[A/N: Bonus chapter for crossing 2k Power Stones in the last week.]
After the first round of assaults, Suna had 8 ninjas against Konoha's 6. But when Ibiki and Genma killed their opponents, they equalized the numbers. And after Kakashi and Fujin killed their opponents, it became 4 Vs 6. All Suna ninjas realized the inevitable result of that fight.
The Puppeteer observed the situation. His heart ached at the fact that 24 of his fellow ninjas had been killed in less than a couple of minutes. He looked at Kakashi, who had stopped disguising himself, hatefully and shouted, "Retreat!"
The Suna ninja in the rear immediately left the base. The ones fighting Yugao and Ken also tried retreating but were stopped by Ibiki and Genma. At the same time, Fujin and Kakashi moved towards the Puppeteer. However, their eyes widened and both stopped.
The Puppeteer made the confrontation hand seal. His crocodile puppet exploded! Numerous hidden mechanisms were fired in all directions! Even the two Suna ninjas in the room were targeted. At the same time, purple gas began spreading out.
Fujin and Kakashi were shocked at the brutality of the attack. The first person who was hit was the Puppeteer himself. His body was turned into a pincushion!
Both Kakashi and Fujin immediately jumped underground. So did the remaining 4 Konoha ninjas and one of the two Suna ninjas. But, surrounded by four Konoha ninjas, he was killed as well.
Kakashi and Fujin ignored that ninja and immediately travelled far away from the base before exiting the ground. Fujin immediately spread his chakra field. A frown formed on his face as he said, "I can't sense him. He must be good at Wind Instantaneous Body jutsu!"
Kakashi nodded and said, "The Puppeteer provided a good opportunity for him to escape. Who'd have thought that he'd be so ruthless."
Fujin nodded. There were numerous people who could act ruthlessly against others who are weaker or helpless. But to be the same with themselves was extremely rare.
In half a minute, their allies crawled out of the ground as well. Ibiki looked around and asked, "He managed to run away?"
Kakashi nodded. Ibiki sighed, "This means that the mission wasn't entirely successful. With him on the run, we won't be able to use this base as a trap to catch and kill any Suna ninjas that might return here."
Kakashi replied, "They had managed to send a message out. It would have been tough to do that even if we killed him. It's fine. I'm just glad that all of us are alright. The fight was much tougher than I had anticipated."
Everyone nodded. Despite the overwhelming victory, the fight was very close. One mistake could have caused a few deaths on their side.
Ibiki turned his attention towards Fujin. Though there was no expression on his face, he was shocked by Fujin's abilities. He thought, 'This kid is very good. I thought that he'd be the weakest in the group. But he is second just to Kakashi.
No, in terms of impact, it was higher than even Kakashi. After all, that first attack killed more than half of them and allowed us to kill a few more. Despite using such a deadly jutsu, there was almost no sign of him preparing it. No chakra leak was detected. And he properly diverted their attention just before attacking.'
Genma had the same thoughts running through his mind. With a chuckle, he thought, 'I guess our evaluation was incorrect. Using him as a support would be a big waste of his talents. I guess no one's a better judge than Lord Hokage.'
He looked at Yugao and analyzed, 'I had heard that Yugao was recently assigned to a different Anbu squad. And seeing how familiar they acted with each other on our way here, they should be in the same squad. Or more likely, she should be in his squad.'
Fujin agreed with Kakashi as well. He thought, 'These guys were very good. I was expecting to cut through them with ease as there wasn't any Elite Jounin among their ranks. I guess fighting underground in a small room played a huge role. It heavily restricted movements and prevented me from taking advantage of my speed.
If I had attacked in the open, I wouldn't have been at any risk. Unfortunately, it wasn't possible to do so in these circumstances. Apart from the underground base, they wouldn't have assembled at any other spot.'
Kakashi looked towards the base and said, "The Poison will begin leaking into the surroundings. Send Shadow Clones to neutralize the poison and recover the dead bodies. Once the poison on them is cleaned, read their memories, Ken."
Everyone nodded and sent Shadow Clones to the base. The poison had begun leaking out from the opening to the underground base. The Shadow Clones used various methods to neutralize the poisonous gas in order to ensure that the surroundings weren't affected.
