章節 103: Naruto Chapter 103
One hour after Naruto had left, he, in his Dark Phoenix disguise, Shikamaru and Hinata were assembled in Kakashi's office.
"I have an A-rank mission for you three," Kakashi informed them and Shikamaru and Hinata stiffened hearing the rank of the mission.
"Dark Phoenix will be the team leader, as his expertise with seals is a critical part for this mission. Another Konoha team of chunins in Fang Country has found a seal that Dark Phoenix identified as a summoning seal used in Jashinist rituals.
Time is of the essence. I would let you take more jonins with you on the mission, but they are already on other missions or have just returned from another long mission. Your mission is to stop the ritual.
If a reaper spirit can be summoned, we will have to deal with another insane and immortal high priest. Normal Jashinists are already a pain to deal with, but a high priest is a whole other cattle of fish.
"Dark Phoenix knows the way to disrupt the seal that is needed for the ritual to work. Make sure that he is able to do that. Also take this," he pushed a new edition of the bingo book over to them.
"You want to read up the entry about Hidan of the former Hot Springs village. He's a known high priest of Jashin and responsible for the end of that country's ninja village, because he used them to fuel his own ritual as far as we know."
Naruto nodded and took the bingo book. He leafed through the pages and found the one about Hidan. The man had silver hair, wore a necklace with a symbol that belonged to the Jashin cult around his neck and carried a scythe around with him. Hinata and Shikamaru memorised his looks as well.
"There isn't a lot of information about the ways a Jashinist fights, but we know that they can somehow transfer their injuries to another person. Be very careful if you encounter somebody wearing that symbol on their person. I doubt that you would meet an opponent like Hidan, as Jashinists normally work alone, but better safe than sorry," Kakashi seriously declared.
"Understood, Hokage Sama," Naruto replied, knowing to slip into his Dark Phoenix cover, "Alright, you already have your equipment, correct?"
"Yes, Dark Phoenix," Hinata confirmed while Shikamaru just nodded, mumbling how troublesome this mission would be.
"Good. We will leave immediately. We should be able to reach Fang Country tomorrow. I have the information about their last known location and they have been sent a hawk with instructions to wait for us to get there and only to interfere if it seems as if the ritual is about to commence," Naruto told the other two, "I will brief you about the other details on the way.
The other two nodded and they left the Hokage's office through the door. Kakashi only hoped that they would manage this mission. But he only had Gai inside the village who had full jonin rank and he wouldn't be suited for this kind of mission. He didn't like the shortage of manpower he currently had, even if the invasion had gone better than could have been hoped for.
...
Naruto set a high pace, which he knew that both Shikamaru and Hinata were capable of following. They moved in triangular formation with Naruto taking point, Hinata behind him to the left and Shikamaru behind to the right.
"So, what kind of ritual are we talking about and what are the requisites for it to work?" Shikamaru asked.
"Blood sacrifice of at least fifty people. There have been lots of disappearances of people in Fang Country, which is why the other team was sent there to investigate.
The Jashinist that wants to ascend to high priest status has to sacrifice the blood in a certain way to activate the seal, which will then call forth a reaper spirit. Said spirit will then fuse with the Jashinist and give him the immortality that is so annoying about their high priests.
A normal Jashinist simply thrives on killing people in the name of his god Jashin, but you can kill him like any other opponent.
They still manage to somehow create a connection with their victims, but they are limited in the kind of damage they can do. There isn't much known about how they create the connection, as most of the ones that fell prey to that, died shortly after.
"A high priest meanwhile has no limits of what kind of injuries he can cause himself to transfer, as he can't die. Which is why Hidan is wanted as an S-rank missing nin. Greatest caution is needed when you engage one of these bastards," Naruto informed them.
"How are we going to fight against somebody like that?" Hinata asked.
"I have a number of seals on me that will help with it. Close combat against a Jashinist is dangerous, which is why we will try to trap him in some way, depending on how the area is built. We will have to get an idea once we get there. Your shadow manipulation should be very useful in that regard, Shikamaru.
You can prevent that the bastard can move and harm anybody while the rest of our team can move in and kill him before he can finish the ritual," Naruto told them.
"Makes sense. For a full plan we need the information that the other team has collected so far. We should get an idea of how far the Jashinist has come in his preparations," Shikamaru nodded.
