For the next three hours, Kenshin was on pins and needles, and when a voice sounded in his mind, he flinched in surprise.
"Father, we've entered a forty-kilometer radius from home. Everyone's alive. The Seventh has a broken ribcage; have Hitomi-san prepare to receive him," Ichiro reported, making Kenshin sigh in relief. The worst predictions hadn't come true, and things were going almost perfectly.
"The Seventh is wounded. Broken ribcage; be ready to treat him," Kenshin said, turning to Hitomi sitting nearby.
"Everyone's alive? What about the Twenty Second?" Hitomi asked. Though she was mentally preparing for the worst, her maternal instinct wouldn't let her ignore her beloved son's fate.
"Everyone's intact except the Seventh," Kenshin replied, noticing that Hitomi's main concern was her son's health, while for Kenshin, they were all his sons, and losing any would hurt him deeply. On the other hand, he saw a small plus in it: the last thing he wanted was for all his wives to be in mourning if one son didn't return alive.
Kenshin decided not to voice his thoughts and headed with Hitomi to the infirmary, which currently had only five beds. He'd created this room two months ago, modeling it after a hospital from his world. The hospital beds were highly technological and comfortable, but he couldn't create any electronic devices. The System wouldn't let him make even basic medical alcohol or aspirin, let alone more valuable drugs. But he planned to fix that in the future.
Exactly twenty minutes later, both teams returned. Team Four, led by the Fifteenth, had run into Team One and escorted them home. Hitomi immediately took charge of the Seventh and began the operation, kicking everyone out of the infirmary.
Kenshin silently looked at Ichiro and slightly raised an eyebrow, waiting for the report. Ichiro understood immediately and began recounting.
"As usual, we got a mission at the outpost and headed out to eliminate a nukenin terrorizing peaceful villages. The mission said it was a Chunin-level shinobi, so we weren't worried. But at the supposed hideout of this criminal, we found Momochi Zabuza, whom you'd warned us about."
"Zabuza?!" Kenshin exclaimed in complete shock. "Let me see for myself," he said, placing his right hand on his eldest son's head.
In a minute, he saw everything, from the sudden "water dragon" attack to the Seventh's injury and the activation of the "Intimidation Formation." He praised himself again for his ingenuity and was finally convinced that the grueling week hadn't been in vain. While creating this formation, he'd poured massive amounts of Psi energy into it every day and, through trial and error, managed to embed a fragment of his consciousness into it. At this stage, the formation was primitive, and the consciousness fragment could only perform basic actions and react to common enemy moves with high probability.
"You all did great! Ichiro, your arm's injured; Twenty Second, check him. Everyone else, go rest. Hitomi will examine you all tomorrow," he ordered, and all the sons, bowing to their father, headed to their rooms.
"What happened?" Kasumi asked, approaching.
"Nothing serious; our little ones just ran into one of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist," Kenshin replied with a smile.
"WHAT?!" Kasumi exclaimed in shock, and he just smiled and hugged her.
"You did a great job. Look how well the Eighteenth performed," he said with a smile, showing her the entire battle against Zabuza.
"God, he's almost caught up to me in skill! Their learning ability is simply incredible, and combined with your knowledge-transfer ability—half a year from a baby to a solid Chunin. If the Nara Clan knew about this, any of our babies with you would be the number one genius of their generation!" Kasumi declared joyfully. She was filled with pride for her sons, who never gave up after any failure but trained even harder.
"I'm surprised myself at how fast they're progressing. But it's too early to celebrate. Who knows how soon they'll reach Jonin rank. Ichiro's the closest, but even he could barely withstand a few blows from Zabuza, who's not even an Elite Jonin..." Kenshin said with a sigh. Though things were better than he could've imagined a year ago, it was too soon to celebrate.
"Zabuza demanded half a million... You really gonna pay?" she asked, sitting on his lap and wrapping her arms around his neck.
"Of course. Half a million for five lives is nothing. This situation will be great advertising for our family and build a reputation as a rich organization willing to honestly pay for its members' lives," he replied with a smile, stroking the tender back of the beautiful girl.
"Aren't you afraid the price will jump to a million per head next time? What if some bastard decides to hunt our kids for profit?"
"A million per person is still a good price. As for scum like that, any of our teams can neutralize a weak Jonin, and there aren't that many strong ones, let alone those willing to risk entering the Land of Fire and turning from hunter to prey for Konoha's Elite Jonin."
"Aren't you worried Konoha will notice our family? A strong organization with several Chunin at its disposal will definitely attract attention..." Kasumi whispered.
"Ichiro already said they tried tailing them a few times. Probably to find our hideout. But since they didn't act aggressively, my formations threw them off easily. Soon they'll get serious about us, and that's already a problem. We're still too weak to declare independence..." Kenshin said with a sigh, caressing his affectionate wife's incredible body again.
"So what do you plan to do?" Kasumi asked with interest. Over time, she and Kenshin had developed an excellent partnership. Her intellect greatly helped him solve many problems. She could approach issues from another angle and argue brilliantly.
"Ideally, we need to move the hideout outside urgently and build a defensive perimeter around it. My formation knowledge would stop and destroy any number of Chunin; even ten Jonin would drown in blood storming the base. But it all takes time..." he said, looking at Kasumi expectantly.
"Natsumi and I can help you with simple formations, speeding things up a bit. How long for the move?"
"By my rough estimate, moving and basic perimeter fortification will take a week, plus a month for solid reinforcement. That's the month I'm unsure about. If they find our hideout and send pushy shinobi we have to repel by force, an elite squad could arrive days later and wipe us out..."
"As far as I know, bureaucracy is a huge problem for Konoha. Shikaku often cursed the council for taking so long to issue orders that by then the situation changed and they were irrelevant. In theory, Hiruzen or Danzou could push for instant orders, but our organization has an extremely positive reputation, so they can't just wipe us out—even Danzou won't risk losing influence points over some unknown mercenary group. If he knew the fate you have planned for him... But he doesn't," Kasumi said with a smile, purring with a sense of belonging to something great.
"I'm not planning anything yet. Just survive and grow stronger ourselves, and you're talking about eliminating Kage-level shinobi... If we hold out the next three months, even Konoha would pay a serious price to eliminate us. Why did Zabuza pop up now? God forbid he spills about the Nara and Hyuga clan members in our family; then Konoha will dig harder..." He sighed, rubbing his tired temples.