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68.76% Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve / Chapter 218: Interlude_6.1 (218)

Bab 218: Interlude_6.1 (218)

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———

.

"Arisu!"

Fuma Arisu, an officer of the Police Force, and the second-in-command of the Narcotics Taskforce, looked up from the intelligence file on her desk. At the end of the bullpen, Chunin Yakumi, the head of the Narcotics Taskforce, stood at the threshold of his office, motioning her to his office.

She shut the file and walked across the bullpen used by the Narcotics Taskforce. As she entered the office and closed the door behind her, Arisu noticed two men sitting there. When they looked at her, she didn't recognize their faces, and neither of them had the Police Force insignia on their sleeve, which meant they weren't from the Police Force.

"Arisu, these people are from the Hot Waters war commission," said Yakumi, pointing to the two men, "they would like to talk to you about a few things."

"What things?" she asked.

"About Genin Takuma," said the bald of the two men.

"Oh, what about him?" Arisu asked, crossing her arms.

Seeing the change in Arisu's body language, the two men looked at Yakumi, who shrugged. He wasn't going to help them with Arisu. Takuma might not be working in the Police Force, but he was still a part of it, and Arisu and Yakumi wouldn't talk if it would be used against him.

The second man got up and cleared his throat. "He's not in trouble, Genin Arisu. Genin Takuma is being considered as a potential candidate for an important mission, and we need some information about his work here. You're close to him, and we're wondering if you could give us some clarity about it all."

"What kind of mission?" asked Arisu.

"We can't reveal many details, but it's dangerous, and thus, we need to verify if he's up for the job. We want to know his history with snitches, informants, and moles, those sorts of people. We know he was experienced in cultivating people into assets and having them feed information to your team. How did he get their trust—"

Arisu scoffed as though she had just heard a joke.

 "First, Takuma is very good at cultivating assets, so if he wants the mission, give it to him, he won't disappoint. Now, trust really isn't a factor for Takuma. There are people who get attached to their assets, treat them as friends, which is fine and all—but Takuma's philosophy was the exact opposite. He sees his assets as nothing but what they are."

"Then how does he make them do what he wants?"

"Leverage," she said, "he liked saying that word a lot. It's quite straightforward for Takuma. When he finds a target that would make a beneficial asset, he would research them intensively. A lot of hours in fieldwork. He would find everything there was to find about them, and then he would find something that would motivate them to help, and then use that."

"So blackmail?" said the bald one.

Arisu shrugged. "Persuasion. Most people don't want to spend their next few years working in a lumber or mining operation, so they open their mouths quick and easy. Takuma made it worth their while—letting them go back to their lives to continue their jobs or choose new careers, and he would guarantee them anonymity so nothing came back to bite them… It's surprising what people would say when a few little conditions are met.

"He was straightforward and kept his word. Eventually, even with all anonymity, we developed a reputation. Open up, and we will give you a fair deal," she said.

They had done it so many times that they had perfected the routine. Pick up(kidnap) the people from the streets and dump them in an off-site interrogation room so that no one saw them bought in. They would let the perp stew in the small room, letting their mind make up stories about what was about to happen to them. A lot of them would've scared themselves by the time the interrogation started.

"But those are low-level guys; even if they fess up, there's often no evidence to back it up," said the man with hair. It looked like the guy had some experience in policing and interrogation. "Takuma might not deal in trust, but there's loyalty or fear in many guys that stops them from parroting."

"Sure, there are people like that, but for most, you just have to find the correct leverage," said Arisu. "One time, there was this higher-up guy we really wanted, but he had a reputation of being tight-lipped, and he was rich and connected enough, which got him out of all sorts of troubles even if he was brought in… We had no idea what to do, but this guy was really important, his cooperation would've made our case…"

"So, what did you do?"

