Chapitre 115: Naruto Chapter 115
"I see, I never realised the danger of that," Lady Shiori admitted, "Reporters were just an unavoidable nuisance of life for me so far. Being nobility basically entails having to deal with them."
Naruto nodded.
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"I think we should escort you back to your hotel now. I'm not sure that Madam Otabane was working alone and I can't take the risk of more real or fake reporters being around," Naruto stated, "It's not too long until the arranged time for you to return anyway and perhaps getting an early dinner wouldn't be a bad idea now."
"I can agree to that," Lady Shiori nodded, while Natsuki looked unhappy.
Especially as Naruto refused to take her arm right now, being too busy with keeping a close eye on everything around, and telling her that he needed to be ready to act at a moment's notice, which he couldn't while she held onto him. Still, Ino read the situation correctly and managed to distract Natsuki as well as she could and they reached the hotel without incident.
Inside the Princess's room, Ino showed her a few tricks that kunoichi were taught to look beautiful at short notice, which was enough to get them over the remainder of the time until Natsuki met with her father for dinner, during which the team was released from bodyguard duty by the regular guards around the Daimyo.
Naruto reported to the leader of the guard team about the busted reporter and then led his team back to the Hokage Tower to give a formal report on the mission. It was thankfully an uneventful mission overall. The reporter could be chalked off as a minor disturbance.
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Naruto sat at his table in his secret home, eating his own dinner and drinking some green tea. He had taken a hot shower to deal with the tenseness of his muscles. He was very glad that this mission was done. As far as he had heard, the negotiations, the first phase of them at least, hadn't gone too badly and a tentative probationary trade agreement was set up to help Wave Country with its recovery.
The relations between Fire and Wind Country were still complicated, even if the Wind Daimyo condemned the attack on Konoha and declared that the previous Kazekage had acted against his wishes there. Still, it would take years until any progress would be made there.
He had been told that he was only going to teach his normal fuinjutsu class the next day, after that he was going to be placed on a team of chunin to investigate some rumours about people vanishing around a gold mine. Some of the workers had managed to escape and asked Konoha for help.
Supposedly a high-ranking, insane ninja was leading the operation at the goldmine and it needed the intervention of Konoha's ninjas to deal with things. The others on the team that he would lead would be Hinata, Sasuke and Shikamaru. Well, he could work with them.
Normally an advanced genin team would get the mission, but the next chunin exams were coming up and Kakashi sensei wanted them to give a grand show of the superiority of Konoha, even just five months after the village being attacked during the finals of the last exams.
Thus Gai and Asuma would be busy with training the two teams that had the best chances to get promoted. The exams were going to take place in four weeks' time in Taki.
During those weeks the two teams would concentrate on training. Normally Naruto wouldn't be going onto a longer mission right now, what with having to teach at the academy, but Kakashi was still short on personnel and with two jonin being occupied with training their teams, another needed to take their place.
And Naruto was incredibly versatile on missions, being only officially special jonin in rank, as he lacked experience for the full jonin rank. Well, missions like the ones he went onto recently certainly would give him that. The lessons from specialists could be switched around so that the children didn't really notice that one of their teachers was out on missions.
He had been told that one of the kenjutsu specialists would be substituting, making it appear that they were holding the specialist lessons whenever one of them had the time.
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Hinata Hyuga looked at the work she had finished that day. She was progressing very nicely in her studies of becoming a qualified medic nin. The lessons with Tsunade Sama were very demanding, but also rewarding.
Seeing how she could now use the mystical palm jutsu perfectly, mainly thanks to having been trained in chakra control all her life, with Sakura Haruno being the only other student being ahead of her, was very good for her confidence.
The other students weren't as far as they were. And she had a bit of an advantage in the study of healing plants, as she had researched them for the cream she had made even before she started medical training.
Her father was even fairly supportive of her studies and defended her against the elders. A number of those weren't pleased with the clan heiress following such a non-combatant path, but pointing out that Tsunade Senju herself was the best medic nin in the Elemental Nations and acknowledged as the most powerful kunoichi there was, made them back down.
And the regular success that Hinata could show from her training, progressing a lot faster than the others, except for Sakura, who simply was a genius in the area and had already trained for some months to take the position of medical nin on the current Hokage's genin team, brought good publicity for the clan.
The new programs that the Hokage had started after taking over the position had gained a lot of attention everywhere and the ones standing out in them were seen in a very favourable light, which would be helpful in the future. And getting private lessons from Tsunade herself, which only Sakura normally got, was definitely something to be proud of.
Not to mention that Shizune was also a very capable medic and was greatly involved in her training, clearly seeing her talent.
When she left the hospital after her last check-up on patients that were treated there, accompanying Shizune during that, she was fairly surprised to find a messenger bird flying down to her, bringing her a summons for a mission.
Of course she knew that the medics in training could be called for them, but normally they were currently limited to their training. It had to be important to pull her out for a mission. She immediately turned her steps towards the Hokage tower to find out what was going on.
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The team stood at attention in front of the Hokage, waiting for instructions.
"We have got information that a missing nin from Kiri is leading an operation inside of Fire Country. According to the reports of workers that fled from a goldmine, we are dealing with Raiga Kurosuki, a former member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of Kiri," Kakashi told the group.
"Like Zabuza Momochi and Kisame Hoshigaki then," Sasuke commented.
"Correct. Raiga left Kiri during the start of the bloodline purges. He's known to wield the Kiba, the double swords that can call down strong lightning attacks.
From what the escaped workers told us, he often holds burials, with the perverted part being that the ones being buried are still alive," Kakashi informed the team, "We won't allow for such a dangerous opponent acting from our country's soil.
While Raiga isn't the most powerful member of the swordsmen, he isn't to be taken lightly. Hinata, you are going to have to take care of all the workers getting proper medical care, after the mine is liberated from Raiga's control.
Naruto, you are in charge with Sasuke being second in command. Shikamaru, I want you to use the new jutsu that Shikaku informed me about you mastering recently to find out as much information as possible before you attack.
"The mission is taking out Raiga and any accomplices he has there by whatever means necessary and securing the mine under the control of Konoha. The workers are to be freed and treated for injuries and illnesses. I will send more medical personnel for a longer stay after the main problem is dealt with. This is an A-rank mission," Kakashi informed them.
"Understood, Kakashi sensei, when do we head out?" Naruto asked business-like.
"Tomorrow morning. Stock up on anything you need today, I want you leaving at the break of dawn," Kakashi answered.
The four confirmed the orders and left to prepare.
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