It was probably the first time Nagato had spoken so much in front of outsiders, and his barely suppressed emotions almost brought tears to his eyes.
Most present didn't paid attention to his emotional state, except for Minato, who has been secretly observing him. While Obito and Kakashi were too engrossed in their food to notice.
After a good night's sleep and a meal, everyone felt re-energized. That afternoon, Minato announced that he would leave the Land of Rain and return to Konoha.
His mission was to cooperate with the ANBU ninjas by assisting their retreat, who had completed their mission and should have returned long ago.
Takeshi felt uneasy about the ANBU ninjas return, knowing that Orochimaru might have also returned to village, so they might be meeting him in debriefing.
Before leaving, he took advantage of Nagato's absence to secretly press a pawprint on Konan.
This pawprint, is a spatial mark that belonged to him, would allow him to return to the Land of Rain, as long as he had enough chakra.
Of course, its main purpose was not his desire to return to Land of Rain, but to leave a mark for easy communication whenever needed, especially during emergencies.
Nagato is crucial in Madara and Zetsu's plan, and Zetsu would definitely have some manner of means to monitor him.
While he didn't have courage to do anything directly, Takeshi would still like to have options available and having quick access to Nagato would help.
After leaving the Land of Rain, Minato asked about Obito's sharingan. After checking them, he found out that Obito had opened the second tomoe (magatama).
He was delighted about this and promised to treat everyone to a feast when they returned to the village.
This promise wouldn't be ignored. Treating these brats to a big meal would cost a lot of money. The three children and Takeshi, who was in a period of rapid growth, were big spenders.
By Minato's rough calculation, almost all the money gained for this mission would probably be spent. The border of the Land of Rain was not far from the Konoha's border camp.
After recovering their strength, they could arrive in just over an hour. To Takeshi's expectation, Orochimaru wasn't present.
It was said that he was still having 'friendly' negotiations with Ebizo in a small town in the Land of Wind and would not be able to come back for a while.
Takeshi was very happy to hear this. While in Land of Wind's town, Orochimaru was ruthlessly demand as much as he could in negotiations, Ebizo was trying his best to retain as much resources as possible for Sunagakure. So the negotiations would go on for a while.
After Minato returned, he went straight to the intelligence department tent. The movements of the Sunagakure and Iwagakure must be reported to the superiors so that they could make certain preparations.
Otherwise, once Iwagakure and Sunagakure launched an offensive together, Konoha would be unprepared and would definitely suffer a devastating loss by the end of war.
Takeshi and his team were resting. While there were many tasks in the camp, but they had just returned from a big mission, so they decided that this day was basically a rest day.
This time, they got separate tents. But Takeshi still missed life in Konoha. Although it was boring every day, it was better to be safe than to lick blood off his paws every day. It was a pity that he couldn't return back to Konoha in the near future.
'Come here, Asuma, life is so boring without you.' Takeshi secretly prayed in his heart, although this wish wouldn't likely be fulfilled...
The normal Genin team were still doing basic missions. While Asuma and the others were elites in their grade, but they were in the middle and lower reaches of the entire Genin Team.
It's not about their lack in ninjutsu they know. On the contrary, many Genin barely know any ninjutsu, but they were experienced and capable, and were much more reliable than children who just graduated, due to performing deadly missions with barely any resources and surviving - Kakashi and their team being exceptions.
Early the next morning, initially, Takeshi planned to sleep for a while, but Obito got up at dawn and exercised.
While Takeshi didn't mind Obito exercising, Obito's mumbling, "If I can't complete 500 push-ups in 30 minutes, I'll punch a thousand times. And if I can't do that I'll walk on my hands around the tent thousand times" was getting irritating.
The main reason was that Rin had left earlier. If Rin was still sleeping, Obito would definitely not dare to shout like this.
'This bastard!' Not only Takeshi was annoyed, but Kakashi was also annoyed. As this reminded him of Guy persistently annoying him.
Although Guy was his best friend and Kakashi would risk his life to save him, he still felt quite annoyed, especially since Obito was gradually getting more annoying now.
