Chương 312: CH_8.47 (312)

Yamanaka Amami scouted the estate in the cover of the night. The main building and one of the secondary buildings, which seemed to be the guard quarters, were well-lit—but the rest of the grounds were covered in darkness. As long as she stayed clear of a couple of lamp posts around the property, she could observe the main building for as long as she liked. Ukuri was inside the main building—the one with three samurai stationed around it.

Two lazed on chairs, leaving one vigilant samurai to patrol the longest section of the building. She glanced at the other secondary building used as the staff quarters. It was dark, which made it a preferable entry and exit route. It would be best if they entered through the wall behind the staff quarters, using the darkness to their advantage and took out the vigilant samurai first. He'd be the biggest problem if they failed to kill Ukuri stealthily.

Taking out the vigilant samurai would also create a clear escape route in case Ukuri made noise. Amami observed for a bit more before carefully leaving the estate and regrouping with Thirteen and informing him of her plan.

"The back right of the estate is dark; we should go in from there and remove the samurai actively patrolling the long side." As she expected, Thirteen frowned and immediately questioned her suggestion.

"That's risky," he said.

"We could alert everyone by confronting him. What if the target wakes up and decides to foot it out of here to avoid the entire situation?" Since they started working together two days ago, he had questioned her suggestions and advice at every turn.

While she was relieved that he wasn't an imbecilic asshole—and that he listened to her, and if her suggestions made sense, which they always did, he would readily accepted her ideas upon realising they made sense—it was a little irritating that he had to get a word in every time. I could just take over the samurai's body, and we could finish him silently, thought Amami—not that she'd actually do it unless strictly necessary.

The Yamanaka clan practised their Mind-Body hiden jutsu, allowing them to possess their target's body and scour their minds if they wished. Their jutsu wasn't protected by an inherent requirement like bloodline, and anyone could learn it, but they wouldn't gain the same proficiency as a Yamanaka.

Not only had the clan created the jutsu so that it would work the best for them, but the Yamanaka themselves had evolved through the generations to adapt to the jutsu—resulting in their clan's jutsu being categorised as a hiden jutsu, or simply, hijutsu. The Akimichi clan's Calorie Control and the Nara clan's Shadow Manipulation were also categorised as hiden jutsu. Seven, the Hyūga, couldn't hide his bloodline limit because of his dōjutsu, but she could hide her hiden jutsu simply by not using it.

The candidates didn't know if the ANBU had something more planned for them, so keeping some of her cards hidden to retain an advantage would be beneficial. Amami glanced at Thirteen. The boy had been surprisingly open to showing his skills. She knew he could use genjutsu; he possessed a chakra augmentation jutsu, which meant he preferred taijutsu; finally, he used Water Release on the ninjutsu front.

There was no way for her to know everything about him but Amami knew it was enough to gain an advantage during combat.

"You can use genjutsu to silence him," she answered, starting another conversation to make him understand line of thinking, "like you did with the old woman at the samurai's house."

"The paralysis worked as well as it did because she was a civilian." Thirteen shook his head.

"This is a samurai with chakra training. My control over the genjutsu will not be anywhere as strong as it was on the old madam."

"So you can't paralyse him?" She sighed. It was her way of subtly challenging him. In the short time they knew each other, she noticed he did not like it when she would speak down to him—nobody did. Thirteen, however, happened to be the sort of person who would do something about it. He was quick to bite back when someone assumed things about him. His usual bland tongue would sharpen and he'd throw a dig of his own instead of calmly explaining that he could. She wanted to smile when Thirteen's eyes narrowed.

"I can do it," he said.

"Are you sure?"

"I just said that I can do it—keep up."

"Great, it's decided then." Amami wasn't being reckless by ignoring the risk that Thirteen might fail. Something told her that he had an appetite for risk and understood the value of the risk-reward equation. In the assassination, he decided to kill the target in the middle of a busy street—but all of his suggestions and opinions played it safe. She realised it was because he didn't trust her and was compensating by choosing options that left room for mistakes—but in doing so, he made things needlessly complicated.

Amami was simply pushing him just enough that they could hit the sweet spot.

"... So, no qualms against someone just trying to make a living?" she asked him. Amami was surprised at how clearly the scroll stated that the bounty on Ukuri's head was because she offended the Hidden Leaf. One would think the ANBU would try to sugarcoat it so the duo would feel better about killing her, but they had very bluntly put the situation before them. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

It didn't change her mind or anything, but it warranted some introspection on her part.

"... They're testing us by being so straightforward," said Thirteen as though reading her mind.

"They most probably want to see if we will complete the mission despite our feelings about the situation. They wouldn't want to hire someone whose personal views interfere with every mission."

"You will do anything as long as they say it's a test?" she asked, curious at how he'd rationalised such a thing. She had been involved in a couple of assassination missions where the target hadn't done anything averse to her and would even be considered innocent from certain points of view, but had he?

"Those who kill must be ready to be killed. The lives of us shinobi aren't valuable enough to warrant guilt or hesitation. Besides, by killing a shinobi, you rid the world of a killer—net positive in the end."

"That's a rather grim view of your own profession, of your own self, don't you think?" she asked. As a shinobi herself, she thought her life had immense value not only to herself but to a good crowd of people. Thirteen didn't reply, and Amami didn't feel like she should push it.