While the poison was being dealt, Kakashi quickly wrote a report and summoned a dog and asked him to give it to Hiruzen.
By then, the poison was finally dealt with. The Shadow Clones brought the dead bodies out of the bases one by one. Yamanaka Ken's Shadow Clone placed his hand on one of the dead ninja's head to read his memories. He inserted his chakra into the head. A moment later, his eyes widened. He muttered, "This???"
Kakashi's clone asked, "What's the issue?"
Ken's clone replied, "I can't read the memories."
He quickly began checking the memories of the dead bodies that still had their brains intact. However, he couldn't read any memories! His face was very dark. He said, "The poison that Puppeteer used is the one that affects the neural system. Though I have the antidote that Lady Tsunade created, it works on alive humans and not dead ones. So I can't read any memories."
The remaining clones were shocked. Fujin's clone paid attention to his words. Unfortunately, Ken didn't say anything about reading memories that he didn't already know.
Ibiki's clone said, "No wonder he chose to explode the puppet. It wiped away all information. Now Konoha can't pursue Suna even if we wanted to. They can just disown these ninjas or try to pin the blame on us. In addition, we can't know what their exact plans were."
Kakashi's clone nodded and said, "Fortunately, we know that there are 9 Suna Ninjas in Fire Capital and four at other places."
Ibiki's clone responded, "Yeah, but Fire Capital doesn't really have Jiraiya. We can't snuff them out. Finding them will be difficult unless they make a move."
Genma's clone chuckled and said, "It's fine. We will let Lord Hokage worry about it."
Involuntarily, Kakashi, Genma and Fujin's clones nodded while Ken and Yugao's clones looked at him with a deadpan expression.
As no one had any ideas, Kakashi's clone sealed the dead bodies into a seal that Kakashi had handed him. Though the dead bodies didn't have any memories, the bodies themselves could provide a lot of information. All the remaining clones dispelled themselves while Kakashi's clone handed him the scroll before dispelling.
After getting the memories, Kakashi sighed and said, "Let's wait here till Lord Hokage sends another squad with the mission to either create a new base or set up a parameter. Until then, let's keep an eye out. If any Suna ninja returns, we will neutralize him and check his memories."
Everyone nodded. They dispersed into teams of two and kept an eye out for anyone who'd stumble there.
A bit after Midnight, Hiruzen received the message from Kakashi's summon. Since he was expecting the message, he stayed in his office. He read the report and analyzed, 'One ninja managed to escape. And he also sent a messenger bird. Looks like keeping this a secret from Suna won't be possible. We can't use this base to lure more ninjas from Suna and kill them.'
A frown formed on Hiruzen's face as the situation caused him a headache. According to Shikaku's plan, Kakashi's squad should have killed all the Suna ninjas. After reading their memories, they would impersonate them and lure more ninjas from Sunagakure and kill them, creating a death trap for Sunagakure. By the time they realized, their losses would have already exceeded the acceptable levels and they would be forced to back off.
He analyzed, 'Now Sunagakure has two choices. In addition to the squad that we killed earlier and the two killed in the Fire Capital, 35 Suna ninjas have met their demise in the Land of Fire. They can either stop, or they will attack using different routes. Either by creating a new base, or more likely, giving individual missions to every ninja as we did.'
Hiruzen sighed and muttered, "I should have sent stronger ninjas there. Preferably a squad full of Elite Jounins."
Unfortunately, such a squad was rather difficult to assemble. Most of the Elite Jounins in Konoha were Clan Leaders or retired from active duty. They wouldn't agree to participate in such a small matter. The few Elite Jounins he could deploy were already stretched thin due to other important matters. For instance, Renjiro was currently in the Land of Water while Eagle was in the Land of Birds.
He shook his head and thought, 'Leave it. Even that wouldn't have been a guaranteed success. They probably were on guard against such a situation. The result we wanted was too idealistic. I'm sure Shikaku has planned for such a situation.'
Without any hesitation, Hiruzen decided to pass the headache to Shikaku. He deployed four Anbu squads to relieve Kakashi's squad and maintain an eye around the base.
Unlike Hiruzen, a certain person couldn't pass his headache to someone else.
[A/N : Bonus chapter on next Sunday if the fic gets 1000 Power Stones. Bonus chapter on next week's Saturday if the fic gets 2000 Power Stones.]
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