Quickly, he made a judgment:
Have his deputy, Aburame Ryuma, lead half of the Root members to the Hidden Cloud battlefield to assist the Konoha Ninja fighting on the front lines.
No matter what, Konoha cannot lose this war.
◎
At dusk, the scenery in the forest appeared extremely dark.
A large number of Konoha Anbu sped through the forest like lightning, darting through layers of dense woods, searching in all directions.
Kakashi led a four-man squad, also beginning the task of searching for Orochimaru's whereabouts.
Kakashi didn't know the details of Orochimaru's defection, nor did he understand the motive behind Orochimaru's betrayal of the village, and why he would experiment on his village's Ninja.
With the power Orochimaru possessed, there was no need to do so.
He could easily supplement human subjects from outside, using his village's people only showed a departure from Orochimaru's cautious style, instead revealing many flaws.
By doing this, it seemed as if he was deliberately telling the higher-ups a message — he has severed ties with the village completely; don't harbor any naive illusions of his return to Konoha! Be ready to stop him or kill him with a resolve to die!
Was all this for the sake of that new path? What a terrifying guy. All of Kakashi's previous confusion now made sense.
Orochimaru's resolute attitude, though not quite comparable to the defection of Hakushi and the others, was nonetheless an extremely vicious form of betrayal.
He hadn't shaken Konoha's foundation, but instead sullied his reputation, transforming from a talented genius to a villain harming his comrades.
Since February, the Anbu's actions have been under his control.
In fact, aren't things going exactly according to his script?
Kakashi harbored little hope of capturing Orochimaru.
Although the dispatched Anbu are powerful, even the two strongest ministers have been deployed for a joint assault on Orochimaru, leaving Orochimaru definitely unable to withstand, ultimately leading to inevitable defeat.
But in the current situation, they couldn't pinpoint the exact location of Orochimaru's whereabouts, nor did they know how Orochimaru planned to escape the Land of Fire, or where his next destination might be.
Are there allies in the village transmitting information to him?
Among the deployed Anbu, is there anyone placed by Orochimaru, ready to stab them in the back at any time?
Too many uncertain factors.
But as long as he remained loyal to Orochimaru, once Orochimaru stabilized outside, he would definitely contact him.
Kakashi wasn't worried about this at all.
As he was thinking this, Kakashi saw a familiar figure ahead, lying injured and bleeding beside a tree, weakly panting, looking ready to faint.
"Jiraiya-sama!?"
Kakashi and the three Anbu members stared at Jiraiya in shock.
The fierce injuries, though not fatal, have resulted in excessive blood loss, leaving him unable to stand for a while.
"I failed to stop Orochimaru..."
Jiraiya's expression was despondent, showing confusion and pain, along with an intensely complex feeling of remorse.
This remorse was something he also felt upon hearing of his disciple Minato's death.
Kakashi glanced around the battlefield, finding no signs of combat, just Jiraiya's blood on the ground.
Even if Orochimaru's power exceeded Jiraiya's, it wouldn't make him so formidable.
To defeat Jiraiya, Orochimaru would certainly have to pay the price of serious injury.
Yet here, there are no signs of any fight.
This likely means that in his battle with Orochimaru, Jiraiya wasn't able to retaliate and was merely enduring hits passively.
Otherwise, none of this makes sense.
Kakashi instructed a team member to take Jiraiya back to Konoha, while he led the other two to continue searching for Orochimaru's tracks in the forest.
Looking into the dark depths of the forest ahead, Kakashi's mind seemed as bright as daylight.
He was not currently pondering how to capture Orochimaru, but considering what task Orochimaru would assign him to execute in Konoha next.