"Yeah… it should be her."
Kiyohara lowered his voice, his gaze fixed on the red-haired woman.
Under the dim oil lamps, her hair looked like dried blood—dark, dull, the ends brittle and split from long neglect. Even so, that streak of red was still painfully eye-catching in this gray, lifeless place.
Tsunade kept her eyes closed—partly to avoid seeing blood, partly to focus on sensing. After a moment, she nodded, her blond ponytail swaying lightly with the motion.
She'd reached the same conclusion as Kiyohara.
"Get ready to move," Tsunade said, frowning.
Right now, these Grass shinobi were "only" exploiting an Uzumaki's healing ability.
But greed always grows step by step.
It was said that Kusagakure once had a glorious past too—split into "Grass's Fruit" and "Grass's Flower," inheriting Sage of Six Paths tools the way Kumogakure hoarded its own "Six Paths ninja tools."
But that was all legend now. The Land of Grass was just a minor nation, and Kusagakure wasn't even close to the Five Great Villages.
Only Hōzuki Castle—an international prison—was still worth mentioning.
"Rescue her first. Avoid hitting the wounded if you can," Tsunade ordered.
"Got it."
Kiyohara felt Tsunade's fingers tighten around the edge of his sleeve… then relax as she released it.
There were a bit over ten Grass shinobi total.
Closest was a Kusa jōnin standing beside the red-haired woman, hand resting on his sword hilt, eyes lazily sweeping the area as he watched the steady stream of patients.
Among the patients were civilians and shinobi alike.
A few chūnin guarded the doorway, chatting in low voices with careless smiles. Every so often they glanced at the red-haired woman—no caution, only an unquestioning air of ownership.
They probably figured she'd already accepted her fate. Or even if she tried to run—where could a lone Uzumaki, cut off from her clan, escape to on this barren borderland?
"Kurenai—start with genjutsu. Then Kiyohara uses long-range ninjutsu to drop a few first," Tsunade murmured as she, Kiyohara, Shizune, and Kurenai kept to the edge of the crowd.
People moved back and forth; no one paid them much attention.
Or maybe once you'd passed the checks outside, things were looser in here.
Two men in the corner were even counting supplies with their backs to the door.
The optimal move was clear: eliminate the biggest threat first—the jōnin—then the two at the entrance.
"Understood."
Kurenai immediately got it. Her hands formed the Dog seal at her chest—one of the most discreet genjutsu hand signs.
"Demonic Illusion: Lingering Phantom Blossom Technique."
A silent genjutsu ripple spread like mist. It wasn't a heavy, direct attack—more like a brief sensory disruption that dulled a target's reactions for a second or two.
Now.
Kiyohara's dark pupils shifted, two tomoe surfacing.
Inside his black gourd, sand-iron surged. Under Magnet Release control, it condensed into several spindle-shaped pellets.
Whoosh!
The sand-iron rounds broke the sound barrier in front of him and shot out at supersonic speed.
The Kusa jōnin beside the red-haired woman jerked his head back—
His skull burst like a melon, red-and-white spray splattering across the earthen wall behind him.
His body stayed upright, fingers still on the hilt as if he hadn't even realized he was dead.
Only the pellet's momentum slowly toppled him backward.
"En—"
The second Grass shinobi managed one syllable before the second sand-iron round punched into his throat.
His voice died instantly. He staggered back clutching his neck—half his throat gone, blood geysering through his fingers—then collapsed and bled out.
But when the third pellet flew toward the third Grass shinobi, something went wrong.
That man happened to turn at just the wrong moment. The shot missed the vital point and tore through his shoulder instead.
The pain ripped a scream out of him.
"Enemy attack! We're under attack!"
The whole outpost exploded into chaos.
"Water Release: Water Dragon Biting Explosion!"
The fastest-reacting Kusa jōnin burst out of the largest mud house, seals already completed.
Chakra yanked at underground water veins—cracking the earth—and a thick water dragon roared up from the fissure.
