In Naruto: Reborn with Talent

The evening hours quickly came and with them, the three malevolent signatures finally got to Pieta. Rei was half-wondering if he should just go and kick their ass to the town, fed up with how slowly they moved.

These were supposed to be scouts? They acted like damn tourists!

At least the action started soon enough and the three Awakened Beings, which were surprisingly male. This kinda surprised Rei since Claymores were supposed to be only women and Awakened Beings were just Claymores turned into Yomas by Awakening.

Deciding to uphold gender equality in this situation, Rei stopped caring.

The three malevolent signatures acted like proper scouts and... for some utterly baffling reason decided to just fuck whatever plan their leaders had and engage right of the bat.

If Rei was still doubting if he should save Claymores or try to persuade Yomas to join him, this was the answer. Why would he friggin' need animals incapable of doing basic reconnaissance? Yes, the Yomas were individually stronger than Claymores but they also seemed to possess exactly zero brains...

It was frankly sad to watch for him as a trained ninja. Seeing such incompetence made him a bit murderous.

Unfortunately for the Claymores, Rei didn't intend to interfere more than necessary just yet, so quite a few of them were in for some painful times.

During the wait for these three idiots to show up, Rei actively tried to sense a wider area around the city and found out there are around fifteen other Yomas, each stronger than the three incoming idiots, waiting some ways off from the city.

Interfering now would tip them off to his presence so Rei decided to let the Claymores deal with the three idiots while he watched their performance and judged if they had any worth for his village.

Sure, he would offer them a place anyway as he did to many, many other clans or more well-adjusted and reasonable rogue ninjas but if he would actively seek to improve their situation and help them, now for that they had to possess at least a minimal level of necessary usefulness to him.

Otherwise, they could simply be more cannon fodder for the village. Rei didn't have the time to pay attention to everyone and he obviously would put more effort into people with actual worth.

The first Yoma appeared right in the middle of the town square, looking like a tall bald humanoid with grey skin that resembled something akin to a carapace, swinging around five thin tentacles coming from the back of its head and massacring every human in sight.

Rei did not feel the need to save those humans. They knew well enough that the only reason for Claymores to gather was to hunt Yoma and they usually worked alone. Gathering of just three Claymores was a big reason for worry. Gathering of twenty-four? These people basically chose to stay in what was effectively a war zone so...

The Claymores quickly engaged with the bald humanoid Yoma, making him too busy focusing on them rather than killing the civilians.

The other malevolent signatures were 'hiding' on the roof of two houses, not yet transformed.

One of the Claymores, Flora, Rei thought was her name, found one of the not-really-hiding guys and instantly jumped through the roofs towards him, only to find out the guy actually had an ability to control the Yoki of others, being able to control their bodies.

That made Rei very curious. He never really saw this application of genjutsu.

Because that's what it was at its core. The guy just pushed his own Yoki into the system of his opponent and instead of causing illusions, he took control over their nervous system in a very crude and forceful way.

Yet, nobody in the Elemental Nations would even think of doing something so outrageous. According to the common sense of the Elemental Nations, this was impossible, and yet it was happening right in front of Rei's eyes.

He quickly noted the ability and its basic workings so the researchers in his village could look more into it and possibly recreate it.

The guy was playing with the attacking Claymores but it didn't last long. He got blind-sighted because he was being an idiot and wasn't taking the situation seriously. In a burst of speed, Clare, and this time Rei was certain that was her name as he distantly remembered her being the protagonist of the Claymore series, used a burst of her Yoki to give her arm... correction, to give the not-her arm a boost of speed.

Clare's sword blurred and the control-guy was almost slashed to pieces.

Oh, he seemed all fine and dandy, trying to show a strong front but Rei clearly saw him evading Clare's surprise attack just by a slight margin.

He too quickly decided to transform and took the likeness of a lizard crossed with a turtle... Yeah, Rei stopped using his brain at that point.

