Chapter 261 - 265: The First Night with Konan

Natsuki stood and went down to Nara Shikaku’s office.

"Lord Hokage." Shikaku was on his feet immediately.

"Gather every computing talent in the shinobi world," Natsuki said, straight to it.

He’d had people working on an internet before, but with limited staff and even more limited attention from him.

Now that the whole world answered to him, it was time to concentrate the effort.

Because life with an internet was, frankly, better. In his previous life you couldn’t get through a day without one. And with peace finally settled here, the shinobi world was overdue.

There were serious applications beyond entertainment, too. Commerce, for one.

Though for Natsuki personally, entertainment was the point. Having games to play when there was nothing to do would be excellent.

Leaving Shikaku’s office, Natsuki went to the Anbu compound.

He found the records room and pulled what he wanted: the roster of Konoha’s missing-nin, going back years.

The file was thorough. Detailed histories, portraits, everything.

Reading through it, he found that a great many of them had already been captured or killed — largely his own doing. The Shinobi World Police Force had swept the world under Minato and Nagato, and rogue ninja turned up in a sweep like that got dealt with.

A small number were still unaccounted for. The world was large. Hiding a handful of people in it wasn’t difficult.

For Natsuki, though, anyone still alive and still in this world couldn’t hide.

He closed his eyes and brought up Observation Haki.

The portraits helped — they gave him something to match against. His perception spread across the entire shinobi world in a single beat.

A moment later, he made a small sound of surprise.

Every last one of them was in the same place.

The underground black market.

"That’s an oversight on my part," Natsuki said, opening his eyes.

He’d taken the Daimyo and the key industries and forgotten the black market entirely.

Its reach wasn’t trivial. In the original story it had driven plot in its own right — Kakuzu being the obvious example, though Natsuki’s interference had pulled Kakuzu out of it long ago.

It was a genuine liability. First, because it competed with the villages for contract work. Second, because its contracts and bounties recognized no limits at all, which made shinobi from every major village into targets.

"Good time to deal with all of it at once."

He closed the file, found the nearest Anbu operative, and set them to identifying who stood behind the market.

The Anbu had Otsutsuki Kaguya now. Finding a name wouldn’t be difficult.

Natsuki returned to his office. A knock came shortly after.

"Come in."

Konan stepped through the door.

"Did you get my order?" Natsuki said first. "Just give it to Kaguya."

"Received, and already passed along." Konan paused. "Kaguya has formally joined the Anbu. Her duties match mine."

"Mm." Natsuki drew her in. "Good work."

"I’d like a reward," Konan said, pulling off her mask and looking directly at him.

The contrast between the request and the completely level way she delivered it did something to him.

Maybe the time had come, Natsuki thought.

She’d learned a great deal by now. There was only one thing left on the curriculum.

He stood, lifting her with him, and opened a doorway.

They came out in a room, and Konan blinked, briefly confused, because it was hers.

She lived in the Anbu dormitory on the compound — though "dormitory" undersold it. As head of the Anbu, she had a two-story wooden house to herself.

"Let’s take a bath," Natsuki said.

Konan took a second to catch up. When she did, her composure gave out and color flooded her face.

"Mm." Her pulse was going hard, but she stayed organized about it. "I’ll wash your back."

Natsuki set her down, and the two of them went through.

The rest of the night was hers and his, and by the end of it there was nothing left on the curriculum for him to teach her.

Afterward, Konan fell asleep against him, thoroughly spent.

Natsuki brushed the damp hair off her forehead, looked at her flushed face, and couldn’t help smiling.

Then he paused.

He set her down, threw on a robe, and went to the door.

He opened it, and outside — some distance from the step — Pakura and Uchiha Mikoto both froze.

"Well, you found the place. You may as well stay the night." Natsuki was grinning.

"You never mentioned Konan would be here," Pakura said, mouth twisting.

"I don’t mind either way," Mikoto said gently.

The two of them had arranged yesterday to come and find him tonight. Konan being involved meant he hadn’t been in the office. They’d tried the Senju compound, confirmed he wasn’t there either, and worked their way here.

