The captain and the ones sitting with him instantly stood up. They looked at the angry Ji in a little bit of fear. "I-I have my 2 best men working on it Priest Ji." The captain replied.
Ji stepped forward a little closer to the captain and said "There is no one in the tent and the bodies are missing. I told you not to store them inside a scroll, didn't I?"
The captain looked confused when he heard that and looked behind Ji and realized that Ji had just come from the same tent where Ron and Sho were supposed to be.
"P-Priest Ji, I am telling the truth. I had 2 of my people working on draining and dismembering the bodies while the bodies were kept out in the open as you instructed."
"Then where are….."
BOOOMMMMMM
A big blast occurred suddenly as Ji was talking to the Captain. Everyone standing near the tent including Ji and the hooded figure were pushed away from the tent. It took a few seconds for Ji to get back to his senses. He looked around and saw that 4 guards were already burning due to the explosion. The tents they were guarding we directly beside the black tent so it was obvious for they got caught up so badly in the blast.
The captain and a few other shinobis lay on the ground unconscious.
"Priest Ji, are you alright?" Ji heard and felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked back and saw the hooded figure asking him whether he was alright.
Ji nodded and stood up with the hooded figure's help. He looked at him and asked "how are you not hurt in the least?" to which a small smirk was seen from the hoodie as he said "A protection rune is one of the perks of being under the direct command of the bishop."
"Working at him may give you protection but all that comes at a cost." Ji said as he dusted his own clothes and looked at the fire where the black tent stood a few minutes ago.
"We were already behind schedule with the sacrifice and now this…I think we are going to face a really big problem if we don't find out another way and also we need to know how this happened." The hooded figure said.
Ji nodded and said "Yes, I am sure this is no accident as we were in the tent just a minute ago. Have some mist shinobis put out the fire with their jutsu, and go and check up on the progress of the tunnel we had them dig. I tried doing this the easy way but now I am not going to stay and wait till I am torn to pieces. Have the stone and mist shinobis go on an all out frontal assault with those bloodline clans."
"But an all-out war without proper planning could lead to Moji's and Jiro's defeat. I know that the both of them also are escaping with us through the tunnel but they won't have anything to come back to here and they will be no use to us." The hooded figure said.
Priest Ji looked at the hooded figure as if looking at a small kid and asked "You don't know how the sacrifice happens, do you?"
The hooded figure looked at him with a confused face and asked "As we do every time, right?" Ji shook his head and said "Go and gather our people…we will be leaving soon. There won't be life on this Island by tomorrow morning. I will have the mist and stone shinobis find out who did this. We don't need to waste our time on this."
"What are you even saying?" the hooded figure didn't understand what Ji was even talking about. In his cult, there were penalties if the rituals weren't done a specific way but never this serious as to wipe out the population of an entire island as big as the hidden mist.
While all this was happening, Yami had slipped through the cluster of tents to circumvent the main entrance where the captain and the guards were posted. He didn't know that the footsteps that he heard were of Ji or anyone else. This was an enemy territory and he didn't have the luxury of time to use his enhanced senses and listen to their talks. Right now Yami was headed straight toward the tent where the digging was happening. He wasn't sure what that was but if it was kept away from everybody's eyes then it definitely had some meaning. As he reached the tent, he saw that there were 2 more hills than before which means that the two shinobis were still digging after he left.
Yami went inside the tent and shouted into the hole "Are you two there?"
It took a few seconds but he got a reply "I remember that voice…They must have sent you to check up on us again… Come on in…There is something that you should see."
Yami recognized that this is the 2nd shinobi's voice and he sounded excited. Yami climbed down the hole and the first thing he noticed was the light. The cave wasn't as dark as before. He realized that this light wasn't because of any fire they had created to light up the tunnel. It was natural light.
"You must have noticed it, haven't you?" The 1st shinobi appeared and signaled Yami to follow him and so Yami did. After walking for a few seconds, Yami saw the 2nd shinobi digging what looked like an entrance to another cave.
The 2nd shinobi put down his shovel and said "Looks like they knew what they were searching for. We found a cave on the other side. You can tell them now that the tunnel has been dug."
With a fake smile on his face, Yami nodded and said "Good work both of you. I am sure the higher-ups will be happy seeing that you finished the job so fast. Just open the entrance a little more so that we can go to the other side. Let's see if that side needs any work to do."
The 2 shinobis nodded and started digging to make the entrance bigger. Knowing that time was short, Yami also joined them and started kicking the rocks that were blocking the entrance.
Within a few seconds, a human-sized hole was formed connecting the old cave and the newly dug tunnel. Yami went to the other side and saw that it opened straight to the open sea. The 2 shinobis also decided to follow Yami and came to the other side.
"This cave must be under a big cliff and must have filled up during high tide due to which no one was able to discover it." The 1st shinobi said as he touched the wet stones around him.
Yami walked a little further with the two of them and they saw a big ship in front of them. The ship didn't seem old or anything which meant that it was recently docked here and was waiting for the tunnel to finish. Yami was about to step forward when he saw a few people on the deck of the ship. They were standing on the edge and talking about something. The next second they looked at Yami and the other two and pointed at them.
Yami was ready in case they decide to attack him but he heard a shout "Looks like you guys managed to find the cave. Go and tell your higher-ups that and tell them to start sending the luggage immediately.
"Looks like these guys were waiting for us to finish digging and join the two places." The first shinobi said.
"Should we go and tell them that we completed the task? Maybe we can get a few bloodline women for doing such an important task." The 2nd shinobi said while rubbing his hands in excitement.
Yami who was standing a few steps ahead of them turned around and said "Here's your reward."
SWISHH…
SWISHH…
2 shurikens left from Yami's hand and straightway got lodged in the 2 shinobi's necks. The two who had their guard down didn't stand a chance of dodging or countering this attack. It came so suddenly that they could only hold their necks and try to block the hole from where the blood was leaking. They knew that they couldn't remove the shuriken or else more blood would come out and maybe even choke them by going into their lungs. They fell to the ground and their bodies started twitching.
Within a few seconds, both of them died holding their necks. This was clearly seen by the 3 people who were on the deck. One of them was about to shout at Yami asking him what he was doing but the one beside him stopped and said "He must have been ordered to kill them to keep the information about this escape route a secret."
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