Chapter 3: I Like Enthusiastic Responses
Yoru had nothing in Konoha—no property, no family, no home.
After joining Anbu, he was also responsible for miscellaneous tasks within Anbu, so he lived in Anbu.
He now had a three-day holiday and could not stay in Anbu anymore. What if Anbu had a mission and the captain saw Yoru there, ruining his holiday?
Yoru changed into ordinary clothes and stealthily left the Death Forest where Anbu was located, wandering around in Konoha.
He stopped and turned his head, looking at the Hokage Rock not far away.
The faces of the First Hokage, Second Hokage, and Third Hokage were enormous, giving a sense of oppression like fear of giant objects.
The closer he got to the base of the Hokage Rock, the closer to the Hokage Building, the more he could feel the oppressive presence of the huge faces.
This village had no youthful energy like in the original young manga; it only had the repression brought by death.
Everyone was like Kakashi in the original work—teammates dead, teacher dead, friends dead, everyone had some mental illness to some degree.
This was a village where mental illness was per capita.
During the Second Ninja War, most ninjas were on the front line, so Konoha Village was somewhat desolate.
He wandered aimlessly for half an hour, and Yoru prepared to find a cheap inn to stay at.
“Where’s my wallet?”
He only discovered when reaching for money that there was no wallet in his ninja tool bag.
After thinking carefully, Yoru believed it could only have been lost at Tsuruzuki Izakaya, so he went to the izakaya to look for it.
Outside the izakaya, the plump and glamorous female boss had just thrown out trash at the street corner. Seeing the ninja from last night approaching from afar, her teeth chattered nervously.
It’s over.
Had her spy identity been exposed?
That handsome young man from last night had stabbed her spy teammate to death.
To prevent leaking information after death, the teammate had never met her or seen her face—why had it still been exposed?
What to do?
The female boss pretended not to see him and turned back into the izakaya.
Gripping a sharp fruit knife tightly, the female boss was slicing lemon pieces at the counter.
Seeing Yoru sit right in front of her, the female boss looked up and said, “Still want a pot of sake?”
“Give me back my wallet, then I can afford to order sake.”
“Ah?”
The female boss stared in surprise at the Leaf Ninja before her, her hand loosening and tightening on the fruit knife repeatedly.
He wasn’t here to catch her?
“What are you dazed about! Give me back my wallet!”
“Wallet? What wallet?”
Looking for a wallet?
The reason was too ridiculous to be fake.
After the emotional rollercoaster, the female boss’s chest filled with joy, unable to stop heaving.
Yoru jumped down from the high stool and headed to the side, straight to the backyard.
But the female boss directly blocked Yoru.
“Customer! The backyard is under repair; you can’t go in!”
The female boss was extremely afraid.
After waking up last night, there was no one in the room.
Her underground teammate had disappeared, and that handsome customer had also vanished.
She tried contacting her spy teammate with a unique method, but there was no response.
On the ground, there was a spot with a different color, like someone had dug something out from underground and then restored the ground.
Yoru pushed the female boss’s hand away and entered the backyard, discovering that the backyard was indeed under repair.
The floor tiles had all been lifted; it was unclear what they were fixing.
“I told you it’s under repair. How about this, customer—you go up to the second floor to rest first, and I’ll go to the backyard to find your wallet for you.” The female boss wrapped her arms around one of Yoru’s arms:
“I recognized you; you’re the customer from last night!
Why did I faint? Why did you leave? Weren’t we going to discuss Yin Release and Yang Release?”
“Last night after you fell, your head hit the ground and you passed out. I like enthusiastic responses, not deadpan ones.”
Yoru’s arm was surrounded by softness as they went up to the second floor. He asked, “What’s your name?”
“Qiao Yi.”
Sitting in the private room on the second floor, Yoru said:
“Qiao Yi, my wallet has 150,000 ryo; you must find my wallet and return it to me!”
Leaf Ninjas were notoriously low-income.
After executing missions in Anbu for a month, frantically probing at the edge of the death line, he had only earned 100,000 ryo; the remaining 50,000 ryo was what he had demanded from the captain last night.
Qiao Yi went downstairs to look.
She searched the backyard, the side room, around every table and chair, but found no wallet.
She went upstairs again, adjusted her expression, and entered the private room with seductive eyes.
“Ninja Lord, I really didn’t find the wallet. I’m so silly—how did I only just guess? You’re not really here for the wallet… Even though I couldn’t find the wallet, I can compensate you in other ways.”
Qiao Yi had heard Yoru liked enthusiastic responses, so she used every trick she had.
In the large izakaya hall on the first floor, the first table of customers came in at noon to drink.
After more than ten minutes, the customers looked up.
Dust rustled down from between the wooden boards overhead.
The floorboards creaked.
After another twenty-plus minutes, the door to the private room on the second floor opened.
Qiao Yi readjusted her shoulder strap onto her shoulder, panting heavily, and closed the door.
Inside the door, Yoru lay lazily on the bed and said, “You said it—lose my wallet, and let me stay here for three days!”
“I’ll compensate you for your loss in all sorts of entertaining ways.”
Yoru was fully satisfied, lying on the bed pretending to nap.
Still young after all, inexperienced. Last night he had actually thought it wasn’t soft or trembling—pretty good, quite good.
Three days later, Qiao Yi saw Yoru off at the entrance with a broken heart.
This Leaf Ninja sure kept his mouth shut; over three days, she hadn’t pried a single word out of him.
The izakaya’s floorboards had been reinforced once—were all Leaf Ninjas’ confidentiality skills this strong?
But she was certain the handsome ninja wasn’t there to investigate her.
Yoru returned to Anbu under cover of night.
After entering Anbu, he saw the wallet in his own wardrobe!
He picked up the wallet in astonishment—how was the wallet here?
He had been very careful, very meticulous. Three days ago when leaving Anbu, there definitely was no wallet in the wardrobe!
Suddenly, the captain’s voice came from behind; the captain had appeared out of nowhere again.
“Fox, I took my 50,000 ryo and left you the 100,000 ryo reward for the B-rank mission, so your wallet now has 200,000 ryo. Count it.”
Whether he counted now was irrelevant.
Yoru just wanted to know why that glamorous female boss Qiao Yi was so enthusiastic these past few days… ah… um?
Wait, the female boss was too enthusiastic toward him—overly so.
She wouldn’t be a spy, would she?
Whatever, spy or not had nothing to do with him; that was Konoha’s business, not his.
Even if Konoha Village was wiped out, it had nothing to do with him.
A female spy was great; female spies had to investigate often, deeply investigate.
The captain said, “Let’s go, execute the mission. The spy we brought back is from Hidden Stone Village; we’re going to follow the vine to get the melon.”
Yoru put on the fox mask and sighed behind it.
Last time a squad went to follow the vine to get the melon, and they all died. Spies daring to operate in Konoha Village all had some strength; it wasn’t clear who was the vine and who was the melon.
After putting on the Anbu iron vest, strapping on the standard ninja sword, and checking every detail, Yoru followed the captain and the other two teammates, disappearing from the Anbu entrance.
Hopefully they could simply complete a C-rank mission.
New book seeking recommendations, seeking follows, seeking support~
