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Chapter 330-Ordered Chaos
🕑 Added 2024-12-27 16:34:41 +0000 UTCThe mood in the facility shifted the moment Hano Ayame arrived. Renjiro noticed it instantly, not because of her chakra—though that was undoubtedly immense—but because the air itself seemed to grow heavier, crackling with unspoken tension.
The once-efficient movements of the guards became sharper, their patrols more deliberate, and their eyes sharper, as if compelled by the invisible weight of her presence.
Renjiro, concealed in the facility’s shadows, let his Sharingan whirl to life, the crimson glow reflecting faintly in the dim light of the corridor. His heightened senses caught every subtle change.
“The guards are also changing their patrolling patterns,” he mused silently.
From his vantage point, he observed their movements closely. Their usual rotations, which had been evenly distributed throughout the facility, shifted focus. Now they were clustering near sensitive areas, their pacing more frequent.
Shortly after these changes, Renjiro caught his first glimpse of Hano Ayame. Her hair shimmered faintly under the facility’s harsh lights. Her aura was as commanding as her reputation suggested.
“So, she is Matatabi’s jinchūriki,” Renjiro thought, his expression neutral but his mind racing.
Through his Sharingan, he could see the faint flickers of her chakra, far deeper and more expansive than those of any ordinary shinobi.
The Sharingan, while not as adept as the Byakugan at detailing chakra flows, offered glimpses that were more than sufficient for someone with Renjiro’s experience.
What he saw astounded him—Hano’s chakra reserves felt like an ocean, vast and unending.
The sensation reminded him of only one other person: Kushina Uzumaki. Kushina’s chakra had been similarly overwhelming, a potent mix of her own reserves and the immense power of Kurama, the Nine-Tails. But now, as he compared the two, doubt crept into his thoughts.
'Wait... her chakra reserves are larger than Kushina’s?' Renjiro frowned, narrowing his eyes as he focused on Hano.
'That doesn’t make any sense. Kurama should have more chakra than Matatabi. Was Kushina holding back?'
The thought gnawed at him. He remembered a time years ago when he’d accidentally entered Kushina’s consciousness while attempting to use genjutsu on her during a training session.
Even then, the sheer scale of her chakra had been daunting. Yet here he was, sensing something even greater from Hano.
He shook his head, dispelling the distraction. 'Enough staring. This is a perfect opportunity,' he muttered to himself as his figure blurred into motion, vanishing silently into the facility’s labyrinth of corridors.
Meanwhile, deep within the facility, Taira, the seasoned S-rank shinobi overseeing security, felt the first ripple of disturbance. His chakra field, a near-flawless sensory web extending across the entire compound, registered a faint fluctuation at its edge. His sharp mind immediately analyzed the anomaly.
'Who could it be?' Taira wondered, his brows knitting together. With a flicker, his form vanished, reappearing near the disturbance within moments.
As he moved, his thoughts raced. The possibility of an intruder had already been considered, given the sensitive nature of the transfer ceremony.
But what remained to be determined was the identity of the intruder. Was it Konoha? Iwa? Kiri? or even Suna? Each possibility carried its own implications.
Yet just as Taira reached the area, he froze in his tracks. Another fluctuation pulsed within his field, this one farther away but equally distinct.
“Huh... another one?” Taira tilted his head in confusion, his mind sharpening further.
Before he could decide which disturbance required his attention, another ripple emerged, faint but deliberate. Then another, and another, each one igniting within his chakra field like a spark to dry tinder.
Soon, the entire facility was alive with at least twenty-five distinct anomalies, scattered across its labyrinthine layout as if mocking the very concept of order.
“Are the other villages working together?” Taira muttered under his breath, disbelief flickering across his usually impassive face.
The notion was absurd—Konoha, Iwa, and Kiri joining forces against Kumogakure? It defied logic. Yet the sheer scale and coordination of the disturbances forced him to consider the possibility, no matter how improbable.
While Shinobi villages were known to be opportunistic, they all shared some deep-rooted hate towards them which was accrued through the last two major shinobi wars.
