The perp was sitting in a self-assured position. His breathing was steady. His lackluster, barely standing out from the usual civilian sample size chakra signature was too minuscule for Mana to get a solid read on and look into. Even with Chogen's sacrifice of his dignity in front of this man, things would not be easy for Mana.
"You've been caught with supplies that did not come from this village. We could not care less about whatever you were doing with them, we only want to know how they got in and find the people responsible. We're Village Protection, ensuring the safety of the gate and all that lies within it is all we care about." Mana started boldly. Perhaps a bit too bold and imposing but words were not how she intended on getting answers. This was just a meaningless precursor before Mana got to the meatier part of the interrogation she had to rule out all other means.
"So you'd just let me go if I tell you about the smugglers? That sounds pretty engaging." The perp's eyes widened. For a moment there Mana wasn't sure if she was being played or not. Could it really have been this easy to get this man on her side?
"I'm not sure how that would work but we could work it out. Your financial crime shenanigans are nowhere near important enough to cover a potential security hole. If you talk, it's going to happen." Mana sensed it. Doubt in her own voice. She had not considered this opportunity, she had not scoped it out with Hoju and the Police Force and there was a distinct possibility that the perp would sense it.
"Yeah… Thought it sounded too good to be true…" the man slumped in his chair, his eyes began wandering, shooting wildly in all directions. This was such an alluring opportunity to get this man to talk without trying anything too bothersome and invasive. Mana would have very much preferred it. "As if a showgirl like you could even offer something like that. What're you doing with the Village Protection anyway?"
"I'm a ninja. Haven't you seen the Chuunin Exams this year?" Mana sat down. This may not have been as bad as it initially seemed. The man was still talking. Talking rubbish, changing the subject but talking nonetheless. If Mana was working for the Police Force she would have entire hours, an entire night to get him to say what needed to be said. Most Police Force ninja would spend that time on torture and beating, some would only resort to it once all other means failed.
Mana neither was a Police Force ninja nor intended to resort to such measures.
"Nah, I was working. Not everyone has the ryo to see it." The man scratched his chin. He probably thought that by having Mana talk about herself he was beating her at this, truthfully, he was getting used to Mana without knowing it. He was getting to know about her and associating thoughts and emotions with her. That could have been useful later on.
"Doesn't happen all that often, not in Konoha. Could have saved up if you planned ahead." Mana scolded the man probably twice her size about responsible management of his finances.
"Pfff, whatever. Wasn't on vacation anyway. Wouldn't have had the time even if I had the dough." The man squirmed. He wanted to hide the grin. It was not a grin of fondness, Mana was not gullible enough to believe it was but the absurdity of this interrogation did invite a smile to his face.
"I don't really get why you wouldn't want to tell on whoever gave you those supplies. When we find the hole, we're gonna plug it. Smuggling by abusing a security hole like this is much more serious than whatever you're into, they won't be able to retaliate in any way. Not inside the village and you don't strike me as a guy that makes enough to travel abroad." Mana tried poking the man with a hot rod a little bit just to test how much of a connection she had formed so far.
"I don't have to talk to you, you know? If you guys beat me up for two days straight and I stay silent – I get to walk. Even I know that much." The man closed back in again, surrounding himself with a thorn wall of crossed arms and a turn to the wall.
Would the callbacks to Shukuba ever cease?
"That's true, for the Police Force maybe…" Mana shrugged. "The village has a hole in it and one way or another it is going to plug it. There's still the Intelligence Division, the Black Ops if need be."
"Is this the part where you threaten me with ANBU torture? I'm sure one of you guys has already hit me with that line, along with some other, blunter things." The man grumbled.
"I just don't see the point of you going down to prison, full of hardened rogues and actually dangerous people for intending to sell some black market goods." Mana leaned back in the chair.
"What do you know about prison?"
"Enough to know that gambling years of your life on how badly it will suck isn't worth the hassle of just telling us who sold you the goods and how they got in." Mana began dragging her finger across the table, trying to emulate boredom. Here she was baiting the pike with a smaller fish, just above the surface, one that the predator has had a tiny nibble on before diving down to the bottom, its heart pounding of the tremendous risk it had just taken.
Eventually, the hunger, the curiosity, the craving will draw it back out. But only if the bait keeps on dangling, clapping its tiny tail on the surface.
"I don't really know their names. I just know where they get in and sell the items." The man leaned forward, crossing his hands together.
"Holy crap, you didn't even have to punch him once!" Hoju almost tore the hair out from his head.
"Got lucky, honestly. I came in here fully intending on having to probe his mind for something." Mana breathed heavily, still failing to believe in how much she got out of the man by just sitting in front of him and talking. Especially after her superior just failed at that very same thing, threatening the man and pushing the pike further down by having a hunting dog aboard the boat, barking at full voice.
