jin Uchiha's squad.

First, the other Nara clan members were all in Class A. Forcing one of them into the squad would have been too conspicuous.

Second, although he didn't entirely trust Kazama, he was confident he could keep him under control. Besides, with Kazama's perceptiveness, a little task like this should have been easy enough.

Unfortunately, Kazama could answer those earlier questions honestly, but this one? Not a chance.

This touched on the biggest scheme he and Jin Uchiha were working on.

At that thought, he shook his head helplessly.

"I don't know about that."

"To put it bluntly, the squad Jin Uchiha and I were in was a cannon-fodder squad."

"Uncle, you know better than anyone what those squads are like."

"Nobody builds relationships in a squad like that, and there's no time for coordinated missions. Talking about trust is a joke."

"So apart from mission-related matters, Jin Uchiha and I barely talked about anything in private."

"But my guess is that Jin Uchiha doesn't trust the Uchiha at all. That would explain why he hides his strength."