What they hadn’t anticipated was being spotted before they could knock.

"This is exactly why he gets away with everything," Pakura told Mikoto.

"Then let’s start with you," Natsuki said, raising an eyebrow.

"Hmph." Pakura walked past him into the house, refusing to concede anything.

She glanced at the sleeping Konan and then ignored her entirely.

Mikoto came in behind her and shut the door.

Konan woke a while later and, once she’d taken in the situation, decided she had no objection to any of it.

It made for a very long night.

The next day. 9:00 AM. The Hokage’s office.

Natsuki was reading a report — Kaguya’s findings on the underground black market.

Her efficiency was impressive. She’d finished in under a day.

Not that it was surprising. With her capabilities, working out who stood behind the market required roughly one glance.

Konan stood a little way off, watching him.

Last night kept surfacing in her mind. All of it — being alone with him, and then Mikoto and Pakura arriving.

"Konan." Natsuki looked up from the file.

She came back to herself.

"Have the Anbu take these people into custody." He indicated several names. "They’re who’s behind the market."

None of them were shinobi. They were senior nobles from the five great nations.

Natsuki hadn’t been surprised. Producing that volume of contracts and bounties required backing from either the five great villages or the five great nations. Given how many shinobi from those villages were on the market’s bounty lists, the nations were the obvious answer.

The Daimyo were already his. That left the nobility.

"Once they’re secured, have them dissolve the market," Natsuki added.

"Yes, Natsuki-sensei."

"Notify the Anbu first." He smiled. "When you’re back, you and I are taking a trip there."

He wanted every Konoha missing-nin dealt with before the market dissolved.

The market held plenty of missing-nin from elsewhere, of course. Those could be left to the Alliance.

Konan left at speed and returned before long.

Natsuki came over and opened a portal.

They stepped out at the underground black market in the Land of Fire and walked in.

"Are you here to place a contract or accept one?" A staff member came forward, smiling.

"Place one." Natsuki was casual about it. "But I’ll be specifying the shinobi who take it. Seven of them."

"Absolutely!" The man’s smile widened considerably.

Naming a specific shinobi was already expensive. Naming seven at once was extraordinary.

With the contract filed, Natsuki and Konan went outside the settlement, and he spread a rug on the ground.

"They’ll take a while to get here." He sat down. "We wait."

The seven he’d named were all Konoha missing-nin, and this was where he’d arranged the meeting.

"Come here." He waved Konan over.

She sat down beside him and let him put an arm around her, and the two of them waited.

An hour later, seven figures came into view in the distance.

Natsuki raised a hand and flicked his fingers.

Seven bolts of lightning tore out, sharpening into arrows that punched through seven hearts. None of them had time to register anything before they hit the ground dead.

[Congratulations! Host has unlocked Emiya Shirou’s Template Ability 2: Projection Magecraft — Rule Breaker.]

Natsuki nodded.

Another template fully unlocked. Three left.

Back in the Hokage’s office, he stroked his chin.

Of the three remaining, two were purely a matter of time.

More accurately, all three were — but one of them he could start working on immediately.

Yhwach’s Ability 3: The Almighty.

Besides himself, the Hidden Leaf currently held four Six Paths-level individuals.

Three he’d made personally: Tsunade, Kushina, and Nonou. Tsunade had absorbed Otsutsuki Isshiki’s power. Kushina and Nonou had taken the two Tenseigan.

The fourth was Kaguya, newly on the payroll.

If five wasn’t enough to satisfy the condition, he’d simply make more.

Natsuki thought of Nagato.

Since mastering the Rinnegan, Nagato had come close to the Six Paths line. He wasn’t quite there.

Natsuki intended to close that gap with the Yhwach template — by granting him a Schrift.

In Bleach, Schrift A came in two forms. The Almighty, and The Antithesis.

He planned to give Nagato The Antithesis. Its effect ran roughly parallel to the Reverse Cursed Technique: transferring damage sustained onto a designated target, among other things.

He could teach him some general Quincy techniques on top of that.

And beyond Nagato — Mikoto, Konan, and Pakura all needed upgrades of their own.