"Meow~ Kakashi, why don't you go out and teach him a lesson?" Takeshi stood up and noticed that Kakashi was holding the sword beside him tightly.
"You can go and team him a lesson yourself. Don't get involved in this mess." Kakashi took a deep breath, then laid down on his bed, ignoring the voices from the outside, then started to utilize this to train his willpower and focus.
Seeing Kakashi not willing to go out, Takeshi decided that he would leave the tent and deal with this noise, after coming up with new ideas in his mind.
Seeing Takeshi go out, Kakashi sat up and looked outside confused. According to his understanding of Takeshi, this cat should've definitely chosen to lay down and continue to rest.
'Why would he really go out to talk with Obito? Besides, Obito was training and it wasn't something he would stop...', Just as he was thinking this, he heard some voices coming from outside.
"Meow~ Obito, why don't you shout out every lap to cheer yourself up, so you feel more motivated."
"Really? Why didn't I think of this ? You are correct, alright! Thanks Takeshi!"
So, Kakashi's stay inside the tent became even more torturous, as he started hearing strings of numbers along with previous ones, "If I can't do 500 squats in 15 minutes, then I will do thousand kicks", and so on basically "If I can't do xxx in xx time, then xxx".
Then the damn cat walked away and not returning to the tent, making Kakashi even more furious!
'I got the points, my dear pal Kakashi, you don't have to thank me. Going to bed early and getting up early is good for your health.' Takeshi walked around the camp, sighing in his heart.
Having fun messing with Kakashi was one of the few fun things he could do here. Rin was already gone to medical tent anyway.
Sure enough, it didn't take long for Kakashi to get up and train. But the sad thing was that after he got up, Obito forcibly pulled him into sparring.
They said it was sparring, but it was actually a different kind of duel.
It was obvious that Obito had gotten cocky after awakening the second tomoe sharingan and needed to be humbled.
Takeshi didn't have the time. He stared at them for a while, and then sneakily returned to the tent to buy a luxury cat food.
During this period, he would not go out for another mission for sometime anyways, so he decided to eat a luxurious cat food and sleep for a while, while his body gets stronger with Natural Energy.
After eating, he wouldn't wake up even if Obito yells in his ear, but Kakashi wouldn't have that luxury. ' Poor Kakashi, still restricted by his humanness and human limitations and currently not having the ability to ignore unnecessary sounds.'
The effects of luxury cat food is simply better than sleeping pills.
However, Takeshi can feel that his adaptability to natural energy has become much stronger. In the past, he would immediately pass out after eating.
Now though, after eating, he still has at least a little bit of awareness, which is a bit like being in drowsy state. Not long after, his eyes closed and he fell asleep.
Kakashi competed with Obito outside for a while. Later, many idle ninjas in the camp came to watch, heckling and even placing bets on who would lose and who would win.
Although Obito had learned Earth Release Ninjutsus, he knew only 2 Earth Release jutsus, Earth Release Earth-Style Wall and Earth Release Hardening Technique
The Hardening Technique can be used in advance to reduce the recoil caused his taijutsu attacks. This is why this jutsu is commonly used by Iwagakure ninjas.
Logically speaking, this match up is not bad for taijutsu users, but Lightning Release's piercing attacks defeats Earth Release defense, and Kakashi is proficient in Lightning Release ninjutsus.
After defeating Obito, Kakashi told him to run around the entire camp while also helping patrol ninjas, as a manner of pushing him as far away from tent as he could, so he can return to sleep.
But when he returned to the tent, he found Takeshi sleeping in his sleeping bag.
The cat was wearing a ninja outfit and wrapped in Kakashi's sleeping bag, sleeping very comfortably in it.
He ruthlessly pulled Takeshi out and shook him abit, only to find that the damn cat still didn't wake up. 'Still sleeping?' Kakashi had no choice but to put him back into the bag.
Then shook the sleeping bag more vigorously, but after doing that for couple minutes and still not waking up the demon cat, he didn't feel like sleeping anymore. 'Why can't they just let me rest peacefully!'
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