Chapter 30: Negotiations, Departure and Hate

Chapter 30: Negotiations, Departure and Hate

__________ POV Narration__________

The very concept of an entire hidden village surrendering to a bounty hunter was unheard of.

And that was with good reason. Even the Grass Village, one of the weakest ones, had around 350 Shinobi. Around 40 of them were just Saburo's clones.Ñøv€l-B1n was the first platform to present this chapter.

Even if the majority of them were Genin, they made up a force large enough to make other villages wary of them.

The Grass Village was by no means strong, but they were stable enough, especially since it once had the support of the Leaf Village.

Village politics were still a difficult thing, and a hidden village would never stick its head out for another unless the situation was dire.

So Elder Yuu was well aware that the Red Dot would get away scot-free even after killing so many of their shinobi.

There were only around 270 Shinobi in the village when Ken attacked, the rest were either away on mission or dead.

Now, only around 156 of them were alive and in fighting condition.

And Ken didn't even seem fazed by the fight that had been happening up to that point.

That was why the Elders, with Yuu at the helm, decided that it would be better to call the entire fight off.

'... If I had known he was this powerful I wouldn't have gone after him in the first place...' Yuu was quite annoyed by the situation, but the fact was already consummated, their losses already materialized...

They sent Saburo to speak to him, as the Anbu Captain, he was the most powerful in their village.

They hoped the formation would be able to hold Ken there, but even if he was held there they wouldn't be able to do much to him.

The formation would fall apart when the Shinobi forming it ran out of chakra anyway, so they couldn't hold him there forever.

"How much is your village willing to give exactly?" Yuu could hear Ken's voice from inside the formation, as the masked monster crossed his arms and tilted his head at Saburo.

"Well, at this point, I am sure you'd be able to talk the elders into giving you anything..." Saburo's response was a bit grating for Yuu to hear, but they'd surely get to speak about that later...

"Money. This village is willing to pay you a good sum if you agree to leave without taking any more lives. As a bounty hunter, you surely appreciate wealth." Yuu interjected from the side, knowing that Saburo wasn't going to say anything to benefit their village.

"... I am not interested in your wealth..." 'More like, I've already stolen most of it...' "I want techniques, Jutsu, as many as you can give me, including this formation." The Red Dot spoke out with a grin.

'A bounty hunter doesn't want money!?' Yuu was completely flabbergasted by that fact alone. Ken requesting techniques off of them was even more insulting.

'Our Jutsu and techniques are our bread and butter! We can't afford to give all of our secrets to a bounty hunter! We've not even managed to recover our secret techniques from that stupid thief!'

Yuu was feeling livid at that point, but he couldn't snap at Ken either, as they truly didn't have any leverage over the bounty hunter.

As much as Yuu hated it, Saburo was completely right when saying the Elders would give him anything to just leave them alone.

"Jutsu huh... Sounds manageable, but you obviously won't get all of the ones in this village." Saburo smiled calmly, clearly not bothered by the situation at all.

"Let's make this simple, I want at least 2 S-rank, at least 20 A-rank, and of the rest, I want at least 30-40 each." Ken's words immediately served to give Yuu a brain aneurysm.

"That's outrageous!" "A bounty hunter asking for this many techniques!?" Plenty of voices around seemed shocked and livid at Ken's request.

Many were also confused, but in truth, no one really dared to refuse Ken's requests at that point.

Saburo simply narrowed his eyes.

"... So you're building an organization, huh?" His voice was lower than before, only Kan managing to catch it.

"... You'll find out soon. How does my request sound though?" Ken's long hair danced in the wind along with his burnt and tattered cloak.

"Well, the village can provide you with copies for a few techniques. There aren't that many S-rank techniques in this village, so you won't be able to pick and choose. But I'm guessing you aren't requesting specific techniques..." Saburo stroked his chin, trying to think more about Ken's words.

'I'll find out soon, huh... This does sound promising...' Saburo was already looking to cut ties with the already collapsing Grass Village.

Getting a ticket to join an organization headed by a person on the level or close to the level of the 5 Kages sounded great to the Strawman. It was certainly going to be easier than trying to convince another small hidden village to accept him in their ranks...

"Indeed, as long as they have practicality I don't care what type of technique I get." The Blind Swordsman nodded as his body started transforming back into that of a human.

Saburo raised an eyebrow when noticing that change, and smirked as he noticed that Ken was indeed not injured in any way.

'At least we managed to de-escalate the situation.' Saburo was also quite glad that he didn't have to lose any more of his clones.

The Elders could also finally heave a sigh of relief when seeing him change back into a more human form.

For one second, the thought of trying to kill Ken while his guard was down appeared in Yuu's mind, but he wasn't willing to risk it and anger him again. Their losses were already substantial...

