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The battle was exceptionally bloody and violent. The seven people surrounded by Naruto initially resisted, but after Naruto took down four of them, the remaining three started to flee. Then they were also captured.
These people were simply too weak, only slightly stronger than Sakura, who at this point only knew genjutsu and medical ninjutsu.
Seven were captured, and eight lay on the ground. The eighth was the prisoner captured by Konoha's Lock-Front Village. He had been unconscious the entire time, carried by someone. When he was thrown to the ground during the fight, Naruko, disguised as Haku, covertly gave him another blow to the back of the head, making him even more unconscious. Then Naruko tossed him aside.
After telling Naruko to go back into the woods to get ropes and tie them all up, Naruto leaned over and asked, "Do you have any others?"
These people were quite defiant, refusing to answer. One of them even had intense chakra fluctuations. Naruto was familiar with this trick; he instantly recognized that the man was about to self-destruct. He punched him in the stomach, interrupting all his movements, and snarled, "I asked you a question!"
"Don't underestimate the people of Lock-Front Village. Once locked, they won't open until death."
You're comparing yourselves to locks, aren't you?
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a padlock. He inserted two fingers into the shackle and, with a forceful twist, broke the padlock open. The lock was a world-building item; it came locked from the moment it was pulled out, and this ridiculous game didn't even provide keys.
He pulled out a few more padlocks from his pocket, stacked them together, and with a strong squeeze of both hands, broke them all open: "If you can't open them, it's because you're not strong enough. Come on, tell me, how much strength does it take to break open these locks of yours?"
Seven bewildered faces. The legendary Demon of the Hidden Mist was a cold-blooded devil, but they had encountered him twice. The first time, he kicked them without a word. The second time, he kicked them again, and he was carrying so many padlocks?!
But the seven remained silent.
"Very good. I appreciate people like you."
He cut strips of cloth from their clothing, tied them over their eyes, and separated them. Then, he took Kubikiribocho and slashed each of them once: "At this rate of bleeding, you have half an hour. If you don't speak now, you won't get another chance."
In the silent night, the chirping of insects accompanied the dripping sound of blood, pressing on their nerves. It wasn't the sound of flowing water; Naruto genuinely cut them. This interrogation method was far more sophisticated than the shinobi world's approach of simply brutalizing and forcibly extracting information from brains. Three of them couldn't bear it any longer.
Ten minutes later, Naruto obtained the information he wanted. Lock-Front Village, to ensure maximum intelligence security, had all its teams communicate on a single line. Each team had only one contact person responsible for their operations, and their superior didn't know who was in their team, nor did they know who their superior was. In other words, after these few people disappeared, Lock-Front Village had no idea that Haruna existed! This was truly good news for Naruto.
After knocking them out one by one, he activated a teleportation portal and took them to an uninhabited deserted island. There, Naruto force-fed them medicine, the same kind given to Princess Koyuki, and a very large dose at that. Naruto had no intention of killing them, not out of mercy or anything, but because even dead people in this world weren't safe. Who knows, they might be Edo Tensei'd to hop around someday. Even if their bones were ground to dust, Orochimaru and Kabuto might still find traces of their blood and flesh left behind during past battles while searching for strong individuals, then Edo Tensei them. So Naruto planned to cripple their abilities and make them lose their memories or turn them into idiots.
A massive amount of medicine was forced into their mouths. Only after each person had swallowed the equivalent of more than ten servings did Naruto stop. Memory loss or idiocyâchemical version. But Naruto's chemistry wasn't as good as his physics, so he pulled out a brick and proceeded with the physical version.
Crippling their abilities was also simple: a surge of violent Nine-Tails Chakra sent into their bodies would end their ninja careers. Moreover, Naruto planned to continuously send clones to secretly observe the seven people on this small deserted island for a while, secretly giving them another dose of the physical and chemical memory loss method whenever he had a chance. He even considered scenarios like passing ships rescuing them or the seven feigning memory loss, and he had countermeasures for those as well. If he ever got Shisui's eyes in the future, Naruto even planned to return and hit them with another Kotoamatsukami.
To ensure Kakashi's lifelong happiness, Naruto had considered everything he possibly could.
