Chapter 190: This Ninja Is Just Weak

On a swaying ship, two figures wearing conical hats sat quietly in a corner—one tall, one short.

Yet despite this, the other passengers on board still stole glances at the two.

Mainly because their attire was unusually conspicuous.

Black robes with red clouds—who in their right mind wears that?

And in this world, anyone dressed so strangely is either a fool or a ninja with extreme confidence in their strength.

As for which category these two aboard the ship fall into, that's up to each observer's judgment.

As if sensing the covert glances from the crew, the taller figure slowly lowered his hat with his left hand.

If one looked closely, they could see a ring bearing the character 【青】 on his left index finger.

These two were naturally Li Ang and Saika, out on a mission.

At this moment, Li Ang muttered under his breath: "I just joined the organization and now I'm facing a tailed beast?"

Saika replied in a hoarse voice: "It's just a routine reconnaissance."

The mission they received was to assassinate a high-ranking official from the Land of Tools.

The Land of Tools currently supplies the vast majority of ninja tools to The entire Ninja World, and Li Ang wasn't sure if this mission was connected to what he'd told Changmen earlier.

He suspected it was—after all, there was no such person as him in the original story.

'So the plot has subtly shifted already—I wonder if Black Zetsu and Obito are sneaking peeks at me right now.'

Li Ang thought silently to himself.

The target of this mission had apparently learned he was to be assassinated and had spent a fortune hiring a group of powerful ninja from Kirigakure.

Powerful ninja, by ordinary ninja standards.

But assassinating the Land of Tools' official was merely their public mission.

Their true objective was to investigate the current status of the Three-Tails, Isobu, which had been in a feral state since the Fourth Mizukage's death.

Based on this information, Li Ang had deduced the current timeline.

He had likely replaced the original position of Deidara, and there was still some time before Akatsuki truly began capturing tailed beasts.

That was why Li Ang hadn't fled immediately—he didn't want to get hit by a Tailed Beast Ball.

'But if it's Kirigakure…'

If he remembered correctly, the Hyuga clan had a Byakugan in Kirigakure—one not bound by the Caged Bird Seal.

'Let's see if there's an opportunity.'

Li Ang felt no guilt at all about seizing Kirigakure's Byakugan—after all, the village had stolen it from the Hyuga clan to begin with.

The Hyuga clan should thank him.

As Li Ang pondered his next moves, the ship had slowly docked at the shore.

This mission's destination was Ducheng, the capital of the Land of Tools, so the two still had to travel further.

Unawares, Li Ang and Saika had reached a river near Ducheng.

At this moment, Li Ang suddenly asked Saika beside him: "Why didn't the leader accept my suggestion? We traveled all this way for a mission and earned only a million two hundred thousand ryō."

Even that price included travel expenses.

Though this sum was enough to let a ninja live in luxury, what was Akatsuki's ultimate goal?

To gather all the tailed beasts and conquer the world.

One million two hundred thousand ryō was a mere drop in the ocean to Akatsuki.

"Or is the leader just trying to eliminate competitors first?"

Kill the boss of the rival company outright.

What a plain and simple business war.

Saika paid no attention to Li Ang—in fact, he cared little for anything outside of puppetry.

Just as Li Ang was about to say more, several sharp whistling sounds suddenly pierced the air.

Ssssh—ssssh—ssssh!

Black kunai flashed forward and arrived before the two in an instant.

In response, the scorpion-like tail that emerged from Saika's Hiryu Sōkō instantly blocked the kunai aimed at him.

As for Li Ang—

He didn't move at all.

Watching the kunai fall uselessly to the ground before him, Li Ang tilted his head: "Who threw a knife with no blade?"

With his current body strength of 72.6, plus the damage reduction from 【Reverse to Primordial】, this level of attack couldn't even scratch him, let alone pierce his defense.

On the other side—

Several figures hiding behind the trees, upon seeing the scene in the middle of the road, were filled with shock.

They had imagined many possibilities—the target using a substitution technique to evade, or the target blocking the attack with kunai themselves—but they had never imagined someone could withstand sharp kunai with bare flesh.

Fortunately, as elite ninja of Kirigakure, they eventually forced themselves to control their emotions.

One of them signaled, asking the captain whether they should retreat first—the target clearly looked dangerous.

Seeing this, the captain shook his head slightly, then swiftly formed three hand seals.

Soon after, thick mist gradually enveloped the road.

Seeing the surroundings, Li Ang realized: "Kirigakure Technique."

At that moment, a voice emerged from the mist: "No wonder you're members of Akatsuki—you're truly formidable."

"But before our Kirigakure assassination techniques, you might as well prepare to die."

Akatsuki was active in the underground contract world, and all major ninja villages were aware of them.

Of course, they believed Akatsuki was merely a band of rogue ninja banding together as mercenaries, unaware of its true goal: capturing tailed beasts to conquer the world.

Ignoring the voices in the thick fog, Li Ang glanced at the motionless Scorpion beside him, knowing the organization wanted to test his strength.

Since that was the case

At this moment, the Mist ninja hidden in the fog were slowly closing in on Li Ang and his companion.

Although they didn't know why the enemy wasn't attacking, they wouldn't show any mercy.

But just then, the Mist ninja suddenly noticed something was off.

'Dojutsu? Kekkei Genkai?'

Looking at the pair of golden pupils that had lit up at some unknown point in the thick fog, such a thought flashed through the ninjas' minds.

But they remembered that the two famous Dojutsu in the Ninja World didn't look like this, did they?

Before they could react, they suddenly sensed the temperature around them seemed to be rising sharply.

The squad captain who noticed something was wrong had his pupils contract abruptly. Just as he was about to call out a warning to his men, he was drowned out by a deafening explosion.

Boom—!

The dense water vapor was instantly dried up, and the violent shockwave tore the already muddy road to shreds.

Scorpion, hiding inside his Hiruko, watched the hellish scene before him with an expressionless face, a hint of confusion flashing in his eyes.

'Kekkei Genkai?'

Because he was standing right beside Li Ang, he hadn't noticed the change in the person next to him's eyes just now, and simply took the Monarch's Flame as a ninjutsu activated by some special Kekkei Genkai.

After all, only a Kekkei Genkai could produce such terrifying destructive power without forming hand seals.

Recalling the scene of Li Ang casually making kunai in the cave earlier, Scorpion grew increasingly certain of his guess.

Immediately after, the puppet master recalled the scene from a few minutes ago where the kunai couldn't even pierce the skin of the person beside him.

'That body of his'

'Did he modify himself into a puppet like me? Or does he have some other body art secret technique'

Scorpion naturally couldn't know that Li Ang had purely blocked the kunai with his stats. After all, in this puppet master's worldview, ninjas were an extremely fragile profession.

Even for the human puppets he made, they rarely chose to handle attacks the way Li Ang had just done.

On the other side.

The Mist captain was hiding behind a tree, gasping for breath in great gulps.

The moment he noticed something was wrong, he had used the Substitution Technique to evade.

But even so, a burning pain still coursed through his body from time to time.

'Is everyone in the Akatsuki organization this kind of monster.'

The captain couldn't help but swallow a mouthful of saliva. Even across the entire Mist Village, he rarely saw ninjutsu with power like what had just happened.

'No, I have to get this intel back to the city quickly.'

The moment this thought rose in the Mist ninja's mind, he heard a shrill whizzing sound suddenly coming from behind him.

Pfft—

The next moment, a pitch-black kunai pierced through his chest.

'What.'

'When.?'

The captain collapsed weakly to his knees, coughing up a large amount of fresh blood.