After returning to the village Shinra began devoting a lot of time to mastering the training seal formula and at the same time, Yogi brought him the five jutsu he had requested. Four weeks had passed since their bandit extermination mission, leaving only slightly more than a week for the chūnin exams.
In that time, he managed to learn Lightning Beast Tracking Fang and Thunder Bomb quite fast. Hiding like a mole jutsu and Wind protection took a bit longer to learn. He was unable to learn water prison jutsu; he merely attributed it to having a bad affinity for water.
Today was just another day at training. Yogi observed his two students sparring and smiled proudly. 'After learning their clan's secret techniques Inumaki and Hyori's strength has increased significantly, Inumaki and Yoshimaru can finally fight as one and Hyori's gentle fist has become noticeably better.'
On the field, Inumaki and Yoshimaru rushed at Hyori from opposite sides and started rotating their bodies at extreme speeds. Shinra, who was watching the spar from the sidelines thought, 'Fang over Fang, the secret technique of the Inuzuka clan, its attack power is on par with a B-rank jutsu. Although in the show it wasn't quite highlighted, since among most of Konoha's clans the Inuzuka are quite weak.'
Hyori with her 360-degree vision managed to barely avoid both attacks causing both Inumaki and Yoshimaru to collide into trees snapping them in half. Hyori, not waiting for Inumaki to recover and start spamming that jutsu closed the distance and assumed a stance that Inumaki had never seen before.
'This isn't the standard gentle fist stance.' Inumaki tried to create some distance, but Hyori connected her palm right into in his right shoulder.
In Hyori's vision, she was at the center of an Eight Trigram seal. Her palms connected with Inumaki's chakra points in a rapid manner, each one of her hits connected with a different chakra point, before long Inumaki coughed blood and fell to the ground on one knee.
'Eight Trigrams: 32 palms.'
Hyori had managed to learn the secret technique of the main branch, but she wasn't satisfied with such an achievement. 'I still can't do more than 32 palms not to mention Rotation. I originally planned to use this in a spar against Shinra or Sensei, but I don't think they would give me an opening to even use it.
Hyori knew that she managed to win easily because it was Inumaki's first time seeing this technique, the next spar won't be as easy.
After helping out Inumaki and making sure he is alright, Yogi and Shinra were about to spar, but before they could even warm up a masked ninja appeared and said, "Team Eight, Lord Hokage requests your presence in his office."
Team Eight looked at Yogi who wore a smile on his face, "What are you looking at me for? Since the Hokage has called for us it is most likely for a mission, let's move."
Yogi flickered away followed by the rest of Team Eight and in a short period they were standing in front of the Hokage building.
Shinra looked at the building up close and thought, 'The last time I came here was to meet Hiruzen for their first D-rank mission. In the show almost every mission handed to Team Seven was through the Hokage instead of the mission building, was it because of Naruto and Sasuke's identity and to keep them safe? It would make sense, Naruto is the village's jinchuriki and Sasuke was the last Uchiha.'
The team entered the Hokage building and was quickly escorted to the Hokage's office. Upon entering the office, Shinra noticed the presence of a middle-aged man and a young girl who looked to be around five. Hiruzen looked at Team Eight and said, "This is Mr. Tarou the chief of a rural village from the Land of Winds, he wants to commission a B-rank mission to find missing children from his village."
He then looked at Tarou and asked him, "Can you fill them in on what you have reported?"
Tarou lowered his head and said, "It started three years ago, the effects of the war were so severe to the point that most of our village was unable to afford food and water. Our only choice was to migrate to a nearby town, but even that was difficult due to the desert and the scorching sun."
He clenched his teeth and said, "We decided for a group of us to head to town to ask for help, whilst the remaining people would use the last of our food supply."
"When we finally made it to the nearest town, we met up with the noble who was in charge of the town and informed him of the situation, but it appeared that our village wasn't the only village that suffered from such a predicament."
He stopped for a second and continued narrating his story, "Our only option was to settle down in that town and start over a new life. After securing a deal with a construction company, I along with a few others went back to the village to gather the rest of the villagers but when arrived there was no sign of any life in the village."
Shinra frowned slightly as he looked at the middle-aged man, but still kept silent.
Tarou looked at the girl next to him and said, "We only managed to find her in one of the houses, but she doesn't remember anything. The rest of the village simply vanished."
The room remained silent, until Yogi glanced at Tarou and asked, "Why come to Konoha then? Since your village is based in the Land of Wind shouldn't your first thought be to head to the closer Sunagakure?"
Tarou's eyes widened slightly as he glanced at Yogi before answering.
"We did."
He lowered his head.
"The local authorities reported it to Sunagakure, but after sending shinobi to investigate several times they found nothing. There were no tracks, no signs of battle, and no bodies."
His hands tightened into fists.
"Eventually they concluded that the villagers had most likely abandoned the settlement and scattered throughout the desert."
He looked at the little girl beside him.
"But I know they didn't."
Tears started to well up in Tarou's eyes, "Among the villagers was my wife and son, they would never leave the village until I returned."
Tarou went on his knees and begged, "Please find them for me."
Hiruzen looked at the man on his knees then back at Yogi and said, "Team Eight… this mission will be left to you."
Shinra looked at Tarou and thought, 'Since the village ranked this mission as a B-rank, there was a high chance they would encounter hostile shinobi… or at the very least enemies far beyond ordinary bandits.
I just hope that the client didn't leave anything out that would alter the mission rank.'
Mission ranks weren't set in stone. A single piece of missing information could easily turn a B-rank mission into something far worse.
Shinra looked at the girl beside Tarou, 'The easiest way to complete this mission would be to have ANBU read her memories and we would know who the kidnappers were, but the Third Hokage isn't a fool and is surely able to reach such a conclusion himself. The only scenarios are, either they were unable to find anything in her memories or that jutsu can cause permanent brain damage.'
"Yes, Lord Hokage." Yogi answered Hiruzen, then looked at the client and said, "We will meet you by the main gate in an hour, then we will set out to the Land of Wind."
Tarou raised his head and looked at Yogi with gratitude, "Thank you… thank you very much!"
After Tarou left the office, Yogi looked at Hiruzen and said, "Lord Third, there is something else I want to discuss."
"Hmm?"
Yogi glanced at his students and said, "Since the signing up for the Chūnin exam is only a week away, I don't think we will be able to make it back before then. So I would like to nominate Team Eight to participate in the Chūnin exam, I believe their current strength and mission record is enough."
Hiruzen eyed all three members of the team and said, "Your current mission record is 28 D-rank missions and 7 C-rank missions in a period of eight months. The Chūnin exam requires at least 8 C-rank missions and the recommendation of a Joūnin."
Hyori clenched her fist tightly, unless they can finish this mission in less than ten days then by the rules they won't be able to sign up for the exams.
Shinra was a little upset, but wasn't really that worried. 'The journey to the Land of Wind with the client without breaks might take around six days. If we can then complete the mission in less than two days, we might be able to rush back and be in time for the exam.'
But at this moment Hiruzen coughed and said, "But since Team Eight would've most likely made the cut if it wasn't for the sudden mission, I will make an exception and allow your participation."
Shinra looked at him with a deadpan expression and thought, 'This old man really likes to play with people's emotions.'