The next morning, early dawn.
Seiki had already been waiting at the city gate. Close to eight o'clock, a young kunoichi with her hair tied in a bun finally approached with a group of ninjas.
"Are you Lord Seiki? Sorry to keep you waiting." Looking at the boy before her, Pakura felt a bit surprised.
Unlike herself, who had been "hyped up" as a hero, this person had proven himself as a real battlefield hero through countless achievements on the Cloud Village's warfront.
Of course, she didn't think herself any weaker than him either.
"If the village had actively joined the war, I definitely could've done the same!" Her enthusiasm this time also carried an underlying desire to compete secretly.
"I actually haven't waited that long." Seiki smiled gently and looked toward the ninjas behind Pakura. "Would you mind giving me a quick introduction?"
"They are Jonin Chuura, Jonin Saseki, Chunin Baki..."
Besides Pakura, there were two Jonin and eight Chunin altogether.
To anyone other than Seiki, such strength would be more than sufficient for dealing with a rogue ninja.
But from Seiki's perspective, out of all these people, probably only Pakura would prove somewhat useful, while the others would likely just end up as clueless spectators cheering mindlessly.
"But it doesn't matter anyway. The reason I brought them along was merely for witnessing a truth." Thinking this, Seiki brightly smiled and started handing out antidotes.
"Although all of you are elite ninjas from Sunagakure, undoubtedly capable of handling a single missing-nin, for safety's sake, please take these antidotes—as payment for protecting me during the mission."
This act caused the Sand ninjas to develop a liking for Seiki—they admired not only his impressive medical jutsu skills but especially how agreeable and pleasant his manner of speaking was.
Only Baki muttered bitterly to himself: Medical ninja? For real—might just be the strongest among us!
Pakura also accepted an antidote and asked, "So what's our plan now? Shall we split up to search for the enemy?"
"No way! Splitting up would be too dangerous for these chunins," Chuura said smugly.
"Then let me use my Sand Eye!" Saseki touched his right eye. "As long as it flies high enough, I can see the terrain within hundreds of meters around."
"Or I could summon my desert fox summoned beast to locate the enemy by sound."
"What good is hearing? Do you even know what kind of sounds the enemy will make?"
Seeing them argue heatedly, Seiki shook his head. "I'll handle the sensing part."
"Leave it to you?" Saseki questioned doubtfully. "Aren't you a Medical Ninja?"
Smiling, Seiki replied, "I double as a sensor when needed."
"Then how large is your sensing range? If it's not enough, let me use the Sand Eye instead."
"There isn't much life in the desert. I can probably sense about half of it through the sounds around me."
"Sensing half a desert?" Saseki gave him a skeptical look saying, "Come on, don't pull that on me."
"Hey, it's worth a shot, isn't it?" Smiling again, Seiki sat down.
Five minutes later, the Sage Art face pattern appeared.
"This is the legendary Sage Mode?" Pakura curiously examined him with interest.
Seiki squatted halfway down and inserted his right hand into the sand. After a while, he stood up again.
"Found enemies?"
"Not directly," Seiki replied. "But I did discover the corpses of several Iwagakure ninjas poisoned in the same way to the northwest. That could be a good place to start searching."
The Suna ninjas around him looked on in disbelief. Seriously? He really sensed all that just by sticking his hand in the sand?
What if he stuck his hand into a person? Would he be able to scan their profile… cough, I mean how many jutsu they've mastered?
...
On the desert plain,
"You're Sunagakure's Red-Sand Sasori? Damn it! This is obviously a trap!" cried an Iwa ninja covered in blood and fury.
Lord Tsuchikage had sent them here to make contact with him—wasn't that practically a suicide mission?
Sasori had no interest in explaining anything to a dead man. Calmly killing him off, he began crafting a puppet.
"One hundred and thirty-seven collection pieces. Barely acceptable..."
At the same time, following Seiki's guidance, the group from Suna arrived at the desert plain and spotted someone crouched over a corpse with his back to them.
Seeing Seiki actually locate an enemy so easily, the Suna ninjas still found it somewhat unbelievable.
"Not only Medical Ninjutsu, but his sensing ability is also this powerful?"
"He's even slightly more powerful than my Sand Eye!"
Feeling like they hadn't contributed much as Seiki had handled all the sensing work, the Suna ninjas felt slightly embarrassed.
"Haha, leave the rest to us!"
"Just relax and enjoy watching our Suna ninjas show off their skills, Master Seiki!"
Since they were so enthusiastic, Seiki didn't want to take credit away from them anyway. With a smile, he stepped aside. "Then it's up to you guys!"
After saying that, they quietly sneaked forward using the Hidden Sand Technique.
However, the closer they drew to the enemy, the more uneasy they felt—something was clearly wrong.
This guy's back was oddly familiar!
At that moment, Sasori turned around, busy dealing with the enemy corpse.
"I hate being disturbed while creating art—even if you used to be my comrades!"
Since he hadn't transformed into Hiruko yet, everyone immediately recognized him.
Shock written all over their faces, the group no longer concealed themselves and leaped out from under the sandy ground.
Chuura spoke grimly, "So it's really you… Red-Sand Sasori!"
Saseki wasted no time on pleasantries. "Sasori! It was you who killed our comrades! Not even Elder Chiyo can save you this time!"
Calmness blanketed Sasori's eyes. "Fools. Do I really have to say it out loud for you to finally understand that I defected?"
Although they had suspected, hearing it confirmed directly from Sasori still shocked them beyond comprehension.
"Why? Why would someone like you betray the village?"
"What did the village ever do to betray someone like you?!"
In their view, had Sasori not defected, given his talent and connections, he might even have been in line to become Kazekage.
Sasori tilted his head slightly, his expression twisting into a rigid smirk. "Reasons don't matter. Let's just say I grew tired of this ridiculous childish charade called 'village life.'"
"Let's set aside the matter of desertion for now," Chuura asked coldly. "I'll ask you this: do you know where the Third is?"
Sasori replied matter-of-factly, "Of course I do. I killed him."
Chuura instinctively scoffed, "The Third Lord was the strongest Kazekage in history. How could someone like you possibly kill him?"
Saseki's expression darkened. "There's a limit to how much nonsense one can spout!"
"That's why I hate dealing with you guys," Sasori sighed, his gaze calm. "Enough chatter. Time I sent you to join the dead."
Although they knew their enemy had once been the former genius of the Puppet Brigade, the Sunagakure ninja weren't particularly alarmed.
After all, they hadn't spotted any puppets around Sasori.
Even the most skilled Puppet Master would lose more than half of their threat without their puppets.
Rather than retreating, they advanced rapidly toward him instead.
"Grab him directly!"
"Don't let him deploy his puppets!"
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