11 Chapter 11: B-rank mission part 1

I was waiting for the two girls to continue, but it seems like they though they had explained all they needed, and was looking at me for a reaction.

So a few moments passed without any progress in the conversation, before I was the first to succumb to the silence:

"We got a B-rank mission?" I asked.

The both nodded, as if that was enough information. Wary of a repeat of what had just happened, I asked more about it:

"What are the details about this mission?" I asked, hoping for more information from my two teammates.

Both Shira and Yugao looked at each other, hoping the other one would have the information needed to answer my question. When they realized that none of them knew more details, they both looked away embarrased.

"The mission is a joined mission between team 02 and team 42" A voice came from outside my house. Recognizing that voice to be Ibiki, I knew our teacher had arrived as well.

"The fire Daimyo will take a few trips around the fire country a few times each year, and when he comes to Konoha, there is a tradition that the best genin team will escort him here." Ibiki said

"Wow, are you saying that we are the best genin team?" Yugao screamed out, very exited.

Ibiki looked at us, smiling and said: "Oh no, not at all. Team 02 is by far the most accomplished and strongest team new genin team in Konoha."

"Then why are we included in this mission? If team 02 is so good?" Shira asked, placing on a thick layer of sarcasm for the last part of her talk.

Ibiki looked at us all, clearly noticing Shira's sarcasm. He then proceeded to answer: "Because I requested us to be part of the mission, as support."

We nodded in understanding, before Ibiki continued: "Team 02 will have a mission to escort the Fire Daimyo from his home to Konoha. Because I think were ready, as a team, to take on a B rank mission, I have requested us to be part of the mission. Our role in this mission is to stay hidden, and provide support to team 02 from the shadows.

We are expected to be at the Hokage tower in 30 minutes, for mission briefing and assignment. Collect your things and get ready to meet in the tower at that time."

And with that Ibiki disappeared in a storm of leaves.

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We were shown into the Hokage office after a short wait. Ibiki announced us as we entered:

"Team 42 reporting as ordered" Ibiki said.

"Welcome" Hiruzen said, and continued: "This is team 02. You will have time after this to get to know each other. But first lets go over the mission assignment."

Inside the hokages office was another team present, as we walked in. I assumed this was the famous team 02. Before the teams could really observed each other, the Hokage started to talk again, pretty much demanding our attention.

"The mission this time is ranked as a B rank mission. Thus there is a high chance to encounter hostile ninja. You should expect ninja, so plan accordingly.

Team 02's objective is to safely escort the Fire daimyo from his home to Konoha. The Fire daimyo is expecting his escort to be at his home in 3 days, to be able to reach that I suggest you leave Konoha no later than tomorrow morning.

Team 42 will act as support, thus leaving team 02 in charge of the mission. As this is an unusual assignment, team 42 should stick to the shadows, unless you have to engage.

Any questions?" Hiruzen said

The jonin for team 02, Yuki Minazuki, said: "Do we have any intel about specific threats, that we could encounter?"

"Nothing specific, but a few groups of missing nin from Kirigakure has been spotted operating in the fire country, but unfortunately that is nothing unusual." Hiruzen answered.

Hiruzen waited a few moment, but no more questions or comments was asked.

"With that you are all dismissed to detail plan your mission" Hiruzen said, and made a hand gesture to dismiss us.

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As we were leaving the Hokage tower, Yuki Minazuki stopped us all, and suggested that we all met up in an unused training ground to get to know each other better. To both be able to get a better teamwork up and running, and to be able to come up with the best strategies.

We met up a training ground 4, which is the training ground used by team 02 for most of their training.

As we arrived I got my first real look at who was part of team 02.

The jonin of team 02 was your typical mid-20 man. As age was strange in this world, he was probably older than this. It is something I have noticed, most people look much younger than they are, when the are grown up, but when they are younger they look much older. Its something strange about this world, although I speculate that it has something to do with chakra. I think chakra effects the body in such a way, that it matures faster, but retains it fighting peak for longer. Take Hiruzen as an example. When he died in the anime, he was 70 years old, and he died in a fight with a sanin and two previous hokages, where he was fighting them all to a standstill. I know the Orochimaru was unable to fully utilize the two hokages, but Hiruzen was still super powerful at 70 year old.

