The "Eye of Light" in the Woods

The bed boards at the border outpost were hard enough to dig into his bones.

Shuo lay on the makeshift bed assigned to him, staring at the pitch-black ceiling, not the least bit sleepy.

It wasn't the unfamiliar bed. His mind was still replaying the ambush that day, along with Minato's words about sensing and controlling "light."

Changes in light can reveal information... He rolled over to face the wall.

Obito was already snoring softly in the next bunk. Kakashi's side was silent, while Minato and Rin each had separate rooms.

He closed his eyes and tried to "see" his surroundings in the darkness, not with his eyes, but with that little bit of light-energy perception.

Everything was a blur.

There were only a few vague outlines of "light and heat" representing living people-the faint radiation of chakra and life energy, not actual light.

He tried "listening" to the light instead.

The darkness wasn't completely devoid of light: the faint glow of a distant campfire coming through the crack under the door, the extremely weak starlight outside the window...

The information was jumbled and faint.

Looks like I've still got a long way to go before I become a "human radar." Shuo gave up and pulled the thin blanket over his head.

Sleep was the more practical choice.

Early the next morning, Minato assigned reconnaissance duties.

The area around the outpost was divided into four sectors.

Minato personally took the northeast, where enemy activity was most likely.

Kakashi and Obito were paired up and assigned the northwest. Rin stayed at the outpost to help with medical care and defense. As for Shuo...

"Shuo, you'll be responsible for the southeast on your own."

Minato handed him a rough map. Several terrain features requiring particular attention were marked in red-a valley with a small stream running through it, a stretch of woods said to contain an abandoned hunter's cabin, and several mountain passes suitable for ambushes.

"On my own?"

Shuo raised an eyebrow.

This arrangement... was it trust? Or a test?

"Yes."

Minato nodded. "The southeast is relatively quiet, but we can't rule out danger entirely. Your movement speed and means of perception are rather unusual. You'll have more flexibility alone. Remember, reconnaissance comes first. Avoid combat whenever possible, and signal and return immediately if you find anything unusual."

Minato added, "I've already spoken to the outpost captain. They'll send two squads on routine patrols to the south and east this afternoon. Their routes will overlap part of your sector, so you could call it indirect support."

In other words: here's your job, figure it out yourself, remember to run if there's danger, and someone will help keep an eye on things.

Shuo took the map and glanced over it.

It was a sizable area, but a full day should be enough to work through it at a steady pace.

Working alone... suited him perfectly. He wouldn't have to accommodate his teammates' speed or explain how he moved.

"All right."

He folded the map and tucked it inside his clothes.

"Stay safe."

Minato patted his shoulder and handed him a specially made signal flare. "Use this in an emergency. We'll be able to see it from the outpost."

Shuo took the flare and nodded.

After breakfast, the team set off separately.

Kakashi and Obito soon disappeared into the northwestern mountain forest.

Minato vanished in a flash of golden light as well.

Shuo, meanwhile, strolled leisurely out of the outpost gates and headed southeast at an unhurried pace.

He looked less like someone on a reconnaissance mission than someone going on an outing.

Only after entering the forest did he pick up his pace a little. Even then, he prioritized conserving his strength, using the lightness granted by "light particle activation" to leap between the trees with smooth, nearly silent movements.

As he moved, he tried to put Minato's teachings from the day before into practice.

Rather than passively receiving information from the light, he actively and consciously "scanned."

His gaze swept over a forest clearing: direct sunlight, normal reflections from the grass, no unusual glints from metal or glass.

It passed over a rock face: moss and shadows were naturally distributed, with no signs of artificial excavation or concealment.

He looked toward the canopy: the swaying branches and leaves matched the wind direction, with no unnatural stillness or movement against the wind.

At the same time, his little bit of light-energy perception worked at full capacity, spreading like an invisible film to catch discordant disturbances in the surrounding "light and heat"-the lingering warmth of a campfire, for instance, infrared radiation from a human body, or the faint energy field created by concentrated chakra.

It felt very awkward at first. Dividing his attention left him flustered, and he nearly ran into trees several times.

