While Nagato had connected with Sunagakure and begun borrowing official power to investigate every assassination incident that had occurred within the Land of Wind, Shisui Uchiha, carrying out his mission as a shinobi with excellent professionalism, followed the intelligence he had obtained from the Land of Demons and gradually drew closer to Sasori of the Red Sand, who had attacked Aoba Mizunotsuki's group.
Distinguishing suspicious figures from the vast sea of people and finding an opportunity to dig genuinely useful intelligence out of them had always been one of the greatest difficulties in the shinobi profession.
But if the other side had been successfully misled by intelligence from the start, then even disguises that should originally have been seamless would reveal flaws they should not have shown because their assumptions did not match reality.
Sasori of the Red Sand's subordinates had prepared their operations with Kirigakure's Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist as their hypothetical enemy.
If the person Rei Kaguya had sent to investigate the assassination incident this time were not Shisui Uchiha, but someone like Zabuza Momochi, a shinobi who had received a standard Kirigakure education, then their disguises would definitely have held until the moment Sasori ordered them to expose themselves.
But the person who came this time was Shisui Uchiha.
A "Seven Ninja Swordsman" who had received Konoha's shinobi education and possessed a pair of Sharingan that a Kirigakure shinobi absolutely should not possess.
And so, after Shisui Uchiha caught one subordinate who had been ordered to subtly leak clues and lure Kirigakure shinobi over, the entire intelligence network Sasori of the Red Sand had developed between the Land of Rivers and the Land of Wind was smoothly traced out by Shisui Uchiha by following the vines.
"What if that member of Kirigakure's Seven Ninja Swordsmen still refuses to show himself? Hah, there's no need to be anxious about that. Once Lord Sasori of the Red Sand finishes making his new puppet, we can just find someone who has seen those Kirigakure materials, have them use the Transformation Technique to disguise themselves as one of them, and publicly show their face. After all, among the people taken away, one of them had an Ice Release Kekkei Genkai. There is no way Kirigakure would not want to recover him or his corpse."
"You're asking where Lord Sasori of the Red Sand is now? Uh, you would probably have to ask Lord Matte about that. He is the only one qualified to receive orders directly from Lord Sasori of the Red Sand. Right now, he should be in this town in the Land of Rivers, waiting for us to report the news that the Seven Ninja Swordsman has shown himself."
"The whereabouts of those Kirigakure shinobi who were taken? How would I know that? But I did hear that the one with the Ice Release Kekkei Genkai was kept by Lord Sasori of the Red Sand himself. He'll probably be carefully processed."
The middle-aged man, who wore no shinobi forehead protector, spoke confidently to the wall.
He did not find it strange at all that his words received no response.
Nor did he think there was anything wrong with casually revealing the whereabouts of his two superiors to someone he had only just met.
Shisui Uchiha silently stood behind him, recording the information he revealed. The three tomoe in his Sharingan slowly rotated, emitting a scarlet light.
"Former Sunagakure special jonin Matte, and the former genius puppet craftsman of Sunagakure, now a missing-nin, Sasori of the Red Sand? No wonder they were able to leave traces at the scene that pointed straight toward Sunagakure… If I catch you, I should be able to see a little of the true face of the organization behind you."
Shisui Uchiha put away the intelligence scroll he had finished recording, then used the Summoning Technique to summon the white snake used to exchange information with Nagato.
He placed the scroll into its mouth.
Then, amid the white smoke from the disappearing summon, he vanished together with it from this intelligence stronghold disguised as a merchant company.
"Thank me for my guidance? Hey, that's nothing. It's rare to meet someone I can talk to in such a gloomy, suffocating intelligence organization. I'm happy enough already…"
Inside the now-empty room, the man trapped in the Sharingan's genjutsu remained completely unaware.
He continued talking to the wall by himself. As he spoke, he even gestured excitedly at the wall, as if there really were a new organization recruit standing in front of him, someone he had hit it off with at first sight.
…
Inside a city on the border between the Land of Rivers and the Land of Wind.
Matte, expressionless and utterly unremarkable in appearance, browsed through the intelligence his subordinates had sent back and narrowed his eyes slightly.
Four days had already passed since he obtained permission from Sasori of the Red Sand to mobilize the members of the entire intelligence organization and start laying a net targeting that unknown member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen.
Based on the travel speed of an elite jonin, even if the person who set out from the Land of Water had to make a trip to the Land of Demons first to confirm the site where Aoba Mizunotsuki and the others were attacked, he should be about ready to appear inside the Land of Rivers by now.
But what was puzzling was that none of the intelligence personnel under him had discovered anyone who resembled a member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen.
That should not be happening.
It absolutely should not be happening.
According to the information relayed by Zetsu, who had never made mistakes in intelligence, the three newly selected members of Kirigakure's Seven Ninja Swordsmen were all young prodigies with astonishing strength. Among them was even someone like Zabuza Momochi, who had earned the title of "Demon" in childhood.
No matter which one had been sent, their style should not be so overwhelmingly covert.
"Did something go wrong during one stage of information transmission? Or is there another member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen that even Zetsu does not know about for now?"
Just as Matte began thinking about the problem, he suddenly felt a stabbing pain in his brain, as if a needle had pierced it.
The pain came quickly and left just as quickly.
Before long, he recovered.
He immediately rose and bowed toward Sasori of the Red Sand, who had appeared inside the room at some unknown time.
"Lord Sasori, why have you come early—"
"I dislike waiting for others, and I dislike making others wait for me."
Sasori of the Red Sand, whose face was handsome yet cold as ice, picked up the intelligence scroll Matte had been reading from the table before him.
After roughly skimming through it, he raised his head and said to Matte, whose expression had become faintly uneasy, "Your sensitivity toward intelligence is truly low, Matte."
"This subordinate knows his mistake."
Matte, who understood Sasori of the Red Sand's personality, immediately realized there was an error in his analysis of the intelligence.
He could not help clenching his teeth, desperately restraining the fear in his heart as he admitted his mistake to Sasori of the Red Sand.
"At least one day ago, you should have realized that the reason the other party never appeared in your sight was because he had already noticed the existence of you informants."
Sasori of the Red Sand raised his hand and pressed it onto Matte's head.
Watching cold sweat instantly soak the other man's back, he said coldly, "You made me waste an entire extra day waiting, Matte. And what I hate most is waiting… If our guest had not already arrived at our door, I truly would have liked to add you to the puppet ranks of my Performance of a Hundred Puppets."
"There will not… be a next time."
Matte desperately restrained his chattering teeth as he answered, cold sweat pouring off him like a waterfall.
"Hmph."
Sasori of the Red Sand casually threw Matte aside.
Then several scrolls storing puppets flew out from his sleeves.
He summoned his standard combat puppets and looked toward the silent stronghold outside, his voice sinister.
"It seems you are also the type who dislikes waiting, Kirigakure shinobi."
Sasori of the Red Sand's words seemed to possess some sort of special amplification.
They easily pierced through the soundproofing of the walls and entered the ears of Shisui Uchiha, who had just used a blade to cut the throat of a wandering shinobi controlled by genjutsu.
Facing those provocative words, Shisui Uchiha only silently shook the blood from the blade in his hand with a flick.
Then, charging toward the room where Matte had originally been at high speed with the Body Flicker Technique, he answered with restrained anger in his voice.
"That's right. I can no longer wait to dismantle you and every single one of your collections, Sasori of the Red Sand."
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