"Hey, you damn sensei—can you stop popping up out of nowhere every time? You're gonna scare me to death!"
Yugito was still perched on a tree trunk, but this time she wasn't napping. She was happily enjoying a dorayaki.
She had just raised it to her mouth when Kazuyama Gekkō suddenly appeared, making her jump. If she hadn't been quick, her snack would've gone tumbling to the ground.
"Enough—stop eating!"
"All you do is sleep and eat! Can't you do anything else?"
Kazuyama scolded her without mercy, not even glancing at her annoyed expression before launching straight into orders.
"Yugito, Kusagakure is about to have… changes. Tomorrow, take your people and set up there."
"I'm guessing you can make a lot of money during this time. Once you've got the funds, you can start running intelligence missions."
Yugito nodded while chewing, but something felt off. Changes in Kusagakure? One look at her teacher's mysterious smile told her enough—he'd obviously stirred up trouble there.
"Sensei… what did you do in Kusagakure?"
"…You didn't poison the whole village, did you?"
That was the disciple of Kazuyama all right—straight to the point.
Though, she was being too blunt. Poisoning them? Pfft—how low-tier. The right way was to take their money and then make them take the medicine.
"Hahaha, that's my student."
"They dared to spread rumors about me—calling me some deranged war freak from Konoha. If I don't wreck them, am I even me?"
"So, I went to Kusagakure, sold a batch of medicine, made a pile of money, and left them with a parting gift. Those hundreds of shinobi won't be able to work for half a month—mark my words."
"And even after that, they'll be weaker than before. Right now they're short on manpower—this is the perfect opportunity for you and your crew."
"Go, my beloved disciple Yugito! Put Kusagakure in the palm of your hand!"
With that, Kazuyama vanished in a flash of the Flying Thunder God.
Yugito finished the dorayaki and blinked in mild surprise—she hadn't expected her casual guess to be true.
"Tsk tsk… Sensei, only you could pull off something so inhuman."
"But… it really is an opportunity."
"Ah, poor me. Guess I'd better get to work."
...
After leaving Kusagakure, Kazuyama made straight for the border, crossing out of the Land of Grass and heading west into the Land of Earth.
The rumor-mongering couldn't be blamed on Kusagakure alone—there was also that damned Iwagakure.
Hmph. Not one of them would escape.
This time, though, he wasn't in a rush. He stopped in a decent-sized town, pretending to rest while really waiting for the Kusagakure situation to explode.
...
One day later, Kusagakure.
"Ow… what's going on…?"
"Why am I so dizzy… and foaming…?"
A shinobi woke with his head spinning so hard it felt like it might fly off, his brain being whipped around like a windmill. He staggered—and collapsed to the floor.
It didn't stop there. The dizziness peaked and he started retching, spraying foamy spit in wave after wave.
He wasn't the only one. Two shinobi walking down the street toward a mission—one dropped unconscious on the spot, the other clutched his stomach and bolted for the latrine. He didn't make it.
Soon the entire village was ringing with shouts and frantic rescue calls.
The hospital was overflowing, every bed taken. Patients were in every corner, symptoms raging like a festival of demons—convulsions, paralysis, endless diarrhea, vertigo, mouth foaming.
The medics swore they'd never seen anything like it. Hundreds of patients at once, with no clear cause—it was beyond bizarre.
"Lord Muyuu, the hospital's at capacity… The symptoms are all over the place…"
The report came from a Kusagakure shinobi to none other than Jōnin Muyuu.
His expression darkened. He had only returned from Hōzuki Castle to rest—never expecting to walk into this chaos.
Hundreds of shinobi sick at the same time, all with wildly different symptoms…
Wait.
As a high-ranking Kusagakure Jōnin, Muyuu's mind leapt to a possibility. Without another word, he strode toward the hospital.
One glance inside the packed lobby and his face turned pitch black.
"Damn it. I knew it!"
"Lord Muyuu?"
"Hmph. Treat them first. Hundreds of shinobi out at once will cripple the village. Recall every available ninja to stabilize things!"
"And send a team to find that damned old medicine seller!"
Medicine seller?
Faces in the room showed collective shock. That old man from yesterday?
Gods—had he really poisoned the whole village, and with a delayed effect at that? Weren't those pills supposed to be good for the body?
...
Meanwhile, while Kusagakure was in chaos, Kazuyama was lounging in a hot spring, admiring his freshly credited rewards.
[Ding! Detected: Host sold 1,071 Scale Powder pills to 535 shinobi in Kusagakure, earning over 100 million ryō.]
[While profiting from the enemy, you also dealt a vicious blow—crippling their manpower and severely weakening their overall strength. A true strike to body and spirit!]
[Special reward: Three bottles of Hero Water (side-effect free!)]
Hero Water?
Kazuyama's eyes lit up.
The sacred water of Takigakure—produced once every hundred years by the village's giant tree. Drinking it would multiply a shinobi's chakra dozens of times… at the cost of drastically shortening their life.
Normally, a great short-term power-up, but too dangerous to use freely.
But these bottles? No side effects. Now that was a prize.
Still… wasn't the reward a bit small? He had, after all, sent hundreds of Kusagakure shinobi to the hospital.
[Ding! System has noted host's thoughts. Although reluctant, it must admit—this time you performed exceptionally.]
[Ding! Additional reward: Speed +7!]
[Detected: Host's speed stat has reached 100! Activating attribute…]