Chapter 70: The Hunter, The Hunted
The orders from the Third Hokage were concise, decisive, and carried the full weight of his office. They moved from the Land of Fire to the Rain Country camp not as a suggestion, but as a decree.
Two core directives were disseminated to the relevant command levels:
All intelligence regarding Operative Rakshasa's recent engagement is classified Top Secret. Unauthorized dissemination is treason.
Operative Rakshasa is hereby permanently transferred to the Konoha ANBU Special Projects Division.
The Special Projects Division existed in a realm of its own. While all ANBU ultimately served the Hokage, standard operatives could be temporarily tasked by field commanders or, through political pressure, influenced by figures like Danzo. The Special Projects Division answered to the Hokage alone. Their missions came directly from his desk, their reports returned to his eyes only. By placing Ragnar there, Sarutobi Hiruzen wasn't just promoting him; he was drawing a fortress around him, marking him as a personal asset of the Hokage's line. In terms of operational authority, Ragnar now stood equal to ANBU squad captains, answering only to Hatake Sakumo as overall commander.
The message was unmistakable: This one is mine. Hands off.
When Danzo received the formal notification, his rage was a cold, silent thing that settled in his bones. Combined with the perpetual, soul-deep damp of the Rain Country, it festered. Sarutobi had chosen a rootless refugee over their decades of shared history, over the needs of the village as Danzo saw them. It was a personal and ideological betrayal.
Ragnar, for his part, understood the calculus. The Hokage's protection came with an expectation, a debt to be paid in service. A significant, likely dangerous, solo mission was inevitable. He didn't mind. With his growing arsenal of power and the trump cards in his system, he had a fighting chance against anything this era could throw at him. Survival was his oldest skill.
In the weeks that followed, he kept to the camp, a quiet, masked figure. He honed the sword principles from Sakumo's scroll, meditated on the flow of his Haki, and pushed the compression of his Spiral Force further. He was a blade being whetted, waiting for the call to cut.
The call came roughly half a month later, in the form of a sealed scroll delivered by a Special Projects courier. The mission parameters were, as expected, singular and stark.
Operative: Rakshasa (Ragnar).
Status: Solo, deep-cover infiltration.
Appearance: Civilian disguise. No ANBU insignia, mask, or standard gear.
Theater: Land of Rain (civilian population centers and hinterlands).
Primary Objective: Intelligence gathering on enemy force deployments, command structures, and supply lines.
Secondary Objective (Discretionary): Elimination of high-value targets. A list was appended.
Ragnar scanned the names. Several elite jonin from Amegakure. A few from Iwagakure and Sunagakure noted for their tactical brilliance or particular brutality. And at the very bottom, a name that was less a target and more a statement of ambition: Hanzo the Salamander.
He snorted softly. Hanzo was in a league of his own, a "demi-god" who had shaped this very war. That entry was symbolic—a reminder of the war's scale, not a realistic assignment. Hanzo was for the Sannin, or perhaps for a future version of himself. Killing Hanzo… the system reward for that would undoubtedly be astronomical.
The mission's beauty was in its freedom. He wasn't required to check in, wasn't tied to a squad. He was a ghost, to act as opportunity and his own judgment dictated. Hiruzen was being pragmatic; even one or two successful strikes from the list would be a monumental success.
After preparing a simple traveler's pack—mundame clothes, rations, a concealed weapons pouch—Ragnar left the Konoha camp. He shed the ANBU identity like a skin, becoming just another rain-sodden, weary-looking refugee moving through the mist.
He hadn't been gone more than an hour.
Deep beneath the Konoha camp, Root Annex.
The Root operative finished his report, kneeling in the damp gloom. "The subject, Ragnar, departed the main gate alone at 14:00. He was dressed as a civilian traveler. He carried no visible ANBU identification. Direction of travel was east, towards the interior river valleys."
Danzo listened, his expression carved from stone. Alone. No mask. A solo mission from Hiruzen. The pieces clicked. The Hokage was deploying his new pet weapon on a deniable string. It was the perfect opportunity.
