Chapter 49: Old Acquaintances and Tailed Beast's Perception

Chapter 49: Old Acquaintances and Tailed Beast's Perception

___________ POV Narration ___________

Ken decided to take his time as he walked through the village unsupervised for the first time.

He was still headed for the gate, he just decided to make the others wait a bit for him, as the Raikage did start the mission suddenly.

The Blind Swordsman took a few moments to admire the brickwork in that village, it was built on a mountain range, reaching all the way up to the clouds.

It was actually a rather impressive structure overall, one that Ken hadn't gotten to admire much when arriving, as he had been too bothered with his thoughts.

Now he could enjoy it all, the wind, the clouds, the strangely cheery atmosphere which reminded him that the Hidden Villages were filled with a lot more people than just Shinobi...

It was rather strange for him to see children playing around in the streets. Especially since he knew that most children would end up as child soldiers in the future, forced to fight in a war they had no understanding of...

Alas, Ken wasn't the arbiter of justice in the world, he couldn't stop wars from happening, and he was far from having the influence to stop Child Solders from being a thing...

Maybe one day he would have the influence to do so, but many had tried and failed in the past, including the 'God of Shinobi' Hasirama, who Ken had only heard about in a few books.

Alas, even the village that said God of Shinobi founded was using Child Soldiers from what Ken remembered, so completely abolishing the practice would likely be almost impossible so long as the wars continued.

'I'll see what I can do about it, but there's no reason to stress over it. Can't control all warmongering lords. As long as there's money to be made from it, war will never truly end.

At least I'll build my own little slice of heaven...'

The Blind 'child' continued walking around for a bit, enjoying the scenery as best he could while steadily getting closer to the gate, where he assumed the Raikage and the others were already expecting him.

The cluster of the city helped dampen his senses, thankfully he could still feel the signatures of everyone around him.

Surprisingly, he also ran into a more familiar face... A woman whose aura Ken could still recognize.

"... Ken?" Even her voice was familiar, coated in the same confusion and wariness that had appeared the first time they had met.

It wasn't exactly something he could forget at the end of the day. The moment he hunted his first bounty, he had technically used the woman as bait.

"Mabui! Fancy meeting you here..." The Blind Assassin nodded towards the Fledgling Jonin as he enjoyed her confusion for a few moments.

Ken didn't know what to think about the woman, the only thing he knew about her was that she was a bit sloppy when it came to actual Shinobi work.

'She's likely more suited for a logistic position... Though I'm guessing all Jonin need to lead a team of Genin at some point...'

"What are you doing here?..." She asked as she turned and looked around them, likely searching for any Anbu that were trailing Ken.

But there were none in sight, meaning he wasn't being escorted personally. Which could've meant one of two things...

1. In the short two weeks she had been missing, Ken had already forged amicable relationships with the Cloud and/or joined them.

2. He had infiltrated the village and had somehow gone undetected till now

At least those were the two options that came to her mind.

"I guess you were away on a mission till now... I've been contracted for a special 'assignment' by the Raikage." Ken smiled underneath his mask as he turned his head to the woman and focused on her a bit more.

She seemed to be wearing jonin garb, donning a long-sleeved shirt this time around, not showcasing any cleavage... Not that Ken would've had any eyes to admire it anyway.

"A contract? With an outsider?" Ken could feel Mabui's eyes widening as she exclaimed out loud, attracting the attention of plenty of people around them.

People were already instinctively keeping a certain distance from Ken since plenty of civilians knew of him already.

His reputation was still not exactly good, as the Grass Village had done a great job of making him look like a madman.

Needless to say, catching their attention in that way certainly didn't help ease any of their nerves...

A for one was still a bit annoyed at having been grounded in his room as a 30-year-old, but he didn't voice out that frustration, nor did he plan to ever try and take it out on Ken.

Instead, he looked at Ken with a more respectful gaze now, hoping to be able to use the Blind Swordsman as motivation and strive to become stronger.

Meanwhile, B was having an entirely different internal debate.

'I still don't get it... Why exactly are you this wary around this bounty hunter?' Killer B's thoughts lacked the usual rhyme that his voice would've had.

The voice that responded was a lot different, sounding more monstrous, and inhuman.

'I'm telling you... Never try to antagonize this thing... This bounty hunter of yours is not even human, he feels more like a Tailed Beast... But it's not chakra that he's made out of...'

The voice that responded was the 8 Tails that was still sealed within Killer B. Also named Gyki.

The large monster was a mix of octopus and bull. It was one of the 9-Tailed Beasts, arguably the second strongest right behind the 9-Tailed Fox.

Like all tailed beasts, Gyki was a being made out of Chakra, normally impossible to kill, but also too powerful to be left to its own devices.

That was the main reason why the villages sealed the Tailed Beasts... That and personal power.

After all, the Jinchriki, the tailed beast carriers, were all valuable assets to villages.

As a Jinchriki, Killer B still had a bit to go before completely mastering the use of the tailed beast's chakra, but Gyki did speak to him quite often, and the two of them were somehow managing to get along.

The second that the Tailed Beast had sensed Ken though?... That was when things went awry.

It was just something off about his presence, the Tailed Beast couldn't quite put its large finger on it at first, but the more Ken stayed at the Raikage's mansion the more the Tailed Beast was able to figure a few things out.

At first, Gyki thought that Ken seemed to be a bit similar to the 'father' of Tailed Beasts, Hagoromo.

But after taking a better look, that clearly wasn't the case.

Ken didn't seem to have any special bloodline limit or any actual connection to the Sage of 6 Paths... At least no connection that the Tailed Beast was able to detect.

So, it ended up realising that instead of being similar to Hagoromo, Ken was a lot more similar to Gyki himself...

The Tailed Beast was able to notice an overwhelming amount of nature energy inside Ken's body, on the surface, it didn't look any different from a regular human's body, but it couldn't be more different.

His state was something that the Gyki would describe as 'A tailed beast, but it seems he is made out of Nature Energy more so than Chakra...'

That was about the extent of what Gyki could tell from observing Ken, but it was already a lot more than Ken himself knew...

In the end, Gyki did also care for Killer B, despite his sometimes odd mannerisms. And that care was what prompted the Tailed Beast to advise him against getting involved too deeply with Ken.

The silence stretched out for the entirety of the journey, which only took around two days, as the 4 moved at rather impressive speeds.

After a while, the Raikage did inform Ken that they were approaching the mountain. He could even feel it in the distance, a rocky and jagged mountain that felt more like a giant earth spike than anything.

So, they were getting closer and closer to their objective, eventually even reaching the base of the mountain, stealthily.

There was a problem, however...

'Where is Akira?'

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Hope you liked the chapter!

No delays this time around :)) Still only got to write pretty late, cuz I was a bit busy but at least I'm uploading anyway

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