"Nothing, we didn't do anything—but Takuma did a lot," said Arisu, sighing. "The guy had a sister who ran an illegal whore house, real nasty stuff." She spat with disgust. "Takuma found out that the sister was the guy's only family, and they were really close, so he helped another officer in the Police Force who was trying to get the sister. Takuma built a case for that officer against the sister, and promised complete credit. Unlike the brother, the sister wasn't as careful or good at keeping herself clean…"

The man with hair nodded in understanding. He said, "The sister became the leverage?"

"Indeed. The guy tried to get his sister out, but the case against her was so solid that she was looking at a decade of hard labor. And to make it worse, Takuma pulled some strings so that if she was found guilty, they were planning to send her to the other side of the nation so that the guy would never get the chance to see her…"

"Did it work?"

"Yes, it did. The guy found out that Takuma was behind it and tried to negotiate just as Takuma expected. The guy first threatened him, then offered him money, but in the end, Takuma got what he wanted."

Arisu smiled. In fact, that guy was giving the Narcotics Taskforce information from the inside. The case was going very well. They were supposed to close it in a month or two.

"I have a question," said the bald man. "What happened to the officer who was promised the credit? Didn't he get screwed in the end?"

Instead of Arisu, Yakumi answered that question.

"The officer was furious that the case he had been working on for so long became a dead-end because Takuma used it as leverage in a negotiation with scum. That officer even went to his higher-up, but they supported Takuma as well… The officer was pissed for weeks, but then Takuma gave a guy a case just as juicy, with all the work done perfectly. That helped in making it up to him," said Yakumi.

The bald guy laughed. "Let me guess, you were the officer?"

Yakumi nodded.

"And now you have his job," said the bald guy.

"That also helped," Yakumi laughed.

Arisu sighed to herself. She liked it better when Takuma was the Head of the Narcotics Taskforce. They were new and operated with frightening freedom because they didn't have an established culture like most of the Police Force. Everyone could do their work in their own way without getting bogged down by some convoluted process—it was chaotic, but the team was small enough to correct and sort out everything by the end. Since Yakumi had taken over, he had established operating procedures and due process, which had its advantages because the team had grown—but Arisu could see the Narcotics Taskforce slowly heading towards operating like any other department.

"Takuma is not above lying, harassing, blackmailing, entrapment, or anything," said Arisu, getting the conversation back on track. "Once he wants something, there's not much Takuma won't do to make it happen. If he gets the information, he will use it to his advantage. So, if you want someone who'll hold people's hand and persuade them through charm, and inspire confidence with his personality, that's not him. But if you want someone who gets the job done, he's your guy."

Arisu clicked her tongue and looked at the two men.

"This mission… is he going in alone?" she asked.

The two men looked at each other for a moment before saying that Takuma would be part of a team.

"Why do you ask?"

Arisu took in a deep breath. "Nothing, I was just worried if he was going in alone. You said the mission is dangerous," she said with pursed lips

They seemed to be satisfied with her answer.

Arisu was relieved that Takuma would have a team with him. She chose not to tell them about Takuma's excessive aggressiveness. When Takuma was running the Narcotics Taskforce, one of the most important parts of Arisu's job was to reel him in. Takuma's way of doing things matched his combat philosophy—to be aggressive. He was always in a rush, pushing forward without ever taking a moment to catch his breath. There were times he'd be so laser-focused that he got tunnel vision. At times like that, he needed someone to pull him out and make him aware of his surroundings.

They talked for another ten minutes before the two men from the war commission declared they had heard enough and left.

"You didn't tell them about the other way Takuma cultivated assets," Yakumi said.

Arisu looked at him. "You never know how people will react… They could've thought he was colluding with criminals," she said.

Threatening criminals with leverage against them wasn't the only way Takuma cultivated assets. There was another way he was known to do business—something that wasn't popular among the Narcotics Taskforce, but Takuma did it anyway because he was the boss. Since Yakumi took over, they abandoned the method.

"Maybe he was," said Yakumi.

"Then why didn't you say anything?" Arisu asked with narrowed eyes.

