Chương 18: Chapter 13

Tea Capital Ryoma, Recently Promoted Ninja"Heya-heya- you didn't tell me you were that guy!" Mari nudged him in the side as they ate- tables and chairs brought out to the courtyard for them to use by the servants of the Daimyo. Something about dishonoring himself by not having furniture for his guests to use. They weren't alone in their planning anymore- the palace of the Daimyo gradually filled with more nobles seeking shelter in the wake of the attacks.

The center of the courtyard was still covered in a large 'field' of sand, which was now into an improvised map to record attack sites and other information about Laughing Smoke. The various ninja were mingling around this map, quietly talking to one another, occasionally talking with some of the arriving nobles, and adding information to the map as it came up. The nobles apparently saw a good opportunity to get free entertainment, and were busying themselves with watching them all work and plan.

This was probably the first time any of them had seen ninja actually plan a large-scale operation like this, and they and their samurai bodyguards were paying close attention. The sides of the courtyard, therefore, had turned into improvised viewing stands and food court for the nobility to gossip about the attacks and watch the ninja play in the sand. Ryoma took another bite of his riceball. It was covered in salt and dried just enough to develop a sort of shell.

On the other side of the sand pit, The Amenins were quietly talking and making their own little notes as they looked over the tactical map. Most of the other ninja were talking with their clients, possibly explaining the situation at hand. Kirinin and Chairomaru had already left more than an hour ago, and were presumably hot on the trail of Laughing Smoke. In the meanwhile, the rest of them couldn't do much more than prepare weapons, eat, organize information, and get some rest.

He had already organized, re-poisoned, and re-loaded much of his launcher-weapons into expended Bolters. He had never stopped organizing info as it came in. All that was left was to eat and get some rest." That guy?" Ryoma repeated, amusedly bemused. That is to say- he was both a little bit confused and a little bit amused. Bemused was a funny word that way, in that it didn't actually mean what it implied it meant.

"Are you really that much of a shut-in?" Mari asked, mildly astonished.

"There are rumors all around Suna- about a super-puppet that showed up to turn the tides before mysteriously disappearing again, the puppeteer never seen but groups of ANBU always hanging around to clean up!" Ah. He maintained his composure by taking another bite. Mari continued to ramble on the chair next to him, waving her hand around in a dramatic fashion.

"A giant puppet with an evil mask that shows up whenever things get desperate, loaded with dozens of weapons and capable of going toe to toe even with Jinchuriki!"

"Absolutely not." Ryoma denied at once.

"One of those guys would rip the Wood Dragoon apart- it probably wouldn't even be a fight." The only way he wins against one of those is if the Jinchuriki in question was particularly young or stupid, and both cases require them to be currently not transformed into a giant chakra monster.

"Bleh- That's not the point!" Mari chopped her hand a couple times.

"The point is- you're the puppeteer! The super-mysterious secret-weapon of the Suna Ninja Army that even the Puppet Force denies knowledge of!"

"I'm pretty sure Captain Gentai knows who I am. As does Lord Kazekage." Ryoma rolled his eyes as he listed off his direct superiors, all two of them, because things were rather dire in Suna right now.

"It'd be pretty strange if the guys in the ANBU and Intelligence departments didn't know either."

"Gah!" Mari gave a comically frustrated huff, leaning back and planting her hand on her hip.

"I'd ask why you didn't tell me, but I know you well enough to guess.

'It didn't seem that important to me, Mari-oneechan. I'm sorry for misleading you~!' That's what you'd say."

"That's slander- I would never apologize for misleading someone." Ryoma shook his head gravely.

"The implication alone is loathsome, please bow one hundred times to apologize for it."

"Pft-heheh!" Mari laughed, throwing her head forwards and covering up her mouth with her hand.

"No wonder no one knew who the puppeteer was, it was a shut-in weirdo like you who likes eating rations!"

"Yup." He nodded firmly, a serious scowl on his face.

"Yup, and in fact, as soon as this mission is over I'm gonna eat another ration." He restrained an amused huff as she lost herself in giggles. Mari really was an upbeat kinda gal- which was weird because they were ninja, she should be way more traumatized and gloomy than this. Not that that would be a bad thing- gloomy girls have strong appeal.

"Sunanin!" A voice called out from the side. Ryoma turned to see a guard, one of the ashigaru that served as the common guards of the Daimyo's household, calling out to them. Behind the lightly armored man were three noble women, Lady Ikeda, Madam Gozen, and one unknown. The old samurai was there too, looking alert but relaxed at all the ambient excitement. Ryoma nodded, pushing himself up from the chair and tapping the giggling Mari on the shoulder as he passed.

He tossed the rest of the slightly-crunchy riceball and sweet potato center in his mouth and chewed rapidly, trying to finish his three-hundred calorie snack before reaching the client and her friends. His sand clone was currently disguised as a chair to watch them. He narrowed his eyes as he passed the side of the sandmap, the Tani-nin looking at him with amused eyes, lounging on top of his kneeling, disguised sand clone as if it was a normal chair.