Gradually, however, he found his rhythm. Visual observation and light-energy perception complemented each other, and details he might otherwise have overlooked began to emerge.

For example, on a patch of wet ground beside a stream, he discovered several very fresh footprints. They varied in size and pointed in different directions. They looked less like animal tracks than human footprints, and whoever had left them seemed to have lingered there for some time.

But there were no signs of camping nearby, nor any discarded items.

He crouched to examine the footprints carefully, then looked up toward the dense woods across the stream.

Through his light-energy perception, the light in the woods on the opposite bank seemed just a little more "murky" than on this side?

As though something had slightly disturbed the transparency of the air?

He hesitated and didn't rashly cross the stream.

Instead, he backed off some distance and circled upstream to a spot where the current was slower and rocks broke the surface, then crossed without a sound.

Once across, he grew even more cautious, suppressing his presence as much as possible as he slowly crept toward the source of that "murky" sensation.

After traveling a little over a hundred meters and rounding a thick clump of bushes, he stopped at the sight before him.

The ashes of a campfire remained in a small forest clearing. They were still fresh, probably from within the last day or two.

Empty cans and compressed-food wrappers lay scattered beside the ashes. The writing on them was unclear, but they certainly weren't brands commonly seen in the Land of Fire.

More importantly, on the trunk of a large tree at the edge of the clearing, he spotted a very fresh mark carved with a sharp implement-a circle with a crooked cross inside.

It didn't look like a map marker. More like some sort of... secret signal for making contact?

Shuo didn't approach. Instead, he crouched behind a clump of bushes and observed carefully.

There were more jumbled footprints beside the ashes, belonging to at least three people.

Judging by their depth and stride length, these weren't ordinary people. They were most likely ninja.

And they had left toward the national border farther southeast of the outpost.

Wandering ninja?

Or scouts from another country?

Shuo assessed the situation.

There were no signs of a direct threat to the outpost. It looked more as though they had rested briefly here before continuing farther in.

He took out his map, checked his location, and lightly penciled a circle in the blank space beside these woods, labeling it "fresh campsite, 3+ people, southeastbound."

Just as he finished and was preparing to withdraw quietly, his ears suddenly caught an extremely faint rustling from behind and to one side, almost swallowed by the sound of wind through the leaves!

Not an animal! That's clothing brushing against bushes!

And it's close-no more than twenty meters away!

Every muscle in Shuo's body tensed instantly, but he didn't move right away.

He remained crouched, slowing his breathing until it nearly stopped, his gaze fixed through the gaps in the bushes on the direction of the sound.

At the same time, he focused all his light-energy perception there!

A vague outline of "light and heat," slightly warmer than its surroundings, was moving toward his bushes with extreme slowness and caution! The other person had clearly discovered the remains of the campsite and was scouting it, and very likely had noticed Shuo's presence as well!

Shuo's mind raced.

Was this one of the three people from the campsite?

Or someone from another group? Friend or foe-unknown.

Fight head-on?

He didn't know how strong the other person was, and his reconnaissance orders required avoiding combat.

Retreat? That might expose my movements, or even get me pursued.

His gaze swept over his surroundings.

A few meters to his left was a dense patch of shade where no sunlight reached at all.

To his right were sparser bushes and a slope.

He quietly drew an ordinary shuriken from his ninja tool pouch without imbuing it with light energy.

Then he picked up a small pebble beside his foot and flicked it with an extremely gentle touch toward a bush several meters to his right.

Tap.

The sound of the pebble landing was faint, but clear enough in the quiet woods.

Sure enough, the moving figure behind him paused, then crept with even greater caution and extreme slowness toward where the pebble had landed.

Now!

Like a boneless shadow, Shuo "slid" low over the ground toward the dense shade on his left! He moved extremely fast, yet stirred little sound of rushing air, more like a streak of light melting into shadow.

The instant he entered the shade, he curled up, using the shadows and bushes to conceal himself completely.

At the same time, he contracted his light-energy perception to its smallest range, covering only himself as he mimicked the "light and heat" characteristics of the surrounding shadows.

