Chapter 433: The Intruder in Konoha
Tanjirō genuinely wondered whether these chat group senpais were just yanking his chain. But logically, there was no reason for them to bother deceiving some brand-new member like him.
Well... under the circumstances, he figured he had no real choice but to trust them unconditionally.
Even if the chat logs made them look like a fairly unreliable bunch.
Every last one of them acted nothing like the wise, composed mentors he'd have imagined.
Tanjirō silently grumbled to himself about it.
Ryū and the others really didn't come across like sages at all.
Way too undignified for that.
"Whew..." Tanjirō let out a long breath, a puff of white fog escaping into the cold air, his gaze slowly shifting from lost to resolute. He murmured to himself, "They might seem like a pretty unreliable bunch, but there's no question their strength is genuinely immense."
"Starting today, I'm going to get stronger. I'll turn Nezuko back into a human, and I'll kill the demon that murdered my mother and my little brother and sisters. That's my first goal."
Having settled on that goal, Tanjirō's expression hardened further.
This was probably exactly what made the protagonist of a passionate shonen story — even in the darkest, most disoriented moment, there was always a resolve to be found, waiting to be seized.
By now, Ryū had long since returned to Konoha. Since Tanjirō wanted to avenge his family with his own hands, Ryū had no intention of dragging Muzan out for a little sunbathing session himself.
Of course, if Tanjirō ever needed a hand with something, Ryū wouldn't hesitate to help. Mutual support had always been the Dimensional Chat Group's whole ethos, after all.
Not that helping would cost him much anyway, given how weak Demon Slayer's overall power level was. Drop practically any mid-tier Vice Admiral from the One Piece world into that setting — heck, even a Rear Admiral from Marine HQ — and they could probably steamroll the entire world and take down its final boss without much trouble.
Demon Slayer's own final boss, Kibutsuji Muzan, was, in Ryū's honest assessment, about the least impressive villain he'd come across in all his years watching anime.
Maybe Gotouge-sensei just wasn't the type to write a genuinely commanding antagonist. Either way, Muzan's overall presence and power just didn't measure up to much.
Not that he was completely toothless, mind you. Dropped into the Dimensional Chat Group's own ranking, Muzan could probably beat freshly-joined Tanjirō, or maybe Chika, who still hadn't taken part in a single group quest yet.
Those two happened to be the weakest members in the entire group right now, after all.
Though Chika had Kaguya Shinomiya as her personal mentor and closest friend rolled into one.
Ryū figured it wouldn't take more than two or three months before her strength shot up dramatically.
Unless she turned out to be another lifelong salted fish like Umaru — lazy to a degree that was genuinely exasperating.
"Counting myself as Admin, the Dimensional Chat Group's up to 26 members now. Four more, and we'll need to pick out another Moderator. Not that Moderators really do all that much, but hey — gotta keep some sense of ceremony in life."
Ryū murmured that to himself, standing inside a two-story building somewhere in Konoha.
"This... how did this happen? He was right here this morning, lying in this exact bed, and now he's gone. And the two Jōnin and four ANBU on guard duty — four of them are critically injured and unconscious, and two of them are already dead..."
Beneath his black mask, Kakashi's face carried a flicker of genuine shock, his dull, flat eyes betraying open disbelief.
His gaze stayed locked on the empty bed.
He turned to look at the ANBU operatives and Jōnin lying nearby. Two of them were beyond saving entirely — gone for good.
The other four had fallen unconscious, their injuries severe.
It looked as though they'd been struck without warning by a genuinely powerful shinobi.
Cut down with no chance to fight back at all.
Uchiha Obito, still lying in that hospital bed —
Had been taken.
Kakashi hesitated for a few seconds before rushing off to fetch the hospital's medical-ninjutsu specialists, hoping to save as many of the critically wounded Konoha shinobi as possible.
At the same time, a heavy dread settled over him. Four ANBU and two Jōnin taken down, and not a single other shinobi in the entire hospital had noticed a thing.
They might not have registered so much as a hint of disturbance.
Not until he himself had walked in and opened the door to the room —
Had any of this even come to light!
Which meant whoever had done this possessed strength on a level that defied belief.
Even with his thoughts racing chaotically, Kakashi forced down the urge to panic. He knew perfectly well that panicking wouldn't accomplish anything — there was nothing a single person, even him, could do about this alone.
"I need to report this to the Fourth Hokage immediately!" Having made up his mind, Kakashi took a deep breath and vanished in a flicker of motion.
The scenery blurred past as he raced toward the Hokage Building, his mind still churning.
Who could possibly have taken Obito? Could it really be the legendary Uchiha Madara?
Because of Ryū's own presence as an "unpredictable variable" in this world, Obito had ended up captured alive by Konoha instead — his eyes even gouged out and removed.
On top of that, Konoha's own secret techniques had confirmed that the legendary Uchiha Madara was, in fact, still alive — and had spent all these years quietly training Obito, filling his head with all manner of twisted ideology.
Which meant Kakashi now strongly suspected Madara himself was behind Obito's abduction.
Obito, within whatever hidden scheme Madara had in motion —
Might well be a genuinely critical piece on the board.
"But Obito's eyes were already removed by Ryū — without them, he shouldn't have much value left to exploit. And those eyes are sealed away in Konoha's own storage vault... wait. Wait a moment. It can't be."
Kakashi's pupils contracted sharply, and in the very next instant, a wave of searing heat surged in from one side.
He turned toward it and sucked in a sharp breath.
A towering wall of flame had engulfed nearly an entire street of Konoha.
Blistering heat scorched the air across the whole village.
The blaze wasn't blinding, exactly, but it carried an unmistakable, dangerous presence all its own.
The inferno kept roaring on, unrelenting — as if a dozen-plus Jōnin, each with genuinely massive chakra reserves, had all unleashed a dozen large-scale Fire Style techniques simultaneously.
That direction — wasn't that where Konoha's storage vault sat?
Whoever this was hadn't just taken Obito. They were after the eyes too?!
Pulling off something this audacious, right in the heart of Konoha itself —
Did this person have no fear of death whatsoever?!