3 3. Trouble
[Emergency Quest: Survive the upcoming ordeal
Rewards: Growth Serum]
Akio ignores the alert and crosses his arms to brace for the impact.
After a few seconds, he slowly opens his eyes as the expected impact never came.
"Huh?!"
Swoosh… swoosh…
The shadow leaps towards the trash can and rummages through it. It gathers pieces of leftover food to eat.
"Who's there?"
Akio narrows his eyes to inspect the shadow.
Ah…
The shadow raises its head and hides in a corner, but Akio is able to get a glimpse of the outline of the shadow.
"It's a kid!"
Gathering his courage, he picks up a lantern from the nearby window and slowly and carefully walks towards the shadow.
Noticing the approaching light, the shadow is startled and tightly hugs its body like a fetus.
Akio shines the lamp on the dark corner and notices a boy around six years of age. The boy has short brown hair and black, almond-shaped eyes. He is dressed in tattered robes.
The boy anxiously hides in a corner as he mutters.
"Don't kill me! Don't kill me! I don't want to die, please don't kill me!"
'He stinks!'
Akio pinches his nose.
"Don't worry, I am not here to kill you!"
He gently stretches his arms.
---------------
A few minutes later,
Nom… Nom…
The brown-haired boy is hungrily munching down on the food as Kaori and Akio watch him from the other side of the table.
"Mom! Those are my clothes." Akio complains.
"They are your old clothes which don't fit you anymore, so I gave them to him after washing him up. You brought him here, so you have to take the responsibility!"
"Fine!" Akio helplessly nods his head.
"Is he an orphan?"
Kaori turns towards Akio.
"No idea!" He shakes his head.
"I found him in the alley scavenging trash to look for food. So, I took pity on him and invited him here. Is it a bad thing?"
"No! You did well. There are many orphans in the world whose parents died in wars or battles. So, to be able to help even a single kid is paving the way for a better world. At least, that's what I believe?" Kaori nods.
'That's an idealistic view in this cruel world, but if there were no gentle souls in this world, then it would have perished long ago!'
Mm…
Akio turns towards the brown-haired kid as the kid is gnawing on the food.
'I wonder if I can see the status of other people.' He muses to himself.
Swish…
A status window appears in front of him as he stares at the kid.
Name: Tenzo Iburi
Race: Human (Modified)
Age: 6 years, 8 months
Class: None
Physique: Smoke Body (Damaged)
Combat Strength: Chunnin
Title: None
Strength: 15 Vitality: 60 Agility: 13 Dexterity: 10 Endurance: 17 Resilience: 22 Stamina: 15 Chakra: 25
Special skill: Wood Release (partially awakened) (Adds +50 vitality, +5 endurance, +10 resilience, +5 stamina, +5 chakra)
'Holy shit!'
Akio almost jumps in shock as he notices the stats of the brown-haired boy.
'And here I thought I was cheating with that +15 dexterity, but damn he is hacking! What's with that ridiculous stats boost?!'
Akio stares at the brown-haired boy with his wide-open eyes.
Ah…
The boy weakly raises his head as he feels an intense gaze on him.
Bam…
Kaori slaps Akio's forehead and chides him.
"Stop looking at him as if he is an exotic species. He is like any other boy of your age. If only you would go out and interact with other children of your age rather than being cooped up in the house all day."
"Then who will take care of the shop?" He snorts and turns his head away.
Kaori warily shakes her head and gently turns to the brown-haired boy.
"What's your name?" She sweetly smiles at him.
"I… I do… don't know!" The boy shakes his head in fear.
"It's fine if you don't know your name. Tomorrow morning, we will contact the orphanage and check your name," Kaori assures him as gently pats his head.
Akio momentarily glances at them and reopens the menu.
'He has all those stats thanks to the Wood Release, but as far as I know about Naruto; no one should have Wood Release besides the First Hokage in this era. Wait, a sec! There was someone else, who did!'
Akio recalls the image of an adult Yamato from his memories.
He slowly overlaps the image of Yamato with the brown-haired boy. Noticing the similarities, between two;
"YAMATO!!"