A few seconds later, a tall, thin figure wearing gray-green camouflage, face smeared with paint and a short crossbow in hand, cautiously poked his head out of the bushes behind and to the side, scanning both the spot where the pebble had landed and the bushes where Shuo had been hiding.

The man looked for a while but found nothing unusual and seemed somewhat puzzled. He listened carefully again, then slowly withdrew the way he had come, disappearing into the depths of the forest.

Shuo waited another two minutes in the shade. Only after confirming the man had really left did he slowly breathe out.

That was close.

He wiped nonexistent cold sweat from his forehead. That fellow's stealth had been highly professional. If Shuo hadn't noticed him early and caught those minute irregularities in light and temperature with the perception enhanced by the "Yata Mirror Hypothesis," he probably would have been discovered already.

He didn't leave immediately. Instead, he remained hidden and carefully sensed his surroundings. Only after confirming there were no other lurkers did he slip like a ghost out of the shade and retreat swiftly but silently from the area in the opposite direction to the man.

Only after running far enough and reaching a relatively safe forest clearing did Shuo stop and catch his breath against a tree.

He took out his map and drew another small cross at the spot where he had encountered the lurker, adding a note beside it: "encountered lone scout, professional, withdrawal destination unknown."

Once he finished, he looked up at the sky. It was already past noon.

The southeastern sector... doesn't seem quite so "quiet" after all.

He put away the map, took a soldier pill from inside his clothes, and began chewing it.

As he ate, he reviewed what had just happened.

Combining visual observation with light-energy perception was indeed effective, but mentally exhausting.

And fine perception of light also seemed useful for both hiding and detecting hidden enemies.

Looks like Minato-sensei was right... there's quite a bit of "information" hidden in light.

He finished the soldier pill and drank some water, feeling much of his mental and physical energy return.

For the rest of his reconnaissance, he was more cautious, while also making bolder use of his newly grasped "Light Perception."

He discovered that by observing differences in the shifting light and shadows on the ground, leaves, and rocks under sunlight at different times, he could infer whether recent human activity had altered the surface vegetation or moved stones. By sensing extremely faint irregularities in the refraction of light through the air, he could discover carefully arranged camouflage nets or trap triggers that blended almost perfectly into their surroundings.

Over the afternoon, he found traces of two more, better-concealed old campsites, along with a few simple marks that appeared to be used for passing messages.

As the sun sank in the west and he completed his reconnaissance along the planned route and returned to the outpost, the southeastern sector of the map tucked inside his clothes was covered with several circles, crosses, and question marks, as well as brief annotations.

Only when he spotted the outpost's outline in the distance did he fully relax, his steps returning to their lazy rhythm.

Walking through the outpost gates, he ran into Kakashi and Obito, who had just returned and were reporting to Minato.

Obito looked dejected, clearly having found little. Kakashi offered a few succinct words to the effect of "nothing unusual found."

Minato's eyes lit up when he saw Shuo return. "Shuo, how did it go?"

Shuo ambled over, pulled the map from inside his clothes, and handed it to Minato.

"Did a lot of walking..."

He yawned and rubbed his slightly aching eyes. "Found signs that a few 'neighbors' had come and gone. And I had a brief encounter with one... not-so-friendly 'friend.'"

Minato took the map. As he examined its dense but clear markings and annotations, a trace of surprise flashed through his eyes, then turned into a deeper smile.

He looked up at the tired-faced Shuo, who seemed to have merely gone out for a stroll, and said sincerely:

"Excellent work, Shuo."

Kakashi's gaze also fell on the map, an almost imperceptible flicker passing through his dead-fish eyes.

Obito leaned over, looked at the markings, and exclaimed, "Whoa! Shuo-senpai, you found all that?!"

Shuo waved a hand, indicating it wasn't worth mentioning.

"I'm exhausted..."

Muttering, he headed toward the mess hall. "Getting something to eat first... and then nobody's getting me out the door again..."

The setting sun stretched his shadow long.

Along its edges, that faint golden halo remained, impossible to notice without looking closely.

As though he had just walked not through mountain woods, but along a reconnaissance path paved with light and shadow, his and his alone.