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The next morning, after dealing with all the follow-ups, Naruto performed another Body Flicker and swapped places with a shadow clone within Konoha.
Three consecutive days passed without incident. During the team's routine gathering, Naruto once again saw Kakashi with Haruna.
The Konoha ninja who had been captured by Lock-Front Village had returned to the village, but he knew nothing. The moment he was captured in Lock-Front Village, he was knocked out. He was fed medicine and kept unconscious all the way to that bridge. The Lock-Front Village operatives only stopped feeding him medicine when they confirmed the exchange for the next day, but then he was knocked out again by Naruko. So, in his memory, he was captured, unconscious, and then woke up within Konoha territory.
For the first time, he felt proud to be a ninja from a major village. See? Even when captured, those small villages dared not harm a single hair on our heads. In the end, they still obediently sent me back, didn't they?
Although it was unclear why Lock-Front Village suddenly showed goodwill and returned the person, Konoha obviously wouldn't let Haruna go. What if she had stolen important intelligence? So, Haruna had been under Kakashi's supervision these past few days, as he had nothing else to do.
While Kakashi was called away by Jiraiya for a talk, Naruto approached Haruna and asked, "Sister, do you like Kakashi-sensei?"
Haruna struggled internally. She indeed liked Kakashi, but she knew her identity. As soon as her superior gave the next operational instruction, she would have to do something to harm Kakashi. However, her acting skills were good, and she didn't show it, smiling, "Why do you ask?"
"The three of us made a bet on whether any girl would like Kakashi-sensei, so I came to ask."
"???"Â What kind of image does Kakashi-sensei have among his students?
After a moment of hesitation, Haruna replied, "I guess I do."
Naruto cupped his hands to Sakura, "Congratulations, Sakura, you won."
"Then does Kakashi-sensei like Sister?" Sakura asked triumphantly.
Haruna shook her head. She could feel Kakashi's aloofness towards her.
"Then how do you plan to pursue Kakashi-sensei next?" Naruto asked curiously. He genuinely wanted to know how a genuine shinobi world girl would pursue someone she liked.
Haruna shook her head again. She was very confused about her future now. She longed to stay in Konoha, but she was a ninja and had to prioritize missions. Perhaps she really had no choice but to give up on this relationship.
Although Naruto didn't consider himself a ninja, he knew about the "mission first" principle held by everyone in this shinobi world. But he also knew there was something that could override this principle: maternal love. Nothing could overcome a mother's love for her child.
Taking a packet of white powder from his bag, Naruto planned to solve this problem with his typical simple and crude method: "Sister, you can't just not have a plan. How about this, I'll teach you a trick. The three of us will help you knock Kakashi unconscious, then you drag him back to his house. That way..."
This was Naruto's method: simple and crude. Love him, go force him. Anyway, Konoha had no laws against this. Children in the ninja world matured early, so Naruto wasn't afraid to appear a bit precocious.
Sakura's eyes lit up. There's actually an operation like this?!
Haruna shook her head. She was a spy. If she did that, she'd be locked in Konoha's prison within three minutes.
"How did you even think of that method?" a voice came. Naruto recognized the speaker and deflected the blame: "Well, look who my master is. Plus, I saw this kind of plot when I was reading Kakashi-sensei's books last time."
Kakashi and Jiraiya, standing behind him, looked very grim, especially Jiraiya, who had indeed written such plots! Jiraiya composed himself and said, "Naruto, let's leave the village for a bit in a couple of days." This decision had both Tsunade's and his own intentions. This child couldn't stay in Konoha anymore. Danzo's pressure on Tsunade was one aspect; another was that this child's ability to ensnare others was too strong. Apart from Sasuke and Hinata, anyone close to him who wasn't vigilant would get into trouble. Just one moment of carelessness, and he almost dragged Kakashi, Haruna, and himself into it.
Jiraiya didn't know this was the Xu family's tradition: specifically ensnaring their own people.
"How long?" Naruto asked.
"A year or two at minimum, three or four years at most," Jiraiya replied.
As soon as Jiraiya spoke, Sasuke's face stiffened.