CH_38

This four-man squad had a heavy atmosphere.

Rawari was stern, Neru was cold, Tōji was dull, and Natchi was tongue-tied.

After checking the map to see which sector their squad was responsible for, they set out.

The instructions from above were simple: treat what could be treated quickly on the spot; for those who could be sent back to the main camp, just apply emergency measures and hand them off to the transport teams.

They weren't told how to handle critical, near-death cases either. Everyone knew the old rule…

But no one saw anything wrong with it. Other shinobi villages didn't even have medical squads.

On the way to the front lines, the smell of blood grew stronger, and occasionally they'd spot dried, dark bloodstains… Over these past two months, just how much blood had these woods absorbed?

Already, sounds of fighting could be heard from up ahead, and signal flares rose from different directions from time to time.

But none of that concerned Tōji's squad. This era had no wireless earpieces, so it was up to Rawari to interpret Konoha's signal flares.

The signal flares used on the front lines were far more complex than the ordinary ones. Only jōnin knew the code. So Tōji and the others simply followed wherever Rawari pointed.

At the first site they reached—where fighting had just ended not long ago—two visibly wounded Konoha jōnin sat leaning against a tree, while a third, only lightly wounded, stood on a branch keeping watch. Lying on the ground was another who'd stopped breathing… two holes in his chest, no longer bleeding, likely pierced by some kind of bladed weapon.

Rawari didn't need to give orders—he leaped straight up to the jōnin in the tree to exchange information. Natchi unloaded various medical supplies from his pack, some of which might not even be needed. Tōji and Neru exchanged only a glance to silently divide the wounded they'd each handle.

Tōji's patient was a middle-aged, skinny man with a goatee. His most serious injuries were the multiple puncture wounds through both feet—from some kind of bladed weapon. He also had several other cuts, his clothes covered in still-wet bloodstains.

Tōji cleaned the goateed jōnin's wounds, applied anti-inflammatory medicine, used the 【Healing Technique】 for initial hemostasis, then bandaged him up.

This old guy's feet… he'd be headed back to camp to rest.

Neru handled the amputated hand case—that jōnin had blocked a poisoned senbon with his palm and had immediately cut off his own hand. He didn't have many other injuries, and none too serious.

From the conversation between Rawari and the others, Tōji learned that this all-tokubetsu-jōnin squad had fought four Iwa jōnin—and wiped them out.

Same number of jōnin, Konoha came out on top…

It's just that on this battlefield, squads with all-jōnin composition like this one were only a small fraction.

Meanwhile, Iwa's ratio of jōnin to chūnin was now about 1:2.

Once Neru had finished treating the amputee, the four of them were off to the next location. They weren't expected to stay and guard the depleted squads or the wounded…

In war, all shinobi operated like machines—maximizing efficiency, not acting on emotion.

Half a day in, their squad had already treated or given emergency care to over twenty casualties. The Konoha dead they'd witnessed… over forty chūnin and over a dozen jōnin…

And that was only because they stuck to their assigned sector—so they barely even saw the squads that had been completely wiped out…

At nightfall, they didn't return to the main camp—just rested at designated temporary staging areas. The front-line shinobi stayed hidden in the woods, maintaining the encirclement and pressure on Iwa.

Fighting at night was noticeably less frequent than during the day. Either way, Tōji couldn't be bothered—after all, they weren't responsible for night rescue operations.