Gritting his teeth, Taira refocused, suppressing his rising unease. With a determined scowl, he vanished in a flicker, reappearing at the nearest disturbance.
Chaos greeted him.
The corridor, normally dim and sterile, was illuminated by bursts of clashing chakra. A patrolling squad, their Kumogakure insignias gleaming, was locked in fierce combat with three assailants. The air crackled with tension, the acrid scent of ozone mixing with the metallic tang of sweat and blood.
“Raijin Strike!” one of the guards bellowed, their voice cutting through the cacophony. With a swift series of hand signs, they formed a spear of pure lightning, its crackling tendrils casting jagged shadows against the walls. The spear hissed as it cut through the air, striking one of the attackers and forcing them to stagger back, sparks exploding from the impact like miniature fireworks.
Taira’s sharp eyes scanned the scene, his mind working at lightning speed. His heart sank as he recognized the assailants.
“Ogura Fuji... Ren Sato... Kana Ichigo.” He named them under his breath, his voice laced with disbelief.
These weren’t foreign shinobi, as he’d initially suspected. They were rogue ninja from Kumogakure, individuals who had abandoned their village and vanished into obscurity.
“Ogura?” Taira’s voice dropped, tinged with something bordering on sorrow. Ogura Fuji had once been his friend—a brother-in-arms he had trained with as a child.
They had shared missions, meals, and dreams of shaping Kumogakure’s future together. Now, seeing him here, aligned against his own, felt like a cruel twist of fate.
But it wasn’t just Ogura’s presence that unsettled Taira. It was the technique he was using.
Ogura’s hands blurred through a series of hand signs, summoning a torrent of water that surged forward with the force of a tidal wave. The liquid crashed against the patrollers’ lightning techniques, neutralizing their attacks with unsettling precision.
“Water Release?” Taira’s mind reeled as he observed the fluidity and strength of the jutsu.
'Ogura always struggled with water nature jutsus. How...?'
His eyes narrowed, his gaze piercing. The pieces began to fall into place, each revelation more damning than the last.
“These aren’t the real ones,” he muttered, his voice firm with conviction.
Channelling his chakra, Taira formed a crackling lightning spear in his palm. The energy pulsed violently, illuminating the corridor with a blinding blue-white glow. Sparks danced along his arm as he steadied his aim, his resolve as unyielding as steel.
“Let’s end this quickly,” he declared, his voice cutting through the din like a blade. With a flick of his wrist, the spear shot forward, its trajectory precise and unrelenting.
The lightning struck Ogura squarely in the chest. For a moment, the figure froze, its form flickering like a faulty projection. Then, with a loud poof, it dissipated into a cloud of smoke.
'Konoha,' Taira thought immediately, his mind racing to connect the dots. The use of shadow clones was a hallmark of Konoha’s shadow clone, and this had all the hallmarks of their strategic misdirection.
But his confusion deepened as the other two assailants fell in quick succession. One crumbled into dust, disintegrating as if made of brittle earth, just like Iwa's Earth Clone. The other dissolved into a pool of water, ripples spreading outward before fading into nothingness, just like Kiri's Water clones.
“Clever,” Taira muttered, his tone begrudgingly impressed. His sharp gaze lingered on the remains of the clones, his mind turning over the implications. “Now we can’t be sure if it was Kiri, Konoha, or Iwa.”
The techniques used were too varied, too deliberate. Each one bore the signature of a different village’s specialty, sowing seeds of doubt and confusion. Whoever was orchestrating this attack was a master of deception, playing on Kumogakure’s rivalries to create discord and uncertainty.
Before he could dwell on it further, his chakra field pulsed again, tugging at his senses like a warning bell. Another disturbance had appeared, this one more distinct and ominous than the others.
Taira’s face hardened, his lips pulling into a tight line. The clones were a diversion, that much was clear. But for what purpose? His field encompassed nearly the entire facility, yet the enemy seemed to slip through it like shadows, eluding his grasp.
