Chapter 52

When Hiruzen placed the bingo book on the table, I could feel slight killing intent. "Oh, it seems our little Haruki is quite popular. What did he do? He does not look your typical S-rank though." Haruki had dirty blonde red hair with plain features and a slim build. He did not look like your typical mean or cool looking S-rank criminal.

Hiruzen sighed as if he understood the reason before he spoke "A former cloud ninja who for some reason seems to be lurking around the village. Interestingly, it was the cloud that dubbed him an S-rank criminal and pushed all reason for being near Konoha to Haruki alone."

"Of course, they did." Hiruzen snorted in response.

"He does not attack the village directly, but what he does is attack Konoha teams on their way to the village, injuring them before making his escape." Hiruzen paused with a sad expression and took a drag of his pipe.

I raised my brow, understanding where he was taking it, "I assume he is able to kill lone ninja, probably chunin, in certain cases?" He nodded, lowering his head to allow his hat to cover his face and then I felt it again, the killing intent.

"Still, it does not seem to add up. Even if he killed someone in the village, he would not be dubbed S-rank criminal, and if it was someone important, I doubt the Raikage would sit back and allow this person to roam free; Especially near here." It did not really add up. With what I knew about the ratings, and his information before me did not seem to match the rank he was given.

"Indeed. He is an experienced Jounin but not enough to warrant an S-rank. What is baffling is there have been occasional sightings of Kumo Anbu around." 'If their Anbu agent had been sighted around, that should mean he probably still was. Probably to bring in his target by any means. But why?' After, Hiruzen pulled out a map and showed me the general areas of his sightings.

"Receive your mission. Find Haruki and bring him back for question before the cloud Anbu can get his hands on him. Take him out if necessary." Hiruzen turned serious and issued out his order.

I couldn't help a savage grin from appearing on my face as I pulled on the hollow mask. The eerie dull yellow eyes glowing slightly in response.

I flickered away, making my way towards the general locations of the major sightings. Although it was quite far, it took me about half a day to get there with my speed. It was already nightfall by the time I got there. Since it was night, I could only assume our dear Haruki would be in a cave or something.

I created five shadow clones and had them score the place for a cave or something. There was a chance he did not stay around, but I had to be sure. What? The shadow clone jutsu? How many times had we seen Naruto use that seal? If I already knew the seal, then all I had to do was experiment with it to master it. Although I only use it for recon and training. For some reason I like my water clones.

The clones scoured the whole place but I was unable to find him. They found a few caves but there was no indication of someone having lived in them, only a chakra beast. I placed a seal in the cave, which would activate and alert me, then silently tag anyone that used chakra in any way. Unfortunately that would include chakra beasts; An unfortunate drawback. The other clones went round placing similar seals all around, including the roads, in case my target finally came out in the open.

After the clones dispersed, I received information about the job being done. I could begin my plans to try and find him the next day. With that, I entered a cave nearby and slept. The next morning, I transformed into an average looking Konoha ninja with the headband and began to walk towards a direction.

The plan was simple, pretend to be an average Konoha ninja and walk distances away from my seals in case he decided to show himself and attack. Unfortunately, in order for my seals, especially the tag seals, to continuously stay active, I needed to stay in a certain range for it to react to my chakra since they were made using my chakra as ink.

Did I say how much Uzumaki Ken was a genius. The red head was a bloody genius?

I continued to walk with my passive chakra carpet completely stretched forward into a hundred-meter straight line. I could not risk stretching the it into a two-hundred-meter radius in risk of my target being a sensory. So, I decided to make it a radar type scan. The outstretched carpet would do a constant 360deg round sweep, to help me detect my surroundings.

I may have great chakra control but the radar sweep was tiring, mentally. That was why I did not like using it. On the plus side, it was really good for chakra control exercises. Anyway, I need to stop every ten or so minutes to rest myself.

After walking to the limit of my placed seal a few miles out, I double checked to make sure no one was watching me before I ducked into a bush and transformed into another average person with the Konoha headband.

I stayed in the bushes for half a day before I began making my way back. Walking in the pace of a shinobi that had completed his mission and decided to leisurely walk back. As usual, my radar sweeping out for ten minutes at a time. I was not particularly worried; with my autopilot, I was not worried about a sudden ambush when the radar was down in the reset mode.

Like that, I walked back to my cave at the starting point with nothing happening to me. A whole day with nothing happening to me nor anyone activating the seals. The anime and manga don't show this long waiting parts.

Just like that three days passed with me doing the same things. Walking back and forth trying to land a medium sized fish. Unfortunately, there was no bite to the bait. I was beginning to get frustrated; I was almost tempted to create a few clones to let them go about on a blind search for either of them. Impractical. I completely threw away that frustrated notion. Either of them could be transformed into anyone and be anywhere.

Just when I was thinking of what to do. I received an alert, two in fact. I sped towards the direction of the alerts while undoing the transformation. As I got closer to the place, I put on my yin cloak and sped up more. I could hear clanging and clashing of metal. There was a fight going on.

I got to the place and stood on a branch looking down at the action going on. There on a silver platter, my two targets. I immediately activated the barrier and sound seals I had placed in a fifty-meter radius. I may be fast but I absolutely don't want to do the cat and mouse chase in a hundred or two hundred radii; the last three days had frustrated me enough.

[Forgive me. I might not be able to pull the 5 chapters on weekend this week since i am still not 100%. I know and pray i will be up to 100% by next week so we continue it. But please keep the stones coming in. Anyone have a question so far? I can answer them as long as it does not require a spoiler. Drop them in the comments and ill answer them. Enjoy]