Chapitre 115: CH_4.15 (115)

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———

The moment the fight began, Razor shot straight toward Scars without the pretense of any planning. He drew the sword out and pointed it at Scars, who armed himself with a kunai in each hand and charged for Razor.

Razor grinned behind his mask when he saw Scars taking charge and swung his sword in an aggressive downward strike that Scars took on with his kunai. Sparks flew as metal clashed. Scars pushed the sword away and immediately swiped for Razor's gut, but Razor's footwork moved faster, and he skipped an inch out of range.

With the swipe, Scars' body moved in the direction of his swing, committing him to the movement. Razor had already drawn his sword back, ready for the next move, now in a position to strike.

"Got you!" the glee oozing in his voice.

Razor thrusted the pointy end toward Scars' shoulder. He wanted to take one arm away so he could have an easier time working on his art on the 'canvas.' He wished to put on a good show and was sure that the audience would appreciate it as well.

As Scars' body moved behind his swing, his other arm shot up and forward. The blade met through the leather arm guard, and the blade sliced the surface fairly deep but didn't reach the skin— and with the upward arm movement, Scars disrupted the trajectory.

Razor clicked his tongue. He pulled back his sword in an attempt to slice through the leather and draw some blood from a skin wound, but Scars now moved faster. Scars put the weight on his back foot and struck out with his front foot for Razor's knee. The ankle dug into the kneecap and immediately hobbled Razor as his entire balance was kicked into disorder.

Scars freed his arm away from the sword and once again swiped for Razor, and this time, it worked. Blood spurted out of a cut across the chest; the wound was shallow due to Razor's last-moment desperate dodge.

Razor didn't look down at the wound as any moment away from his opponent could lead to his death; he didn't need to look down as the warm blood on his skin and pain over his chest told him all. He didn't appreciate having his body and blood used as a canvas.

As Razor tried to push away to get some space, Scars dropped the kunai in his arm and clenched it into a fist. Razor skipped back, but Scars took a swift fore step and whipped out a body punch. Razor closed his body and brought his block to stop the punch, but in the split second before the fist made contact with Razor, he was abruptly pulled away from the punch's trajectory.

Smoking Tiger pushed Razor away behind him as he faced Scars.

"This ain't going to be this easy, young buck," said Smoking Tiger.

———

Smoking Tiger brandished his sword as he set himself between Scars and Razor. He couldn't let his partner get taken out in the first bout of the fight— that would most definitely spell the end of the fight.

In truth, he believed Razor was an equal match to Scars. In fact, their team, too, believed that— which was why they immediately accepted when the scheduling office gave them a choice between Razor and another team member. Smoking Tiger was chosen as the aid to provide Razor with the edge he needed and, well, keep him focused and not let things get crazy.

Scars was on an impressive win streak, much more impressive when one considered he had 2v1 sprinkled among those wins. Smoking Tiger could only imagine the rising win-streak bonus he was going home with after every fight. Not only would this win give Smoking Tiger and Razor some notoriety in the Ring by taking down a big shot, but it'll also get them the incentives their team promised them.

Smoking Tiger knew that he couldn't stop Scars, which was why Razor needed to be in fighting condition.

His eyes shifted to Scars' clenched fist that he had saved Razor from. That fist was well-known in the Ring; as far as Smoking Tiger knew, Scars was the only one to use chakra augmentation in the Ring. The uniqueness of it and the damage it could do made it threatening— so much so that many had lodged complaints against Scars and had pushed for banning the chakra augmentations from the taijutsu and weapons category— but they hadn't gotten anywhere with it.

Scars was too big of a draw to restrict now. The people had seen him use chakra augmentation, and if he suddenly stopped using it, they'd be dissatisfied. And he was sure the amount of 2v1 Scars was participating in influenced the management's decision, allowing him to use something everyone else thought should've only been permissible in the ninjutsu category.

Smoking Tiger blocked and evaded a spray of shuriken from Scars but immediately jumped back in when Scars tried to bypass him to get to Razor. He slashed at Scars, who had reequipped himself with a kunai in both hands like he always did.

