Torches hissed in the damp night as the last earth-clone broke apart into mud.
Okabe dropped from a branch, eyes sweeping the perimeter once, twice, then cutting to the caravan.
"Form up. We move," he said, voice low.
Hirotada almost burst from his wagon. "Move? After that? We should turn back—"
"You hired shinobi to get you to the Capital," Okabe replied, calm slicing through the panic. "That hasn't changed."
The merchant's mouth opened and closed. He glanced at the wagons, then at the dark tree line.
Greed won over fear. He swallowed. "Fine. But double the pace."
"We'll set the pace," Okabe said, already signaling the guards into a tighter shape.
They rolled out within minutes. Renjiro took the forward arc, Kanae the left, Okabe shadowing the right, while Ryusei, blood drying along his collar and his uniform cut through, stretched out on the rear wagon's canvas, one hand glowing faint green as he poured warmth into broken ribs.
The Mystical Palm, more simply called the healing jutsu, flowed, stitch by stitch. Copper on his tongue. Heat under his chest. Breath counting out the pain.
Hirotada climbed up once, nerves frayed. "Boy—are you going to—"
Ryusei tilted his head just enough to show one slit eye. "If I die, you'll hear it. Keep your men walking."
The merchant recoiled at the tone and climbed down without another word.
They made two more miles before Okabe called a rolling halt under a stand of cedar.
No fires. Low voices. Wheels wedged with stones.
"Report," he said.
Renjiro knelt, blade across his thighs. "Clone I had was strong, but dumb. Kept pushing the same angle. We broke it."
Kanae stood straight-backed, eyes ordinary again, no veins, no glow.
"The real body that attacked us was stronger. It went for me first."
Okabe's gaze flicked to Ryusei on the wagon, then back to Kanae. "And you're alive because?"
Kanae paused, just a moment. "Ryusei warned me."
Renjiro's brows lifted. "Huh."
Okabe filed it away without expression.
"New rules. No Byakugan for an hour at a time. We rotate patrols. Renjiro, you take two arcs until sunrise. Kanae, center-left with the guards. I'll hold right and rear. Ryusei, heal and breathe."
"Already doing both," Ryusei murmured, dry.
A little later, footsteps brushed the wagon edge.
Kanae stepped into the shadow of the canvas, voice low enough not to carry.
"You saved me."
Ryusei didn't look up right away. He pushed a last ribbon of Mystical Palm into a cracked rib, felt it set, then let the glow fade. "You're welcome."
Silence. He could feel her studying him, the way her chakra thinned and tightened when she weighed words.
"How did you sense it?" she asked at last. No edge this time, just the question.
"Habit," he said. "And a net."
"A net."
"A thin field within five, six meters. Worthless at distance, but nothing steps inside without touching the strings."
"You didn't mention it before."
"You didn't ask." He turned his head then, narrow eyes catching the faint shine in hers.
"You've been running your Byakugan all day. It slows you before you notice. At night, that gap gets you killed."
Her jaw tightened, the smallest show of pride against truth. "I know."
"Good." His mouth curved. "Consider this my invoice."
"For saving me?" she said, cold again.
"For not saying 'I told you so.'"
A pause. If it were anyone else, she might have bristled. Instead: "Hn."
Ryusei leaned back against the wagon post, half-smile still tugging.
"Guess we've got a running tab now. You save me, I save you, repeat until we lose count. Call it a connection if you want."
Her chakra flickered faintly, like a ripple quickly buried.
She didn't answer, only shifted her gaze to the road ahead.
Ryusei chuckled under his breath. "Don't look so grim. It's not a curse. Just means you're stuck with me a little longer."
Her eyes flicked back once, cool as ever, though her voice dropped a notch lower.
"Then try not to make it harder than it already is."
Before he could press that, a faint crunch of gravel carried from the right.
Renjiro's chakra brushed the edge of his net; he had circled close, probably catching the tail end of Ryusei's laugh if not the words before it.
By the time Renjiro padded over, grin already on his face, Kanae had stepped half a pace aside, her posture unreadable.
"So we're just… not going to talk about how a 'mystery jōnin' decided to box with Ryusei instead of frying him on the spot?"
"Some people prefer the classics," Ryusei said. "He wanted it fast, quiet, and cheap."
Renjiro snorted. "Cheap didn't work out."
Okabe arrived last, arms folded.
He looked from the cut across Kanae's bangs to the bruising along Ryusei's ribs.
"Assessment?"
Ryusei let the medic light bloom faintly over torn muscle, answering with proof.
Then: "Main body was… low jōnin after splitting. He kept it taijutsu to save chakra. I baited him, traded blows, and when he felt his clones drop, he broke off."
"Clean ground. No ninjutsu marks," Okabe said.
"He chose not to escalate," Ryusei replied. "Which means he didn't want noise, not that he couldn't make it."
Okabe studied him a moment longer, then nodded.
"We finish the contract. Then a sealed report goes to the Hokage. I'll send a short burst now: 'engagement, unknown jōnin, convoy intact.' No details over open lines."
He moved into the trees. A muted flare pulsed once, then faded.
Kanae lingered. Her eyes dropped to his hand, still faintly warm.
"You traded injury for injury… counting on healing it."
"Counting enough."
"That's reckless," she said, but the edge was dull.
"Efficient," he corrected.
She looked like she might argue, then didn't. "Rest. I'll cover your flank for the next stretch."
He watched her go, shoulders squared, step steady, one lock of hair shorter than the rest where the kunai had cut.
The corner of his mouth lifted.
Renjiro leaned on the wagon rail. "You two are weird."
"Work with what you're given," Ryusei said, closing his eyes.
The caravan rolled before dawn, wheels wrapped with cloth, guards moving like ghosts.
Hirotada didn't open the curtain again.
When the road widened toward the Capital routes, towns spreading near the fields, the man finally dared a whisper as he walked by the wagon.
"You… you'll keep this quiet? If word spreads, investors will—"
Okabe's look shut him up. "Your job is to arrive. Ours is to make sure you do."
Ryusei let the road's rhythm carry him.
Heat pulsed once more through his palm; pain settled back into a dull ache.
Plans clicked into place like stones on a board: a sealed report with just enough truth, a merchant who would never dare say more, teammates recalibrated by a brush with death, and a certain masked "stranger" whose existence would stay where it belonged, for now, in the dark.
He opened one eye as Kanae passed the wagon again on her loop, her glance snagging on him for half a second before sliding away.
"Try not to die before we get to the Capital," she said without looking.
"I'll schedule it for after delivery," he answered.
"Hn."
The wheels creaked on. Dawn thinned the trees.
And the gold kept its secrets, silent under canvas, as if it hadn't just become the axis of a much larger game.