"At our last meeting, Kakuzu and Hidan mentioned they were heading to Amegakure to earn some extra money."
Walking down the dim corridor, Sasori relayed everything he knew to Ryoma.
The Akatsuki's ultimate goal was the collection of tailed beasts, but before that, the organization needed to stockpile strength—both manpower and financial resources. That required a vast amount of money, and nothing produced quick cash like chaos. Even though the world wasn't embroiled in a major war, small-scale conflicts and gang skirmishes still happened regularly, especially in minor villages outside the Five Great Shinobi Nations.
Hidan and Kakuzu—who essentially served as the organization's "financial department"—were naturally drawn to bounty missions. The black market was the ideal place for quick money, and both men enjoyed it far too much.
According to Sasori, Kakuzu and Hidan were the closest Akatsuki members to their current location, which made Ryoma instinctively wary. He had no desire to go anywhere near those two.
Ryoma remembered Kakuzu clearly. In the original timeline, Naruto's newly completed Wind Release: Rasenshuriken had defeated him. Kakuzu was a Shinobi from the era of the First Hokage, once ordered by Taki Village to assassinate Hashirama Senju. After infiltrating, he was discovered and easily overwhelmed by Wood Release. But instead of being praised for his loyalty, he was punished harshly for the failed mission.
To Kakuzu, that betrayal made the village unforgivable.
He escaped prison in rage, stole the forbidden technique Earth Grudge Fear, and ripped out the hearts of the village's upper echelon to strengthen himself. That was the birth of the Kakuzu the world now feared.
"Let's head to Amegakure first."
Ryoma glanced sideways at Sasori, whose current puppet body moved stiffly, every step looking like agony. With a frown, Ryoma pulled out a storage scroll.
A soft thud.
"Boom!"
A plume of white smoke rose—and Sasori's eyes widened in disbelief.
Standing there was a familiar red-haired puppet: a restored version of his original human-form puppet body.
That shouldn't have been possible.
"Your original human puppet was destroyed. This is a replacement I put together while studying your puppet techniques these past two days," Ryoma said, pushing the puppet toward him. "Use it for now. Otherwise, your current shell will fall apart in less than fifteen minutes."
"Yes…"
Sasori transferred his regeneration core into the new puppet body. Immediately, strength surged through him—natural, responsive, almost… human.
"This…!"
His pupils trembled. The body didn't feel like a puppet at all. In theory, puppets were mere external shells—never able to match true human sensation. Sasori had long abandoned his flesh for the sake of "eternity," fully aware that he would never again experience the harmony of body and spirit.
Yet Ryoma's creation offered exactly that.
No weapons were installed, but its performance far surpassed any puppet Sasori had ever crafted.
"Just a casual two-day project…?"
Sasori silently acknowledged it: Ryoma's mastery over puppetcraft now far exceeded his own. A faint sense of awe took root.
…
As always, a light drizzle blanketed Amegakure, casting a grey veil over the steel towers and narrow alleys. The oppressive atmosphere seemed carved into the bones of the village.
In one such alley, Chartaro trembled as he stared at the figure behind him.
The man wore a black cloak. Around his pale green pupils, the sclera were tinted a reddish-brown—inhuman and unsettling. The lower half of his face was concealed behind a black mask, and a scratched headband bearing the symbol of Taki Village hung upon his forehead, marking him unmistakably as a rogue shinobi.
"W-Who the hell are you!?" Chartaro shouted, voice cracking. "We have no quarrel—why are you trying to kill me!?"
"People pay me to deal with their problems."
Kakuzu's voice was emotionless.
"If you want someone to blame, blame yourself for appearing on a bounty list."
His gaze locked onto Chartaro with the quiet intensity of a predator watching prey. Cold sweat dripped down Chartaro's spine.
"I won't die here!"
Desperation flaring, he drew a short blade and charged.
"Futile."
From beneath Kakuzu's cloak, his arms stretched unnaturally—elongating, twisting. Thick, dark tendrils—the black threads of Earth Grudge Fear—connected his forearms like grotesque sutures.
"What—?!"
Chartaro froze mid-step, horror flooding his eyes as the tendrils lashed toward him.
Seeing the sudden eruption of black threads, Chartaro, who had been mid-swing, froze for a heartbeat. But with his momentum already committed, he could only grit his teeth and let the blade fall.
Even when faced with such an unnatural sight, retreat was no longer an option.
The moment before his blade touched Kakuzu's extended forearm, the dense black threads beneath Kakuzu's skin writhed like serpents. His palm twisted away with inhuman precision, avoiding the blade by barely a fraction of a centimeter. Then—his arms burst open.
A storm of black threads erupted outward.
Earth Grudge Fear: Thread Binding Net.
Countless tendril-like threads wrapped around Chartaro in an instant.
"AAAAAAAHHHHH—!"
Helpless within the living net of stitches, his resistance lasted less than a second. The tightening threads sliced through flesh and bone with mechanical cruelty. Wet cracks echoed through the alley as Chartaro's body was carved into dozens of blood-soaked chunks. A grim and efficient death.
"…Pathetically weak," Kakuzu muttered, brushing off stray blood. "Still, an easy bounty is an easy bounty. My luck today isn't bad."
He lifted the severed head—damaged, but recognizable enough for verification—and stuffed it into his sack. The reward would not be affected. That alone left him in a good mood.
"A decent haul. Maybe I should stop by the bounty station and treat myself to a drink."
With that comfortable thought, Kakuzu turned to leave. But as he stepped out of the alley, he immediately felt two distinct gazes fixed on him. Whoever was watching him either had terrible stealth skills… or simply didn't care to hide.
"A pair of idiots looking to die."
The temperature around Kakuzu seemed to drop. He abandoned the idea of drinking and strode toward the outskirts of the village. If someone wanted to follow him, he would deal with them properly—preferably by turning them into spare hearts.
His feet kicked off the steel walls and pipes of Amegakure's buildings as he moved rapidly through the cityscape.
By the time the sky darkened, a pale moon was already hanging over the metallic towers. Kakuzu slipped through the gates and entered a patch of quiet woodland beyond the village.
His pale green eyes glimmered coldly in the shadows as he sensed his pursuers approaching.
Two figures descended into the moonlit clearing.
A black-haired, dark-eyed young man with striking, austere features.
And beside him—a red-haired youth in a handsome puppet body.
Kakuzu's gaze shifted between the two.
Most of Akatsuki had never seen Sasori's restored human-form puppet, so Kakuzu didn't recognize him. But the other one…
Ryoma.
Recognition flickered in Kakuzu's eyes.
Ryoma—known across the world as the strongest man of the current era—standing before him could only mean trouble.
After all, Akatsuki was not a benevolent organization. It was a criminal syndicate of rogue shinobi, assassins, and missing-nin. Someone like Ryoma appearing here would never be good news.
And Kakuzu understood that perfectly.