Chapter 1040

For a time, Hatake Sakumo's heart was in a mess.

Although with his state of mind, he could not help but feel somewhat melancholy and complex at this moment.

But complexity was complexity, and the mission had to continue.

Hatake Sakumo had to forcibly disperse the complex emotions in his heart and forcibly focus his attention on the mission that was about to unfold.

Next, after giving a few simple instructions, Hatake Sakumo led this "Root" squad and pursued from the location where "Hai" was attacked, following the traces left by the enemy bit by bit.

Only, what Hatake Sakumo did not notice was that the other members of this "Root" squad looked at each other.

In their eyes, there was nothing but indifference.

Such eyes were not so much calm as they were "deathly silent."

The enemy was much more cunning than imagined, leaving many traces along the way to confuse and interfere, trying to shake off the pursuit of Sakumo and his party.

It seemed the enemy also knew very well in their hearts that after they captured Konoha's important "test subject," Konoha would inevitably send additional forces to retrieve him.

Who was "Konoha's White Fang"?

Although the other party had tried their best to set up a formation, they were still seen through one by one by Hatake Sakumo.

Under Hatake Sakumo's leadership, this Root squad soon caught up with the invading Mist ninja team.

"Lord, about five kilometers ahead, I saw a strong chakra reaction."

A Root ninja with perception expertise reported to Hatake Sakumo.

Hearing this, Sakumo furrowed his brows tightly.

Although he had gone through many twists and turns, his heart always felt somewhat strange; the matter seemed to be going too smoothly.

"Lord, give the order."

Just when Sakumo was lost in thought, a poker-faced Root member urged him.

Sakumo woke up from his deep thought; he forcibly ignored the strange feeling in his heart and scrutinized the few Root members before him.

The faces of the few Root members still carried that poker-like deathly silence, as if they were just playing cards that would not change.

Hatake Sakumo sized up the faces of the few for the first time; the abilities and ninjutsu they were good at also immediately floated in his mind.

Hatake Sakumo was not in a hurry to answer the urging of this Root ninja, but was checking the source of his unease one by one in his heart...

On the way of pursuit, Sakumo had already had a detailed understanding of the few in advance.

Being able to be favored by Danzo and selected into the Root already explained the extraordinary aspects of these members.

The few before him were basically ninjas of the secret technique type who possessed some kind of special secret technique, and among them, two had already reached the Jonin level.

Such a squad, even looking at the entire Konoha Village, was an elite-level squad.

With such a squad as assistance, let alone the opponent being just a team of Mist ninjas, even if the opponent was a Kage-level ninja, Hatake Sakumo had the confidence to behead them.

This showed that the unease in his heart was not from worry about insufficient strength.

And the most difficult point of this mission was not how to drive away and kill the enemy, but how to rescue the "companion" captured by their side.

As everyone knew, the difficulty of missions like rescuing hostages had always been very high.

But Hatake Sakumo did not worry about this point.

The "hostage" being able to survive and be captured by the other party, rather than being killed on the spot and then using secret techniques to obtain intelligence, was enough to show that the hostage possessed sufficient value to the enemy.

As long as the hostage had sufficient value, this showed that unless it was a necessary moment, the enemy would not harm the hostage.

This point created sufficient conditions for Hatake Sakumo's rescue.

Hatake Sakumo quickly determined this point and concluded that this was also not the source of his inner unease.

"What exactly is it?"

He could not think of it for a moment.

"..."

Silence, long silence.

After a urging, the Root ninjas were just like puppets in a display window, just quietly looking at Hatake Sakumo and not speaking anymore.

In such silence, Hatake Sakumo exhaled heavily.

"Hoo."

He came back to his senses, no longer paying attention to his messy thoughts.

Some things were not something that could be avoided because of Sakumo's unease and hesitation, because Sakumo had reasons that could not be avoided.

"Prepare for combat."

"I will arrange the tactics."

Hatake Sakumo finally issued the mission for combat.

And the few Root ninjas before him were like robots whose switches had been turned on; they first looked at each other, then began to listen quietly to Sakumo's arrangements.