"It could still be a dud but… Very well done what with the answers and the talking and the like." Chogen nodded a pair of times. His face was serious and thinking through what he had just seen and heard the man say, trying to call if his revelation was a trap of some sort or not.
"It did feel a bit easy, doesn't it?" Mana's cheer quickly turned to disorientation. What if the man did lie or intentionally give the Village Protection something to get them off his tail.
"No, it doesn't make too much sense. As you've established before, the village will get to him even if he does time us out before we can confidently put him in front of the Tribunal. As far as he knows – playing for time is pointless. Plus, he knows that no amount of smugglers and hired hands can challenge Village Protection, not inside the village walls." Hoju pondered.
"Very well observed, what with the thinking and the reasoning and the like." Chogen smiled, the sourness on his face quickly faded away.
"Too bad we can't just up and let him go." Hoju stuffed his hands into the pockets of his uniform before moving his lips around as if he was flipping a twig in between his teeth.
"Wait, what?" Mana turned to the Police Force ninja. "But I told him that would happen. That's how we got intel on the smugglers."
"Yeah… I've no idea why you did that. Anyway, you got the intel so it's fine. Did some fine Police Force work here. The perp will go to prison and you managed to find out what he knows by pulling on his teeth. Well done!" Hoju commended the magician. Despite Mana's horrified face, he appeared very proud of her and extremely glad to have let the two interrogate the man.
"Don't worry, we'll pull on some strings and see what can be done, what with the authority of the Village Protection and the like." Chogen pat Mana on the shoulder, looking a bit hesitant to do so but growing increasingly confident in it the longer he did it.
"My god, I just lied to a man about his freedom…" Mana smacked her forehead.
"Eh, I mean you did just lie to gather intelligence. Given that it's perfectly legal, I'd say our laws are pretty flexible. I think it's a waste to let a perfectly crooked perp go but… We'll see…" Hoju scratched his head finally catching on to Mana's discomfort and changing his gears.
"You've got bigger things to worry about. The whole warehouse district and smugglers we need to detain thing and all…" Chogen mumbled in a calmed and low-pitched voice.
"Alright! Let's go catch some smugglers!" Hoju shot his fist up into the air, making plenty of Uchiha Police Force officers glare at him with cold, death-wishing glares for disturbing their work from over their tables.
"A very nice try but you have an actual job, don't you?" Chogen turned at the Police Force officer who just shook in the lower parts of his body and made a long face. He may have liked his job but he would have liked taking part in something like official Village Protection business much more.
"I thought you guys wouldn't realize it…" Hoju whined out.
"This is the place, what with the described location and the description and the like." Chogen concluded once the two ninja pressed to a wall inside an alleyway and observed a warehouse district that lacked a single living soul to inhabit it. These were simply not its working hours. Currently, the objects to be stored within were still being manufactured or old ones that called this district their own before - being sold.
"Quiet so far." The giant spoke as if entirely to himself.
"Can't sense a thing…" Mana gave him some additional information, even if what she had to add was useful in only the smallest ways. "I suspect they would use some Earth Release technique to travel underground, in a ninja village it has proven to be difficult to detect before."
As fate would have it, Mana's theory would be proven wrong almost instantly after she had shared it, as if ordered by a higher power to make her seem like a dork. A large glyph lit up like a beacon on the side of a warehouse building. Before it sparked with a purple light it was merely a black paint stain, one entirely identical to the numbering present on the other warehouses. The smugglers were using a sealing technique!
The men that emerged from the light started out quite normal but grew increasingly curious. The first one was just a grey-haired and full-beard having man in casual clothes. Just the inconspicuous type that one would suspect a smuggler to look like. The second one adorned himself with some fine silks and even shoulder-armor and had long, dark hair tied in a ponytail.
The final one looked nothing like a smuggler at all. He was a tall and slick, bald type wearing a long weapon on his back. A staff or a spear possibly. Mana's sensory reached out to him almost instinctively to sense the man's threat level, oddly enough she could not pick up a hint of it. Either he had his chakra completely suppressed or his chakra signature was the size of that of an ordinary civilian. Even if chakra size did not decide battles all by itself, one could not augment their abilities that long with smaller resources and at all with those of that shortage.
"You detain these smugglers. I'll deal with the third one. Looks like a mercenary they could have hired to protect them, what with his weaponry and cold glare and the like." Chogen squirmed in the hiding spot causing a rubbing noise that nobody of their possibilities of chakra augmentation could have noticed at that distance.
"Please, no. The smugglers are too important and too slippery. Keep hold of them. I'll deal with the mercenary, his chakra signature is almost non-existent." Mana suggested.
Without answering directly, Chogen soared up in the air with the strength of his lower body alone. The man spread his massive limbs out wide like a sea-star before smacking his palms together.
"Multi-Size Jutsu!" Chogen yelled out as his body grew several times its already considerable size. "Fire Style Akimichi Secret Technique: Ring of Fire!"
