The courtyard was brightly lit, yet not a single person could be seen moving.
Hiashi gave Neji a look, and the two dropped silently into the courtyard.
The sight before them made both their pupils contract.
Several bodies lay sprawled beneath the eaves and across the courtyard.
Judging by their clothing, they were the elder's grown children and trusted guards.
Their faces still held expressions of shock, terror, or attempted resistance, but their lives had already been snuffed out.
Even more striking was the way they had died.
Their wounds were not ragged. On the contrary, they were unusually "clean."
Most of the fatal wounds were to vital points such as the throat and heart. The cuts were smooth, their edges coated in a thin layer of white frost that had yet to melt completely, gleaming eerily beneath the lanterns and moonlight.
Tiny fragments of ice crystals were scattered across the ground and nearby pillars, while a faint, biting chill of ice and snow hung in the air.
Hiashi crouched down and extended a black-gloved finger, lightly touching the wound on one corpse's throat.
A bone-piercing cold reached his fingertip, along with the distinctive hardness of ice crystals.
He carefully picked up a bloodstained sliver of ice, a flicker of startled doubt crossing his pure white eyes.
"This is... Ice Release?"
He murmured to himself, his brows drawing tightly together.
The Ice Release kekkei genkai belonged to the Yuki Clan of Kirigakure, which had been wiped out long ago.
As far as he knew, the Yuki Clan's bloodline had already been declared extinct.
There had never been any record of an Ice Release ninja within Konoha, either.
How could Ice Release have appeared here?
Moreover, the technique was clean and decisive, each strike fatal.
An outside assassin?
*But why had