Smoking Tiger didn't believe he could beat Scars, but that didn't mean he couldn't hold him back. He took charge and pushed Scars back with aggressive swings that Scars effortlessly blocked, but Smoking Tiger was able to push Scars away from Razor… and he was able to create enough time.

Smoking Tiger deflected one of Scars' kunai strikes and jumped back as Scars swung the kunai only for Razor to switch in and blocked the other strike seamlessly.

"I'm back, baby!" Razor yelled with a feverous expression, blood still dribbling from his chest, but he didn't seem bothered at all. He stabbed Scars and nicked him in the shoulder.

Scars retaliated with a sudden kunai throw at point-blank range that cracked Razor's laugh, but like a madman, Razor completely ignored it and immediately left a deep gash in the back of Scars' right hand.

Smoking Tiger smiled behind his mask, and the moment he saw the gash on Scars' hand, he positioned himself on that side, and the moment he saw an opening, he lunged in with a thrust that ripped through the side of the already injured arm. The arm guard took a chunk of the thrust, but Smoking Tiger was satisfied with it. He stepped back and gave Razor the space, which immediately turned up the aggression to eleven and pressured Scars back while getting a few slashes.

"That's more like it!" Razor yelled. "Today will be a great show."

Scars hobbled back a few steps as Razor landed a solid strike to the calf and almost brought Scars to his knee.

Smoking Tiger saw an opportunity and moved in.

Scars deserved the reputation he had in the Ring as even with his shoddy balance, he parried the next slash from Razor and rolled on his back to evade the downward slash from Smoking Tiger all the while regaining the balance at the end of the backward roll.

Razor and Smoking Tiger didn't want him to recollect himself and straightaway charged in to pile more pressure on him.

And their efforts paid off as Scars froze up in the face of two assailants.

Smoking Tiger left a gash in the side with a well-placed thrust while Razor aimed a downward slash for the neck that instead caught the shoulder and dug deep due to the momentum and gravity.

'We got him,' thought Smoking Tiger.

But the next moment, faster than he had moved in the fight or the fight they had previously seen, Scars palmed Razor's sword up out of his shoulder while launching a terrifyingly quick palm strike into his stomach that launched Razor back like a cannonball.

Out of pure instinct, Smoking Tiger followed Razor— and instantly realized his mistake— he had looked away from his opponent in the middle of the fight. More importantly, he had looked away from Scars, someone who had just demonstrated that he could use chakra augmentation. Smoking Tiger hastily looked back at Scars, fully expecting to get socked in the face, but Scars suddenly jumped all the way up to the cage surrounding the arena.

———

"Chakra augmentation," Kano whistled. "Now, that's interesting."

She wasn't expecting to see chakra augmentation down in the Ring. There were several types of chakra augmentations that affected different attributes, depending on their use case. Many clans held some variant of chakra augmentations that suited their combat style.

Chakra augmentations weren't restricted to clan shinobi. There were plenty of augmentations in the jutsu archives— even though most of them, in Kano's opinion, weren't practically usable— but they were only usually used by chunin who specialized in combat. She was surprised to see a genin in the Ring use chakra augmentation, and from the looks of it, he seemed to be decently proficient in it.

"He could have finished the fight right there," Arisu said, shaking her head.

"That was a mistake." Kano agreed. The one named Smoking Tiger name had looked away— a grievous mistake— and Scars should've punished Smoking Tiger for it. It would've taken a single kunai stab in the right place to end the fight for Smoking Tiger. She turned at Razor, who was quaking as he attempted to get up.

Both Scars and Razor were injured, and she didn't know if either had shown their complete hand, so she couldn't predict how the fight would go between the two. Scars was the superior fighter because he was going solo, so if she had to, she would go with Scars— especially with the chakra augmentation he had shown.

"Ring fighters are good at attacking vital points." Given that they were at Ring, Kano decided she could give a quick few pointers to Arisu. It wasn't part of her responsibility, but Arisu was from the Fuma clan, Uchiha's closest allies, and she liked Arisu well enough to help her out here and there.

