"So, we aren't going to talk about what your crazy ex-fiancé said to you?" asked Kiba as we approached the gate to the Village Hidden Among Dreams.
The journey to the Village Hidden Among Dreams was a long one. To reach our destination from the Leaf Village, we had to travel through a large forest until we came across the border of the Land of Fire. What Lord Hokage failed to tell us was that the village was located within the notorious Forest of Mythical Beasts somewhere near the border, causing us to get lost an incredulous amount of times and forcing us to avoid abnormally large insects. By the time we found the village, nightfall long since covered the Land of Fire. Yet, despite how tired we all were from the long, frustrating journey, Kiba continuously asked me about Lord Toneri and that made me more irritable.
I frowned at him.
"Alright, alright," he said. "We're all tired, I know. That's why I'll just ask you tomorrow after we rest up at the inn." Kiba flashed me a smile when I shot him a glare. "Can I just mention that for a team of elite tracking ninja, we botched everything we learned when it came to finding this village?"
"Normally, I would have brought that to our attention, but I don't think that you should blame our skills in tracking," said Shino. "This area is covered in an unusually thick mist."
"Mist shouldn't stop my nose from sniffing it out," said Kiba.
Akamaru barked in agreement.
"I know that, but this mist is different. It's impairing our abilities," said Shino. "My kikaichi aren't as active like they are normally. It must be genjutsu."
Shino is a part of the Aburame family. Since birth, children of the Aburame clan are infused with these beetle-like insects called kikaichu that allows the host to use them to fight and track a target in exchange for using their body as a home and their chakra as a food source. Shino carries thousands of kikaichu inside of his body.
Kiba sniffed the air. "Yeah. The scents around me aren't as strong as they should be. I can hardly smell my own sweat."
My teammates looked at me, waiting for me to use my ability to track others. With a crooked smile, I activated my Byakugan.
The Byakugan is a visual jutsu passed down through the sole bloodline of the Hyuga clan. It allows the user to see their surroundings in a 360-degree point of view except for it's only blind spot on the back of the neck above the first thoracic vertebra. It also allows the user to see when genjutsu is being used, discern clones from the real person, and see their chakra flow. By using the Byakugan with the Gentle Fist, a Hyuga can control or shut down their target's chakra simply by surgically injecting their own chakra into their opponent's chakra pathway system. In all, there are three-hundred-sixty-one nodes in a human body, but I only need to hit a few to control or shut down the ebb and flow of their chakra. Despite the name "Gentle" Fist, the slightest tap cause damage to the chakra pathway system. That is why the Hyuga clan is the strongest and most feared clan among the Hidden Leaf Village.
When I activated my Byakugan, I felt the veins around my eyes bulge out, and my pupils, that are usually invisible, became more pronounced. With it, I stared at the mist to see if I could find anything out of the ordinary, however, just like my teammates, my ability was impaired.
Deactivating my Byakugan, I said to Kiba and Shino "My vision is being distorted. I cannot see anything in this mist."
"It must be intentional," said Shino. "The people here probably don't want to be found so easily. If that's the case, you need to rethink your plan, Kiba."
Kiba crossed his arms over his chest as he thought of a new plan. "Hinata, I want you to ask the villagers about Arata just as I told you before. Shino, Akamaru and I will go to the inn and ask the innkeeper if Arata booked a room there. If not, then we'll search the village for anything out of the ordinary."
"What should I do in regards to Kei Sairenji?" I asked. Unfortunately, since Kei was investigating secretly, it was unlikely that anyone saw him around, not that I could ask anyway. His identity and reasons for spying must be kept hidden. If I were to mention him, I could potentially place him in jeopardy.
Kiba seemed to know precisely how to answer that question. He told me "When we find Arata, we can ask him that personally."
I smiled at Kiba. "It is still hard for me to get used to you sounding like a team captain."
"Oh yeah? I can be a leader when I want to be," he said. "Now, let's set up camp outside of the gate. If we decide to sleep at the inn, and Arata is there, it'd be bad if he caught us."
"I'll take the first watch," said Shino.
We wasted no time in setting up camp three-hundred meters away from the Village Hidden Among Dreams. Kiba and Shino set up the tent and fire while Akamaru and I gathered food for me to cook. After we ate, Shino took the first watch just as he said he would as Kiba, Akamaru, and I rested up. Once Shino finished his watch, Kiba took his place, and then I watched after that. Before we knew it, the sun began to rise, forcing us to pack up our belongings and enter the village.
It was plain to see that the village was remote, far from any other villages, and hidden well amongst the trees and mist. Not many people lived here as there were only about one-hundred houses and a handful of shops. Considering that day just broke, hardly any people were outside, leaving me with little to work with.
