"Captain, the target is inside. Should we go straight in and break his arms and legs?"
Outside a shop called Yakiniku Q on Konoha's shopping street.
The normally bustling shopping street was deathly silent after the battle it had just endured. Debris and dried blood littered the street, and the civilians had long since hidden in the shelters.
Yet amid that deathly silence, the utterly incongruous, mouthwatering sizzle of grilling meat drifted out of Yakiniku Q.
Outside the shop, a dozen or so dark figures in gray bodysuits and expressionless animal masks silently surrounded the entire restaurant like ghosts. Their killing intent was perfectly contained within their bodies, like a pack of cold-blooded venomous snakes on the hunt.
The one who had just spoken was a Root ninja wearing a tanuki mask. He held a short blade coated in deadly poison, his eyes fixed through the slits of his mask on the restaurant's half-closed wooden door.
The captain at their head wore an eerie Hannya mask. He raised a hand slightly, signaling his subordinates not to act rashly.
"Lord Danzo's orders: this boy is extremely dangerous. He possesses monstrous strength capable of killing a Kage Level fighter in an instant. Under no circumstances are we to engage him in close combat," Captain Hannya said quietly in a mechanical voice devoid of emotion. "Follow the original plan. First, seal off the entire shop with the Four Black Mist Formation, a modified version of the Four Violet Flames Formation, and cut off every escape route. Then release highly concentrated paralytic gas and powerful illusion techniques. Once he can no longer resist, use the specially made chakra-sealing chains to lock his shoulder blades. Remember, we need him alive."
"Yes!" the surrounding Root ninja answered in unison.
At a gesture from Captain Hannya, four