"It's interesting, you know," Kano said after recollecting the points of interest that had already happened in the fight until then. "Every clan has developed their combat style after years and decades of adjusting, improving, and optimizing to create something unique to them— suitable to their bloodlines and traits. Older clans like mine and yours with old roots in the Warring Era had honed their combat through true combat in the turbulent times of chaos, blood, and death.

It's that pedigree, rich culture, and tradition that makes us better than others."

Uchiha's Interceptor Style, Fuma's Shadow Windmill, and others were developed through long years of effort by entire clans that had accumulated into what they were today, and were continued to be developed by the current generation and would continue to be developed by the future generations.

Kano continued. "The Ring is doing something similar. A group of shinobi who learn from each other through repeated combat, which, while isn't exactly actual lethal combat, is dangerous enough. Each one of them brings something unique to them, even if that something isn't special, and due to the nature of combat, people learn even if they don't actively intend to.

In many ways, it's similar to how clans develop their styles. It's not as effective as the methods that the clans have perfected, and the Ring very well doesn't have the pedigree, and it's highly inconsistent due to the competitive and adversarial nature of it all— but they've, without a doubt, have created a style of combat flexible enough that it successfully becomes the foundation— a competent foundation— of so many Hidden Leaf genin that go through this.

Observe them, Arisu. Many look down at this place, and they aren't completely wrong, but you can't deny that there's something that you and even I can learn if we want to."

Arisu looked away from Kano and down at the arena. Kano didn't know if Arisu took her words seriously, many in their position wouldn't, but Kano had done her job; now, it was up to Arisu to proceed from here on.

———

Smoking Tiger cautiously but hastily skipped back towards Razor while keeping an eye on Scars, who remained hanging from the cage.

"Razor, how's your condition? Can you continue?"

Razor lifted his hard mask above the mouth slit in the ski mask, and spat out blood. He clutched his lower chest in agony.

"I-I can," he coughed, "fight… fight!"

'Did he break a rib?' Smoking Tiger bit the inside of his cheek. The place where Scars had punched had bruised horribly. It didn't look good. This kind of injury wasn't optimal, but if it was only as bad as it looked, Razor could continue to fight. Plus, they, too, had injured Scar, and if his time hanging on the cage and his lack of attack on Smoking Tiger, it seemed they had done significant damage.

There was a sudden burst of cheers from the crowd that made Smoking Tiger look back. Scars had dropped down from the cage and was now standing in the middle of the arena, staring at them. Beside him, Razor stood up and took his sword that Smoking Tiger had retrieved.

Smoking Tiger spoke, "I have a plan; we should—"

"Shut up," Razor snarled and recklessly charged at full speed toward Scars.

"Razor!"

"I will kill you!" Razor screamed as he drew his sword, bloodlust oozing out of him.

Scars threw a trio of kunai at Razor, who effortlessly deflected them with his sword.

"How dare you make me—" yelled Razor.

"Razor, look out!" Smoking Tiger tried to warn.

Razor hadn't noticed that right after the kunai, Scars had thrown a surujin (a rope with weights on each end) in their shadow. The rope directed by the weights caught Razor's legs and rapidly wrapped around them, snapping them together, and tripping Razor down to the ground.

Razor fell.

Scars ran toward his fallen opponent.

Smoking Tiger ran towards his partner. Alas, he was much slower than Scars. Scar reached Razor first.

Razor tried to swing his sword at Scars, who dodged and kicked him in the face. A kunai appeared in Scars' hand, and he immediately used it.

Stab! Stab! Stab!

Blood spurted out of Razor's shoulder. He screamed as the same kunai dug into his side. And before he could react, Scars stabbed Razor's thigh and dragged the kunai down to the knee, leaving it there.

By the time Smoking Tiger reached them, it was clear that Razor wasn't going to be continuing the fight.

