The workshop was a hive of high-frequency mental activity. Elder Chiyo was currently walking me through an ancient rune-coupling trick, a "Legacy Patch" that allowed for better energy-coupling between the Natural Energy core and the secondary propulsion thrusters. My pen flew across the scroll, recording the logic of the rune-overlap. Under her tutelage, the "Mirage Protocol" was seeing its first major optimization, shaving the energy-latency of the vector nozzles by nearly 15%.
Suddenly, Chiyo's voice faltered. It wasn't the slow fade of someone losing their train of thought; it was a "System Hang", a sudden, sharp cessation of output. Her gaze had drifted to a pile of classified mission reports half-buried under a stack of ball-bearings and etched wooden plates on the edge of the desk.
One line, written in the cold, administrative ink of the Anbu, seemed to snag her eye like a jagged piece of scrap metal.
[Intel Log: Sector West-4]
[Incident: The "Fangs of Sand" bandit collective, confirmed neutralized. All fifty-three members terminated. No survivors found. Location: Ghost-Weep Ravine.]
The sentence carried a heavy, freezing magic. I watched as the light of craftsmanship drained from Chiyo's eyes, replaced by a dull, aching vacuum. Her fingers, which moments ago had been steady enough to carve micro-runes, began to tremble. The "Master-Level" composure she wore like armor crumbled into the raw exhaustion of a grieving grandmother.
She straightened her back slowly, her joints popping with a sound like breaking wood. She picked up the report with aged, unsteady hands and carried it over to me. Her voice was a husky, low-bandwidth rasp.
"…Look at the forensic details, Sayo. Tell me what you see."
Puzzled, I took the parchment. In the lawless periphery of the Land of Wind, the eradication of a bandit cell was a routine "Background Task", hardly enough to crash a Village Elder's focus. I scanned the technical breakdown of the scene, my 30-year-old engineer soul, the mind of Logan, performing a rapid-fire diagnostic on the data.
"…copious poison residue identified as Type-S Neurotoxin… victims paralyzed in less than three seconds… killing blows delivered with sub-millimeter surgical precision… bodies pierced by high-velocity wooden shards and unknown serrated blades… no sign of prolonged combat… zero tactical errors identified on the aggressor's part…"
A chill rose from the base of my spine, vibrating through my Natural Energy-tempered nervous system. A lone, lethal figure loomed in my mental database. This wasn't a military operation. This was a "Clean-up Script" executed by a master programmer.
"This style, the extreme efficiency, the specific chemical signature of the toxin, and the total lack of unnecessary movement..." I looked up, the horror flashing in my eyes as the pieces clicked into place. "Senior Sasori?!"
Chiyo shut her eyes and nodded heavily, the lines on her face deepening as if the desert wind were carving them in real-time. She sank back into her chair, her strength seemingly de-allocated.
"It's him. Only he 'cleanses' a target zone with that level of detachment," she whispered, the pain in her voice thick enough to choke on. "That child… he has finally chosen his path. He has utterly… betrayed the Village. He is no longer a student. He is a rogue file."
Silence swallowed the workshop, broken only by the low-frequency hum of the Mirage's core.
Looking at Chiyo's haggard profile, a storm of conflicting emotions surged through my own "System." Sasori was the eccentric genius who had given me the "Regeneration Core" research, the man whose "failed" suspension drafts were the foundation of the Mirage's chassis. To me, he wasn't just an S-rank rogue; he was the "Lead Developer" of the puppet arts. And Chiyo, torn between her duty to the Sand and the "Corrupted Data" of her grandson's legacy, was bearing the load of a server about to crash.
A thought sprouted in my mind, dangerous and cold. Sasori's craft was a double-edged blade, but it was the highest-spec technology in existence. His work on the "Regeneration Core" held the keys to the neural interface I needed for a true cockpit.
If Suna was going to survive the Third Great Ninja War and the budget cuts, we needed that "Source Code." We needed Sasori or at least, the data he was carrying.
I inhaled, my resolve hardening into a firm directive. "Elder Chiyo."
She opened her eyes slowly, looking at me as if I were a distant memory.
"I… want to try finding him. I want to initialize a search-and-scout mission."
"What?!" Chiyo jerked as if hit by a high-voltage surge. "Do you have any idea what you're suggesting? Sasori isn't the boy who showed you his workbench anymore! He's a lethal anomaly! Seeking contact with him is a suicide script!"
"I've run the risk-assessment, Elder," I said, my voice calm, clear, and clinical. "And I have three primary reasons why this mission must be executed."
I paused, marshaling my thoughts like an engineering proposal.
"First: Sasori's advanced puppetry holds the data needed to perfect the Mirage Protocol and Suna's future military hardware. Without his 'Regeneration' logic, my project hits a ceiling. Second: As a rogue element with his level of power, he likely has intelligence on the other nations' 'Zero-Day' vulnerabilities that we can't get from standard Anbu channels. And third--"
I gestured toward the hovering Mirage, the matte-gray shuttle radiating a quiet, poised power.
"--With the high-speed mobility of the Mag-Lev chassis and my own Magnet Release, I am the only unit in Suna capable of a high-speed retreat. I won't engage him in a direct 'Combat Loop.' I will act as a mobile sensor, observing his movement and potentially establishing a data-link."
Chiyo stared at me, her sharp eyes searching for any "Lag" or hesitation. She found none. She knew my architecture: a gentle, supportive surface backed by an unyielding, iron-clad will. Once a project was greenlit in my mind, it was immovable.
She opened her mouth to issue a "Kill Process" on my idea, but only a long, powerless sigh escaped. I could see the conflict in her eyes, the desperate, human ache for news of her grandson versus the fear of losing the one student who had finally bridged the gap to her heart.
"If you must initialize this hunt," she said, her voice raw with a grandmother's worry, "you must promise me one thing. Never face him directly. At the first sign of a 'Critical Conflict,' you flee. Your life is the most valuable asset in this village, Sayo. Your life outweighs any intel, any technique. Do you swear it?"
"I swear," I nodded firmly, the Natural Energy core in my chest humming in sympathy. "I'll keep my signal-to-noise ratio low. I'll be careful."
As I left Chiyo's residence, the weight of dusk seemed to stretch my shadow across the sandstone. The simple joy of the Mirage's successful first flight had been overwritten by a sense of duty and a cold, strategic urgency.
Hunting Sasori meant walking into the eye of a hurricane. But if I wanted to grow stronger faster, if I wanted to seize the technology that could reformat the Ninja World, I had to take the step.
I lifted my gaze toward the western desert, where the sun was sinking into the dunes like a dying fire.
Sasori, I thought, my mind running through the "Regeneration Core" formulas. Where are you… and how much of your humanity have you already deleted?
The hunt was live.