We spend another night at our outpost in order to rest properly before starting our journey. Once we wake up the outpost gets destroyed again and we leave for Sunagakure. While traveling I continue training the Eternal Mangekyou, keeping it active for as long as possible. Yesterday I managed twenty minutes, today I kept it activated for half an hour.
When we arrive at Sunagakure we beeline for the Kazekage Tower. The doorman instantly recognizes us and opens the doors for us. Once we ascend to the final floor we find the doors to the Rasa's office open. Rasa is standing, looking out towards Sunagakure from the windowed walls. We all enter and liberally take our seats.
Rasa turns towards us. "You have brought great benefit to Sunagakure. Those imbeciles were unlikely to succeed in their attempt, but their tactics were bringing us heavy losses. Here is your payment, you may leave."
He then proceeds to pull out ten solid gold bars from his coat, setting them on the table one by one. I get up and take one, weighing it with my hand. Should be about one kilogram, so we are getting paid in about ten kilograms of solid gold in this case. I take each bar and seal them away one by one.
I nod at Rasa "Thank you. We will be on our way"
He also nods and then he goes back to watching Sunagakure.
After that exchange we just leave Suna and start heading towards Konoha. On our way out I see a red haired boy giving us a murderous glare. Must be Gaara. I blow him a raspberry and his glare somehow turns even more malicious.
—
We arrive in Konoha at midday. The ninja metropolis has changed a little since we left. Everyone seems to have gone back into their routines, the bread and games having long since ended. Reaching the Hokage's office does not take long, neither the population on the way to the tower nor the guards inside the tower giving us any trouble along the way.
Entering the office we find Hiruzen perched on his chair reading reports. Once he looks over at us he smiles "I am glad you have all arrived safe and sound. Rumors have spread that Itachi attacked your team."
I nod "They are true. Itachi attacked our team and almost eliminated all of us. Sakura managed to paralyze him and then bled him to death."
Hiruzen kindly responds "I am only glad that all of you are safe. Itachi was not a weak shinobi."
We all nod and then he gives each of us a probing look "You may leave, my advice would be to rest."
After that we just left and went towards our home. The first thing I do when we arrive is take the letters from our mailbox. I'll just read them later when we're inside. Once we enter the house we just laze around. Hinata and I are being bums, Sakura has to actually unpack her lab, unable to just leave Hirogi and the sisters to do that for her.
-next day
I've decided to do something I've both sort of forgotten about and put off for some time. I'm asking Hirogi what her clan's super duper super hidden jutsu is supposed to be.
Hirogi takes a deep breath "It's a lightning release sensory jutsu. If used actively it can detect shinobi in a large radius around you. It works by detecting the magnetic fields emanated by living tissue. According to our legends our founder was also able to sense chakra using it, but no one in the clan knew how to do that."
I give her a stare "Then how did we sneak right under you? Shouldn't you have been able to sense us?"
She gulps "None in the clan can use it to detect anything underground. We can only vaguely sense the direction and distance when we are aboveground."
I have a realization. That's how Itachi dodged everything despite being blind. He was using a sensory jutsu. And knowing that fucker he'd probably mastered it well beyond reasonable standards.
- one week later
My routine has now changed a little. After physical training I start training the abilities of my Mangekyou. Amaterasu, Kagutsuchi and Susanoo. Amaterasu slowly begins costing less and creating more flames with practice. Kagutsuchi becomes more natural to use, the flames seemingly becoming more malleable and responsive to my wishes. It's the Susanoo that gives me the most difficulty.
I've trained the Susanoo the most for the past week, and all I managed by the end of the week was to manifest the ribs. Right now I'm standing with them activated while Hinata is aiming her bow right at them. Until now they've resisted everything else we've thrown at them. Physical attacks did nothing, even with the first gate activated. Combination jutsu were also completely ineffective. So we're going for the big guns now.
I nod at Hinata "You can fire, just don't aim for anything too important please"
She solemnly nods and shifts her aim. The instant she lets the arrow go it smashes into my Susanoo with an excruciatingly loud bang. The arrow shattered into dust, the Susanoo still intact. This is pretty neat not gonna lie.