"Hinata, I want you to regularly activate your byakugan to alarm us in case of somebody closing in on us. I think activating it every two minutes for a short look around should suffice once we are in Fang Country," Naruto continued.
"I will do that," Hinata confirmed.
They left the trees to run across a grassy field until they reached the next area with trees, which they jumped up into again to travel unnoticed.
...
Izumo Kamizuki and Kotetsu Hagane were waiting for the backup that the Hokage had sent their way. They didn't like the information that their team leader, Shimon Hijiri, had passed on to them about the analysis that Dark Phoenix had given about the seal that they had stumbled about while investigating the disappearing people.
It wasn't enough that some strange house seemed to be the cause for them vanishing, now there was also an insane cult involved. Not at all what they had expected when they had been sent on this supposed B-rank mission.
"When do you think they will arrive?" Kotetsu asked.
"No idea, but if they left Konoha shortly after the hawk that Hokage Sama sent, they should be here soon," Izumo answered.
"I wonder who they will send. We don't have a lot of jonin available after all. Asuma and Kurenai are busy with that mission in that village east of Konoha, Genma and Yugao are in Wind Country to keep an eye on Suna after their betrayal during the chunin exams.
Gai is in Snow Country, Anko is busy in T & I, as is Ibiki, the clan heads are on reserve to deal with clan business and most others are doing one mission or another.
Even our team didn't get a special jonin to lead us after all. And that's the normal procedure for a B-rank mission."
"True. That invasion cost us a lot of manpower, even if we were victorious. Thankfully we knew beforehand and had a good strategy. Otherwise the number of victims would have been much larger," Kotetsu shuddered.
"I don't want to imagine it. It was bad enough as it was. With a seal like that involved in our mission, I would guess that they might send a fuinjutsu specialist. Wasn't Naruto one?" Izumo mentioned.
"He was confirmed as a seal master by Jiraiya Sama, that's true, but he's in Snow Country with Gai and his team. I think the new Ice bloodline limit user, Haru or Haku was his name I think, was also sent there with the team. Probably a smart decision, as the terrain would be optimal for his jutsus," Kotetsu mentioned.
"A pity. Hokage Sama could just have sent us one of Naruto's kunai and he could have teleported to the position like his father did in the past," Izumo sighed.
"It's amazing if you ask me that nobody ever noticed who his father was. I mean, knowing it, the similarity in their looks is startling."
"We didn't want to look too closely and the Sandaime did his best to keep Naruto's true identity a secret. I guess that Iwa and Kumo would have tried badly to assassinate him had they known. Especially Iwa hated the Yondaime," Izumo admitted.
"Which fuinjutsu specialist do we have in the village?" Kotetsu pondered.
"Well, Jiraiya Sama, Hokage Sama and Danzo are either masters in fuinjutsu or proficient. Then there is of course Dark Phoenix, but I doubt that Hokage Sama would send him outside of the village," Izumo commented.
"Well, I guess we'll find out soon. There is movement over there," Kotetsu pointed to the east.
And indeed three figures were moving towards their position at high chunin speed. When they reached their position, the two chunin that were normally stuck with gate duty were surprised. They hadn't expected two rookie chunin and somebody who hid his identity to arrive as their backup.
"You're the team Hokage Sama sent?" Izumo asked.
"Yes. I'm Dark Phoenix, and I was sent to inspect the seal you found and neutralise it before it can be used," Naruto answered, "My teammates Shikamaru Nara and Hinata Hyuga were chosen to assist with trapping our opponent and being scout and medic for the team."
Izumo nodded, really surprised to see the famed fuinjutsu master that had been the cause for the greatly upgraded stock of the armoury with seals of all kinds in person. He really hadn't expected him to be this young. He would guess him to be around sixteen going by his height and voice.
"Good to have you here. By the way, which rank do you have, just to know where to place you among the chain of command," Kotetsu wanted to know.
"I'm operating with special jonin rank," Naruto answered, knowing that there were too many secret agents in Konoha that had that rank to be found out by just that.
"That would mean you're the highest ranking ninja among our group. Everybody else is chunin," Izumo mentioned.
"I'll leave leading the mission in the hands of the one chosen to lead it, except I need to take command over a specific part related to the seal and the Jashinist that is running around somewhere," Naruto informed them.
They nodded and then led the three towards their base where the other two members of their squad were waiting for them.
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