Kakashi accepted the blood-stained cloth scrap, then bit his thumb and sketched a quick pattern on the ground.
His hands blurred through hand seals—
Summoning Technique!
A puff of smoke.
A small ninken wearing a Konoha headband appeared in the center of the seal.
"What now? Another mission?"
"Pakkun, I need you to track this."
Kakashi held out the cloth.
"I could smell it from half a mile away."
Pakkun wrinkled his nose dramatically.
"Disgusting. Way too much blood."
He sniffed once, then padded off in a specific direction.
"Follow him."
"As expected of Lord Kakashi."
Kiyota Shin hurried after Pakkun, excitement flashing in his eyes.
Tenten shadowed him closely, protecting the client—
but behind the group, Souma quietly let himself fall further back.
"Souma."
A soft voice drifted from a nearby tree.
It was Kasa.
"Switch identities with me using the Transformation Technique," Souma whispered. "Just in case."
"You… Want to switch? But you don't even know proper Transformation. And what about the voice?"
"I've read the theory. Harder things I've figured out; this won't kill me."
"You found something suspicious?"
"Tentatively—no evidence. But that man isn't right.
My intuition says his real target may not be that samurai named Yuichi…
but Kakashi-sensei."
Kasa's pupils shrank.
If someone dared target Kakashi, they must have a plan—and confidence.
"Kakashi-sensei and I have preparations. I don't know exactly what Sensei is planning, but switching places with you reduces the risk."
"…Alright."
Kasa didn't hesitate.
Her Transformation was nearly perfect now, her chakra control drastically improved from earlier months. A typical jōnin wouldn't see through it.
And their "client" was a samurai—no chakra sensing, no detection jutsu.
The switch completed seamlessly.
Souma—now looking like Kasa—moved toward the treeline and melted into it, suppressing his presence.
Moments later, the disguised "Souma" (Kasa) returned to the group.
Kiyota Shin immediately frowned.
"Kakashi-dono, aren't you missing someone? Could she have been ambushed by Yuichi?"
"No," Kakashi replied. "She's skilled at hiding. She's nearby, just concealed."
Kiyota nodded uncertainly.
"But she's only a genius… can she manage?"
"I'm here."
A quiet voice descended from the branches overhead.
Leaves rustled.
Kasa's heartbeat almost stopped—
Souma's imitation of her voice was perfect.
And if he hadn't spoken up, she wouldn't have sensed him at all.
Her ability to completely erase her presence came from her clan's bloodline limit.
He didn't have that.
So what was he?
She also remembered Souma's transformation technique being… abysmal.
Yet now he could mimic pitch and speech patterns flawlessly.
Tenten was equally startled, though she quickly forced herself to accept reality.
Of course Souma could mimic voices without ninjutsu—
He was Souma.
For someone like him, anything other than innate inability was just a matter of minutes of study.
Some people could memorize a jutsu in a week.
Geniuses memorized it in a day.
Souma?
He only needed a glance.
The gulf between prodigy and the rest of the world was brutal.
"Good, then we can continue," Kakashi said smoothly. "The enemy is devious. He injured the other samurai using traps and poison—stay alert."
He shut down Kiyota Shin's excuses with a glance and motioned the team forward.
They left the settlement and continued north.
The direction…
"He's fleeing toward the Land of Iron?" Kakashi murmured.
"That bastard! If not for you, I would never have guessed he'd dare return there!"
Kiyota Shin said, perfectly timed outrage in his voice.
Souma moved swiftly through the canopy, monitoring the area while pushing his sensing ability to its limit.
But—
Nothing.
Not a single foreign chakra signature within range.
Tch.
Too short a range?
Souma frowned.
His sensory talent—granted by the Bodhi Seed—was exceptionally sharp, practically cheating.
But it had one flaw:
High resolution, tiny radius.
Even with his boosted mental strength, he barely reached a kilometer or two.
Then a thought struck him.
Wait… what if…
The idea was absolutely idiotic.
The kind only a gamer would think of.
But idiotic ideas sometimes worked.
When a game couldn't handle high graphics, what did you do?
Lower the graphics settings.
Reduce the resolution, drop texture detail—
and suddenly, the hardware could handle bigger maps.
"…Could sensing work the same way?"
If he didn't need detail—
if he only needed presence—
Then maybe…
Souma focused.
Sensing was an application of mental energy.
Not unlike genjutsu theory.
Souma didn't know genjutsu, but he had studied mental structure under Sarutobi Hiruzen's library.
He couldn't craft a genjutsu…
but adjusting mental output?
That, he could do.
A few seconds later—
It worked.
His sensing radius sharply expanded—nearly double—
but the clarity dropped dramatically.
People were no longer "outlines" with info.
They were… fuzzy blobs of chakra.
Pixelated silhouettes.
Blurry mosaics.
He'd literally lowered the resolution.
Souma exhaled.
"Good enough. I don't need detail. I just need to know whether there are enemies."
Then his expression tightened.
Because now that his range had expanded—
He detected five chakra blobs.
Four were Kakashi's group.
But the fifth…
Trailing them roughly four kilometers back.
Possibly Kakashi's backup plan.
But the other three clusters?
One matched the predicted position of Yuichi.
The remaining two…
"What the hell…? Two more groups?"
He tried to sharpen resolution—but the blurred state made details impossible.
Still, their trajectories didn't overlap.
Three separate unknown forces.
So it's a mantis hunting the cicada… while the oriole waits behind?
Souma accelerated silently along the branches.
Kakashi's ears twitched.
He heard something—
a faint disturbance only someone of his caliber would notice.
Souma had increased his pace.
"Pakkun."
"I'm still with him. The bastard used some drug to mask his scent."
"If I can smell the drug, then we're still on his trail. Keep going."
"Haaa… fine, fine."
Pakkun sped up.
Kiyota Shin didn't suspect a thing.
After all—
Even Kasa hadn't realized Souma had moved far ahead.
Only Kakashi had heard it.
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