One of the first things Yakumi did after taking over was an internal audit to see how Takuma managed the Narcotics Taskforce because Takuma had refused to provide any help to Yakumi on how things worked.

Officially speaking, every asset for the Police Force had a file in the system. The Narcotics Taskforce followed the same process and maintained files for their assets. They were highly protected, "eyes-only" documents that couldn't be removed from the office space assigned to the Narcotics Taskforce. Takuma was serious about the anonymity he promised.

But Takuma also maintained unofficial assets that weren't filed into the system. They were high-level assets because of their identity and influence in the drug trade in the Hidden Leaf. Takuma had somehow gotten access to these people and had managed to rope them into helping the Narcotics Taskforce put away other big players.

These people were high up in the drug trade, and Takuma didn't have any leverage on them. It couldn't be more abundantly clear that they were cooperating with Takuma because he was going after their competition. And he didn't log any of them into the system, keeping it entirely off-the-books, which looked extremely shady. It was a practice heavily frowned upon in the Police Force, and Takuma was using it aggressively.

From one perspective, it looked like Takuma was helping them, which brought up an allegation against him: Was Takuma being paid by the people he was cooperating with? When he called it a true collaboration of the police and the criminals to put away other criminals, a good number of people in the team suspected him of colluding with criminals.

Takuma was blind to his team's thoughts as he was so focused on targeting criminals. Arisu had to shove the problem in his face for him to look at his team, properly explain the situation to the team, and truly bring everyone on the same page. Some of them remained doubtful until the results started coming in, and the team could see what Takuma envisioned.

Yakumi found out about Takuma's practice, and he could've passed on his findings to the higher ups but didn't because a lot of ongoing cases, many of them close to crossing the finish line, were built on the foundation of Takuma's collaboration with his unregistered assets. If he had brought it to the higher-ups, they would've ordered Yakumi to dump all of them, and he would've been forced to start all over again.

But Yakumi didn't want that because the performance of the Narcotics Taskforce would suffer, and all the blame would fall on the new and current head, who had failed to keep up the Narcotics Taskforce's bullish moment established by Takuma. So, while Yakumi ended all relationships with Takuma's shady assets, he never reported them to the higher-ups.

Under Arisu's glare, Yakumi stayed silent.

She walked out and looked at the bullpen with all her co-workers.

If the people who worked closely with Takuma suspected him of being a mole and a corrupt sell-out, then two strangers who knew nothing about Takuma could think of him as much worse.

As she walked back to what she was doing, Arisu wondered what he was doing now. Things had ended on an awkward note, and the one letter he had sent had avoided any mention of the kiss. Arisu was disappointed he didn't write anything but relieved at the same time because she was scared of what Takuma would say and preferred for things to remain ambiguous.

Arisu ruffled her hair in frustration.

"He better appreciate it… that idiot."

.

———

.

Author's Note [¡¡¡ IMPORTANT !!! PLEASE READ ¡¡¡ VOTE !!!]:

Ran an experiment this week:

¡UPLOAD SCHEDULE!:

The past week (CH 216 - CH 218) I ran experiment to give you a taste of uploading the story 1 chapter at a time instead of the usual 3 chapter/week (all at once). Now it's time for you, my dear readers, to decide which way you want me to upload the story.

CHOICES:

1) The usual, no change. [3 chapter/week, all together]

2) Upload chapters 1 at a time throughout the week. There are two things to note: A) I'll revert to [3 chapters /week together] during combat chapters, and will notify about it beforehand. B) IMPORTANT!! I CAN NOT commit on specific day schedule (Like [Mon, Wed, Fri] or [Tue, Thurs, Sat]) because that's not how I write—so if we go option (2), the chapters will be uploaded when they're completed, which will be entirely depend on how productive I'm that week.

HOW TO VOTE:

I've left a PARAGRAPH COMMENT on both options. LIKE the paragraph comment you want to vote for.

