The two men who emerged from the morning mist were Uchiha Itachi and Kisame Hoshigaki, who had traveled from the Land of Fire's capital.
After kidnapping the Daimyo of the Land of Fire, they had been lying in wait for Konoha's reinforcements. Before those reinforcements arrived, however, the organization sent them to Konoha to investigate.
As for the Konoha Ninja Kisame Hoshigaki had encountered earlier, Itachi insisted that the whole thing had been a dream.
Itachi solemnly reasoned that Kisame had probably gone too long without a fight.
Fighting was always on Kisame's mind, after all. What occupied him by day would naturally haunt his dreams at night. Besides, Itachi occasionally did "hear" Kisame talking in his sleep.
That actually left Kisame a little embarrassed. To think he could no longer settle down and focus on a job—
Back when he had assassinated the Daimyo of the Land of Water and other high-ranking officials, he had never been like this.
In short, after Itachi's convincing spiel, Kisame grew a little lax about their mission to lie low in the Land of Fire.
Just then, Pain, the Leader of the Akatsuki, contacted them for the first time in ages and assigned them a new mission.
According to their Leader, intelligence reports indicated that another battle had broken out in Konoha after the chunin ninja exams, one that had gone largely unnoticed.
It had also been an enormous battle, leaving the surrounding terrain severely devastated.
Most importantly, Sasori and Deidara, whose whereabouts had previously been unknown to the organization, had appeared. Deidara had even fallen into Konoha's hands.
"Nothing but a bunch of troublemakers."
Kisame Hoshigaki shook his head.
"Hold on."
As they approached Konoha, Uchiha Itachi suddenly stopped and looked up at the village a short distance ahead.
"What is it,