"Is that all, Red Dot?" Saburo said as he smiled at the bounty hunter.

"For now... I will state any further requests after seeing this one fulfilled." Ken crossed his arms as he looked at the barrier surrounding him.

"Might as well take this down, since we're now on negotiating terms. Also, bring me my blade, I left it somewhere near the rubble." The Blind Swordsman tapped his leg on the ground a few times as he wondered how far he could push the village with his requests.

To the others, it looked like Saburo's Anbu Squad was also defecting with him.

There seemed to be around 24 of them left, but Ken did notice Saburo sending a few of them away during the fight, so their number was likely a bit bigger than that.

Confusion and outrage spread throughout the Grass Shinobi. And Yuu was sweating heavily, the veins on his forehead had already popped as the clones seemed to be intent on stopping him from acting.

"I will be taking my squad and leaving... I don't want to kill any of my former comrades, so don't follow me..." Saburo narrowed his eyes as he looked at the surrounding shinobi.

The Strawman tugged at the heartstrings of the Grass Shinobi, Ken was a bit impressed by the level of bullshit that Saburo was spewing.

'Comrades? Bah! Didn't know this guy was also a comedian...' Although Ken found it funny, that was just because he had already figured Saburo to be a shrewd and opportunistic sociopath.

The other Shinobi were still coming to terms with his departure, so they were seemingly hesitant.

Saburo didn't look at any of them as he walked past, the Grass Shinobi seemed to just stand there and look at each other with despair in their eyes.

In the end, they could only make way for Ken and Saburo's clones to leave the village.

"You are quite decent at manipulating others..." Ken said in a low tone as he continued to walk, just making conversation with his new member.

"Hmmm... I'll take that as a compliment." Saburo simply nodded, a calm smile on his face as all of his clones followed suit.

"It was a compliment," Ken said as he and the clones stepped out of the front gate of the village.

The 4 clones that were holding the elder hostage also tried to flee after Ken and the rest of the clones managed to depart from the village.

But the Elder wasn't about to just let them leave...

The enraged Elder Yuu immediately trapped them all in overgrown grass and thorny vines, his teeth cracking in anger as he started barking orders again.

"Kill them!" The Elder shouted, taking out his rage on the clones that had almost taken his life.

The shinobi around him seemed to look at each other for a few seconds, before listening to his orders and burning all of the clones alive using a few fireballs.

The clones stood eerily still, not even bothering to protect themselves as they started burning alive. Such a scene managed to further unnerve the people present.

The rest of Saburo's clones didn't even bother to turn around and look at them, as they had already left the village gates.

Yuu, in the end, was just left with 4 burnt corpses that had once been Saburo's clones, an extremely demoralized ragtag group of shinobi, and a few buildings to rebuild.

The angry elder took a few deep breaths to calm down.

He wasn't stupid enough to pursue Saburo outside of the village. Ken was also with him, so it was impossible for their village to attack the Strawman.

"For now, announce to the world that Saburo is a Missing-nin, he is to be branded a criminal..." Yuu spoke in a much calmer voice, he was still confident that the village wouldn't fall, even if they were bound to have to suck up to a higher power...

"S-Sir... The enemy must have brainwashed Sir Saburo! There's no way he'd do something like th-" An injured Jonin to the side tried to plead for Saburo, it seemed that the poor shinobi was likely fooled by the Strawman's act.

There were plenty of people like him, Saburo had spent a good decade in that village, so plenty of people were able to get accustomed to him and 'befriend' him.

Yuu was hearing none of it though.

"Don't kid yourself! Saburo is just a criminal now. I don't want to hear anything else..." The Elder didn't care to explain that they had all been fooled by a sociopath. He only gave them the orders and continued on with his work.

'At least we still have the funds to rebuild... We need to do a quick inventory of everything and recover everything from the collapsed Kage Building.'

Yuu was quick to get to work... Unfortunately for him, their funds had just happened to disappear...

Well, not all of them, a part of their finances was kept in the Kage Building, but the bulk of it was spread out throughout all of the clans in the village.

Yuu ordered everyone to do a quick check on their resources, he now controlled them since all of the clan heads were now dead, and he was to manage their finances until new leaders were appointed.

He received the report that everything was gone rather quickly. Even the funds from his compound were gone, and he had amassed significant wealth there...

The last hair on Yuu's head fell out when he heard that report, he was left completely shell-shocked by it.

But it didn't take long for him to realize where those funds may have disappeared to...

'... Curse that bounty hunter... Not interested in our wealth my ass...'

Yuu looked at the wrecked state of their village with empty eyes, his mind wondering how exactly to avoid total destruction.

But one thought surfaced in his mind.

'... I won't forget this, Red Dot, Saburo! Both of you will pay for this!'

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Hope you liked the chapter! It's 3 am now so imma go slep

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