———

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The link is in the synopsis!


next chapter

Bab 219: CH_7.1 (219)

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———

.

"There's a common misconception among shinobi that chakra control makes them stronger… that by improving their control over their ability to mold and manipulate raw chakra, their jutsu will become more destructive or effective—this, however is a misunderstanding that has propagated far and wide," Anko said as she slowly paced between the walls of a large room.

"What do you think?" she asked Takuma.

Takuma stood in the center of an empty room with nothing but his underwear on. There was a desk in front of him propped up tall on bricks till it was the height of a standing desk. There was a large tray on the desk with coarse sand of two colors in it—blue and red. There was a mound of the two colors mixed in the middle and two small piles of single-colored sand on either side of the tray.

"Chakra control helps in the efficient use of chakra; we waste a significant amount of chakra each time we use a jutsu. By improving control, the wastage goes down, and you're able to do the same with less—thus the perception of increased strength," his eyes were stuck to the tray as he answered, "but in truth they always had that strength, they just weren't able to use it properly…"

Takuma pressed eight fingers into the mixed coarse sand mound, and pulled away the grains of sand with the entire length of his fingers. He stared intensely at his left hand as the red dyed sand grains fell one by one back into the mound; he winced each time a blue dyed grain fell. He did it until only the blue grains were left and then turned to his right-hand and did it again, this time with the colors reversed. When he was done, he dumped the separated sand into their respective piles.

Anko said, "Correct. Chakra control doesn't make people stronger; it only makes them more efficient, and while it does increase their combat ability, we should be clear about the distinction." She then yelled: "Thirty seconds!"

Takuma, halfway through separating the sand through targeted chakra adhesion, dropped the sand back into the mixed mound, wasting his progress, and thus increasing his irritation.

He moved to a fortified heavy punching bag hanging from the ceiling and threw an augmented jab. His arms, from the back of his fist to the top of his shoulders; his collar, shoulder blades, and his chest were covered in spaced-out smooth marbles through chakra adhesion. The moment he threw the augmented jab at the heavy bag, several of the marbles shuddered from the force and fell to the ground.

The marbles were polished smooth, making them slippery. Even a slight disturbance in chakra flow would make the adhesion come off—and augmented strikes were all about creating large disturbances. The chakra for the augmentation flowed from his lower abdomen, going up to his chest, then to his shoulder, before going down his arm and out of his fist. More than two dozen marbles were on that route, and if Takuma allowed the chakra flow for the augmentation to disturb the chakra flow for adhesion, the marbles would fall.

"Ugh!"

Takuma cursed. Every thirty seconds, he had to throw an augmented punch while ensuring that no marble came unstuck. The marbles coming free meant that he didn't have sufficient control over his chakra flow. The purpose of the exercise was to perfect the chakra flow for augmented strikes— to use the least amount of chakra for the most damage possible, to mobilize the chakra as fast as possible, and to increase the ease with which Takuma could use augmentations.

He had gotten a nasty recoil from the augmented shoulder charge against Masumoto. It had opened a whole new dimension for Takuma in regard to augmentations, but it didn't change that he hurt himself, and thus needed training. Anko had set the short-term goal of using augmentations from anywhere in his body without getting hurt—and the long-term goal of backing every taijutsu attack with augmentations no matter the situation.

"Pick 'em up," Anko ordered.

Takuma huffed as he pointed his open palm toward the floor. Chakra strings shot out of his fingertips and attached themselves to the fallen marbles. His face twisted in strain as the chakra strings pulled the marbles up. One of the strings snapped mid-way, making Takuma sigh deeply. He re-cast the line and snagged the last remaining marble on the second try.

When Anko had initially started training Takuma, they had devoted all of his time and effort up Takuma's physical energies to correct his energy imbalance. But she had also promised to help him improve his chakra control, and after interviewing him on how he had been training his chakra control until then, she had devised a regimen to improve his chakra control.