The dragon was half a meter thick, packed with mud and gravel, jaws wide as it lunged toward Kiyohara's direction.
That jōnin had experience. Even without seeing the attackers clearly, he'd judged the rough location from the direction his comrades fell and the screams.
Kiyohara raised his left hand, lightning snapping between his fingers.
"Lightning Release: Furious Thunder Arrow."
An arrow-shaped bolt shot out—faster than the water dragon—skimming past it and striking the jōnin's hands first.
Electricity versus water—who wins the race?
The answer was obvious.
The bolt smashed his hand guard apart.
"Gah!"
The jōnin convulsed violently.
Without armor, his hands would've been ruined outright.
Even with it, the shock numbed him instantly—his fingers spasming out of control.
The massive water dragon collapsed midair, dumping into a downpour that turned the ground into sludge.
The next instant, Kiyohara stomped—cracking the earth.
His body blurred through the falling water, a streaked afterimage, and his ninjatō was already in hand.
A flash of steel.
A chūnin still twitching from the earlier shock sprayed blood from his neck; his head rolled into the mud.
Another chūnin tried to retreat and form seals—
Kiyohara's left fist was already there.
Steel Release.
Earth Release: Earth Spear.
A chakra-packed punch slammed into his chest, drove through his torso—his back exploded outward as his spine bulged under the skin—then he flew backward and smashed half a mud wall apart.
"Genjutsu: Tree Binding Death!"
Kurenai's voice came from the side.
At some point she'd already looped behind the mud house, hands steady in seals.
Her Yin Release genjutsu chakra spread silently.
Inside, the two men counting supplies froze.
In their senses, the earth split open and thick roots erupted like giant serpents, wrapping their limbs, torsos, throats.
The suffocation felt terrifyingly real; the crushing pressure made them scream.
In reality their bodies just stood stiff—but their brains fully believed they were being strangled.
Kurenai flicked two shuriken and finished them cleanly.
With more combat experience, Kurenai's timing—and her understanding of how to chain techniques—was improving fast.
"Ninja Art: Poison Mist!"
Shizune appeared on the other side, exhaling a purple cloud.
It spread and caught more Grass shinobi.
Blood mixed into the muddy water, blooming into harsh red stains.
Working together, they quickly wiped out the guards around the red-haired woman.
Minor-nation shinobi, overall, simply weren't on the same level as those from major villages.
Their ninjutsu repertoire wasn't as deep either.
Kiyohara sheathed his blade and flicked the blood from the edge.
His two-tomoe Sharingan swept the area, confirming there were no hidden enemies.
Rain kept falling, washing blood away. Red water seeped into the earth. The air stank of iron and wet soil.
Only then did the wounded finally process what had happened.
Screams. Panic. Running. Shoving. People tripping over each other.
The crowd scattered like frightened animals—no one cared about the red-haired woman anymore, and no one cared about the dead guards.
Survival instinct crushed everything else.
"Fire Release: Demon Lantern!"
A low roar came from the side.
Dozens of flame-formed demon lanterns appeared around Ryūmei Daishi—each fist-sized, each with a twisted oni face writhing inside the fire.
"Go!"
They swarmed at Kiyohara like hornets.
This wasn't ordinary Fire Release—Yin chakra was mixed into the flames, disrupting the mind and inducing hallucinations.
Kiyohara only gave them a cold glance.
The Sharingan feared genjutsu interference least of all.
His two tomoe spun faster, instantly reading each lantern's chakra flow.
Real and fake—only seven were lethal. The rest were illusions.
"Lightning Release Chakra Mode."
A pale blue electric sheen crackled over his body; his hair lifted slightly from static.
He didn't try to dodge every lantern—he burst through the gaps between the seven real ones.
His speed spiked again. Only an afterimage remained where he'd been.
Ryūmei Daishi's pupils shrank.
Too fast!
He'd never seen a shinobi move like this.
The Yellow Flash?
The thought flashed through his mind.
No—impossible.