Surprisingly, this lizardo-turtle also had tentacles that could lengthen and be used for attacking. It was also incredibly tough as the Claymores had a hard time penetrating its skin no matter how many slashes they landed.

Honestly, the turtle Yoma was not even trying to evade. He just stood in one place and laughed.

And while that fight was going on, the last one from the Yoma recon group transformed into a monster resembling a massive grasshopper crossed with a bee sporting multiple legs. It seemed to also be blind since its eyes were covered in the armor-like carapace.

Of the three idiots, this one was the most disgusting-looking but also appeared to be the smartest. After all, he was the only one not trying to have fun but went for the kill right off the bat.

Rei actually had to intervene for the first time and prevent the Claymores from receiving fatal wounds.

He didn't do much. Just using very subtle and insanely advanced Wind Release to shift the air currents whenever the Grasshopper Yoma attacked, causing its attacks to steer slightly to the side. The Yoma still hit its targets but missed vital places.

Rei also tried to affect the three Yomas with genjutsu but their Yoki was too chaotic for his chakra to have an effect. It was dispelled before it could even take hold.

The following fight was much less dramatic than what would one expect from an anime... Well, Rei knew it was not anime anymore and his experience as a high-tier ninja was screwing the enjoyment out of the battle for him... but it was just so underwhelming!

Sure, both the Claymores and the Yomas moved at high chunin to low-jonin speeds and the Yomas had quite the physical prowess and durability but... Rei expected more.

The Yomas had everything one would expect from a monster. Speed, power, and toughness but almost no technique or tactics. Not to mention any sort of teamwork.

The three idiots could have dealt with the Claymores thrice over by now if they worked together. Instead, they let themselves be controlled by their baser instincts. It was just sad.

Rei almost lost hope for Yomas. What good is above jonin-level physical prowess when they are too lazy to even move from their spot, just letting others hit them?

But there was one signature with the gathering of the fifteen Yomas further away from Pieta that had energy-wise S-rank reserves, and two that actually surpassed average S-rank reserves, so he reserved his final judgment.

For now.

The Claymores had teamwork and technique alongside some special abilities of their own. From what Rei noticed, they were separated into different types. Some were defenders that had stronger healing abilities and some were the offensive types that had... Rei had no idea what. He didn't get that far yet.

The problem with Claymores was that they could not match the physical prowess of these three Yomas. Rei's senses were telling him that energy-wise the strongest three Claymores were on the same level as the Yomas.

In reality, the Claymores were far behind the raw power of the Yomas but they were using their brains and slowly started winning.

What Rei predicted happened though. The Claymores won the fight, killing the three Yomas by exploiting their arrogance and stupidity, and Rei gathered a lot of data from these fights, but most of the weaker Claymores were wounded.

The mix of power levels in the teams enabled all of them to survive as the strong Claymores protected the weaker ones but it also made the battle unnecessarily more complicated for the strong Claymores.

One wrong step and the outcome of this battle could have been the complete opposite. Simply put, the Claymores were lucky the Yomas did not actually try to win.

Rei was not very impressed. These Claymores would need a lot of work if he took them under his banner. But from what he saw of the Awakened Beings, the supposedly former Claymores, Rei was a bit impressed.

If the two above S-ranks in the distance were any indication, Claymores could become real powerhouses if trained well. And who knows? Maybe he could even find a way to give them the power of Awakened Beings without actually having them transform into Yomas.

That day, Rei was going to sleep with a lot of thoughts swirling in his head.

Yes, Claymores had potential... but that was all they currently had. The amount of work necessary to realize this potential was almost not worth it but if every single one of them could become a powerhouse physically rivaling an S-rank ninja...

Alas, Rei couldn't think about it too much. Tomorrow was his time to shine. The fifteen Awakened Beings started stirring once the three idiots were dead and Rei could already predict tomorrow would begin the real battle.

One he didn't intend to sit out.