Separating minuscule sand grains according to color and using chakra strings to pick up objects were two exercises Anko had him training for one hour every day… He did another hour at night in his own time.

But that was not all in Anko's regiment.

"Focus!" she shouted at him. "The waves are becoming messy."

Four water tentacles stuck out from the water mass on his lower back. The tentacles wriggled in a sine-wave pattern, with each tentacles moving at a different speed, creating waves of varying frequency and amplitudes. It was an exercise much similar to tracing a square with an index finger of one hand while the other index finger traced a circle simultaneously—but with more complexity and difficulty. It required Takuma's constant attention to move the individual tentacles according to their own pattern and any slip up caused them to move at the same pattern and speed—which was a fail state.

Sweat dripped from Takuma's chin as he focused on moving his tentacles. He had to become skilled enough with four tentacles before he moved up to eight, adding one tentacle at a time. It reminded him of his early days with Water Style: Eight Tentacles, he had to learn how to control the jutsu by increasing them one at a time.

"There's another misconception, a much more important one," Anko resumed her slow walk around the room. "Many shinobi believe that chakra control exercises increase their skill with their jutsu—they do not—chakra control exercises only make one chakra control efficient. If they actually want to improve their skill with their jutsu, there's one sure-fire way to do it, and that is the repeated use of the jutsu."

"Yes… I know." Takuma continued to separate the sand. The grains were too small, and when he tried to unstick one of them, three around it would fall as well. The intention behind the exercise was to improve minute chakra movements until he could unstick one color in a single go rather than slowly unsticking them. "You have already told me this… which is why I have a clone doing my guard duties for me."

Every morning, Takuma made two clones, using half of his substantially large pool of chakra. One of the clones would do his duties for the day, clean the room, and wash his gear and clothes, while the other clone would read complicated jutsu text, study up on topics, make reports and notes, and in the evening, the clone would sit down with Takuma and teach him what he had learned that day like his own personal tutor. Takuma still had to do self-study, spend time reading and comprehending the concepts, but the clone made it easier to digest the topics.

It wasn't the cheat-like Shadow Clone Jutsu, but Takuma was getting his worth out of the Water Clone Jutsu.

The Eight Tentacle exercise and the thirty-second loop of chakra augmentation had the same concept of improvement through repetition.

The tentacles held his chopsticks and bowls for him, they bathed him, and half of his kunai and shuriken throwing practice was done with the tentacles. He threw out 120 augmented punches during his hour with Anko and another 120 at the evening training with his duty clone barking at him like a training instructor.

"Because you don't listen to me, I have to keep repeating myself," said Anko.

Takuma pursed his lips. Anko was still upset that he had sprung the Masumoto/Bishop plan at her at the last moment, leaving her no choice but to accept. She didn't look like she was angry at him, but he knew that he was running on thin ice with her.

"Thirty seconds!"

Takuma jumped to the heavy bag and threw an uppercut this time.

"You're sweating too much; keep hydrated," Anko threw a water canteen at Takuma, caught by one of the tentacles.

"Taste a bit off, but thanks," said Takuma after he emptied the water canteen in one go.

"Because it's Daiki's sweat," said Anko, "all natural."

Takuma and his tentacles froze for a moment but then calmed down the next second. It wasn't salty, therefore not sweat. He shot the teasing Anko a look before going back to his training.

"So, what are you doing after this?" asked Anko.

"Rest," said Takuma, shortly, moving over to the sand tray.

There were only five more minutes until the training session ended. He was going to rest and recuperate some of his chakra to train Earth Style: Earthen Dome a few times before his third physical workout of the day.

"So, you're free, that's good."

As Takuma was separating the sand, most grains of both colors suddenly fell from his fingers. Thinking that he had made a mistake, he opened and clenched his hand before dipping his fingers back into the mound—which was when the marbles on the right side of his back hit the ground and rolled down the wooden floor.

"What the hell?" Takuma frowned as he raised his hand to shoot out chakra strings, only to find that his entire arm had gone numb. He shook it off, but the numbness climbed to his shoulder, and he found himself unable to lift it.