Immense heat began pouring out from the man's pores, heat that lit up in scorching flames that formed a rotating ring of blazes and descended upon the handful of smugglers who did not have nearly enough time to react to anything that their ninja opponent did. As expected, either the three underestimated the ninja village by suppressing their signatures so much that they could not power back up in the instant they needed it back up on or they simply had no strength to spare, to begin with.
The smugglers grunted and took rapid steps back to keep them away from roasting in the incalculably heated ring that kept them contained. Finishing his impressive aerial show of acrobatics, Chogen landed on the other side of the ring and turned back at his surrounded and detained targets.
"You're coming with us, for the questioning and the possible detainment and the like." Chogen declared quite confident in his own words.
The mercenary amongst the smugglers did not speak, he merely moved his hand to his back with remarkable speed for someone of his lack of noticeable might. The instant he moved Mana realized that his weakness was deceptive – he was not trying at all to reach for his back this fast and yet he surpassed any limits of human swiftness.
With his weapon in hand, the mercenary swiped and spun his clothed package, tearing the ring of flames apart for mere milliseconds before the blazing inferno closed back up but just that meaningless moment was enough for the mercenary to calmly step out of his blazing prison. The package around his weapon set aflame, reducing the leather on it to red cinders and revealing an obsidian spear underneath.
Chogen did not waver, neither did Mana. She revealed herself by leaving the hiding place and calmly walking in front of the mercenary.
"I see it now. It appears Shukuba is not the only ghost that haunts me today." She stated while walking up to the man. The eyes of his opponent looked thrown a little bit off-track by the boldness of his newly revealed enemy. "The reason why you don't put out that impressive of a chakra signature is because you're a martial artist using Budojutsu."
"Budojutsu?" Chogen wondered. Of course, he was unfamiliar with the term. It was an old style of fighting but it was not one that was named or recorded, everyone called it however they wanted.
"You augment your body just like you would using chakra but using only the physical aspects of your chakra. Just as I have once done when I had my chakra network broken." Hundreds of lightning-fast thrusts from the man's spear all at once managed to silence Mana once she got within his range. The jabs all worked their magic like high-caliber bullets, tearing the girl's body to shreds and leaving fist-sized holes wherever they hit.
The mercenary took a couple of steps backward in respectful intimidation of his opponent's ability. He was hearing Mana's voice ringing in his ears but he could not see the girl he could have just sworn to have killed before her riddled body dispersed into a shower of flower petals.
"You fool, she's right in front of you, kill her!" one of the smugglers barked out from within the ring of flames. Despite the absolute heat present inside the flames, the temperature of the ring was almost entirely contained within the flames. Irradiating only a meaningless portion of its built up heat, just enough to make the smugglers sweat when they got too close but nowhere near enough to incinerate them as being so close to a source of similar temperature normally would.
The mercenary protecting the smugglers took a defensive spear-fighting stance. Mana was slightly less familiar with the particular weapon and its stances but she could identify the basic signs of balance over ferocity in the man's stance – he was preparing to defend from the magician once she resurfaces within his field of vision instead of swinging wildly and opening himself up. He was well versed in the more technical skills of martial arts after all…
"I can see why they'd choose you to protect them now." Mana's voice continued to taunt the man as he closed his eyes, no longer feeling confident in his ability to trust his sight. "They did not hire you for your skills or some bond. That's not the kind of people smugglers are. Even amongst criminals, they have a nasty reputation."
Mana was astounded by the reaction of her opponent. He did not struggle against her illusion at all but allowed it to flow its course without any resistance. He did not try to break it or even react to it but merely let go and saw where it would take him. Had he tried to break out, with his chakra signature he'd have busted his network and rendered himself catatonic. Genjutsu was immensely effective against such an opponent.
A black blur broke Mana out from her trance of wonderful display of battlefield experience from someone who shouldn't have been at all familiar with the ninja world. Bright blazes followed wherever the mercenary's spear moved, sending a slicing crescent of blazes all around him that was nowhere near being focused or matching the heat of stars like the flames of ninjutsu but they were enough to send Mana tumbling back and get her all flustered all just to avoid this one simplistic budojutsu technique.
"You're a ninja…" Mana realized to herself. "Used to be, anyway. Broken permanently, just like I used to be."
That was how this man knew so well of how exactly to fight off Chogen's Fire Release ninjutsu with the Fire Release affinity of his own as well as remarkable spear-work and how to properly deal with illusions. Mana picked herself back up from one knee and placed her top hat back on as she had lost it in the very impromptu manner of evasion.
"That's right, Aruseki is going to crush you!" one of the smugglers taunted the magician. "Better get your partner into the game, girl!"
He wanted that, he wanted Chogen to stop concentrating on the smugglers so that they could attempt a comfortable sealing technique express getaway. If Mana was to convince the Village Protection she was worth letting in on the Congregation tracking mission, she needed to win this all by herself and bring these smugglers in.