Rustling sounds whispered through the forest.
Hidden deep within a thicket, Yagyu Souma held his breath and waited, fingers wrapped around the hilt of his borrowed blade.
Tenten's weapons weren't chakra-forged, but for ordinary combat, they were more than enough. Their only downside was that they didn't channel chakra particularly well.
Far ahead, Kakashi-sensei's battle raged intensely.
"Lord Ishi, we—"
"Wait," the middle-aged samurai murmured. "Let Kakashi and that man fight a little longer. Once the waters get muddier, we'll step in and profit from the chaos."
The samurai gestured lightly.
"Spread out. Don't let him escape."
"Yes!"
Their voices were low, cautious. Then the group dispersed.
Souma's eyes sharpened.
As expected.
These men weren't here to retrieve anyone.
They were here to target them.
No—more accurately, they wanted to provoke conflict between the Land of Fire and the Land of Iron, dragging a neutral nation into the Third Shinobi World War's lingering power struggle.
"Craftsmen Ninja Village… and the Kiyota clan," Souma thought, frowning.
The idea of these two factions working together sounded absurd.
But the more he thought about it, the more it made sense.
Ninety percent of the ninja tools in the entire shinobi world came from the Craftsmen Village.
The whole world relied on them—
but nobody wanted the "factory" to have its own military might.
That contradiction created fertile ground for ambitious individuals—most notably, the descendants of the notorious ninja craftsman Seimei.
Souma's thoughts fell neatly into place.
"Should I attack now?"
He hesitated only for a breath.
He was worried that if he struck early, he might scare away the "cicada" before the "oriole" appeared…
But on second thought—
Anyone bold enough to strike at a jinchūriki and a jōnin-level target wouldn't possibly view a child like him as a threat.
If he killed a few Kiyota samurai, the Four Celestial Symbols wouldn't see him as a rival—
they'd simply mistake him for another predator swooping in.
With that in mind—
He no longer hesitated.
He would not use the sealing traps yet.
His first wave would be clean, sharp, and silent.
He formed his plan in seconds.
Then, he crouched silently, waiting for prey to step into range.
The fighting ahead was reaching its climax.
Almost there.
"Now! Move!"
A group of figures surged toward the battlefield—
But a shadow flickered out of the underbrush.
A flash of cold steel.
A single step.
A single cut.
And the nearest samurai's throat opened in a spray of crimson.
The attacker vanished behind a tree before the others even registered what had happened.
"Who's there!?"
Kiyota Ishi's face contorted.
An incredibly refined iaido slash—
the sort that only a handful of samurai in the entire Land of Iron could execute.
And the most terrifying part?
He'd been hiding right beside them… and they never sensed him.
One of Mifune's subordinates?
Impossible.
If Lord Mifune already knew about their scheme, he wouldn't send one man.
Then who—
A Leaf shinobi?
"Lord Ishi! The Leaf has how many ninja here?"
"Hatake Kakashi, one boy, one girl… If it's the standard four-man team, they're missing one."
"I see," Kiyota Ishi muttered darkly.
"So, boy… Kakashi trusts you enough to let you roam freely? To play assassin?"
Souma's voice echoed from tree to tree—
But it was Kakashi's voice that echoed.
"How wasteful of you to worry. Dealing with your little group only requires one of me."
"You—no, you're not Kakashi," Ishi replied, narrowing his eyes.
But inwardly, he felt shaken.
A youth who could mimic voices flawlessly, hide his presence perfectly, and wield iaido with killing precision…
Such a genius could only come from Konoha.
Kiyota Ishi reorganized his thoughts.
"Boy, we hired you to catch Yuichi. And now you kill my men? Unreasonable, don't you think?"
"Hmph. That man clearly has jōnin-level strength. Yet you reported this as a B-rank mission.
Based on that alone, we could abandon the commission entirely."
Souma's tone was light, cold.
His Limit State wasn't something he could activate repeatedly without consequence—it brought real fatigue.
But thanks to the Bodhi Seed, his recovery was astonishingly fast.
If the enemy wanted to stall with words, he welcomed it.
But of course—
they weren't merely talking.
Three samurai had already circled behind him.
No one underestimated a life-or-death battle.
Souma pushed his mental focus to its peak.
His hands blurred through seals.
Chakra gathered at his fingertips—
Kiyota Ishi charged toward the tree Souma hid behind.
"Careful! That boy is fast—and his sword is dangerous!"
In that moment—
Souma finished weaving his jutsu.
Around him, invisible chakra threads spread outward, drifting like a web.
Silent, fine, deadly.
With one hand maintaining the threads, Souma popped a specially-made soldier pill into his mouth.
Then he lowered himself and waited.
Three faint whooshes.
Three enemies struck simultaneously.
The first samurai saw "her"—the disguised decoy—peek out in alarm.
"Die!"
He swung—
And agony exploded across his body.
His eyes widened.
A trap!?
His muscles, tendons, and veins were being sliced by countless invisible threads.
He tried to continue his swing—
But Souma's blade flicked lightly—
And his body dropped from the branch like a puppet with its strings cut.
The other two samurai leapt into the air, then froze mid-step.
"What… is that…!?"
From above, they could finally see it—
A spiderweb of chakra threads.
Fine, shimmering, crisscrossing in every direction.
Souma stood at its center like a predator waiting for prey.
They tried to dodge—
but it was too late.
Even minor injuries in real combat meant death.
And Souma's sword was too fast.
Two strokes.
Two bodies fell.
Souma exhaled.
"Ninja battles really are about intel."
These three weren't weak—
mid-level at least—
but against a prepared trap, and his newly-polished iaido, they never stood a chance.
This jutsu was something he'd developed over the past two months.
It required terrifying chakra control—
meaning only he could use it.
"The Spiderweb Technique works well… but the chakra cost is excessive, and the control requirements are too high.
It's not something others can learn yet.
Maybe I can convert it into a barrier-type technique later."
He filed the thought away.
Then he slipped deeper into the forest.
Yes—he killed three.
But he wasn't arrogant enough to think he could take on Kiyota Ishi's main force alone.
Anyone who dared ambush Kakashi Hatake definitely had real killers among them.
What he had done just now was—
A perfect example of "with planning, a single strike can turn the tide."
Not invincibility.
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