25 Assault Begins

Three days later

"Itsuki, it's almost time for our shift! Get ready quick." Kuhara's loud voice roused him from his meditative trance. Giving his panicking friend a stinkeye before handing him his genin jacket Kuhara seemed to be searching all over the room, Itsuki got up and wore a cloak over his already combat-ready attire.

Itsuki exited the bunker and made his way to the courtyard of the fort. Sun was down, its rays only lighting up snow-capped peaks in a lovely shade of orange, plunging the rest of the valley in darkness.

Two genins arrived near Itsuki, the taller among the two addressed him, "East sector patrol duty handover." and handed Itsuki a scroll containing permission to patron the east sector of the outpost.

Nodding, Itsuki took the scroll and placed it in the pocket. The tall genin spoke again, "Where is your partner?"

"Here!" Kuhara came, half running. "We are ready to leave."

Other genin team nodded and left, while Itsuki and Kuhara went through usual checks before leaving to patrol.

Itsuki and Kuhara made their way outside the fort and started hopping from tree to tree, beginning their patrol.

Soon Itsuki sensed a weak chakra signature moving towards the fort. He immediately stopped and focused on the chakra signature.

"Is there a problem?" Kuhara stopped beside him and questioned.

Itsuki focused on actively sensing the chakra signature, making a tiger hand seal while slowing the chakra in his body to a near standstill.

'The chakra signature is weak and the person is definitely a samurai. But something feels wrong. The chakra feels odd and suppressed.' Kuhara shaking him brought him out of his thoughts.

"Is everything alright?" He asked with concern.

Itsuki shook his head. "No nothing. I just thought I sensed something."

"Puuhahahaha. You sensing something. Who do you think we are. Reserves, that's right. We don't have sensors." Kuhara laughed.

Itsuki rolled his eyes, before questioning him, "Sensors can't be that rare? Reserves must have some of them." After all, reserves made the majority of Ninja forces. It was slightly illogical to not have even a single sensor.

"Rare! You really have no idea." Kuhara asked incredulity. Itsuki nodded, a little subdued after seeing his expression.

Kuhara sighed, "You did miss all those lectures at the academy. Why Fusao sensei allowed it, I have no idea." With an indignant shrug, he started, "Well whatever, let me explain."

"Sensors being rare is like saying Hyugas are just a little arrogant. Itsuki, my naive friend, Konoha has fewer sensors than elite Jonin's. Blokes in the sensing division devote all their life to becoming a sensor, and even then only a few of them ever become a full-fledged sensor. Hell, even the most rudimentary sensing is a Jonin skill." Kuhara went on, getting more and more heated as he continued.

"Even a few Chunins who...." Itsuki cut him right there.

"Alright, alright, I get it. Sensor nins are a big deal and I lowly, unworthy one could never be one." Itsuki chuckled while trying to calm the worked up Kuhara. Ideally, he wondered this was a little out of character for Kuhara to be so worked up for something so small.

"Yeah, I guess you are right." Kuhara sighed. Before jumping and continuing with the patrol.

Itsuki gave one last look towards the direction of the fort before following after Kuhara. His focus diverted to revelations brought about by Kuhara about being a sensor. He never thought being a sensor was such a big deal, much less his sensing technique which was so similar to Mind's eye of Kagura, one of the strongest sensing techniques bar sage mode.

A silhouette wearing samurai armor slowly staggered towards the fort. The eyes of the person inside the armor were glazed over and every inch of his skin was covered in black and red seals. If Itsuki had tried to sense the emotions of the chakra signature, he would have felt nothing but the cold stillness.

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"All teams are in position. Teams A and B are covering the north border, C to F are in place to prevent escape from the south back into Land of Fire, teams G to K are covering east and west." The visionless sensor reported to Darui.

"And what about the mercenary?" Darui asked.

"He.. too is in position." Sensor nin responded with a quiver in his voice.

Darui mercilessly crushed the feeling of shame rising in his gut and closed his eyes to center himself for the coming battle.

'What would your mother think.'

Darui's eyes immediately shot open, his breath became ragged. His eyes were wide in panic. Calming himself, he raised his head towards the darkening skies. Despite the fog in the valley, the sky was clear. Closing his eyes, he tried again but again an angry voice spoke in his head.

'Your mother will be ashamed.'

Darui just stood there, desperately trying to calm his shaking body.

'This is for the village' Darui tried to justify himself.

'Yes, the very same village responsible for ruining our mother.' his inner self replies, voice dripping with rage and hate.

Darui tried to reply, kami he tried to form a response but if he denied, he will only be lying to himself.

Suddenly a shout brought him back, "Captain, it is time." Sensor standing behind Darui informed him, unaware of his inner turmoil.

Darui raised his head to look at the snow-covered peaks. The caps illuminated by sunlight were now reduced to just the orange tips at the top. Soon the sun will set, plunging the entire valley into darkness.

And darkness will herald the purge.

Darui steadied his shaking hand, slipping back into his lazy facade. He went to a logistics ninja carrying a backpack radio communication unit. The ninja respectfully handed him the microphone, which Darui took and brought up to his mouth.

Setting up the frequency, logistics gave him a thumbs up but Darui just kept his eye at the retreating sunlight at the snow caps. Just as the last visage of sunlight disappeared from the mountain top, Darui begins the transmission.

"Kill anyone in the fifty-mile radius and let no one escape. Move out." Darui ordered all the Kumo troops, signaling the beginning of the event that will go down in the history of elemental nations as the Winter border war.

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Hundreds of Kumo ninjas got out of their hidden locations after hearing the radio message. Systematically, they started to form a perimeter of a radius of fifty kilometers, half the moving inwards the perimeter, intent on killing any and all human civilization in cold blood.

___________________________________________________________________________________________

A samurai staggered towards the border outpost, taking short unsteady steps towards the fort. The guards in front of the fort saw him, quickly unsheathing their swords.

"Stay where you are and raise your hands up in the air." Guards warned, patrols on the wall pointing their arrows at the intruder.

The figure stills for a movement before falling face fault on the ground.

Samurai's looked at one other before the commanding officer pointed one of the guards to check on the fallen figure. A guard moves towards it and using the sheath, turned it over.

"Captain, it is Chen. He does not look good." Gaurd yelled.

"Bring him to the medics," Captain commanded, prompting the guards to pick up the fallen figure and bring him to medic-bay.

The residential medic quickly removed his helmet and checked his pulse.

"He is Dead." Medic pronounced to the crowd of samurai's, "Remove his armor, I want to see how he died."

A guard pulled out the chest plate. Just then an Anbu came to the medic-bay, "What is going on here?"

"We found a dead samurai of our battalion at the front door, shinobi-san. We were just..." Commander was cut by the loud shout of the medic.

"What the hell is this!", pointing to the chest of the dead body. On the table, the exposed chest of the dead samurai was filled with sealing marks carved in the flesh, as well as thick dark threads that appeared to be stretched into the limbs and torso.

Anbu turned his head, beneath his mask his eyes widened. He screamed, "GET BAC..."

"BOOOM"

A resplended explosion rocked the entire fort, blowing the entire medic bay and surrounding section of the fort to smithereens. Shockwave zoomed out and blew back any and everyone near the explosion.

Alarms blared to life, remaining shinobi and samurai mobilized, trying to find the injured as well as getting ready for enemy attack.

Not far from the fort, pupil-less green eyes watched with apathy. Sensing the scattered Anbus now gathering at the fort, he jumped down from the tall pine tree and started walking towards the fort.

"Let's get this show on the road."