"Why are....leaf shinobi attacking them? Was it not our mission to just take the formula without fighting?" Kabuto asked confused seeing the situation.
"Because they are not leaf shinobi. Whoever they are, is probably using transformation jutsu." Itachi guessed
Shikuro though shook his head "They are not that stupid to use transformation jutsu in a battle. One solid hit and their cover-up would be blown. They are using their real faces, real bodies with fake leaf village clothes and headbands. Heck, I am pretty sure that you would not find these shinobis in any of the bingo books of any village. This would likely be the only time they would be seen.They were trained only for this mission most likely."
"But Why?" Kabuto asked confused. Unlike in canon, where he was taught by Root and Danzo and later by Orochimaru about different schemes and spying, no one had taught him about the true nature of the politics in the shinobi world.
It does not mean that he does not know about the cruelty of the Shinobi world in fact he had witnessed it firsthand as his parents were killed by Shinobi.
But under the care of the orphanage head who took him under her care and gave him his name as well as the multiple friends he made at the orphanage, he was more innocent. But his dream was still the same that was to have his own orphanage that would accept orphans from all countries.
Shikuro answered Kabuto's question "They want to steal the formula and at the same time lay the suspicion on the Hidden Leaf."
"But this country does not even have their own shinobi village so what would they gain by directing their hostility towards us?" Itachi asked
"Firstly, higher-ups ups here are not foolish enough to believe that Leaf just attacked them openly. They would likely have their suspicion but with us trying to use the same fertilizer as their company, they would pretty much be sure that we were responsible for this incident. And Yes you are correct that they would not be able to do anything against us since they don't have the military strength for it."
"But they could still target us by increasing the prices of the goods that we buy from them or collecting more taxes from the merchants who come from the land of fire. This would certainly hurt the economy of our country. This is also one of the reasons why no village tries to take the land of other small countries during a war. Instead, you would see them trying to take land of the larger countries like us who have much more military strength. That's why you should not underestimate the small countries. They can harm us without the use of shinobi and usually, these countries band together to fight against the bigger ones." Shikuro explained to them while keeping an eye on the fight. The guards of the company were managing to hold out but were slowly getting overwhelmed.
Ken who has not spoken anything yet was watching the battle and was trying to see how he would measure against these shinobi. Ken would admit that while he was being overconfident in his skills and even maybe arrogant, he had his skills to back him up. While he was not Jonin level, he was still a tricky opponent even with using just one of his two kekkei Genkais. And while he was overconfident, he knew even if he completely developed and mastered both his kekkei Genkai's he would not be a match for someone like Obito, Madara, or Pain.
Pain destroyed the entire leaf village while Madara nearly killed all the five kages with just some clones. And Obito had countless sharingan which means countless revives for him and Kamui.
But that did not mean he had given up on becoming stronger than them. He already had thought about various ideas to make him able to at least hold his own against these monsters.
And when he saw the battle between the company guards and the disguised shinobis, he knew that he could easily take the chunins and maybe hold for a couple of minutes against a Jonin.
He can simply create a rubber ball around him to protect himself. He doubted any Jonin that was here was capable enough to destroy it.
"So what village do you think they are from?" Ken asked
"Hmm, They are using the basic fire-style jutsu that is available everywhere to keep up their appearances as Leaf shinobi. But their mastery over earth jutsu that they are using to defend themselves is surprisingly good. They are most likely from Iwa. Other villages don't stand to gain anything from this except Iwa and Suna. But Suna would not try to antagonize the Leaf like this since they are suffering a lot from the recent wars and we are 'allied' villages." Shikaru said
"So what's our plan?" Ken asked eagerly hoping for a battle.
"We will have to help the company guards. We can't let them all die otherwise the entire blame will be on Leaf and we won't have any proof that we are innocent not that we are since we have stolen the formula. But destroying the entire company would be disastrous for our company. I would not have let you enter the battle if there were not the guards supporting you all. Go for the chunin enemies while I will quickly deal with the Jonins." Shikuro said removing his gloves as his 'purple' hands came into view.
"Also keep your headbands removed since we don't want confusion among the guards that we are their enemies or not. Now go and stay safe!" Shikuro said as the three genin departed to engage the enemies.
'They are strong enough to handle the chunins but just to be safe I should leave an insect clone, no two clones watching over them.' Shikuro reassured himself as after creating the clones, he himself joined the battle.
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