"Alright, state your purpose."
Zabuza wasn't stupid. He understood Minato Namikaze had created evidence to fake his and Haku's deaths. Those renegade ninjas who escaped could all testify that the two of them had died.
Minato said, "Believe it or not, this is merely our mission."
"Mission?" Zabuza clearly didn't believe that. Why would Konoha go out of their way to help two Kirigakure Missing-nin who had once tried to assassinate the Mizukage?
And speaking of missions...
Naruto and the others suddenly remembered to check the status of the B-rank mission written in their mission scroll. Since Minato's team had helped during the second half, if the mission scroll judged the criteria strictly and declared the mission failed, they really wouldn't have grounds to complain.
[Mission Rank: B-rank]
[Mission Content: Assist Zabuza and Haku in faking their deaths to evade Kirigakure pursuit.]
[Mission Status — Completed]
"We did it, dattebayo!!!"
Naruto was so excited he even slipped into Kushina's catchphrase.
Zabuza glanced at Haku, then raised an eyebrow at Naruto and the others. That seemingly ordinary scroll they carried was clearly anything but ordinary.
Seeing the mission marked complete, Kakashi and Minato both exhaled in relief.
The young shinobi immediately shifted their attention to the mission reward. They had already completed a D-rank mission and an A-rank mission. The rewards were a hundred-ryō gold coin (the equivalent of top-tier A-rank mission pay in Konoha) and their chance to save more Konoha comrades during the Kannabi Bridge incident.
Naruto rummaged through his backpack and pulled out his small toad wallet.
Last time, Naruto had intended to divide the gold coins into four parts: one for himself, and one each for Sasuke, Sakura, and Kakashi-sensei. Since the coins were too heavy and hindered movement, Minato had sealed the two million ryō worth of gold he and Obito earned into two separate scrolls.
Because of that, Naruto's backpack wasn't very heavy.
But his little toad wallet was completely empty.
Clearly, a B-rank mission reward wasn't going to be something as simple as money.
"Three kunai, one Fūma shuriken, twenty shuriken, one medical kit, one small bag of rations..."
Naruto sat on the ground, emptying his backpack item by item, still finding nothing new.
"You've gotta be kidding me!! Are we working for free?!!"
Staring at the tools Konoha had issued them before departure, Naruto wailed in despair. He even turned his wallet upside down, revealing nothing but paper bills and a few coins.
"Wait," Sakura said, bending down to pick up a tiny, unremarkable object near Naruto's foot.
Everyone leaned in to look.
"This looks like... a mini scroll?"
Kakashi inspected it and confirmed, "A communication scroll for ninja hawks. It usually contains short but extremely important information."
"Information?!"
"Either way, open it first," Minato said.
Naruto carefully unrolled the miniature scroll. Only a few words were written.
But those few words stunned everyone present.
"The masked man controls the Mizukage."
Naruto read it aloud...
Zabuza felt his heart jolt.
He'd been right. Someone really was impersonating the Mizukage of Kirigakure to issue orders!
Minato Namikaze's expression darkened. "No wonder Yagura Karatachi changed so drastically before and after becoming the Mizukage."
"To control the Mizukage for so many years without being discovered..."
Kakashi mused, "No wonder the mission to eliminate the masked man was rated SSS-class."
Zabuza tightened his grip on his greatsword. Thinking of the irrational tyranny that had overtaken the Hidden Mist, he only wanted the answer to one thing—
"Who is this masked man you're talking about?! And how reliable is your intel?!!"
Naruto and the others glanced at Kakashi-sensei and the Fourth Hokage, unsure whether they could reveal the mission scroll to Zabuza and Haku... or whether that SSS-rank mission was something they were even allowed to share.
Kakashi and Minato didn't respond immediately.
Zabuza asked, "So you can't tell me?"
It was understandable. He was a Missing-nin from the Land of Water, and the people in front of him were shinobi of the Land of Fire. Even if there was no active war, every village and every nation still protected its own interests.
While Minato was weighing what information could safely be shared, his expression suddenly shifted.
"It's my shadow clone stationed on the eastern coastline."
Kakashi said, "The Kirigakure assassins pursuing Zabuza have arrived?"
"Yes, that's right!"
"Tsk, that bastard Gatō." Zabuza lifted his Kubikiribōchō. "Let's go, Haku."
"No, wait," Minato Namikaze stopped them.
He turned to his students and instructed:
"Kakashi, go make two graves. Obito, you and I will intercept the Kirigakure assassins."
"Yes." / "Yes, Minato-sensei."
Zabuza frowned. "Is Konoha planning to make an enemy of the Hidden Mist?"
Haku looked at Obito Uchiha—who was younger than himself—with mild surprise.
"Besides..." he said carefully, "the Kirigakure assassins are not easy opponents. You've seen the Fourth Hokage's strength, but bringing along a student seems like it would only get in the way."
"Heh, heh," Obito declared confidently, "Minato-sensei is just sending me over. I'll handle the rest!"
Zabuza: "You? Kid—"
He didn't even finish the sentence.
Obito had already transformed into Yagura Karatachi.
