Mumei's hand dropped.
The world narrowed to the flicker of the dying fire, the shapes of the three bandits, the drumming of the rain.
Ryugo didn't wait. Hesitation was death.
He made a quick, sharp hand seal—Ram → Snake → Tiger—and felt the chakra, sharp and eager, gather in his lungs.
"Now, Tetsu!" he hissed, the command low but carrying through the downpour.
To his left, the masked boy trembled.
His hands, hidden by oversized sleeves, moved in a fluid, hypnotic pattern. The air around the campfire wavered.
The rain didn't change, but to the bandits, it would have seemed to thicken, to solidify into a suffocating, grey curtain, paralyzing in its unnatural density.
A Waraiko specialty: illusions woven from the environment itself.
The bandits jolted, their heads snapping up, eyes wide with confusion as the world seemed to close in.
Ryugo moved. He leapt from the cover of a crumbling wall, his feet churning the mud. As he landed in a slide, his hands were already finishing his own sequence
"Raiton: Denkō Kō!"(Lightning Release: Lightning Arc - [D])
A jagged, brilliant fork of blue-white electricity, no thicker than a kunai wire, sizzled through the rain from his outstretched finger. It wasn't a massive, battlefield-clearing jutsu. It was precise, surgical, and deadly. It connected with the furthest bandit—a burly man fumbling for a cleaver—right in the center of his chest.
There was no dramatic scream, just a choked gasp, and a heavy thud as the man collapsed into the mud. Smoke was rising from his soaked tunic.
One.
Before the other two could even process their companion's death, a blur shot past Ryugo.
Ameruyi Takeda.
Slender, her face covered by a veil, she was graceful. Her sword strikes, however, were simple. Efficient.
Her worn katana flashed once.
The second bandit, half-rising with a short sword, simply toppled, his head cleanly separated from his shoulders before a look of understanding could reach his eyes. The fire hissed as blood sprayed across it.
Two.
The third bandit, a younger man with a face etched by hunger and fear, finally broke free of the illusion's hold. He saw the two dead, saw the kunoichi with the dripping sword, saw the other boy with crackling fingers.
He scrambled backward, shrieking, clawing at his belt for a rusted knife.
"Please...please...I have a family to feed"
He never got the chance.
A kunai, weighted and true, took him in the throat from the darkness where Ryugo stood. The shriek became a wet gurgle, then silence, broken only by the relentless rain and the sputtering of the fire.
It was over in less than ten seconds.
Ryugo stood, his breath coming in controlled puffs, the adrenaline a live wire in his veins.
He felt…nothing.
No revulsion, no exhilaration. Just a cold, analytical clarity. The System' prompt flashed, intrusive and bright in his mind's eye.
[Combat Concluded. EXP Gained: 20 (2 kills). Lightning Release: Lightning Arc (↑2), Kunai Throw (↑1)]
[Quest 'First Blood' Updated: Survive your first official mission - COMPLETE]
[Reward: 200 EXP, Unlocking Raikōgan (I) - Claim? Y/N]
He mentally selected 'Y'.
A new, deeper pulse thrummed behind his eyes. The world didn't change visually, but he felt a new layer to his perception, dormant but ready. He did not activate it right away.
He glanced at his teammates.
Tetsu was breathing heavily, his masked face turned towards the bodies. His shoulders were hunched, but he wasn't vomiting. He was staring. Processing.
Ameruyi was calmly wiping her blade on the less muddy part of a bandit's cloak before resheathing it. She adjusted her straw hat, the veil hiding any trace of emotion.
Mumei emerged from the shadows, his expression unreadable.
His eyes, sharp and assessing, scanned each of them in turn.
He had seen it all—the coordinated opening, the ruthless efficiency, the utter lack of hesitation. This wasn't the fumbling, traumatic first kill of most genin. This was…execution.
"The camp," Mumei said, his voice devoid of its earlier sternness, replaced by something more neutral, more cautious; "Search it. Recover any intelligence on caravan schedules or maps. Be thorough."
"Hai," Ameruyi responded immediately, moving towards the lean-to.
Ryugo and Tetsu followed. As they rifled through damp bedrolls and moldy packs, Ryugo felt the chunin's gaze lingering on him. Not just him, on all of them, but with a new weight.
They were too calm.
Ameruyi, he could understand. A noble clan heir. This was the least he could expect from those apathetic sword madmen. Even if she was just a child, Ameruyi was a Takeda. They had a strong reputation in the village.
But Ryugo and Tetsu? They were just out of the academy, yet showed composure in a real life and death battle.
'I guess this is the difference between shinobi clans and civilians shinobi like myself...Back in my first mission, I remember fainting after seeing blood...This is not bad', he mused
"Sir", Ameruyi said, handing him a water-stained, crudely drawn map with some dates scribbled on it, "Their intelligence. Basic, but it confirms the pattern."
Mumei took it, his eyes still on his team, "Good. We return to Ame. Report directly to the Dark Hall Tower"
He paused, the rain plastering his grey hair: "Your performance was…adequate. Do not let efficiency breed overconfidence. The next enemy will not be starving bandits but hostile shinobi, incomparably more dangerous"
"Hai, Mumei-sensei", they chorused
The return journey to Amegakure was silent. Ameruyi was frowning, wondering why she had only killed one bandit in this battle whereas Ryugo had killed two despite being noticeably weaker.
Tetsu was processing the assassinations, holding back his tears to avoid making a bad impression to their new chunin sensei
Ryugo was allocating points.
[You have reached Lv. 11]
[You have gained 10 Attribute Points]