Anyway back to the jonin of team 02. I don't remember him from the anime at all, but he looks like your average Konoha jonin. He was wearing the standard Konoha jonin attire. He had brown hair, the length of his hair was all the way down to his shoulders. He had tied the hair into a ponytail, which was a popular hairstyle with many jonin I had seen until now. My impression of him was that he was no one special or important to the overall plot of the story, but for right now he was probably the strongest guy assigned for this mission.

The 3 genin for team 02 was more interesting, or at least one of them was. Let us start with the two I didn't recognize from the group.

The first one was named Tenma Izumo. If I didn't know better, then I would have expected that he was the child of Yuki Minazuki. The looked almost identical, if you add 15 years to Tenma. He had a bit shorter hair, and proudly displayed his forhead protector on his forhead. From his introduction he was a frontline fighter, but used speed over strength. Using speed to flank and confuse his enemy, while others can support from further away. He also seemed to be the oldest of the genin here. I think he is 13 years old.

The second one was named Shinko Inari. This was the only female on team 02. She also had brown hair tied into two rat tails, placed parallel with her shoulders. She was wearing a bandana version of the forhead protector, which hid the top of her head. From what she said she focused most on medical ninjutsu, although she was still early in her training. She could not use the more advanced healing jutsu, but she could bandage and perform beginner level first aid.

The last person on the team, was one anyone who had watched the anime would recognize. Although it took me a bit to get there myself. He was looking so much younger than what was shown in the anime. Itachi Uchiha. He was by far the youngest assembled here. He was just 8 years old. Although I am unsure if he has awakened his sharingan yet, he introduced himself. He was focusing mostly on ranged combat, as that fit best into this team. He also mentioned that he was skilled in Uchiha taijutsu, and was focusing on developing his genjutsu. I know from the anime that he was talented into fire jutsu and had the crow summoning jutsu at this point, although he didn't mention it during his introduction. I guess he wanted to keep some of his ability secret from us or his teammates.

After our team introduced it self as well, we started brainstorming and training combined formations for the mission. As we were leaving tomorrow, we didn't have much time to refine the formations. The training resulted in only two usable formation. One for close combat focus, and one for long ranged focus, to avoid confusion we just called them formation 1 and 2.

Formation 1 was used for close combat. It involved me and Yugao going up close to confront the enemy directly from the front. Tenma would use his speed up close, to flank and disrupt the enemy. Itachi will be at mid range, supporting where the need is, as he can help in both close and ranged combat. Shira and Shinko will stay a long range, Shira to both protect Shinko and to provide information to the rest of the team. Shinko will stay behind to provide support, as she is the only medical expert we have.

The Second formation, switches things around a little. Yugao will be the only one engaging directly from the front, but in this formation Yugao takes on a defensive stance. Tenma will still flank and confuse the enemy. I, Itachi and Shira will stay at medium range, to attack at range, or move around to what is needed. Shinko will hide herself at long range, and support if the opportunity is there.

As Tenma is the oldest and most experienced we decided that, if the situation arises, he will act as the captain of our two groups.

After using most of the day to train with the two teams, we decided to split up to get ready for early departure tomorrow.

As we were about to split up, I motioned for Itachi to follow me, and he did. I had a favor to ask, and he would be the best person to help me with a task. This period of the mission would also be perfect to help with this task.

The rest of our teams, moved away towards their homes. Me and Itachi stayed behind.

"You wanted to talk about something?" Itachi asked.

"Yes, I was hoping to get your help with something, and maybe I can help you with something in return" I said.

"Tell me more" Itachi said.

"You are the first person, that I have gotten into contact with, that is skilled in genjutsu. As I myself have no talent in genjutsu, I want to practice how to get out, or even resist genjutsu." I said.

"When we have time together during the mission, I can help you with that" Itachi said, with no real emotion in his speak.

"Thank you, if you ever need help with something that I can do, don't hesitate to ask" I answered to Itachi, trying to be as friendly as possible.

Itachi didn't say anything more, but nodded before turning around to go home.

I walked home to pack for our departure tomorrow.