"But if you kill a shinobi, wouldn't the number of killers stay the same?" she asked to move past the heaviness of the topic.

"Kill two then," he replied. ———. The moment twilight began, and the sky started to lighten, they infiltrated the property from the darkest portion of the boundary and slipped past the staff quarters. It was reasonable that some staff would wake up early to prepare for the day, so they had to be quick to keep their footprint minimum. The plan was to exit after ten to twelve minutes. The vigilant samurai patrolling his route suddenly heard a clicking sound from a few trees and thick bushes at a distance.

"Cricket?" he muttered to himself. It sounded off to him. Having been focused his entire shift, he strayed from his position momentarily and approached the trees to get a better listen. As he approached, the sound got clearer and louder, and it became apparent that it wasn't a cricket but something else entirely. Before the samurai could even get the chance to register suspicion, his body froze up, and he found himself paralysed, unable even to shift his weight over his legs.

As the panic rose, Three emerged from the thick bushes and stabbed the man in his chest, almost instantly killing him. Not wasting any time, she dragged his body into the bushes, where Takuma helped her hide it before they swiftly closed in on the main building. They had scouted the building for several hours but never had an indoor view of the main building; as such, they couldn't be sure that there weren't samurai stationed inside.

However, it was unlikely for someone on guard duty to not step out for fresh air or stretch their legs in the time they had been observing. With that assumption, they entered the building through an open door. They remained cautious and quiet in case their assumption turned out to be false. Fortunately, the house seemed empty, with no guard presence. The next problem was to find the target's bedroom. As they traversed the house, they had to be utterly silent to prevent alerting the samurai outside and the Ukuri.

As the minutes passed, the tension between the duo rose until, five minutes later, they found the bedroom. As Takuma grabbed the handle to pull the sliding door open, Three stopped him and gestured for him to step aside, after which she inspected the door. He didn't know what she was doing and simply observed as she took out a rigid wire and slipped it between the gap in the door to check if it was bobby-trapped. Clear, she gestured. Takuma nodded and took out a kunai as Three slowly opened the door.

The room had no bed-frame bed, and Ukuri had pulled her futon away from the door and was facing the door. The moment Takuma entered the room, he threw his kunai for her throat. Three looked surprised at his sudden action—but it was the right choice as Ukuri's eyes snapped open an instant before the kunai hit her but she had no time to react to the kunai tearing through her throat.

Three reacted quickly and rushed towards Ukuri while she was still in shock and unable to even think, much less do anything directly to defend herself. She finished her off with a stab to the heart, Ukuri's hand trembled as she went for Three's mask, drawing on it with her blood. The strength left her fingers, and her arm went limp as life extinguished inside her body. Takuma used a dagger to remove Ukuri's middle and ring finger from the base as proof of assassination for the bounty office.

The most preferred proof was the entire body or the head—which would get them the money the quickest as the verification could be done on the spot—but they didn't care about the money, and the risk of carrying an entire body without a storage scroll was too much.

"Let's go," Takuma whispered as he bagged the fingers. They left the estate without alerting the guards just as the sun became visible over the horizon and immediately split up with the plan to rendezvous at the bounty office. Twenty minutes later, Takuma entered the bounty office located within a single-storey building. The office itself was built in the basement and accessible from the outside.

The plain, white-painted metal pipe railings along the concrete steps leading to the green heavy metal gates set the tone. If Takuma had to describe the interior, it would be— all function, zero form. The interior was a reception area with not a single piece of furniture possessing aesthetic purpose. The reception desk looked like it was from another era. There were three types of mismatched waiting chairs without a care for uniformity and even the wall posters existed solely for instructional reasons.

Takuma stepped to the reception desk and rang the bell. There were two doors behind the desk—a single-panel door and a double-panel door—which closed off the rest of the building from the reception. Thirty seconds later, a stout man exited the single door with a bored expression. He looked at Takuma, and the blood on him made him click his tongue with unhidden dissatisfaction.

"Do you want to claim or register a bounty?" he asked.

"Claim."

"Name or reference number?"

"Kinohei Ukuri." The man curled a brow when he heard the name, but it went back down almost immediately.

"What proof do you have?"

"Two fingers."

"Show me. Don't put them on the table," said the man quickly. Takuma held the fingers in the small pouch and put it in the man's gloved hand, who then took out one and gazed at it for a moment.

"I can only issue the reward after I have confirmed the kill. It will take a week. After I confirm it, you can collect your reward." The man reached into his pocket and took out a token. It was stamped in the middle, surrounded by a blue-coloured outer ring.

"Bring this back in a week and not a day before. You can show up a year later for all I care—but you need this token. Anyone who has this token will be given the reward."

"Understood," said Takuma as he put the token into one of his pockets.

"Anything else?"

"No, nothing." Takuma turned around and left without another word. He was nervous as he stepped out. He feared that someone would be waiting to catch him—but he breathed a sigh of relief when the street was as empty as it should have been. He caught a glimpse of Three on the edge of the street before she disappeared, which meant the situation was clear. She weaved hand seals for the Body Flicker Jutsu and did the same himself.