Her client was sitting in her lap, marveling at all the ninja as they walked around and went to work, and her chin was on top of the boy's head. There was a perfectly good, not-clone, chair right next to her. Bothersome woman, it's not like he was going to remember any of that through a sand clone, she just wanted to tease him. He rolled his eyes, forcibly swallowing the rest of his snack as he reached the established perimeter and the three nobles standing there.

He gave a little nod to Sarutobi and the ashigaru, as was proper, before turning to address the three ladies.

"Lady Ikeda, woman who isn't my client, other woman who isn't my client."

"Mister Ryoma! Don't be mean!" Lady Ikeda scolded, effect somewhat lessened by her restrained giggles at his blatant disrespect.

"I'm introducing you, so whatever you say reflects on me, you know?!" He pretended like he was going to say something, before stopping himself and reaching under the illusory veil to rub his chin.

"So, to be clear, my client is now commanding me to lie to her friends- is that right?"

"That's not what I said at all!" The laughter of the other civilians told him that the comedy routine was a one-hundred percent success. He gave a comical sigh, shaking his head and shrugging in a mildly confused manner. Lady Ikeda reached forwards and smacked him lightly on the arm, lips wobbling as she tried in vain to maintain a reproachful look.

"Enough of that- this is lady Oda of the Land of Rivers- tell her what you told us!" Ryoma turned to look at the apparent 'Lady Oda'. A short, somewhat petite woman with pitch black hair cut into a shoulder-length 'hime' cut, serious looking red eyes, and slightly worn kimono on. Her inner robes were cream, her coat was deep green, and both of which looked like she bought the best she could on a budget.

Honestly, she looked a bit poor for someone like Madam Gozen to be hanging around, but he supposed stereotypes existed to be broken.

"About what? The breathing exercises or proper corpse disposal?" He asked dryly. She glanced around before leaning forwards.

"You know- about Suna and the Wind Daimyo!" Her whispers were not as quiet as she probably thought that they were. He supposed she knew that she probably shouldn't be talking about this in such an open place, but she didn't exactly understand why. In any case, anyone who had been bothering to listen had certainly heard that, so there wasn't much point in keeping it a secret.

It's not like this wasn't public info- he could wander into Earth Country and ask the state officials about every past declaration and public policy their Daimyo had ever made for a dozen generations back. The same was true for anyone wandering into Wind Country and doing the same. He nodded, then focused on Lady Oda.

"It's not a secret by any means, so don't get your hopes up if you're looking for hidden ninja truths." He explained shortly, to which she nodded in understanding and waved a hand for him to continue. Which he did.

"Due to internal political pressures, the Daimyo of Wind Country has vowed to stop supporting the ninja of Sunagakure over his own Samurai. He has thus far upheld this vow by diverting any high-level missions that he would normally generate from Suna to other, neighboring ninja-villages. This has led to an economic drought in Sunagakure, as our expected largest employer refuses to provide taxable work.

If this continues, the ninja of Suna will have to grow increasingly creative to maintain our current location and standards of living. The situation is unsustainable, and something will eventually have to change." Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Sarutobi, having already heard all of this before, merely closed his eyes with a deep furrow to his brow and frown on his face.

The Ashigaru, hearing all of this for the first time, had a substantially larger reaction, with more silent dread at the situation that was being described. Lady Oda had an expression of deep thinking on her face, staring up at him as she thought that through.

"... But the Daimyo isn't the only client, is he?" She asked, raising a hand to rub at her chin.

"What's stopping you from simply getting work from other places?"

"Suna does get work from many places." Ryoma nodded, supporting her statement.

"However, the Great Ninja Villages are incredibly expensive to run. A single high level mission is worth many lower-level missions. While Suna receives many jobs from other individuals, it is rare for anyone except nobles or merchants to have the wealth required to pay for a high-level mission. Of those- the Daimyos are the most consistent and abundant source of such high-level missions, and thus contributing the most to any Great Ninja Village's economy. Other clients simply don't have the funds to compare."

He reached up and rubbed the back of his neck.

"I could turn this into a lecture about economics, but this probably isn't the time for that. In short, while Sunagakure does get work from many people, we don't get enough work to make up for this. This is compounded by the fact that- we live in a desert." He shrugged.

"We have to import most of our supplies, and all that importing takes a great deal of wealth. Only a Daimyo would have the wealth capable of fixing a drought like this- and all the other Daimyos have local ninja villages to hire instead. They have little reason to start hiring Suna ninja."

"I see." Lady Oda responded, rubbing her lower lip in thought.

"That is a difficult situation…'

"I wouldn't worry about it too much." Ryoma responded, waving a hand off.

"We are ninja, after all, chances are we'll resolve this internally in a few years and no one will ever even notice that something was wrong. If I had to bet- we'll pack up our things and move down to the Land of Sea." That was completely false, there was no way they were moving to someplace so thoroughly in the control of Kiri ninjas.

"Land of Sea?!" Lady Ikeda responded with a somewhat baffled expression.