Scars looked up, and Smoking Tiger froze when he felt the cold eyes pierce him. He felt a bloodlust blast his body, and it felt like someone was stabbing his body with a hundred kunai. Compared to Razor, who was a maniac for blood, it felt on a completely next level.

He got a very real sense that there was a real possibility that things could go terribly wrong and end with his death.

He couldn't believe that he had considered Razor and Scars on the same level.

Smoking Tigers immediately jumped back and raised his hand in the air, declaring forfeit. His heart leaped in his throat when Scars ran after him with Razor's sword in his hand.

Fortunately, Scars stopped the moment Smoking Tiger declared forfeit, and a sharp horn shot blared through the arena, announcing the end of the fight.

Smoking Tiger couldn't calm his heart well past after the fight had ended.

———

Takuma laid with his eyes closed in the medical room while Sango treated his injuries.

He had made an egregious mistake. He had frozen during the fight. He might have very well knelt in front of his opponents and given them free swings at him. He had panicked.

In that moment when Razor and Smoking Tiger were upon him, the image of two sword-bearing fighters had overlapped with the memory of the two Hidden Frost shinobi who had almost killed him in the Land of Frost. Something in his consciousness had made the connection.

He clenched his fist. He had defeated the Frost duo; he was alive while they were dead— even if Razor and Smoking Tiger triggered that memory, it shouldn't have elicited that reaction from him. But the truth of the matter was that it did, and that fact unsettled him deeply. It didn't help that one memory dragged more memories out to the surface.

It left an undesired taste behind.

"Hey, ease your arm," Sango said, displeased.

Takuma took a deep breath and eased his body, but it didn't help ease what he was feeling.

"I found what you told me to find out," Sango said after she was done patching him up.

Takuma opened his eyes and looked at Sango.

Perfect.

This was exactly what he needed to take things off his mind.

———

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Chapitre 116: CH_4.16 (116)

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———

The knock on the door made Kano glance up from the paperwork at Takuma standing at her office door. She motioned him to come in as she ticked some boxes and filled over the dotted lines. One day she would die, and she was sure the damned paperwork would be the reason behind it.

"Is it about the Shirogumi Robberies?" she asked. It was one of the cases Takuma was handling as the second investigator.

"No, ma'am," Takuma placed an open letter envelope and two sheets of paper on the table. "I was going through the anonymous public submissions… and well, I came across this one. I think this one might have some weight behind it."

Every police precinct had these submission boxes and postbox addresses where civilians could send anonymous 'tips' about crimes in their neighborhood or crimes they had witnessed to the Police Force to consider without divulging their identity.

Kano was skeptical. The anonymous tips were mainly baseless accusations by people who didn't like their neighbors, jealous business owners hindering their rivals, people with grudges who wanted others to get into trouble, building owners who didn't appreciate their tenants but couldn't kick 'em out because of the lease agreements. It was stupid people trying to get other into trouble— and they wasted time because it wasted a lot of time and manpower to process those submissions and chase the leads which looked real— which would then not pan out.

Of course, it had been long since Kano had touched the anonymous submissions. It was grunt work. She had long left the part of her career where she was required to do grunt work. Takuma, on the hand, was precisely in that part of his career. Before him it was Arisu who handled the submissions, but the moment Takuma came in, she dumped the chore to him.

"You think so?" Kano picked up the letter. The two pages were printed by a typewriter, giving no indication as to determine what kind of person wrote it through the handwriting. They could send the letter to the Intelligence Division to analyze the linguistics, but that would be an overreach for anonymous submission.

She read the contents of the letter with disinterest, but by the time she was past the first page, she could see why Takuma thought the submission was legitimate. The detail with which the things were laid out was well-thought and written, which made it easy to digest. But the point which made it look legitimate was the subjects mentioned.

One of the state pharmacies is illegally supplying to the Maiko Triad.