Within a few seconds, Takuma's entire right side was numb, and he fell to his knees, unable to stand. The immobility rapidly spread to his left side, and with great difficulty, he turned his body toward Anko as all the marbles on his body fell and bounced off noisily before rolling away.

"Anko, h-help!" Takuma said with great difficulty as his mouth and tongue were also going out of function.

Anko stood there looking down at him with a closed-mouth smile. The smile struck Takuma with a revelation: Anko's water canteen and the off-tasting water that she dismissed with a joke.

She had poisoned him!

"Y-You!"

Takuma could no longer stand and fell to the ground like a marionette-less puppet. The water tentacles failed before his fall, and he found himself drenched and lying in a small puddle on the floor. He could only stare at Anko while fear gripped his heart. He didn't see it coming. Why would she do that? Yes, she was unsatisfied with his behavior, but not enough grounds for poisoning.

"Oh, shut up. You're thinking too much," Anko squatted near and lightly slapped his face. "I'm not trying to kill you, you stupid brat… This is a training exercise, which is why I asked if you had free time. I like you kid, why would I want to kill you? It'd be a different matter if we didn't get along, though."

A thin, yellow and black snake slithered out of Anko's wide sleeves and climbed up to her shoulders. The snake's slit eyes rolled this way and that as it stared at him with a low hiss. Then, to his surprise, the snake spoke,

"Don't worry, kid," the snake sounded peppy as if this was all hilarious. "It's a mild paralyzing agent made from my venom. It's a tested recipe, so don't worry; you'll be fine in three to four hours, depending on your constitution."

Takuma could only make pathetic noises, losing his ability to speak.

"Do you remember when I was teaching Iori how to sober herself after drinking using chakra, and you wanted to learn it as well?" said Anko with a smile. "I hope you remember to do that because that's how you escape this situation faster. It's much more difficult than getting rid of the effects of booze, but you can get rid of this poison with that method—no antidote required."

Takuma glared at Anko as she got up, doing his best to express the anger he was feeling. He fought against the paralysis and weakly flapped on the ground.

Anko sighed and squatted back down. She gently stroked his chin, looking into his rage-filled eyes.

"You wanted this," she said.

Takuma wanted to yell and shout that he, by no means, wanted this—whatever this was.

Anko chuckled. "You were so excited when I told you I'd teach you my teacher's methods. Remember?"

Takuma stopped struggling and went still on the ground, staring at Anko. He did, in fact, react that way. Until now, Anko's regiment made sense in every way, and Takuma liked them very much because he could see the potential gains he would get in the future, but there was nothing uniquely "Orochimaru" about them except that they were all very smart and well thought out.

"This is how Orochimaru taught me chakra control," she said. "You're lucky, Takuma, that the effects will fade in three to four hours. The snake he used bit me directly, and that venom was much stronger—it lasted twenty-four hours, an entire day… I had no way to stop it and ended up shitting and pissing myself while trying to burn the poison away with chakra. You probably might do that as well, but the chances are lower than mine. I don't want to embarrass you, after all."

The snake laughed at Takuma from Anko's shoulder as she stood up.

"I will be back in three hours to check on you, but I expect you to free yourself before that and come find me." Anko turned and walked away. She was out of Takuma's sight and at the door when she spoke again. "Get used to this; we'll be doing this every day from today onwards. A different venom every day—some more annoying than others.

"As long as you don't give up, I'll see to it that you compete with the likes of iryo-nin and fuin-nin."

The next thing Takuma heard was the door closing, and he was left all alone.

For a few minutes, Takuma did nothing but lay limp on the wet floor. Eventually, however, he started to run chakra through his body to burn the venom's effect from his body.

If Anko could deliver on her promise just now, he would do anything she asked of him.

.

———

Chat with me and the rest of the community on our DISCORD server.

The link is in the synopsis!


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