The plea for help came from an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the Resettlement Zone.
Relief lumber had once been stored there after the Night of the Nine-Tails.
Once the shacks had been rebuilt, the warehouse had stood empty.
Thick dust.
Few people.
A good place to hide someone.
And a good place for an ambush.
When Uchiha Jun heard the location, his first instinct was to take a team and seal it off.
Gen stopped him.
"We can't just go pick him up."
"If we wait any longer, he'll be dead."
"If we pick him up without precautions, he might still die."
Gen placed the wood chip and the sealing residue on the table.
"The one calling for help could be another hook."
Those words silenced Uchiha Jun.
He did not want to admit it, but it was true.
If the Uchiha took the Distress Caller away on their own, Root could accuse them of harboring a witness.
If the Distress Caller died in Uchiha custody, the blame would fall squarely on them.
If the Distress Caller carried information designed to mislead them, the more urgently the Uchiha acted, the easier they would be to steer off course.
So this time, Shisui proposed having three parties present as witnesses.
The Uchiha would handle security at the scene.
The Hokage's Anbu would oversee the procedure.
A Medical Ninja would assess his physical condition and the sealing residue.
When the message reached the Hokage Building, Hiruzen Sarutobi did not hesitate for long.
He dispatched his own Anbu.
That alone made his stance clear.
Danzo would hear about it too, of course.
But he could no longer openly stop them.
At dusk, the three-party team arrived at the abandoned warehouse.
Shisui led the way.
He did not use his Sharingan, relying