Interlude 4

Tea Country
Kurenai Yuhi, Elite Genin

“What the hell was all that?” Raido grumbled as they settled down for the night, sleeping bags in their chosen corner of the large courtyard.

“This mission has been going downhill since it started.” Asuma grumbled back, already laying down on his mat with a face that was pinched together and deep scowl on his lips. His hair was a bit frazzled from the fighting, and she could almost hear him grinding his teeth in thought. “First that Ogress lady, then a three-prong attack like that?”

She was shaking out her jacket with an annoyed expression, letting dozens of tiny purple particles loose. Almost being bombed a second time on this mission, Asuma being an idiot was one time too many already. Her other coat was still absolutely stained in soot.

“Asuma.” Gaku-sensei spoke quietly, leaning back against the wall in a relaxed manner to take pressure off his leg, but remaining upright to take the first night-shift. “Your Flying Swallow- do you think it could have taken out that moth?”

Asuma glanced over, lips pressed as he considered that.

After a few moments, he responded. “…Maybe- if I had a clean shot. My fire ninjutsu might also work-“

“It wouldn’t.” Gaku shook his head, cutting her teammate off. “It was hard to tell, but it was also engulfed in that Fire Ninjutsu the summoner used and emerged fine. I’m almost certain it’s highly resistant to fire, if not immune.”

“…Then I’d need a good shot. Flying Swallow is great at piercing, but it only does so much damage.” Asuma grumbled in a troubled fashion. “If I hit a wing, it might not even notice.”

“I don’t remember hearing about that puppet during the war.” Kurenai pointed out with lips pressed. “Is that what took you out, sensei?”

Gaku shook his head slowly, reaching into his front pocket and withdrawing both a lighter and a cigar. Oh sure, perfectly willing to smoke in front of them but when she tries spending her own money to buy some sake he stops her. Hypocritical sensei. “No- he took me out when one of those bolter’s blew up underneath me. If I had my flak jacket on, I could’ve kept fighting, but it had been ripped off earlier in that battle.”

Lighting the cigar, he took a long drag of the noxious stick before letting it out in rings. After a moment, he continued. “I check our Bingo Book every time we’re back in Konoha, back to front. There’s absolutely no mention of a puppet like that in his arsenal.” He let his eyes drop to the rest of them. “Either it’s brand new, or no one has been able to retrieve information on it yet.”

A hidden jutsu, as they were semi-officially labeled. A technique that has no information pertaining to it, often because anyone who has seen it has died against the surprise factor. They were semi-frequent, their Team had fought against two such jutsu before, over the course of the war, and both had nearly killed at least one of them.

‘The most dangerous kunai is the one you don’t see’, was the common saying. This was less a ‘kunai’ and more a hundred kunais, from the glimpses of it in action.

“We’ll have a more thorough debriefing about it later- when we’re back in friendly territory.” Gaku declared bluntly, taking another drag. “If nothing else, this is going to be an update for the bingo book- it’s good that we saw it on somewhat friendly terms first, a Hidden Jutsu like that-“

“Not exactly a hidden ‘jutsu’, is it?” Asuma interrupted with a musing statement, throwing off the mood. “It’s a puppet- that’s like a weapon or something.”

“Well ‘hidden weapon’ doesn’t really flow off the tongue, you big monkey.” Kurenai grumbled at him for interrupting the very-serious moment, making the thick-headed Sarutobi chuckle and lean back.

“Hidden Art, maybe?” Gaku proposed, an amused tilt to his lips as she turned a glare in his direction.

“Don’t encourage him, he’s bad enough already.”

“Super Secret Shinobi Tool.” Raido proposed raising his hands before his eyes and spreading them apart in a dramatic fashion. All three of the boys on her team were unified in this- annoying her. Emphasis on ‘boys’, with how they were smirking at her.

In the face of such opposition, Kurenai could only sigh and surrender, setting her jacket aside and settling down into her own sleeping mat.

“Get some sleep, pups- I’m imagining tomorrow is going to be a very long day.” Gaku commanded with a shake of his head.

“What’s on the agenda again? Talk to the client, eat some breakfast, have yet another big meeting with a bunch of ninja who hate us?” Asuma asked, throwing a blanket over his body to deal with the somewhat cool night temperatures.

It was November, after all, it was pretty chilly.

“Don’t forget- avoid being killed by all those ninja who hate us.” Radio added, somewhat pessimistic.

“Not all of them hate us.” Kurenai countered, mostly to alleviate her own nerves more than anything else.

“Yeah, just most of them.” Asuma, the idiot that he was, didn’t notice her worries and plowed ahead. “Don’t worry though- My big strong arms will carry you to safe- grkh!”

She pulled her arm back from throwing her jacket at his face, glare on her face as she tried to settle back down again, stomach knotted up in tension.

“…Oh sweet, a free jacket.”

She glared at the stars above, silently considering applying a genjutsu to the big monkey that was sleeping near her.

“Oh man- it even smells like perfume. Cherry and lavender. This will go great with my natural musk.”

“Asuma, shut up.”

—

Meetings between this many foreign ninja was something she normally only saw in the Chunin Exams, the one time they had tried. They didn’t end up failing, but they had to pull out midway through thanks to their Sensei being killed. It was irritating, but that was the way these things went sometimes.

It had been a couple years since, and they hadn’t gone back to the Chunin Exams since. Allegedly because they were always on extended missions around that time, dealing with various parts of the war-effort, but she was beginning to suspect that Gaku-sensei was just too lazy to go.

Which is why it was rather shocking to hear him say. “I plan on remaining behind to protect the client- my team will join the hunter-team.” One arm on an improvised cane, the other in a cast, Gaku looked utterly calm in the face of the foreign ninja and samurai all giving suspicious glares his way.

“Also, I’m still working with two broken limbs right now.” He admitted somewhat more candidly, provoking a ripple of mocking and derisive laughter from the others. She furrowed her brows into a mildly reproachful look at the sound. “I’m good for a scrap, but I’d just slow any hunter-team down.”

The other day had been stressful, with the attack and the move. The gas-grenades, a firebomb ambush, waves of corpse-clones attacking. It was only more annoying because her specialty, genjutsu, was mostly useless in all three situations. Genjutsu worked by injecting chakra into a target’s system and manipulating them from within, she could make any normal enemy fall over and die, but that didn’t work so well when their chakra-networks were already dead.

She can’t convince a corpse that it was being strangled by ivy- that doesn’t work!

“Sensei?” Asuma asked with a raised brow. Gaku turned to them and shrugged.

“You’ve been ready for Chunin for a while now- It’s just been too much of a hassle to take you to the exams.” He shrugged, provoking another round of chuckles from the gathered foreign nin, this time somewhat more earnest.

She knew it!