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*Time skip, next day*

I arrived 5 minutes before departure time, at the Konoha gates. I was apparently the last person to do so. Everyone was carrying a backpack, which in my case was filled with plenty of storage scrolls. We were planning to stay in the wilderness for about two nights, before arriving at our destination. Thus we had a lot of camping equipment with us as well. Basic survival in wilderness is essential for any ninja.

As we departed, we took up a standard traveling formation. Shira and Shinko was traveling in the middle, while Itachi and myself was at the back. Yugao and Tenma traveled in the front. Our two teachers was hiding, and traveling unseen along side us. We were making good progress, and nothing major happened on our first two days of travel, like this.

When we made camp on the first night, I had Itachi help me with my genjutsu training. I don't remember all they way's one can resist or break a genjutsu, but I remember some of them. Also I did get some basic training about genjutsu and how to counter them, but that wouldn't work for more skilled genjutsu users.

I remember that one of the basic way to break genjutsu, is to have someone else inject chakra into you, to disturb the chakra flow. This is why jinchuriki are pretty much immune to genjutsu, as the tailed beast inside can disrubt the chakra flow of their host. That is not really an option for me, so I need to look elsewhere.

The other common way to break a genjutsu, is to experience pain. This approach requires that the user is aware about being caught in a genjutsu, and any really talented genjutsu user will be skilled enough to catch someone unaware.

The best option from what I can estimate, is to avoid getting caught in the genjutsu in the first place. However this also presents another set of challenges. To avoid a genjutsu, you need to avoid the point of entry of the opponents chakra. This is usually based on eyesight or sound. However in the anime, Itachi was shown to be able cast genjutsu from his fingers, so there is no universal good way to avoid genjutsu.

The plan I came up with, and what I wanted to have Itachi's help with, is my two pronged plan to avoid genjutsu, using skills I have. The first line of defense is to train my eyes to resist and recognize genjutsu. In the anime, Deidra showed that he could train his eyes to resist genjutsu. I don't know how he did it, but I am hoping repeated exposure to genjutsu will help me figure it out.

The second part of my genjutsu resistance plan is to use fuinjutsu to created a seal, that can stimulate my pain receptors and have it tattooed on my body. While for now, this is still to advanced for me, it should not be to far in the future, before I can make such a shield. I hope that I will be able to make the seal with an autoresponse to foreign chakra invading my body.

So I had Itachi casting genjutsu and breaking them, on me for a few hours that evening. While it did get easier and easier to see the genjutsu, and recognize it, I didn't get any idea or clue about how to train eyes to resist genjutsu.

At the end of the first evening, I had made progress, but it became clear to me that this training requires much more time than what I originally thought. Another unexpended gain was that Itachi seems to be opening up to me more. He told me that this was also good training for him. I expect he is training in his genjutsu at the same time.

The second day, and evening was similar to the first day. More walking and more training.

However in the middle of the third day, we finally arrived to the home of the Fire Daimyo.

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As we were arriving at the home of the Fire Daimyo, we were stopped by some guards. They don't seem to be ninja, but we all sensed the guards were strong, strong enough for us not to mess with them.

"Identify yourselves" Guard 1 said, while having his hand on a sword still in its holster.

"We are Konoha ninja, coming to escort the Fire Daimyo to his yearly trip to Konoha" Yuki, as the highest ranked ninja, took up communication with the guards.

"You are early. We expected you to arrive later today." Guard 2 said, before he continued: "As such you will have to wait for entrance, until the designated time."

"What?" Yuki said: "What are we supposed to do until that time? Can you just let us in already?"

Thus Yuki and the two guards, started a long argument, resulting in us having about 4 hours to kill, before we could be let in.

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Four hours later, that we spend resting, we were finally let into the home of the Daimyo. Only to once again be stopped by the next level of security. Here we got another surprise. While we were expected to arrive today, and we had expected that we could set of again quickly with the Fire Diamyo. This turned out not to be the case. While the Fire Daimyo had insisted we be here today at this time, he did not have any intention of setting of today. In reality when we arrived, we were informed that everything was now here, and the Fire Diamyo would start to prepare for departure. And this was apparently not a quick preperation.

Thus we found ourselves with an estimated week of waiting time, before we could set out again.