The way it was presented made it so that a Police Force member would read and appreciate the points mentioned in writing, making it convincing. The organizations and groups around the Hidden Leaf were made up and supported by shinobi— active or discharged— and were involved in a number of gray or outright illegal activities hidden behind the veil of legal fronts. They did everything from robberies to collecting payments for 'security.' A lot of them were highly territorial and had well-defined areas where they operated and clashed against their neighbors, which was the source of many homicide cases that came to Organized Crime due to the inter-gang conflicts. Shinobi deaths far outnumbered civilian deaths.

Maiko Triad was another one of the territorial groups that ran labor scams, contract frauds, security extortions, and a variety of other offenses in their territory. They were a big organization in the Hidden Leaf with several chunin associated with the organizations at its helm; of course, due to the nature of it all, when asked, everyone would refuse their involvement.

"Looks real, but as usual, nothing of substance we can use," Kano sighed as she dropped the letter on the table. It might have been a better submission than most, but nothing new she hadn't seen before.

The Police Force got hundreds of those submissions, and perhaps a couple of them looked legitimate. It took a hundred potential legitimate tips for them to get one lead that actually turned into something tangible.

"Should I drop it then?" asked Takuma.

"No, don't do that," said Kano. Even if she didn't appreciate the abysmal return on effort, she couldn't ignore it just because she didn't like it. "Forward it to either Yoshiaki or Miwa. Both of them have worked on the Maiko Triad before; they'd be the best to follow up on this."

"Yes, ma'am."

As Takuma exited the room, Arisu walked in with a stack of files in her hand. She opened her mouth to speak, but Kano raised her hand to silence her and silently took the files.

Paperwork would kill her someday.

———

Takuma walked out of Kano's office with the letter in hand and gazed across the Organized Crimes offices. He was satisfied with how the conversation had gone with Kano; he had hoped Kano would take charge, but he knew with Maiko Triad involved, she would forward them to those with experience and not needlessly increase her workload.

"Found something in the tips?" Arisu asked behind him.

"Yeah, just a little something. Hey, who do you think is less busy right now— Yoshiaki or Miwa?" asked Takuma.

Arisu thought for a second before telling Takuma that Miwa had just closed one of their major cases last week and thus would have more space on their docket if Takuma wanted to present them with the submission to follow up on. On the other hand, Yoshiaki was in a critical stage of two of their cases, regularly making that team pull overtime to ensure everything went right.

"Thanks," Takuma smiled and headed towards Chunin Uchiha Miwa's cabin before re-routing himself to the other side of the office where Uchiha Yoshiaki's cabin was situated and knocking on the door.

"Enter."

Yoshiaki was a slender man with broad shoulders. Like all Uchiha, he had black hair and onyx eyes with a mix of a few facial features one could find in the Uchiha Clan. He was older than Kano and had been part of the Police Force since the very start; as such was much more experienced when it came to police work, unlike Kano, who had joined the Police Force after completing her stint under a jonin team lead.

Yoshiaki was an admired figure not only in Organized Crime but also throughout the Police Force.

"Sir," said Takuma.

Yoshiaki didn't attempt to hide the sourness that overcame his face when he looked at Takuma. The man looked like his day had been ruined by Takuma breathing the same air as him.

No man was perfect. And unfortunately for Takuma, one of Yoshiaki's flaws was his prejudice against civilian-born shinobi. It wasn't to the level where he despised them, but when Takuma was put in Organized Crime, that had apparently crossed a line in Yoshiaki's mind. He was one of many in Organized Crime who were against the special recruits training program and their subsequent transfer to major departments. Ever since day one, the man had shown no pretense and had put forth his displeasure for everyone to see.

"What?" said Yoshiaki snipingly.

"An anonymous submission that seems promising." Takuma tried to put the letter on the table, but Yoshiaki cut him off before he could even take a step forward from the office's threshold.

"Why are you giving me those? Chunin Kano is your commanding officer."

"Sir, it might involve the Maiko Triad," replied Takuma. "I thought—"

"I don't care what you think, genin," Yoshiaki's eyes narrowed. "Give it to me."

Takuma didn't mind the unfair behavior and handed the letter as he was going to do before being needlessly berated.

