Sunagakure Cemetery

Upon returning to the village of Sunagakure, Takara wasted no time and went to deliver the mission to receive the reward. He wanted to visit Maki's grave at least once before heading to the chunin exams in Konoha.

"Did you manage to complete the mission in the Land of Waves?" the mission officer asked in surprise upon receiving the dwarf magnate's head and confirming its authenticity.

"You know, that tone of surprise is always annoying to hear," Takara commented with a slightly offended voice, his expression hidden behind his characteristic mask. "Is this... what, the fourth time in a row? You should try to be more professional."

"It was a B-rank mission, and you're just a solo genin, how am I not supposed to be surprised that you managed to complete it?" the mission officer thought without words.

"Oh, by the way," Takara took out another additional scroll and handed it over.

"What is this time?" the officer asked as he reached out to take it.

"The head of two rogue ninja from Kirigakure along with one of the Seven Mist Swords, the Kubikiribocho," said Takara.

He already had a small mountain of metal in his workshop and only needed blood to get more, so delivering the genuine one did not weigh on him in the slightest.

As for the heads, obviously, he was going to get them before turning the bodies into trees, if he wouldn't lose money!

"Wait!" the officer almost dropped the scroll from how shocking the news was for him. "Did you say the Kubikiribocho?" upon seeing Takara nod, the officer didn't waste any time and examined the scroll's content right there and then.

When the sword the size of a door appeared in the mission office, most of the staff and ninja who were delivering or taking missions turned around with curiosity.

"For the Sage's sake..." the officer ran his hand over the metal and could tell at a glance that it was genuine, those weapons had too much fame not to be able to recognize them with his work.

Remembering that it was not the only thing stored inside the scroll, he went to the back and compared the heads.

"The head of the Demon of the Mist and his henchman?!" the officer felt like his rank as a chunin was a joke at this point. "What a monster, no wonder old lady Chiyo vouches for him..."

It took him a moment to compose himself and return to Tanaka.

"I'll need a report of what happened," said the mission officer seriously.

Takara already expected that reaction, so he handed over the report he already had in hand and let him read it quickly.

"Kakashi, the copy ninja? Did Konoha take the money from the target? Did they take the nine-tails jinchuriki out of the village?" the officer got an idea of the general picture and looked at Takara. "Is this true?"

"Remind me once that I haven't reported in detail every event on a mission," Takara replied in a flat tone.

The officer could almost see the eyebrow raising through the mask, threateningly!

"I-I see," the officer felt like he would need a drink at the end of today's shift. "Give me a second, I'll give you the payment for the mission. As for these extra merits... I have to discuss it with the superiors."

"I expected that," Takara took the envelope with the money and left the place, ignoring everyone's reactions.

He didn't go home to rest, but walked until he reached the village's cemetery and carefully cleaned Maki's tombstone. After leaving it as shiny as a mirror, he took out some flowers he had collected on the way back and left them on top.

"Takara?"

Hearing a voice calling him, he turned his head and saw a blonde kunoichi who, from the cloth in her hand, seemed to have come to clean a tomb from the sand.

"Temari, visiting your mother's grave?"

"Yes…" Temari looked at the tombstone in front of Takara and answered somewhat uncomfortable in her heart.

Her mother's tomb and Maki's were quite close, so she used to run into Takara often when he came to clean it every time he returned from a mission outside.

Although they didn't interact too much, they could at least consider each other friends.

She was the first to notice the change in the air around her friend after Maki's death and being aware that it was her father's selfishness fault, she didn't know how to face him when she saw him.

She could feel Takara's great resentment towards her father, so she was very confused when the next thing he did was help Gaara to be able to sleep.

She wanted to think about other things, but it didn't help that her brother Kankuro seemed obsessed with trying to figure out how Takara's highly realistic puppets worked.

Maybe she was a bit affected by discovering that the girls she adored from the Ninja Academy, Ram and Rem, were actually puppets that Takara had created.

"Why don't your brothers ever help you?"

"I'm the eldest, it's my responsibility," Temari responded as she walked forward.

The truth was that Gaara was not mentally prepared to come to this place, while Kankuro preferred to deal with mechanical arms. Not even their father seemed to have visited his wife's grave since Gaara's birth.

Takara remained silent and let her clean in peace as he turned his gaze back to Maki's grave, lost in his thoughts.

He had thought more than once about using the forbidden technique he recently obtained from Orochimaru, the Edo Tensei, to retrieve Maki.

But... he was reluctant to do it, feeling that she would not be happy to become something like that.

Nor did he have the obsession of Nox, to go back in time and prevent his loss. He hadn't even been able to unlock Xelor's time spells yet; they consume too much chakra.

He just... needed to collect chakra, a lot of chakra.