He'd never fought Minato, but he'd heard the man had blond hair.
Ryūmei Daishi yanked his tachi free.
A weapon he'd paid a fortune to have forged in the Land of Iron—special alloy, light but resilient. It had blocked countless attacks.
Kiyohara's blade came straight down.
Ryūmei Daishi raised his tachi to parry—and in the instant the blades met, he saw Kiyohara's blade coat itself in a deep black metallic sheen.
Steel Release!
Crack!
The custom alloy tachi snapped in half.
The broken tip spun away and buried itself in a nearby mud wall.
Ryūmei Daishi stared at the half-blade in his hand, disbelief written across his face.
How was that possible?!
Even chakra metal shouldn't be that sharp—
His thoughts ended there.
Kiyohara's left hand clamped around his throat like an iron vice, lightning chakra surging through his palm.
In crackling arcs, Ryūmei Daishi convulsed violently—skin blackening and carbonizing—until he collapsed, silent.
Less than a minute into the fight, Grass had lost a jōnin, an elite of the Ryūmei clan, and multiple chūnin.
The remaining shinobi finally realized they weren't facing ordinary raiders.
"Run—go report it!"
Someone shouted, and the survivors scattered.
They weren't stupid. They knew they had no chance against Kiyohara's group.
And when they looked at the blond woman with her eyes closed, they vaguely guessed who she was.
The legendary Sannin name alone was enough to make them bolt.
"Trying to escape?"
Kiyohara shot into the air.
With Sharingan-enhanced motion tracking, he locked onto every fleeing body, grabbed a handful of shuriken, and laced them with magnetic force.
Whoosh—whoosh—whoosh!
One fleeing chūnin took a shuriken through the back and collapsed.
Another ducked behind a tree—but the shuriken curved midair, arcing around the trunk and slicing into his neck.
In moments, several Grass shinobi dropped.
Kurenai and Shizune moved too.
Kurenai trapped one trying to slip away with genjutsu; Shizune followed with a chakra scalpel, cleanly cutting his carotid artery.
Another tried to throw a smoke bomb to cover retreat—Kurenai pinned him with Tree Binding Death, and Kiyohara finished him.
Two minutes.
From the first sand-iron shot to the last body hitting the ground—two minutes.
The outpost went quiet, leaving only drifting smoke and a blood stench so thick it felt physical.
Most of the wounded cowered in corners, trembling, too scared to make a sound.
As for any shinobi among the wounded who still had the will—and strength—to resist, Kiyohara cut them down without hesitation.
Tsunade still kept her eyes closed, but her hands had already formed the Summoning seals.
White smoke burst out.
"Katsuyu-sama," Tsunade said.
A slug half a person's height appeared, blue-white striped, body slick with moisture, antennae swaying, emitting a gentle chakra presence.
"Tsunade-sama," Katsuyu's voice was soft.
"What do you need?"
"Heal that red-haired woman. She's probably out of chakra," Tsunade said.
"Understood."
Katsuyu slid toward the mud house entrance, stopping beside the red-haired woman curled on the ground.
The woman had been shaken senseless by the sudden violence.
She lifted her head.
Only now did Kiyohara see her face clearly.
She was a bit older than him—likely around Kushina's age.
Their children were from roughly the same generation, after all. Naruto and Karin were about the same age.
At this point, Kiyohara was almost certain—
This woman was Karin's mother.
The Uzumaki weren't cabbages you found everywhere.
The red-haired woman stared blankly at everything:
The corpses carpeting the ground.
Kiyohara approaching.
The blond woman with closed eyes.
The slug crawling toward her.
There was no fear on her face—no joy either.
Only numbness, the kind you get from living too long at the edge… and deep within that numbness, a faint, disbelieving flicker of hope.
"Y-you…" She tried to speak, voice rough and cracked—she clearly hadn't had enough water in a long time.
"You are…"
"We're Konoha shinobi," Kiyohara said, pulling out his Konoha forehead protector with the Leaf symbol.
