The post town wasn't a specific place, but more like a stop or station.
Since travelers came and went all the time, the area was like a busy market, full of noise.
There were also many houses and inns all around.
Sasuke looked down from the stairs. Travelers riding carriages always stopped here, and from the looks of it, the crowd below was overwhelming.
He took a deep breath and thought about how to handle this.
At this hour, they could no longer travel by carriage, so they had to find a place to stay.
"No choice, we'll just have to check them one by one."
Sasuke jumped down from the stairs and quickly went around asking about the two people based on their features.
…
Naruto was tricked by Jiraiya, who used the excuse of teaching him training to drag him out.
But just as the two were about to decide on a place to stay, an exceptionally beautiful woman suddenly walked up outside.
Both of them were stunned the moment they saw her.
A strange blush spread across Jiraiya's face. He turned and shoved the key in his hand into Naruto's palm.
"Here, Naruto, this is the room key."
"You go back to the room, focus your chakra for training, and then go to sleep. Got it?"
"Huh?"
Naruto froze, looking at Jiraiya who walked straight out the door.
"This is too sneaky! Leaving me here all alone."
"So now it's the world of adults, huh!"
Naruto shouted angrily at Jiraiya's back, but still went back to the room by himself.
Did he even want to teach him how to train or not?
Even though Jiraiya was strong, Naruto still felt he was brushing him off with things like this.
He sat cross-legged on the bed, frowning and squinting, pretending to concentrate on chakra.
But with so many messy thoughts in his head, he couldn't calm down to train properly.
Not far from the inn, two men in black cloaks with red clouds quietly watched as Jiraiya walked off with the young woman in his arms.
"Even the strongest people have weaknesses."
Kisame grinned, showing a row of shark-like teeth.
Itachi lowered his straw hat slightly, the red glow in his eyes dimming as he sank his face deeper into shadow.
"Let's go. He'll realize soon enough that the woman is under a Genjutsu."
During his fight with Kakashi, Itachi hadn't expected him to suddenly use the Mangekyo Sharingan.
Itachi wasn't sure what was going on with those eyes of his.
Normally, the Mangekyo Sharingan could only awaken after experiencing deep pain and loss.
But Kakashi, an outsider with a borrowed eye, awakened it after being stabbed a few times in a Genjutsu.
No matter how you looked at it, it was strange.
In his mind, the face of Hatake Satoru appeared. Had he interfered in this somehow?
If it was that man, there was nothing he couldn't do.
But using Tsukuyomi put a heavy strain on himself. If he clashed head-on with Jiraiya now, it would cause a huge commotion, and he and Kisame might not be able to escape unscathed.
So Itachi used his Sharingan to cast Genjutsu on a woman, making her lure Jiraiya away from Naruto.
Standing before the inn, Itachi looked up with a blank face, then vanished from the spot along with Kisame.
"…Hm?"
Sasuke had just left the last inn after asking around when he turned his head and frowned slightly.
Wasn't someone standing there just now?
He then looked up and saw the inn's signboard hanging above. Suspicious, Sasuke rushed inside.
"Hey, did a white-haired guy come here earlier with a blond idiot about my age?"
Sasuke barged into the inn and asked in a hurry.
The longer he wasted, the smaller his chance of seeing Itachi.
Whatever Itachi wanted with Naruto, Sasuke had to see him to find out.
"Uh… I think so, I saw them during the shift change."
"They should be in the room at the end of the second floor."
The woman at the counter answered absentmindedly.
So it really was here! Sasuke had just sensed those two chakra signatures vanish in an instant, and it made him sure something was wrong with this place.
Without hesitation, Sasuke sprinted inside and went straight to the room the woman mentioned, knocking on the door.
"Knock knock knock…"
Naruto was on the bed, training chakra with a bunch of shadow clones, but most of them had already fallen asleep in messy heaps.
The sudden knocking at the door pulled him out of his wandering thoughts.
"Bang bang." A few more knocks later, the sleeping clones all burst into white smoke and disappeared.
"Coming!"
Naruto shouted, jumped off the bed, slipped on his shoes, and headed toward the door.
"So fast, already got dumped and came ba—"
Naruto was grumbling with a smirk as he opened the door.
But it wasn't Naruto at the door.
Sasuke was staring at a stranger with a blank face, and inside the room sat a skinny old man with white hair, looking up at him.
"Tch."
Sasuke frowned sharply, then dashed off toward the stairs on the other side.
Naruto froze mid-sentence, his hand still on the doorknob, eyes widening in shock.
A tall man stood in the doorway. If Naruto had opened the door any faster, he would've stumbled right into him.
A black cloak with red clouds—flashy and clearly not the outfit of a good person.
Uchiha Itachi stood there, face cold, looking down at Naruto.
The man in front of him gave off a silent, oppressive pressure that made Naruto uneasy.
Naruto stiffly lifted his head and saw a face with features strikingly similar to Sasuke's.
Long eyelashes, Sharingan, black hair.
"…Who are you?"
"So it's just a kid. Didn't think a brat like this could seal the Nine-Tails."
He looks pretty lively too, not like someone burdened by a tailed beast inside him.
As Hoshigaki Kisame said this, he stepped out from the other side of the doorway.
Another strange guy showed up!
Blue skin, carrying a huge sword, looking like a shark!
Both of them gave off a suffocating aura, and how did they know about the Nine-Tails?!
In Naruto's memory, he had never seen people dressed like this inside the village.
Now they suddenly showed up at his door, talking about the Nine-Tails… this was bad!
Naruto's face showed shock and confusion. With the whisker marks on his cheeks, he looked just like a startled cat.
Uchiha Itachi lowered his gaze, his Sharingan staring coldly down at Naruto. His Akatsuki cloak covered half his face, hiding his expression.
"Naruto, come with us."
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