Chapter 36 – Another simple C-rank mission?

Chapter 36 – Another simple C-rank mission?

For the next few days, we spent the morning practicing group combat as usual, during the afternoons we finally learned the Body Flicker Technique.

This time there was enough time after practice for my usual dates with the girls, which may have become turned a bit more handsy and pleasurable when we found ourselves alone.

As for the Body Flicker Technique, it works by channeling chakra actively into our leg muscles to allow faster movement.

The main difficulty and weakness of the jutsu is in controlling it.

Because the chakra distribution isn’t even to all the leg muscles and the ninja is unused to the extra strength and speed granted, during combat it’s impossible to maintain control and balance without paring the jutsu with augmented reflexes.

It is however one of the simplest and most useful jutsu to have when traveling, if we had known the body flicker last week we would have made the journey back to Konoha in two days instead of four.

On the morning after we had mastered body flicker Anko got us another C-rank mission. Seems we were about to get an endurance Body-Flicker course.

We were leaving right that afternoon so we quickly got ourselves ready for a short mission that would take us about a week to accomplish.

We ran out of Konoha heading west, body flickering at as high a speed as we were comfortable with as Anko filled us in on the details.

“Our mission today is to investigate the disappearance of a merchant headed to Konoha from Kusagakure.”

Kusagakura, the word rings some alarm bells in my head already... It’s currently where Orochimaru’s main base is located. And a lot of their official ninjas secretly serve him.

“This merchant was secretly providing us with information from the nearby regions and was scheduled to have arrived in Konoha several days ago.”

Anko continues her explanation.

“Chances are he was either delayed for some reason and we’ll run into him, we find traces of his corpse, or get too close to the border and call out the mission.”

At least they were sensible enough to not send us outside of the Land of Fire, I wouldn't wanna step inside that snake's den.

If I had to guess the mission was assigned to us as more of an easy recon mission for Anko to do while we tagged along.

We body-flicker close enough to check the road from afar as we make our way.

What to do...

We continue running close along the road for the next couple of days.We stop only for 6 hours each night to catch some rest.

We found several people on the road but none matched the merchant we were looking for.

That was... until we were about 80% of the way to the border.

We found a broken wagon on a road and the dirt around it was a faint red tone. The pair of oxen that were pulling it were dead along with several of its occupants.

Anko’s hand goes to her neck and I fear the worst.

She examines the bodies and the remains of the destroyed wagon before giving us her conclusions.

“Our target is missing and, based on the state of the bodies, the other victims have been dead for about 5 days now.

It is too late to start a chase and our informant has likely long been dragged back into enemy territory for interrogation. We are leaving.”

Sakura seems annoyed with the conclusion of our mission.

“Are we just leaving empty-handed like this sensei? We’ve done nothing but run for the past days and now we just go back?”

“Sakura, as much as it pains us we have to play it safe. The lands outside Konoha are dangerous and you are still only Genin”

“So what if we are just Genin, when are we getting a chance to prove ourselves?”

This time it was me chiding Sakura

“Sakura, we are still too weak. There will be chances to prove ourselves, but there is no reason to go looking for death”

As we were in the middle of our argument Hinata alerted us.

“Sensei, two ninjas are approaching us fast from the west”