Using the Hyūga eyes, they were able to see that the Kiri-nin were checking every boat after their own.
Oh well, they passed—and at the end of the day, that was all that mattered. Whether they passed or not.
Anyway, the boat continued for a few more hours, moving at a leisurely pace, which he frankly didn't mind at all.
Eventually, the boat docked.
A dull gray sky loomed overhead. The mist clung to everything. This place felt like a cemetery. Unlike Konoha, the civilians here looked like they were dead inside or some shit like that.
Well, that didn't matter.
They had made it.
Kirigakure.
The Bloody Mist.
The village where suspicion was a sport and paranoia a culture.
The village where killing kids was encouraged, where only the strongest were allowed to graduate, where loyalty wasn't guaranteed, and where the word teamwork didn't fucking exist.
Seijuro and his team—Deer (Shikaku), Ox (Choza), Whisper (Inoichi), Eagle (Hikaru Hyūga), and Moth (Aburame Shiran)—walked in loose formation, eyes down, shoulders slumped. They were traders, after all.
That's what the papers said.
Their civilian names were different now—carefully forged identities approved by Konoha's best infiltrators. Each of them carried actual trade manifests, regional dialects, and practiced neutral behavior.
And they needed all of it.
Because the moment they stepped off the dock—
"Checkpoint One," said the Kiri shinobi at the gate.
Masked, armed, and visibly irritated, he stepped forward. His partner waved a chakra-sensing rod past Seijuro.
Nothing. He kept his chakra signature suppressed. Dampened like wet ash. He had several seals on him for that. So did his team. Of course, they weren't found out.
Their packs were opened, scrolls checked, stamps verified. The officer glared at the paper... and stamped it.
They were waved through.
Checkpoint Two was a few hundred meters deeper—this one with genin and a more senior chunin.
"State your intent."
"Merchant run," Seijuro replied. "We have ink, basic ninja gear, and ration pills. Mostly for small village contracts."
They didn't press. Another stamp.
Checkpoint Three had actual chakra-detection jutsu. One of the gate guards sliced his own palm, dropped the blood on a stone... and nothing happened.
"The more the stone glows, the more chakra you possess. If it glows too brightly, then you're a shinobi." So, he pressed his hand on the stone, pouring some chakra into it.
The shinobi nearby made sure he poured all his chakra into that bitch.
When he was done, the lamp only barely lit up, and Seijuro... looked dizzy.
He was fed a chakra pill before being allowed to move on.
They passed.
Checkpoint Four had trained dogs. Chakra-hound types. Samehada-lite.
One sniffed at Choza.
The massive Akimichi didn't flinch. He even offered the dog a smoked sausage.
The dog sneezed. Then licked him.
Pass.
Checkpoint Five—final border before the main trade district.
This one had a sensor-nin using chakra threads, brushing each traveler's spine.
Seijuro clenched his jaw. It wasn't painful, but if you resisted the probe—it was over.
He let it happen. The thread skimmed over his back, his chakra sealed so tightly it felt like nothing was there. A drip of dull chakra—just enough to mimic a civilian's nervous system.
The sensor scowled.
"These ones feel weird."
"Weird doesn't mean guilty," the other guard grunted. "Stamp 'em."
The final stamp hit the manifest. Five layers of clearance achieved.
They were in.
—
Now that they were in Kiri, they needed to plan carefully. There was always a Kiri shinobi following them, so they went through the normal process—going to the registration station, where they registered their names and declared what they planned to sell.
They even gave some tax to Kiri. Calling it a protection tax was crazy work, but aight—anything to seem legal.
Once that was done, they began setting up their stalls to start selling the good shit. You know, what people came here for.
The mission was a big part of it too, but the merchant front needed to be fully accepted first.
So yes, they sold items. And since they were ninja, they were really good at it—especially stopping little kids from trying to steal their shit.
Oh well, that didn't matter much. The front was being handled perfectly by his team. By this point, suspicion toward them should've dropped at least a little.
He wasn't planning to stay here for long anyway. Their permit only allowed them to stay for about a week.
So a week was all the time they had for this mission.
They had to make that shit count.
Unless, of course, they were prepared to go multiple rounds.
Oh well, none of that mattered now.
For now, they just needed to screw with the Mist's systems a bit. Leave them damaged—damaged enough that they wouldn't have the balls to attack Konoha again anytime soon.
With this mission, Seijuro planned to get the Three and Six-Tails chakra.
Once that was done, he would have Four out of the nine Bijū he needed.
And for anyone wondering why he didn't catch any during the three-year time span... well, because he was busy learning Sage Mode, and adding more Tailed Beast chakra to that process would've messed him up badly.
So that was why.