[The Battlefield of the Land of Stone]
After the Iwagakure shinobi first occupied the area near the vein, they hadn't rushed to start mining.
After all, if they sent ordinary workers here now and someone died, no one would dare come later.
These forty-some Iwagakure shinobi were mostly brought here by Kitsuchi, who happened to be nearby on a mission.
As for the batch of Iwagakure who had fought Rasa earlier, most of them were already dead.
So now they were focused on building defensive works.
As the great earth-style corps, Iwagakure's speed was naturally unmatched.
By now they had already created a small fortress out of earth-style for shelter.
Its defenses were of course far stronger than Sunagakure's.
At this moment Kitsuchi was discussing the next battle with the other Iwagakure.
Since Sunagakure could attack again at any time.
To fully secure this area, the forty-some of them were still too few.
"Sunagakure has temporarily retreated, but they could launch the next attack at any time."
"Everyone discuss. How should we respond?"
Kitsuchi looked toward the Iwagakure beside him, mainly Oiwa and Atsuishi.
These two counted as elites within the unit.
Oiwa was tall and muscular, with dark skin. Atsuishi was shorter, but stocky.
They exchanged a glance. Then Oiwa spoke, "We should fortify here and wait for Lord Tsuchikage's reinforcements."
Atsuishi added, "We should continue strengthening the stronghold. Sunagakure won't be able to gather forces here so quickly."
"Defending puts us at the advantage."
Because of Onoki's long-term conservative style, when it came to combat, Iwagakure's shinobi generally leaned toward defense and counterattack.
After all, group earth-style warfare was very strong, and they were used to fighting like that.
Kitsuchi, being Onoki's son, naturally had the same mindset.
Seeing no other opinions in the unit, he nodded slightly, "Then…"
"I have a better way, hm," A young voice interrupted, making Kitsuchi turn his head.
In the corner of the room where they were meeting, a blond boy sat.
His build and looks stood out completely from the rough men around him.
It was Deidara.
Ever since he had been kidnapped, he seemed to have changed. When he came back, he began training diligently, rarely finding time to cause trouble.
Especially, he kept pestering Onoki to teach him Dust Release.
But since Deidara was too young and his personality too wild, Onoki refused.
Not to mention the difficulty of learning Dust Release. If Deidara really learned it and then went out causing destruction, even Onoki couldn't cover for him.
Still, since Deidara had changed a lot, and Iwagakure was short on successors, Onoki had begun training him seriously. By now, he was letting Deidara get familiar with three chakra nature transformations.
Once his personality matured a little more, he could begin teaching him Dust Release.
Deidara had also done some missions with Kitsuchi and the others, but his ideas were completely different from theirs.
They were often wild flights of fancy, but still had value as reference.
Kitsuchi didn't always adopt them, but was willing to listen to his strange ideas.
"Then let's hear your method, Deidara."
Deidara kneaded clay in his hands. In moments, it had become the shape of a spider.
"We use earth-style to make the upper layers of the mine heavier and thicker, then retreat from this area."
"When Sunagakure comes to take over, we collapse it in an explosion and bury them all alive! Hm!"
As he spoke, his eyes shone.
"The more people they bring, the more people will witness my magnificent art of explosion!"
By now, Kitsuchi had learned to automatically filter out Deidara's talk of "art."
But he did seriously consider the method.
After thinking for a long while, Kitsuchi still shook his head, "No. If Sunagakure doesn't occupy the vein, but instead comes to hunt us, we would lose all the advantage we've gained in this time."
"Deidara, your idea is good, but since we lack intel on Sunagakure, this is still too risky."
With Onoki's orders to nurture Deidara, Kitsuchi still needed to occasionally encourage him.
And besides, Deidara's idea wasn't bad this time.
Deidara rubbed his hands, "Getting intel is easy. I can fly and scout, it's way faster than your methods."
Kitsuchi studied him. After spending some time leading Deidara, he had learned a bit about how to communicate with him.
"Alright then, go scout first. If there's an opportunity, we can consider trying your method."
"No problem, leave it to me, hm!", Deidara answered excitedly, then ran off.
A moment later, an Iwagakure shinobi came to report to Kitsuchi, "Lord Kitsuchi, Deidara just flew off on a clay bird toward Sunagakure's side."
"Mm," Kitsuchi acknowledged, and sent him away.
Oiwa spoke up, "Lord Kitsuchi, are we really going to use Deidara's plan?"
Kitsuchi shook his head firmly, "No. I just wanted to give him something to do."
Everyone present showed expressions of sudden realization.
They all knew what kind of person Deidara was.
If he didn't cause trouble, that was blessing enough.
"But…", Kitsuchi paused.
"If he really does bring back some valuable intel, that would still be useful."
———
After making his clay bird, Deidara mounted it and flew toward Sunagakure's side.
He quickly ascended to an absolutely safe altitude.
Most ninjutsu attacks only reached several dozen meters.
But his altitude was three hundred meters. From this height, it was completely safe.
Of course, at this height, he couldn't see the ground clearly. People looked smaller than ants.
But Deidara had prepared. He pulled a miniature telescope from his tool pouch and fixed it over his left eye.
Now the scenes below were magnified in his view.
Deidara's current life was somewhat stifling.
Although Rengoku had shown him the clay bombs he'd make in the future, and he had quickly figured them out himself, he had run into trouble when trying to learn Dust Release.
With his intelligence, Deidara firmly believed he could master it.
But the foundation of Dust Release was the fusion of three chakra natures.
He had to fully grasp those three first. Training nature transformations required repeated and complicated practice.
Deidara didn't have Naruto's shadow clone "cheat". He could only do it over and over himself, which was extremely tedious.
That was why he came along with Kitsuchi to do missions.
"Hm? Brother Sasori…?", Flying along, Deidara spotted the man from his memories.
Though he knew Sasori, Sasori didn't know him.
At this height, neither Sasori nor Kakuzu could see Deidara with the naked eye.
So he could safely observe them.
"Their route?"
"Could they be heading to attack our camp?"
Deidara's expression grew excited as he steered toward his own camp.
For a first meeting, he had to prepare a big gift for Brother Sasori.
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