"It might be too early to ask the innkeeper about Arata. We should check out the village and come back to the inn later," said Kiba.
Shino nodded in agreement. When the two of them walked off, I initiated the task of asking around.
I approached the first person that I saw and asked him "Excuse me, sir? May I borrow a moment of your time?"
The old man took a glance at me, sneered, and then continued walking.
Admittedly, I was taken aback at his response to me, however, as rude as he was, I chose to not let that bother me, and I resumed searching for people to speak to.
The next person that I found was a middle-aged woman tending to her garden at the front of her property. I stood at the fence separating us to ask her "Excuse me, can you spare a moment of your time?"
A bit startled, the woman complied and she rose to her feet to meet me.
"This is a small village. Do you often get visitors here?" I asked.
"No, not often," she said.
"When you do receive visitors, they must stand out, correct?"
She nodded her head meekly.
"Have you received any visitors recently? Perhaps within the past couple of weeks or so?"
"Just a few," she said.
"Was there anything out of the ordinary that you noticed?"
"There wasn't anything too unusual. The only thing that caught my attention was that whoever came through arrived here in a carriage. I figured that whoever was travelling inside must have been important because there were a few people walking beside it, almost as if they were assigned to protect the person inside," she said.
"Did you ever receive the opportunity to see who was travelling in the carriage?" I asked.
The woman shook her head.
"Do you know if this person is still in the village?"
"I don't know, honestly. I never saw them leave. It has been five days since I saw the carriage. It is possible that they left without me seeing."
Learning that Lord Arata might still be in the village raised my hopes. If he had left, then that would undoubtedly make this mission tedious. Neither Kiba, Shino, or I felt like chasing this man through the Land of Fire.
"Thank you so much for your time," I told her as I bowed.
The woman gave me useful information, however, I felt as though I needed to question more people, seeming as I could not simply stick with one story. I wanted to confirm what the woman witnessed as well as obtain more knowledge on what was seen. I needed to know if Lord Arata left the village, and if he did, I needed to know when he left.
I tried questioning a few more people after that with no luck. With little to no villagers outside at this time, I decided to wait until the village became more active. Unfortunately, yet expected, I had to wait a few hours for the villagers to leave their homes, but when I did decide to wait, I didn't regret it. The streets flooded with enough people for me to feel confident in obtaining new information.
I asked around some more, often hearing the same story as the woman I spoke to earlier or nothing at all. No one seemed to have caught a glimpse of the face of the person inside of the carriage, convincing me that the person inside did not want to be seen by just anyone. People also did not see the person in the carriage leave the village within the past five days that they have seen the carriage come in. They told me that they usually see it stationed at the inn.
Feeling as though I was not going to learn anything new from the villagers, I left to find my teammates. Unable to use my Byakugan, I had to find them the old-fashioned way, which did not turn out as difficult as I originally thought.
I saw my teammates in the distance discussing something that seemed important. As I closed in on them, a person with an appearance unlike any other in this village caught my attention. She had messy purple hair and two red symmetrical lines under her amber colored eyes. Around her neck, she wore rings held together by red string and she wore a headband shaped like a face guard with the Village Hidden Among Dream's symbol on it, telling me that she was a kunoichi. In fact, throughout my wandering through this village, I had not come across any shinobis, which is the main reason why she caught my attention.
And I think that I grabbed her attention as well.
She approached me with a very serious expression plastered on her face. She said to me "I heard that you were searching for someone."
"Y-Yes, I am."
"Do you want to know who was in that carriage?" she asked.
I nodded my head. "Yes."
She looked around with caution. "It isn't safe here. Go to the chief's house and tell them Ryuka Tenro sent you. The guards will let you in to see the chief – my father."
"Why are you telling me this?" I asked.
"The man that came here is up to something that could threaten my village. My father won't take action to stop him and he won't let me do things my way. He says it's too risky to throw punches. He says that we need to approach this from a different angle. So far we haven't had an opportunity to explore that angle until you and your team showed up."
"So, you want to use us to get rid of your problem?" I asked.
She shrugged. "From what I heard, he's your problem too. Take your team and go to the chief's house."
Before I could say any more, Ryuka left.
I met up with Kiba and Shino, whose faces looked defeated.
"I take it you did not find anything worth investigating?" I asked.
"Oh, we found something alright," said Kiba, his face changing from defeat to annoyance, "but those bastards guarding it wouldn't let us go in."
"We couldn't find anything inside of the village so we decided to explore outside of it," said Shino. "Not too far from here lies a cave inside of a volcano used to prison a monster the villagers call Three-Heads. It's a beast that is made up of a solid concentration of chakra and said to bring forth cataclysms. Legend has it that the first cry it makes scorches mountains and plains, the second cry shakes the earth, and the third turns the world to nothingness."