Saying Yoshiaki reading the letter would be an over-exaggeration; he barely skimmed the pages before dropping them on the table. If he had Sharingan activated, Takuma would've given him credit, but he could see the disinterested onyx gaze cruising over the lines.

"This is a hoax," Yoshiaki dropped the letter on the table. "Maiko Triad won't do this; they have no reason to buy medical provisions. Take this away and get out."

'Well, they did buy up medical provisions. I was the one who delivered it to them,' Takuma thought— but he couldn't argue with Yoshiaki. He picked up the letter and turned to walk out of the office. Yoshiaki had refused him, but he still had Chunin Miwa he could pitch the anonymous letter.

"Wait," said Yoshiaki. Takuma turned back, a flickering hope in his chest. "I changed my mind. Let's pursue that." He smiled, "And you know what? We are a little busy right now. How about you try it out? I'm sure you haven't had an investigation where you were the first investigator. This can be your first stint as a lead. How about it? It'll be a good experience."

Takuma held back the smile that threatened to break on his face.

"Yes, sir."

"Excellent. I'll talk to Kano and have you report to me for this follow-through. We will see this through," said Yoshiaki.

"Thank you, sir. I won't disappoint you," said Takuma.

Yoshiaki smiled. "You better not."

Takuma walked out of the room, and his smile drained, but inside he felt phenomenally great.

He wrote the anonymous letter to get a starting point for a potential investigation. He had read enough anonymous submissions to know how to craft one that would gain some traction with the chunin heads. He typed it out with a typewriter to ensure no one could trace it back to him. All he needed to do then was to present it to Kano, who he knew would see some weight behind it, but due to her lack of involvement with Maiko Triad, he would have to pass it over to one of the teams who did have it.

From there, Takuma knew that Chunin Miwa and Chunin Yoshiaki were the two options Kano would send him to— those were the two names that came up the most in the police records when he was researching the Maiko Triad.

Both were viable options. Uchiha Miwa and her team were strictly professional with Takuma, while Uchiha Yoshiaki's team mirrored their chunin's opinion.

The reason why he had chosen to approach Yoshiaki first was because of that conflicting attitude.

Due to Takuma's position as the newest member and the culture of Organized Crime, if anyone wanted some grunt work done, they could have Takuma do it even though he was part of Kano's team. On multiple occasions, Yoshiaki and his team had dropped troublesome and even senseless work on Takuma, which they were supposed to do— Takuma couldn't complain— and no one saw any fault because that's how things were done in Organized Crime. The rookie had to earn the chops. All of them had done so at some point in their career.

Takuma knew that if he presented something to Yoshiaki, it would surely get rejected. But he also knew that there existed a possibility that Yoshiaki would try to burden him just because he could do it.

The letter was written in a way that convinced Kano, but it wasn't enough that chunin like Yoshiaki and Miwa, who had experience with the Maiko Triad, would see it as a 100% deal. If it was too convincing, they would take the follow through on their own— which Takuma didn't want.

He wanted a case of his own.

If he went to Miwa, there was a strong possibility that she would use one of her own to pursue the matter. That possibility only strengthened as they had just offloaded a big case recently, allowing them to take on more work. If Yoshiaki had rejected him, Takuma would have gone to Miwa, showed it to her, and would've tried to get involved in the name of experience. If she, too, had rejected him, he would have volunteered to follow through and say that he had a hunch that this might be something. Unlike Yoshiaki, Miwa could have given him a chance.

That was the second option.

There existed a chance that Yoshiaki would once again try to push useless work on him as he had done before. Takuma had been in the office long enough to have observed a good number of people and studied them to ensure he didn't say or act in a way to make them suspicious of him. He knew what kind of person Yoshiaki was. He knew that if presented with a chance, Yoshiaki would try to make Takuma's life difficult.

And that guess had paid off.

Yoshiaki had told him to lead the follow through, and if it turned out something, he would get the lead as the first investigator.

It was time for him to get some traction running in the Leaf Military Police Force.

———

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