The area around the Ninshu Ruins was far too desolate, so the cultists had simply carved out a cave to serve as temporary lodging. With a ninja's instinctive caution, they had made its passages rather complex despite its modest size. An ordinary person who wandered in could easily get lost.
Ninja sometimes laid traps in terrain like this. Unless intruders used a large-scale ninjutsu to destroy the cave outright, they would have to avoid or disarm those traps.
Aside from the cultists patrolling outside, everyone was resting in the cave. Draped in loose black robes, they looked decidedly eerie. Kakuzu, the only one who did not worship Jashin, wore the same outfit, mostly because he did not want to reveal his true appearance.
Although the cultists had hired him, Kakuzu had no interest in talking to them. They would only try to teach him some nonsensical doctrine anyway, so he simply lit an oil lamp off to one side and read by its light.
Perhaps no one would have imagined that a ninja who had killed as many people as Kakuzu was, in private, a middle-aged man with a love of literature. When he had no missions, he would spend an entire day reading alone. It broadened his knowledge and relaxed his mind, keeping him from remaining on edge all day.
Turning a page gently, Kakuzu looked up at the other cultists. They were muttering among themselves, discussing their doctrines of Jashin. Who knew where those teachings had come from? As far as he knew, the worship of Jashin had emerged toward the end of the Warring States Period and spread widely during the Shinobi World War. Even some members of the Yugakure Ninja Village believed in it. Its original source could no longer be traced.
*Still, whoever started it