章節 24: Chapter 24
A black cloaked, but otherwise nondescript man walked in, waved casually at him and was gone to the back. Then ten seconds later, an identical black nondescript man walked over and went to the back. It might have been said they were twins, but the way he walked was identical to that of his predecessor. And just as he was about to write it off as idle day dreaming, a third one walked in and repeated the actions of his predecessors. The scary thing was, Tom didn't know that face(and he never forgot a face), they walked in such a way that it might as well have been a magical photograph, and well, the dark cloak was even now just striking him as having resembled the ones death eaters used.
Tom straightened up, walked to the back and opened a bottle of Ogden's finest. He was definitely going to need this more than anyone else. "To hell with excitement!" was the last anyone would have heard, if the cauldron had customers.
Harry watched Tom's actions carefully, from his place on the bar stool. Then he took out a paper scroll, and carefully wrote out his observations for the test in the strokes that were characteristically Japanese. It was really to be expected. But then, he had pulled a minor genjutsu in the bookstore and nobody had been any wiser. It was rash and he had momentarily forgotten about the test, which he had just conducted. It was a good thing too. He could only imagine what would happen if his genjutsu was discovered, or worse they were ineffective. Now it was still not a very conclusive experiment. He still didn't know if the more powerful wizards/witches, of the ilk of the dark lord and Dumbledore were immune to the illusions that he was by now bandying about less and less frequently. He still didn't have the absolute control, that he imagined he would eventually develop. He was growing, his chakra was growing and all the control exercises he did was meant to let him keep up with his growth rate. If the disparity got much larger, he wouldn't be able to cast any genjutsu – a most frightening thought.
As he walked into the alley, he was struck with how dull the place looked right now. Unaware that he had been channeling Tom, he created six shadow clones and henged them into nondescript wizards and witches. Well, henge was not the word really. He called it the shadow jacket. A chakra construct that, mimicked a shadow clones matrix onto his skin. It was a solid form, and because it drew chakra from his own coils(or that of the shadow clone using it), it was not dispelled so easily. And for his clones, that meant that their forms would be dispelled only if the main structure of the clone dispelled, ie with a death blow. Such a useful innovation that.
The disguised clones already knew what they were supposed to do, so they left, to explore the alley more thoroughly. Harry himself headed to Gringotts. He had money to manage.
The activity that took place at the entrance of Diagon Alley, did not go entirely unnoticed. There was after all one old man who had been monitoring what he thought of as a mysterious energy signature at a distance. So it was quite a shock for Takeda, who was meditating to feel an enormous surge of that energy so close by, probably just next door in Diagon. It was time to see what exactly this 'source' was.
He turned to the other two in the room, who were looking at him curiously. "Prepare yourselves, we must be off. Tell the others". And so they were off.
A few minutes later, five Japanese shinobi sat crouched on the roof of the weapons store, in formation. They all were in 'pursuit' configuration, minimal weaponry and armor, used for scouting, tracking and of course pursuit. They could all sense it somewhat, the distinct twinge of the mysterious energies that their senses existed. At the same time, what they were feeling was not something they had felt before. If they absolutely had to describe it, they might have called it sorcery's creepy cousin. It was quite overwhelming for a second though, as they got used to it. It was not hostile, but it did seem to have a warning inside. They prepared for battle.
Takeda looked at the ninja behind him out of the corner of his eyes. They were not fresh rookies. They already had a good service record before they were even considered for duty outside the eastern territories, never mind the long term outpost in London. They were assassins and warriors. Whatever the situation they would be able to deal with it more efficiently than he could, if he needed it. For now, they would content themselves to observing the what or who that was causing this...disturbance.
When they got the nod from Takeda that they were waiting for, they took off. The first part would be to check all the places as quickly as possible. On the second run, they would actively try to sense if anyone in their assigned area had the feel that they were looking out for. Then they would converge on the place where they had discovered the anomaly. That was basically the gist of what they were attempting to do. It was borrowed from that of a search and retrieve mission, but it was not like they had a standard operating procedure concerning anomalies.
In ten minutes one had locked on to an ordinary looking wizard who seemed to be looking at the wares of an apothecary with a great deal of boredom. Following protocol, he immediately called in the others. When they got there,he did seem to do a slight bit of shifting, something that only Takeda noticed. So, to see what they could find, he tried the diplomatic approach.
Harry's clone was not sure what to do. He could literally feel the people who were watching him, a slight ticklishness that was present only when he was being scrutinized by someone that he couldn't see directly. But what really raised his curiosity was the fact that they were on surrounding rooftops and seemed to be quite different from the wizarding folk he had seen so far. For a start, they were leaking killing intent. Secondly, they were on the rooftops. They were all tense, from the way their abnormally large chakra signatures(at least, compared to the rest of humanity he had seen) were flaring, much like his did when he was in the 'zone' so to speak. He himself was a clone, so he had no problem sacrificing himself if necessary by exploding, or going on a kamikaze run. But attacking first in a situation which he did not know the entire circumstances of, could be disastrous. Especially considering that not only did he not know how skilled these people were in combat, he was not sure how he could hold off all five of them as well, and at the same time, there was no surety if the original was also being tracked/followed. And in any case, revealing any of his capabilities without his having expressly planned for it was a very bad idea. He knew very well how important even the smallest amount of information could be used against you. And even if they would have no way to connect anything with 'Harry Potter', the very knowledge that such abilities exist was a dangerous prospect. And who knew if these people were just curious because he was here on an otherwise dead day? After all, they were quite skilled at hiding, much like a ninja ought be really...
That thought brought the clones thoughts to a halt. It couldn't be ninja...could it? He had specifically looked for any mention of them and had hit a brick wall. There was practically nothing on Japan. For all he knew, there might not have been any magical people in Japan. But there was. A book on quidditch, which seemed to be some sort of insanely popular sport ('played on brooms! Honestly...') mentioned that "... The small and intensely private wizarding community in Japan fields a national team, which has won...", which only really told him that Japan had an isolationist community, which was not really odd considering the quirks he noticed in the rest of the magical world. And he still didn't know if there were ninja or not.
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