Chapter 563: The Villagers: Those Who Know Which Way the Wind Blows
"Hm?"
"What happened?"
After killing Hoshigaki Shizuma with a Flying Thunder God Slash, Senju Tobirama didn't stop for even a moment. He immediately used Flying Thunder God again and left.
The villagers couldn't react at all. They didn't even see who had appeared. All they noticed was that Shizuma had collapsed to the ground.
The main reason was simple—Shizuma was still just a child and was too short.
To perform the Flying Thunder God Slash, Tobirama couldn't even lower his body enough. He had no choice but to slide across the ground.
As a result, everyone present completely failed to notice him.
They only felt a sudden gust of wind sweep past their legs. When they looked down, they saw Shizuma lying on the ground, blood spraying from his neck.
"What happened?"
Kisame, who had been secretly monitoring the villagers, was also stunned.
Even he hadn't seen what had happened.
Part of it was because the villagers were too weak, making him relax his guard slightly.
The other reason was that Tobirama had slid along the ground, hidden by the crowd.
Boom!!
After a brief delay, the room where Hoshigaki Chinrei was exploded into the sky by the Mutually Multiplying Explosive Tags.
The nonstop explosions sounded like tens of thousands of firecrackers going off during New Year's.
The villagers no longer had time to care who had died. Running for their lives was all that mattered.
Those who ran quickly were only struck a few times by flying chunks of broken walls.
Those who ran slowly were hit head-on by the blast wave, and some were even burned, forcing them to dive straight into the water.
Now Kisame looked even more confused.
If he remembered correctly, Hoshigaki Chinrei had been inside that room.
As for the body lying outside that had just been blasted into the air... it seemed to be Chinrei's son, Hoshigaki Shizuma.
Weren't those two the mission targets?
So...
He hadn't done anything, yet the mission was already more than half complete?
Since the father and son named in the mission were already dead, Kisame stopped hiding and walked over openly.
Facing the flying rubble from the explosion, Kisame casually swung Samehada, effortlessly knocking aside the debris. By the time the explosions ended, he had reached the ruined house.
Shizuma's body, nearly blown down to a bare skeleton, fell from the sky.
Without even looking up, Kisame casually swung Samehada backward, sending the skeletal remains flying.
A villager who had just raised his head was knocked flat again.
Looking at the hilt of the Sword of the Thunder God lying on the ground, Kisame fell into thought.
If someone had really come here and killed the father and son...
Then why hadn't they taken this thing with them?
"Who are you? Why did you kill Chinrei-sama and his son?"
The villagers cautiously approached Kisame. One of them finally gathered enough courage to ask.
"My name is Hoshigaki Kisame. I wasn't the one who killed them."
Being an honest man, Kisame couldn't be bothered to lie when there was no need.
People asked questions.
He answered them.
"Hoshigaki Kisame? That name sounds familiar..."
"I remember Chinrei-sama mentioning him before. Kisame-sama is the strongest member of the Hoshigaki Clan and the wielder of Samehada."
"That's right. I heard the baby girl from the Hoshigaki Clan that Chinrei-sama picked up back then was raised to become another Kisame. He even named her Nanami, hoping she would conquer the seas."
"That was Chinrei-sama's ambition~"
"Isn't that child, Nanami, now serving beside the Mizukage as a spy?"
"That's right. Nanami has already earned the Mizukage's trust. She's second only to Chōjūrō and Ao. Since she's a girl, she's actually even closer to the Mizukage."
"What a shame. Chinrei-sama and Young Master Shizuma are dead now. Otherwise, sooner or later we could've attacked from both inside and outside..."
"Oh, right. I also heard that the name of Chinrei-sama's younger son, Shizuma, was chosen to inherit your will, Kisame-sama."
Of course the villagers had heard of Kisame.
One after another, they eagerly shared what they knew.
The sadness over their leaders' deaths quickly disappeared.
As nothing more than a disorganized mob, what they feared most was having no one to lead them.
Without a leader, they lost the sense of security humans instinctively sought.
Now that Kisame had appeared to seamlessly fill that role, the villagers immediately felt at ease.
"..."
Instead of interrupting their chatter, Kisame listened carefully.
This was all valuable intelligence.
When he heard about Hoshigaki Nanami, it immediately sounded familiar.
'Well, well.'
'Isn't this exactly the same as Itachi-san's past?'
'A double agent who ultimately chose the village.'
As for naming a girl Nanami with the hope that she would conquer the seas, Kisame didn't find that strange.
The current Mizukage was a woman.
And Kirigakure was famous for producing feminine-looking men.
So Kirigakure had never really cared about gender.
Besides, "Nanami" was a perfectly fitting girl's name anyway.
Although...
Every time he heard it, Kisame couldn't help thinking of the "Seven Warlords of the Sea" that Strategist Shiromo had once mentioned.
Before coming here, the Strategist had even joked that everyone connected to Kirigakure and Hoshigaki Shizuma looked like they had wandered out of a One Piece set to make a guest appearance.
Finally, there was Shizuma's name.
"Shi" (屍) meant corpse or oni.
"Zu" (澄) meant clearing away Murk.
"Ma" (真) meant truth.
Altogether, it really did match Kisame's lifelong pursuit.
What puzzled Kisame was this—His pursuit of truth should only have been known by the masked man... Uchiha Obito.
So how had Hoshigaki Chinrei known it, and even given his son such a similar name?
Surely Uchiha Obito didn't keep a diary.
Oh, right.
The villagers had said, "I heard."
It wasn't necessarily true.
Could it simply be another one of those coincidences brought about by fate that Strategist Shiromo always talked about?
Kisame felt like he was about to grow a brain from thinking too much.
He decided to stop.
Instead, he sent out a signal, calling Itachi over.
How to calm the villagers after the deaths of the Hoshigaki father and son, and guide them back onto the right path...
Uchiha Itachi had been preparing for this for a long time.
The Itachi who had once wiped out his own clan now did these things only to find peace for himself.
Saving these villagers felt as though he were allowing the Uchiha Clan of the past to survive.
"The one who attacked was probably the Second Hokage. The Sword of the Thunder God was his personal weapon. The fact that he deliberately left it behind means he probably doesn't want it anymore."
After persuading the villagers to return to the Mizukage's rule and promising that work would be assigned to them, Itachi and Kisame entered a house the villagers had vacated for them and began talking privately.
Based on Kisame's description, Itachi had already guessed what had happened.
After all, during the period when Ōtsutsuki Urashiki invaded, Itachi had spent some time with the Second Hokage and personally experienced the Flying Thunder God Technique.
"?"
A question mark practically appeared above Kisame's head.
As one of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist, it was difficult for him to imagine anyone intentionally abandoning their own ninja sword.
"There's... something dirty on it."
Itachi hinted tactfully.
"Something dirty? Even if Samehada fell into a latrine, I still wouldn't abandon it."
Kisame still couldn't understand.
Hearing Kisame's heartfelt declaration, Samehada affectionately rubbed its handle against him.
Unfortunately, the honest Kisame had no idea that Samehada was, at heart, an absolute green tea sword.
In the original story, it switched its loyalty to Killer B almost instantly.
By the Boruto era, it had fallen even further, allowing the useless Shizuma to play with it—and had even fused with him.
(End of this chapter)