"Rei Kaguya… Did Lord Third send you to kill us?"
Inoue Nobuhiko looked at the two companions on the ground whose eyes refused to close in death, then looked at Rei Kaguya, who showed no sign of injury at all.
He only felt his heart sinking faster and faster, falling into an abyss colder and more despairing than when he had watched his comrades be slaughtered by Obito Uchiha like pigs and dogs.
"No choice. Who told you seniors to choose defection?"
Rei Kaguya shrugged somewhat regretfully. "Even if I can partially understand your reasons for defecting, defection is defection. No matter which village it is, the Kage of that village will never show mercy to shinobi who choose to defect."
"Especially when you still know some information that is very unsuitable for public release, and you even intend to use that information to throw the entire shinobi world into chaos."
"Stop spouting those pretty words, Rei Kaguya!"
Honda Denjiro angrily interrupted him. He glared fiercely at Rei Kaguya's expressionless mask, his eyes bloodshot, his breathing as rough as an ox's. Blue veins bulged across his forehead as he growled with a vicious expression, as if he wanted to devour him alive.
"You are nothing but a hypocrite who wears a mask for the sake of your own ambition, pretending that you are only following orders! The main reason you accepted this mission to hunt us down—isn't it because you are worried that we, who know the truth, might do something that affects your plan to realize your ambition!?"
"Stop using Lord Third as your shield. You and he are not the same kind of person at all!"
Rei Kaguya fell silent for a moment.
Then he shook his head and laughed with a touch of helplessness and self-mockery.
"I thought that plan of yours earlier was merely you venting the unease and fear in your heart… I didn't expect you to see things so clearly. Did the memory of once joining forces with other powers to destroy Uzushiogakure awaken your heart and qualities as a shinobi?"
"Think whatever you want, you Kaguya brat whose mind has been mixed with who knows what…"
Honda Denjiro drew his ninja blade and, together with the bitter-faced Inoue Nobuhiko beside him, assumed a stance for a fight to the death.
"Come on, then. Come kill me. Otherwise, I will find a way to completely ruin your plans!"
Honda Denjiro understood very clearly that unless some miracle occurred, he was probably dead today.
But that did not stop him from viciously venting his emotions on Rei Kaguya, who stood before him wearing that mask.
It was not that Honda Denjiro had truly discovered any problem with Rei Kaguya's inner soul. The main reason he could say such words was that after so many years together, everyone had basically accepted the setting that the Kaguya clan were reckless brutes who did not use their brains and only knew killing, killing, fighting, fighting.
Now, however, a mutant like Rei Kaguya had suddenly appeared.
A Kaguya with brains.
A Kaguya who could disguise himself.
An ambitious schemer.
Instinctively, Honda Denjiro found that impossible to accept.
Damn it, I actually lost to a Kaguya brute in the matter of using my brain!?
Impossible.
Absolutely impossible!!!!
"Then there's nothing more to say."
Facing the two men who intended to fight with their backs against the wall, Rei Kaguya shook his head. While inwardly marveling that even the human brain could experience a flash of clarity before death, two bone blades slid out from his palms.
He prepared to dispose of them cleanly, just as he had killed the two defected Anbu who had been amusing themselves by slaughtering wandering shinobi and civilians.
"Yo, looks like we found the targets, Kagemaru…"
"Woof, woof~ Awoo~"
A third party's voice rang out, disrupting the tense atmosphere between the two sides.
Honda Denjiro remained on guard against Rei Kaguya, who could attack at any moment, while signaling Inoue Nobuhiko beside him to identify the newly arrived intruder.
When he glanced toward the source of the voice from the corner of his eye, a figure wearing an animal mask, with an enormous ninja dog beside him, entered his field of vision.
Animal mask?
Giant ninja dog?
Someone from Konoha's Inuzuka clan!?
A variable had appeared.
As for Rei Kaguya, he was not surprised by Inuzuka Seo's intrusion. After all, he had long known that a Konoha Anbu squad might appear during his mission.
What he needed to consider was only how to lure out every member of the Anbu squad and kill them all.
Inuzuka Seo, who had been the first to discover the mission targets, did not immediately take out the Flying Thunder God kunai on his body.
Instead, while maintaining a threatening posture toward the three Kirigakure shinobi currently in a standoff, he observed and analyzed the enemy's abilities and intelligence.
None of the three were sensory-type shinobi. Otherwise, they would not have waited until he spoke before realizing his presence. From that point alone, the battle situation was very favorable for his side, which still had several comrades who had yet to reveal themselves. As long as the captain and the others followed Kagemaru's barking and found their way here, there would be many chances to launch unexpected surprise attacks.
Of the two being hunted, one was a ninja blade user, a Kirigakure specialty. The other's specialty was harder to identify. However, judging from their abnormally fast heartbeats, elevated body temperatures, and constantly falling sweat, they were deeply afraid of that pursuer.
As for the Kirigakure Anbu hunting down the defectors…
A member of the Kaguya clan?
Inuzuka Seo frowned.
He recalled a piece of intelligence he had read from the Third Hokage before carrying out this mission.
Kakashi Hatake, who had exhausted his chakra and fallen unconscious, had been found together with Rin Nohara's corpse in a forest several li away from the battlefield.
And on that battlefield, where the earth had been dyed red by rivers of gathered blood, a forest made of sharp, hard, enormous white bone spikes had destroyed most of the traces of combat.
That was the strongest dance that could only be used after developing the Kaguya clan's Dead Bone Pulse Kekkei Genkai to the extreme.
Dance of the Seedling Fern.
Could this relaxed pursuer before him be the man capable of using Dance of the Seedling Fern?
It should be him.
Most likely.
Because after merely meeting Rei Kaguya's gaze once, Inuzuka Seo instinctively stepped back several paces. The clothes on his body were instantly soaked by cold sweat.
"G-good thing I didn't rush forward alone… Otherwise, before the captain and the others arrived, I probably would have become that monster's trophy together with those two Kirigakure defectors."
Inuzuka Seo took a deep breath.
He decisively stuffed soldier pills into both his own mouth and Kagemaru's. While causing their bodies and chakra to swell at the same time, he activated the secret technique passed down in the Inuzuka clan.
"Ninja Art: Beast Human Clone!"
"Inuzuka Style: Combination Transformation—Double-Headed Wolf!"
White smoke dispersed.
A massive double-headed black wolf appeared where Inuzuka Seo and Kagemaru had just been.
But unlike the ferocious appearance of the double-headed wolf, after transforming, Inuzuka Seo not only failed to attack first, he instead widened the distance between himself and Rei Kaguya even further. He ensured that no matter how fast the opponent's Body Flicker Technique was, he would have some time to react.
Was that half-step backward of yours serious?
Rei Kaguya rolled his eyes speechlessly at Inuzuka Seo, whose entire body was radiating the aura of following his heart, then turned his attention back to Honda Denjiro and Inoue Nobuhiko.
"Looks like you two seem to be hoping Konoha's Anbu can save you."
"Honestly, I'm a little envious. When you daydream, you don't even need to close your eyes…"
The moment his words fell, in an instant too short for even a blink, Rei Kaguya's figure vanished from Honda Denjiro and Inoue Nobuhiko's sight.