"That sounds dangerous," I said. "You did not run into Three-Heads, did you?"
"No," said Kiba, still sounding annoyed. "The beast was killed three years ago!"
"Wait, that does not make sense. If the beast was killed, why are their people guarding the cave?" I asked. "With the beast gone, that cave is nothing but a landmark."
"Which is why we became suspicious," said Shino. "We tried getting in the cave, but there's no way in other than the front entrance, and with our abilities impaired, we can't ask you to use your Byakugan to see what they're hiding."
An idea suddenly came to me. "Maybe not. We can ask the village chief to give us access to the cave."
"This village has a chief?" asked Kiba. "I didn't see any fancy houses."
"If we ask, maybe we can find it," I suggested.
Asking for directions to the chief's house proved to be much easier than gathering information on Lord Arata Sakuraba, seeming as the very first person I asked described the home in vivid detail and pointed me in the appropriate direction. Momentarily, my team and I reached the house only to be met by two guards posted outside the front door. They demanded to know who were and when I told them who sent us, they let us through without any further questioning.
The home was small and very similar to the others. It did not take long to find the chief of the village and when we did, I was thrown by how large he was. He was a man of stature that I had never seen before what with being well over two-hundred centimeters. Observing the rest of his features, I noticed that he was bulky for an older man and, judging by facial expression alone, he looked as though he did not enjoy small talk. He had grey spiky hair and he wore a headband and rings around his neck identical to Ryuka. Regardless of how his appearance intimidated us, my team and I bowed respectfully and introduced ourselves.
Since we were in his home, and his position as village chief was a higher title than Leaf Village Jounin, he did not bow back. Instead, he gestured for us to sit down, introduced himself, and then jumped immediately to business. "I am Enzo Tenro, the chief of the Village Hidden Among Dreams. What business do Leaf ninja have in my village?"
My team and I exchanged glances, deciding that it would be best to let me speak since I am the least likely to unintentionally upset the chief with disrespect.
I said "Chief Enzo, we came here in search of a man that could potentially cause a great disturbance within the Land of Fire. This man we are looking for is supposedly suspected of taking refuge somewhere in your village. I would like to ask if you have seen this man."
Chief Enzo Tenro's face transformed from business to great displeasure. "We received a few visitors about five days ago that don't plan on leaving anytime soon. Is it Arata Sakuraba you're looking for? The new feudal lord for the Hokage?"
Relief overcame me and my teammates. I asked "Is Lord Arata still here? Do you know where we might find him?"
"That snake is holed up in the Three-Head's Prison, the cave we used to hold Three-Heads when it was still alive. What he's doing in there, I couldn't tell you," said Enzo.
"There are people guarding the entrance to the cave. Are they your men?" I asked.
Enzo shook his head. "No, those are some of the people that Arata brought with him when he got here. Ever since he arrived he's been acting like he owns my village. I would have long since kicked him out of here, but he threatened me."
"You seem like a man that doesn't stand down to anyone regardless of their position," said Kiba. "What did he threaten you with to make you let him do whatever he wants?"
Chief Enzo's face turned grim. "He had a weapon unlike any that I have ever seen before. He pointed it at one of my guards and before anyone could move to stop him, my guard was pushed with so much force that his body left an indent behind the Three-Head's Prison… There was nothing left to salvage from his body."
My team and I exchanged glances again.
"We were sent here to expose Lord Arata," I said. "I would like to ask you to give us access to the Three-Head's Prison."
"As much as I would like to do that, I can't. If I can't get in, what makes you think I can get you in?" said Chief Enzo.
"You know your village and the land around it better than anyone else," said Shino. "If we can't sneak into the cave, maybe we can get the guards to leave somehow."
Chief Enzo thought for a moment. When he came up with something to aid us on our mission, he told us "The Hill of Illusions is located on the edge of the village. It overlooks the Forest of Mythical Beasts, including the Three-Head's Prison. If you go there, you might be able to lure the guards away."
We bowed to the chief. I said to him "Thank you, Chief Enzo. We will leave at once."
Just as we stood up to leave the room, Chief Enzo called out to us. He handed me an envelope and said "My daughter found this yesterday in Arata's room at the inn. I figured that it'd be more useful to you than to me."
Kiba and Shino gathered around me as I opened the envelope entrusted to us. Inside were letters Yuji Fuma sent to Arata Sakuraba regarding their conspiracy to murder the Hokage and take over the Leaf Village. By no means what was written in said letters were a good thing, yet, my and team and I couldn't help ourselves from smiling at our discovery.