Preparing Supplies

The world of Naruto had originally been an ordinary planet. Had it developed naturally, its people might have seen native supernatural powers coexist with technology. But a few outsiders from the Otsutsuki clan had completely changed the planet's development.

Chakra.

Kaguya Otsutsuki had planted the God Tree on this planet. She had ambushed her companion, Ōtsutsuki Isshiki, and sacrificed him to the God Tree before eating the Chakra Fruit herself. After giving birth to two children, she had clashed with Hagoromo Otsutsuki and Hamura Otsutsuki over her beliefs and ultimately suffered the fate of being sealed away.

In the end, Hagoromo Otsutsuki had spread chakra throughout the world. After his son Indra developed ninjutsu, ninja gradually stepped onto the stage of history and grew in strength.

There seemed to be a war going on in those scenes I just saw, but I have no idea when it was. If it was the Fourth Shinobi World War, I'd better wait a while before going. But they standardized their forehead protectors during the Fourth Shinobi World War, and I saw both Konoha and Iwagakure forehead protectors just now. The ninja were also fighting each other, so it probably wasn't the Fourth Shinobi World War.

Karn considered this. The other three shinobi world wars had been less severe. The Fourth Shinobi World War had literally shattered mountains and split the earth, and anyone too slow to escape might even get caught in the Infinite Tsukuyomi.

Since they're still at war, I can adjust my earlier plans for food supplies a little. Increase the medicines by half and leave only the instruction leaflets.

Karn had attended a few private receptions with his father and made some acquaintances there, including several people from pharmaceutical companies. He could order a batch of medicine directly from them.

Besides, Karn wanted a substantial quantity. Removing the branding or switching the instructions to Japanese should have been easy enough.

Antibiotics and anti-inflammatory drugs, fever reducers and painkillers, vitamins, all kinds of emergency wound treatments, medical equipment, and so on.

There were plenty of things Karn could take over, but that raised a question: what could he get from the Hokage Universe?

Currency from the shinobi world was an immediate no. Once brought back, it would be worth less than toilet paper. Gold was the most straightforward option, but there did not seem to be much gold in the shinobi world either. The only source he knew of was Sunagakure's Fourth Kazekage, that glorified miner, and Karn did not run a gold shop or a metals company.

That made gold and other rare mineral resources his last choice. Surely he was not going to risk his life just to bring back a little gold. If that was all he wanted, he might as well go into business on Wall Street.

If he wanted to make money, business opportunities were everywhere in this world.

What Karn wanted was strength that would let him reach the supernatural. The most miraculous energy in the shinobi world was chakra, but it was something unique to the world of Naruto. Everyone there had over a hundred trillion cells in their bodies, making them naturally stronger than Karn.

Even if he went there, never mind whether he could extract chakra at all, the amount he produced would not be very large.

I need a way around that. Orochimaru, or Tsunade?

Karn picked up a sheet of paper and wrote down a few plans, only to tear it up afterward.

Everything he was considering now was a castle in the air. He could not even establish what era the shinobi world was in, so making more plans would be pointless. But Karn was certain of one thing: if he wanted supernatural power, he would most likely have to pin his hopes on Hashirama cells.

If he focused solely on chakra, he would always be a weakling, and perhaps a short-lived weakling at that.

What Karn needed to do now was prepare thoroughly, whether that meant medicine or clothing.

"Good thing I speak Japanese. Thank you, FBI!"

"Carl, how are the warehouse and suppliers I asked for coming along?"

On the other end of the phone, Carl took thirty seconds to open her bleary eyes. After glancing at the clock on the wall, she shouted into the receiver in disbelief, "Karn, have you even checked the time? The Constitution of the United States protects every citizen's sacred and inviolable right to sleep!"

"It's noon, Carl. Are you still half asleep? I'm going to tell your father you stayed up all night playing again."

Carl snapped awake and immediately put on a smile. "Come on, Karn, I was just joking. I've found both the warehouse and the people you need. I'll take you to see the warehouse first this afternoon."

"No problem. I'll drive over to pick you up in half an hour."

Karn hung up after that. Then he found the address book his father had left in his study, located the pharmaceutical company manager's name and number from memory, and called him.

"Jace? This is Kane Penter. I'd like to discuss a business deal with you."

Sales work was a little beneath a department manager at a pharmaceutical company, but Kane Penter was a major shareholder in a private hospital in New York. To Jace, he was a connection worth maintaining. Besides, Karn wanted a substantial order: a rough estimate put the medicines and medical equipment at five hundred thousand dollars.

For someone to make a purchase that large in one go in the early twenty-first century, even a fairly senior manager like Jace had to treat a major client like Karn with the utmost courtesy.

Afterward, Karn took Carl along to inspect the warehouse. Both its security and floor space were decent. It would serve as a temporary facility in the early stages, and with so few people coming here, it offered enough privacy as well.

Once Karn earned enough money, he would build several more secure warehouses. Large shipments arriving and then disappearing for no apparent reason might go unnoticed once or twice, but if it happened too often, someone would certainly come knocking.

Besides, he was not the only tenant in the warehouse Carl had found. It merely looked empty because relatively few people rented space there.

After renting the warehouse, Karn dropped Carl off and prepared to discuss the medicine deal with Jace. Once that was done, he still had other things to buy.

Medicine could not be the only thing the shinobi world lacked. If it was the Second or Third Shinobi World War, food would also be a lifesaver.

Beyond trading, Karn always kept in mind that he needed to establish himself in the shinobi world and build a force of his own, something like Gato's operation, but without courting death the way Gato had. With no real backing, the man had seized control of an entire country with nothing but a bunch of samurai and rogue ninja.

Guns and ammunition would be Karn's weapons against rogue ninja and bandits. If enough people were armed with guns, they would have a chance of killing even a chunin.

Firearms were far from weak. Some rifles were almost as powerful as a chunin's shuriken, with a rapid rate of fire to boot. A chunin without defensive ninjutsu facing a squad of gunmen might genuinely be in trouble.

Karn requested an extended leave from school outright, which meant he bailed on his arrangement with Carl again. But because he had spent so much over the past two days, he gave Carl another sum in US dollars and asked her to invest it in the stock market for him. The United States had recently shown signs of heading toward war again, leaving plenty of room to trade in both oil and gold.

Since Karn needed to make money, he spent a day discussing their next investment moves with Carl.

After leaving Carl's house, Karn began preparing for his trip to the shinobi world.