Chapter 370: Ahri
Once Kaguya's words faded, something taut settled into the air — the forest's already dim, unsettling atmosphere thickening further, as though the very air itself had grown heavier.
Ahri still hadn't shown herself, hadn't made a sound, but that was hardly surprising — anyone in her position would be wary, cautious to the bone.
Even though the newcomer hadn't officially joined the Dimensional Chat Group yet, Kaguya had already decided to think of her as one of their own. And if she was one of their own, then whoever was hunting her had made themselves an enemy of the whole group.
The invitation quest had made the terms perfectly clear, besides — eliminating the threat to Ahri was the actual condition for completing it. Only once the quest succeeded would Ahri be formally welcomed into the group.
A gentle breeze rustled the treetops overhead — towering trees, many easily over ten meters tall, their trunks thick enough that it would have taken several people joining hands to fully encircle one.
The dense canopy above blocked out nearly all the wind, leaving the air beneath stagnant and heavy, offering no relief even out here in the middle of the forest.
The tension from the approaching newcomers only made the air feel that much more suffocating.
Kaguya's furrowed brow smoothed out quickly enough, though — her Observation Haki had already picked up a rough read on the incoming group's strength.
A read like that wasn't always perfectly accurate, of course, but it rarely drifted far from the mark. If she sensed someone's combat power as roughly 50, the actual figure might not be exactly 50, but it would land somewhere close — say, between 45 and 55.
Kaguya's Observation Haki wasn't on Ryū's level, admittedly, but within the Dimensional Chat Group as a whole, she still ranked among the best who'd trained in it — one of the true standouts among everyone who'd picked up the discipline.
She was, after all, one of the group's founding members — having joined at almost the exact same time as both Ryū, the group's Admin, and Yukari, its Moderator. The gap between the three of them had been a matter of seconds, maybe a few dozen at most.
Yukari gave a light shrug, no trace of tension on her face, and said with a faint smile, "Yaraya~ra. Looks like we won't need to go out of our way after all. Little Kaguya, keep an eye on our newcomer here — I'll go handle this."
Kaguya had no objection to that, nodding along. "Sounds good. Be careful, Yukari-nee — no telling what tricks they might have up their sleeves."
Though, even as she said it, Kaguya couldn't help thinking the warning was more or less redundant. Whose tricks could possibly outnumber Yukari's?
The woman probably had upward of ten thousand distinct schemes she could pull out on a whim, no two ever quite the same.
Honestly, there were times Kaguya genuinely couldn't say who was actually stronger in the group.
Admin-sama?
Or Yukari-nee?
Or maybe the two of them were simply too closely matched to call at all.
Either way, she still had some distance to close before she caught up to either of them — all three of them had joined around the same time, and she absolutely couldn't let herself fall too far behind.
Watching Yukari's figure vanish into the gap, Kaguya settled her scattered thoughts and turned her attention to the cluster of bushes twenty meters ahead.
She stepped forward, slow and steady, and with every step the smell of blood grew that much stronger.
Her Observation Haki picked up Ahri's life force — weak, certainly, but not yet at death's door.
Though, had that group of intruders actually found her first, things might well have gone the other way entirely. She might not have survived at all.
At about five or six meters from the bushes, Kaguya felt a wave of open hostility roll toward her — clearly, Ahri had lumped her in with the approaching enemies.
Kaguya slowed to a stop. A handful of medical supplies materialized in her hands out of nowhere — bandages, antiseptic, hemostatic powder — items she'd borrowed a moment ago from other members through the chat.
Standing five or six meters from the bushes, Kaguya spoke gently. "I know you don't have much reason to trust us right now, but we really aren't your enemies. This is just medical supplies — I can see you're hurt."
"If it's not treated soon, the wound could get infected, and that would make things a lot harder to deal with later. I've got antiseptic, bandages, hemostatic powder — I'm guessing you know how to use these?"
She tossed the supplies forward, and they landed somewhere deep in the thick, towering bushes ahead.
The branches of those bushes bristled with sharp wooden thorns, many of them faintly glowing green at the tip — a glow barely visible to the naked eye.
Clearly there was a reason Ahri had chosen to hide in a spot this dangerous. The thorns were likely poisoned — one scratch, and it might mean instant death.
As for why the newcomer had chosen to hole up somewhere this hazardous in the first place, either she'd been backed into a corner and had no choice but to gamble with her life, or she had some way of shrugging off the danger entirely.
Kaguya found a nearby boulder and sat herself down on it, just about to speak again — when the "boulder" beneath her suddenly shuddered.
She glanced down and found a turtle's head poking out from underneath, and her mouth twitched involuntarily.
She genuinely hadn't expected the random rock she'd picked to sit on to actually be some turtle's shell.
She gave the turtle's head a light tap and, not particularly caring whether it could understand her, said, "Stay still, don't move around. You're big enough that me sitting here for a bit won't hurt you any — keep squirming, though, and I'll turn you into soup."
Just as she finished speaking, a weak, faintly gentle voice drifted out from ahead. "...Maybe you really aren't an enemy. Sorry — Ahri misjudged you."
Under Kaguya's watchful eye, the strange thicket of bushes ahead seemed to come alive of its own accord, parting slowly to either side.
And there stood the newcomer — a bushy, fox-like tail immediately giving away exactly what she was: a nine-tailed fox spirit, sure enough.
She'd trusted her that easily? Kaguya blinked, momentarily thrown. Just a moment ago Ahri had been bristling with suspicion — and now she'd come around this fast?
Was it just that she couldn't sense any ill intent from her?
That, Kaguya supposed, was probably the only explanation that made sense.
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