Tsunade stepped closer, eyes still shut, head turned slightly toward the woman as if "facing" her.
Even with her eyes closed, Tsunade could still sense.
"I'm Tsunade—of the Senju," Tsunade said, keeping her tone as gentle as she could.
She almost never mentioned "Senju" out in the world—Senju had dissolved long ago, a relic.
But saying it now was meant to earn trust.
Tsunade took out her canteen, unscrewed it, and held it out.
"Drink. You need strength."
When she saw the red-haired woman accept the canteen, Tsunade continued.
"What's your name?"
The woman drank several deep gulps.
Only then did she respond, hesitating before answering slowly.
"Uzumaki… Karin."
"T-the Uzumaki… but Konoha—" Tsunade said, steady. "The Uzumaki were Konoha's allies."
These days, every Konoha uniform still bore an Uzumaki swirl on the back—an emblem of that bond.
And Tsunade's grandmother, Uzumaki Mito, had once held immense authority among the Senju.
"But… the Uzumaki are already…" Karin couldn't finish.
Tsunade understood anyway.
"I know," Tsunade said. A heaviness fell over her face like a shadow.
"Konoha received word of Uzushio's fall. We were too late. I'm sorry."
She paused, then continued.
"But Konoha is willing to take in the remaining Uzumaki."
"If you want… come with us."
Uzumaki Karin shook her head, as if she wanted to say something—but in the end she only pressed her lips tight.
"There are still others of your clan in Konoha," Kiyohara added. "You're not alone."
"Others…" Karin repeated, and for the first time her eyes truly moved.
She remembered—vaguely.
Some clan members had gone to Konoha, living with Uzumaki Mito-sama.
"Her name is Kushina," Kiyohara said.
Karin's pupils widened.
She'd clearly heard that name.
Even scattered as they were, the core Uzumaki names still circulated among survivors.
Kushina—sent to Konoha as a direct descendant—was well known within the clan.
"She… she's alive?"
Karin hadn't kept up with the world for a long time.
She only knew the war was chaos—even Konoha was buried in it.
"Very much alive," Tsunade nodded.
"She's noisy, but full of energy. If you come to Konoha, you can meet her. She'll be happy."
Karin fell silent.
She looked at Tsunade, then Kiyohara, then Kurenai and Shizune behind him.
Just as she was about to speak—
Footsteps sounded outside.
Kiyohara's Sharingan snapped to the source, and he saw the newcomers clearly.
Seven people.
At the front was a man in his early twenties, tea-colored short hair, a red band tied across his forehead, and a peculiar pair of diamond-shaped sunglasses.
Hands tucked in his sleeves, he walked with calm, unhurried steps.
Behind him were six others.
Two were clearly bodyguards—big men in black shinobi clothes, wearing iron forehead plates marked not with a village symbol, but a private militia emblem.
The other four wore mismatched clothing—hired shinobi, eyes sharp as they scanned the area.
"Oyashiro En," Kiyohara said under his breath.
He hadn't recognized him at first.
Because En didn't match what the black market broker described.
The one who recognized him instantly was Anbu Kiyohara—floating behind Kiyohara now, staring at En with cold hatred.
I disguised myself. How did he recognize me? Oyashiro En was mildly surprised.
He'd changed his hairstyle, clothes, sunglasses.
And yet someone still named him.
So someone had been digging into him recently.
En didn't show any emotion.
Plenty wanted to kill him. Plenty wanted to beg him.
He'd meant to erase all traces—then decided that was bad for weapon sales, so he left a few breadcrumbs on purpose.
That way, he filtered out weak "partners" and small-time troublemakers.
Anyone who could still track him down under those conditions was, by definition, a high-quality contact.
Even without Anbu Kiyohara's intel, Kiyohara could recognize him too—or rather, recognize that aura.
It wasn't the aura of a normal shinobi or merchant.
It was the cold, almost inhuman detachment of someone who viewed people as collectibles… or test materials.