Insolent brat, Danzo thought, the memory of the tent confrontation fresh. You dare look at me with those eyes. Konoha needs obedient tools, not willful, arrogant children. And Sarutobi… you protect him from me? After all we built?
The fact that Ragnar's files were now locked behind Hokage-level clearance only stoked the fires. In Danzo's mind, it wasn't protection; it was proof of a valuable secret—the method behind that impossible slaughter. A method he deserved to control for the village's ultimate good. Sarutobi's sentimentality was a weakness.
"Summon Kurama and Yuhi," Danzo ordered, his voice echoing softly in the chamber.
Two figures materialized from the darkness as if stepping through a curtain, kneeling in perfect unison. One mask was styled after a fox (Kurama), the other seemed to swim with faint, hypnotic patterns (Yuhi). They were utterly still, breathing in sync.
Danzo looked at them, his most reliable tools for mental extraction. "Kurama Bloodmist. Yuhi Dreamshatter. The target is the operative who just left camp, traveling east. You are to intercept and retrieve him. Alive. I want him, and I want the secret he carries. Do not be seen by Konoha patrols."
"Understood," they intoned as one, their voices flat and empty. Perfect instruments.
They vanished without a sound.
Danzo felt a flicker of satisfaction. The Kurama and Yuhi clans were genjutsu specialists without peer. Their combined techniques could ensnare even a seasoned jonin, stripping away will and reality. The boy, for all his strange power, was still a child. He would be brought back, broken, and his secrets harvested. Then, he could be properly remade into something useful.
The rain was a constant companion. Ragnar moved with an easy, ground-eating pace along a sodden track. Yet, around him, a small miracle occurred. The raindrops, as they fell towards him, would veer aside at the last moment, as if repelled by an invisible shell. His clothes remained perfectly dry, the mud barely clinging to his sandals. It was a subtle, continuous application of Armament Haki—not a hard shield, but a field of repulsive force, a testament to his deepening control over Level 4.
He was deep in thought, mapping possible infiltration routes, when his Observation Haki pinged—a sharp, clear note of intent from behind. Not hostile yet, but purposeful, fast.
He stopped, turning slowly.
Two figures closed the distance, their movement efficient and silent. Their cloaks and masks were similar to ANBU, but the masks were plainer, the aura more sterile. Root.
They halted before him, a precise ten paces away.
"Operative Rakshasa," the one with the hypnotic-patterned mask (Yuhi Dreamshatter) stated. The voice was cold, devoid of inflection. "Lord Danzo requests your return to the camp."
Ragnar didn't bother with pretexts. The intent radiating from them was clear as ice. "Declined. I have prior orders."
"In that case," the other, Kurama Bloodmist, said, his tone identical, "we will escort you."
There was no further warning. Yuhi Dreamshatter's hands flickered through a series of seals so fast they blurred. "Ninja Art: Realm of Eternal Dusk."
The world didn't fade—it was stolen.
One moment, Ragnar stood on a rainy path. The next, all light, all sound, all sensation of the wet earth beneath his feet vanished. He was suspended in a perfect, sensory-deprived void. It wasn't darkness; it was the absence of everything. A masterful genjutsu, attacking the very foundations of perception.
Illusion, Ragnar thought, his mind cool and analytical. He reached out with his Observation Haki, pushing against the nothingness. It located the two chakra signatures easily—they were standing right where they had been. But his senses insisted he was floating in a vacuum. The disconnect was jarring, the illusion layering false sensory data directly onto his mind.
He felt a spike of killing intent from Kurama Bloodmist's position. An attack was coming in the real world, masked by the sensory blackout of the genjutsu.
A smile, unseen in the void, touched Ragnar's lips. They thought they had trapped a ninja reliant on the five senses.
They had trapped a Haki user.
Shave.
In the absolute blackness of the illusion, Ragnar's body moved based on the true map provided by his Observation Haki. He vanished from his position and reappeared in the physical world, directly in front of the charging Kurama Bloodmist, whose kunai was aimed at where Ragnar's neck should have been.
The genjutsu, tied to his original location, shattered like glass.
Ragnar's fist, sheathed in the faint, dark shimmer of Armament, was already mid-strike.
(End of Chapter)
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