Akio jumps in shock as he yells the name.
"Yamato!!"
The brown-haired boy and Kaori turn towards him.
"Hmm… that's a good name!" She nods her head.
"Until we find your real name; we will call you Yamato."
"Y… Y-a-m-a-t-o!"
The boy slowly mumbles the name and nods his head.
"Good, you liked it!" Kaori happily nods her head.
'No! That's not what I meant to say. Since he is that 'Yamato'; then that can only mean one thing; he is trouble, huge trouble!'
Rustle… rustle…
As if on cue, the roof of the house rattles as the trio hear footsteps quickly moving away from their house.
Hmm…
Kaori frowns and raises her head.
"It's good that I have house insurance or else I would be drowned in debt by the amount of money I would have to pay for the damage caused by these impatient shinobis."
She turns towards Yamato, who is shivering with fear.
"You don't have to worry about anything. After eating your fill, you can sleep with Akio in his room."
"Mm…"
Yamato weakly nods his head.
'I don't think it would be that easy!'
Akio silently stares at the invisible mission notification on his reticle.
[Emergency Quest: Survive the ordeal without raising any suspicion of the Root]
'I knew it!'
Akio gazes out of the window as he notices a few anbu quickly flickering through the roofs of Konoha.
'Forget about the rest of the enemies. Currently, Danzo is the only main villain in my life. If he figures out about the system; then I am sure the last thing I will see would be the creepy face of Orochimaru and Danzo as they dissect my brain!'
Brr…
A shiver runs down his spine at the mere mention of such a scenario.
'I have to get rid of this plague tomorrow.'
Akio stares at Yamato with a not-so-friendly gaze.
Umm…
Yamato tilts his head in confusion at the change in Akio's expression.
Clap…
"Alright! It's time for you to sleep."
Kaori claps her hand to get their attention.
"Fine!"
Akio grumbles and leads Yamato towards the bedroom.
Kaori stares at their back and mumbles to herself.
"I can't understand the maturity of this kid. Sometimes, he acts like an adult, but other times he will behave how an eight-year-old should be like?"
Click…
Kaori switches off the lights and pulls down the blind as she throws the last gaze out of the window.
Inside Akio's room…
Akio silently stares at Yamato, who is soundly sleeping on his bed.
"This guy… he fell asleep as soon as he lied down on the bed."
Akio shakes his head in dismissal.
"He must have escaped from one of the Orochimaru's lab and sneaked into the village to take shelter.
However, from the looks of it; Danzo and his goons somehow found about it and now they are looking for his trails."
"Damn, what a headache! I wanted to live peacefully and grow strong while selling and collecting weapons, but what's the deal with this rough start?"
He pulls his hair in dismay.
------------------
On the roof of a nearby house,
Whoosh… whoosh… whoosh…
Multiple anbus with demonic masks gather around.
Swish… swish…
One of them makes some hand signals and gestures to others.
[Any lead]
The other anbu member makes some hand signals and shakes his head.
[The trail end at this location, but there is no sign of the target!]
Another anbu member makes some hand signals and gestures to them to disperse.
[We can't keep Danzo-sama waiting! We have to find the target before the sunrise or else we might raise the suspicion of the Police Force and the ANBU unit.]
Swoosh… swoosh… swoosh…
The root members quickly flicker away from the spot.
A few seconds later,
A tall man with brown eyes, olive skin, short spiky hairs arrive at the previous gathering spot of the Root Anbus.
"Looking at those demonic masks, these people must be the members of the Root since the Anbu unit under Hokage-sama wears masks with animal faces.
From their anxious looks, I can see that they are searching for something or someone. I must quickly inform Hokage-sama!"
Whoosh… whoosh…
The tall man quickly flickers towards the Sarutobi clan with an urgent look.
At the entrance of the Sarutobi clan,
Hmm…
The guards recognize his identity and let him in as they whisper among themselves.
"The young head is in such a hurry, looks like there is an urgent situation which requires Hokage-Sama's attention."