"Why Land of Sea?" Madam Gozen asked, arching a single refined eyebrow. Ryoma nodded.

"Well it's because of the fishing- it's the most popular pastime for Suna nin everywhere. We simply love to fish. The Second Kazekage built a pyramid of glass to commemorate how much we love to fish." All three noblewomen looked at him somewhat quizzically, then glanced at each other, then back to him.

"Do you?" Lady Oda asked, tilting her head to the side and staring up at him.

"Yep. As you know, there's huge lakes and ponds in the desert, all of them full of fish." He waved his hands around in a casual manner.

"That's not true!" Lady Ikeda complained with a smile. They were starting to realize that he was throwing out bullshit again.

"That's why it's called a desert- because it's full of freshwater. Cool, humid, and absolutely brimming with life. In fact, there's nothing but greenery in a proper desert." He lied as easily as he breathed, raising a finger and pointing it straight up in a declarative fashion.

"You're such a liar- a rotten liar!" Madam Gozen declared with a grin.

"I'd never lie- that would be evil I think." — It took another few hours for the scout team to come back, the Kirinin and Chairomaru sitting on the edge of the sand-field as they gave their report. The other ninja were gathered around relatively close, the hunter-team in front and the garrison-team slightly further back, and the gathered nobility and samurai along the more distant edges of the courtyard as they tried to listen in to the dramatic ninja-happenings.

"The scent ended at a set of docks on the coastline- smaller ones used for fishing boats." Chairomaru, currently transformed into a copy of Gaku, explained to the gathered ninja.

"A small island offshore was the nearest location."

"I asked the local fishermen about it." The Kirinin picked up, using his needle-sword to draw out the surrounding area on the sand nearest to him.

"Old Jashinist shrine, they eventually turned it into a lighthouse, then they decommissioned it. Apparently no one has been there in a few years, so naturally we ran over to investigate."

"The scent continued at the docks of the island, leading up along the stone path and towards the lighthouse itself. This scent mixed with the smell of blood and ammonia." Chairomaru growled lightly, shaking his head.

"This was enough for me to call the search short- a few other potential hideouts were investigated and then discarded." The Kirinin grumbled, putting 'x' over several spots on the sand-map.

"Most likely hideout is that lighthouse, we agreed to pull back after investigating the surroundings. Area is only lightly forested, the surrounding shore mostly rocky and high, not suitable for boat landings save the single beach facing the relatively calm waves near the mainland shore." He marked the region on the map, as little as that terrain feature mattered to ninja.

"Overall cover leading up to the lighthouse is sparse, the occasional tree or outcrop and little else. Tower itself looks abandoned from the exterior, wildlife is mostly birds and insects. Lots of crabs on the beach."

"Lots of other scents there- of other humans, but little disturbance in the plants. They stuck mostly to the main path and made their way up into the tower for the most part. Most of the scents are recent, nothing there is more than a month old." Chairomaru grumbled, scratching at his neck with the back of his hand.

"I can't smell anything of specific danger beyond the corpses- no poison or explosives. Mostly just death."

"That's strange." The Amenin spoke up at this, eyes narrowing in through.

"That concoction he used earlier should absolutely have a scent. Those canisters were good, but they weren't perfect. The scent of their manufacture should be lingering."

"I didn't smell anything like them there, no." Chairomaru shook his head, confirming his earlier statement.

"He's manufacturing the poison somewhere else- or getting it from someone who is." The Iwa-nin spoke what everyone was currently thinking, a deep frown on his face.

"That's fucking annoying."

"At least two centers of operation, or an accomplice. Most likely one close or within the capital." Amenin nodded with a growl in his voice.

"That will need to be resolved as well." There were a few moments of silence, Ryoma made a thoughtful hum to draw attention towards himself.

"Chairomaru, if you smelled that gas again, you'd be able to identify it, yes?"

"Absolutely- I'm not just some cute puppy, you know?" That statement was very funny coming out of Gaku's face.

"Do you think you'd be able to identify its ingredients as well?" Ryoma continued to ask. Chairomaru paused at that, considering the question for a moment, before nodding.

"... Yeah, I can do that." Ryoma turned his head to address Asuma.

"Konoha team- you've been working with Chairomaru for some time now- will you be willing to accompany him on the search for the source of the poison? If this would forfeit your share of the mission payment- I'll be willing to hand over my share of the bounty." The Konoha team considered this for a few moments, glances exchanged before a conclusion was swiftly reached.

"We can- but there's no need to forfeit your share of the bounty. This is just something that needs to be done." Asuma denied the offered payment rather nobly, nodding firmly in his direction. Ryoma used his chakra-strings to move three rocks from the 'hunter' group and split them off into another, separate 'hunter' group.

"Chairomaru and the rest of the Konoha team will be split off and search for the poison source, meanwhile the rest of us will hit the base- I presume a four-prong attack with a single overwatch is acceptable?" There were no arguments. Ryoma nodded, standing up straight from his crouch.

"Final preparations, then we move out." He declared to the assembled ninja. Thankfully- this whole operation was getting a bit smoother over time.