At the same moment, his demeanor shifted. That dark, crazed expression...
Was that not the real Yagura Karatachi?!
Obito—transformed into Yagura—steadied his presence.
"Last time I fooled even the two of you. Those Kirigakure assassins shouldn't be any harder."
The madness in his eyes, that killing intent radiating off him, sent a cold shock racing up Zabuza's spine, straight to his skull.
"Yagura... Karatachi..."
Zabuza stared at the figure before him. Even knowing it was the Transformation Technique, it was hard to believe someone could replicate Yagura's insanity and cruelty so perfectly.
It was as if the Fourth Mizukage he knew stood right in front of him.
"You're the Masked Man?"
Zabuza's tone carried a quiet but unmistakable killing intent.
Because idiot Obito was the weak link, both Adult Kakashi and Young Kakashi instantly stepped between him and Zabuza.
Adult Kakashi hurried to explain, "It's a misunderstanding. Obito only deceived you because he had no choice if he wanted to complete the mission. Minato-sensei and I will explain everything to you later."
Young Kakashi pointed behind himself.
"You think killing that idiot is worthy of an SSS-rank mission?"
In an instant, all the dark, ominous energy Obito had built up collapsed. Using Yagura Karatachi's face but his own voice, he snapped at Young Kakashi.
"What did you say?! Why wouldn't I be worthy of an SSS-rank mission?! Don't forget, I flawlessly completed an A-rank mission! And I did it alone! Alone!!"
He intentionally emphasized that in that A-rank mission, useless Kakashi hadn't helped at all.
This made Young Kakashi extremely irritated.
"Heh. You? The Masked Man?"
"You're just impersonating the Mizukage. You really think you're the Masked Man controlling the Mizukage?!" Young Kakashi scoffed. "If you were that Masked Man, I'd read the entire Icha Icha Paradise to you ten times!!"
"What?!!!"
Obito knew better than anyone the psychological trauma reading Icha Icha Paradise had caused stupid Kakashi. Saying something like that meant Young Kakashi despised him to the extreme.
"Kakashi, you bastard!!!"
"What? Want to fight?"
Zabuza: "....." God, I'm exhausted.
Could you not argue while wearing the face of the Fourth Mizukage? It's making everyone who fears the Mizukage look like fools.
Minato Namikaze sighed, rubbing his forehead. "Alright, everyone, go complete your missions. Dismissed."
He placed a hand on Obito's shoulder, and in the next instant the two of them were standing along the coastline of the Land of Waves.
Obito, invoking the authority of the Fourth Mizukage, confronted the arriving Kirigakure assassins.
His high-level performance impressed even Minato, who was hiding in the shadows, and left the Kirigakure assassins trembling.
Heaven knew they had rushed as fast as possible—so how were they still a step behind the Mizukage?!
They bowed respectfully to the Mizukage before them, silently wondering if this was the end of their lives.
'Yagura Karatachi' stared at them so intensely that the longer they looked, the more disturbed they felt. Some even began wondering whether they should end themselves before the Mizukage could.
Just as the Mizukage spoke, they froze.
"Zabuza is dead."
Leaving only that sentence behind, Yagura Karatachi boarded the large ship the Kirigakure assassins had arrived on.
The Mist shinobi exchanged uncertain looks, but since the Mizukage had spoken, they hurried aboard to escort him back to Kirigakure.
Only days later would they realize that the Mizukage who told them not to disturb him had long since vanished from the room he'd entered...
...
Kakashi worked with impressive efficiency.
By the time Minato and Obito returned, the graves for Zabuza and Haku were already complete.
To make the deception convincing, Zabuza had even dragged two rogue-nin corpses of similar build and buried them in their place.
Seeing Obito bragging to Young Kakashi and Rin about how he'd fooled the Kirigakure assassins the moment he returned, Zabuza couldn't help taking a deeper look at the boy.
His impersonation of Yagura Karatachi was simply too accurate.
Zabuza didn't know whether to attribute it to Obito's acting skill or pure coincidence.
"You were also the one pretending to be Yagura Karatachi when we received that mission to kill Kakashi and the others last time, weren't you?" Zabuza said.
The feeling of being tricked and manipulated was unpleasant, so his tone wasn't friendly.
Obito hid behind Minato-sensei. "But we did help you, didn't we?"
Zabuza didn't bother arguing with a child. He turned to Minato Namikaze instead.
"Are you truly the Fourth Hokage? What is that scroll? What is your mission? Who is the Masked Man? And is the intel about him controlling the Mizukage reliable?"
He fired off five questions in a row.
Minato had already prepared what to say while Obito was deceiving the Kirigakure assassins.
He exchanged a glance with Kakashi.
"First, regarding your first question: by your understanding, I am indeed the Fourth Hokage. However, I believe calling me Minato Namikaze is more appropriate."
He stepped aside so Young Kakashi was fully visible to Haku and Zabuza.
"They are both Kakashi. One is currently twelve years old, and the other is twenty-six. There is a fourteen-year gap between them."
Zabuza raised an eyebrow. "So you're saying you came from the past? Then if I kill the younger one now, the older one dies too?"
...
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