"Oho… looks like my reputation's grown again," En said, pushing his sunglasses up, voice so gentle it felt wrong—so sweet it came off sarcastic.
"And I seem to have arrived a step too late."
"I heard Kusagakure found an interesting 'piece' here, so I came to take a look… but someone's already gotten here first."
His gaze slid over the corpses. Paused on Kiyohara. Then settled on Uzumaki Karin.
In that moment, Kiyohara could see En's eyes behind the lenses—glittering with excitement.
Like a collector finding a treasure.
"Red hair. Powerful life-force chakra… an Uzumaki remnant after all," En licked his lips.
"Miss, how about changing environments? I have many… special friends like you. I'm sure you'll all get along wonderfully."
"Oyashiro En."
Kiyohara stepped forward, placing himself between Karin and Tsunade.
"Black-market weapons dealer and kekkei genkai collector. I'm not wrong, am I?"
En's eyes narrowed slightly behind the glasses.
"Oh? And what do you want to say?"
He looked Kiyohara up and down.
"Konoha shinobi? No forehead protector—afraid to expose your identity?"
"But those eyes… Sharingan. What an enviable bloodline. Makes me want it."
He spoke the way someone appraises a rare work of art.
Kiyohara didn't respond. He calculated.
En had six men with him. Judging by chakra alone, at least four were jōnin, and two were stronger than typical jōnin.
On Kiyohara's side, Tsunade couldn't fight directly due to her hemophobia. Kurenai and Shizune had to protect Karin.
The only real combat power here was Kiyohara himself.
He didn't panic.
The guards weren't that strong. He could take them down quickly.
The real problem was En himself.
Kiyohara looked at him.
There was blood everywhere.
Against Oyashiro En, that was a terrain advantage.
"Kiyohara."
Tsunade's voice came from behind.
"You go. I'll hold them."
"Sensei… your condition—"
"I'm uncomfortable," Tsunade said, pride of the Sannin in her tone, "but that doesn't mean I can't fight."
"Against a few nobodies, I don't even need my eyes open."
Kiyohara could almost picture her eyebrow lifting as she said it.
But he shook his head.
"No. Sensei—take Karin and go."
When Tsunade's hemophobia flared, even a younger Kabuto had pinned her down after drawing blood.
Her combat ability swung wildly—either terrifyingly strong or disastrously weak.
In this state, she was a gamble Kiyohara didn't want to take.
"Leave this to me."
"Kiyohara—"
"Trust me," he cut her off.
He turned, meeting Tsunade head-on with his Sharingan—even though he knew her eyes were closed.
"Don't forget—I can fly. I'm faster than you all."
Tsunade went silent.
As a teacher, she should order her student to obey.
As a shinobi, she understood: sometimes trust mattered more than orders.
"…Ten minutes," she finally said.
"In ten minutes, if you're not at the place we camped before, I'm coming back for you. Understood?"
"Understood."
Oyashiro En watched with amused interest, making no move to stop them.
After Tsunade helped Karin up and led her out the back with Kurenai and Shizune, En slowly began to clap.
"How touching. But letting your teacher leave and staying behind alone to face the seven of us…"
"Is that brave… or stupid?"
He recognized Tsunade—and was wary of her.
But he didn't understand why she left instead of fighting.
Was the Uzumaki too important?
En didn't care.
Either way, he'd gotten a satisfying outcome.
Fighting Tsunade might not end well—he could easily come up empty.
But leaving Kiyohara behind?
That, he liked.
Kiyohara carried something En wanted.
The Sharingan.
He'd heard that the more an Uchiha suffered, the stronger their eyes became.
En was fascinated.
He wanted to see whether Kiyohara's eyes were truly as rumored.
"Hehehe…"
En's laugh slipped out—creepy, like a man drunk on obsession.
Kiyohara frowned.
This guy was just like Orochimaru—bloodline-hungry, predatory, covetous.
But Kiyohara wasn't about to let him have what he wanted.
He was going to fulfill the wish right here.
~~~
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