Danzo still hated the idea of paying for the jutsu.
He wanted the deal to cost him nothing.
But Chiba Shun's next sentence struck him at the root of his obsession and changed everything.
"Advisor Danzo, Konoha as it stands today belongs to Hiruzen Sarutobi," Chiba said calmly. "So Konoha's jutsu belong to Hiruzen Sarutobi as well. Trading Hiruzen Sarutobi's assets for your own future is a bargain no matter how you look at it."
Those words stabbed straight into one of Danzo's oldest wounds.
Konoha belongs to Hiruzen Sarutobi.
That was the truth Danzo hated most and refused to accept.
He slammed his palm down and shattered the table before him.
Even so, after venting his rage, he still agreed to pay. The only question left was the price.
And because he was Danzo, he immediately tried to cut Chiba down at the knees.
"Twenty C-rank jutsu and ten B-rank jutsu," he countered.
Chiba almost laughed in disbelief.
Yes, his own opening offer had been shamelessly high. But Danzo's counteroffer was just as ruthless in the opposite direction.
To be honest, C-rank and B-rank jutsu were not especially valuable to a great village in the long term. The true pillars of a hidden village were jonin. If a path led nowhere beyond mediocre techniques, no genius would willingly choose it.
A jonin's trump card had to be A-rank at minimum.
If a village only possessed low- and mid-tier elemental jutsu, then no prodigy of that element would ever rise all the way to the top. Chiba Shun knew that better than anyone, which was why he refused to retreat too quickly.
At the very least, he had to secure an A-rank Earth Release technique suitable for himself.
So the two of them bargained back and forth in the dark, each line sharper than a knife.
When the haggling finally ended, they settled on a compromise. Danzo would pay in advance with twenty C-rank jutsu, fifteen B-rank jutsu, and two A-rank jutsu.
That was all.
Not a single S-rank technique.
Chiba was disappointed, but not enough to jeopardize the agreement. Fortunately, the two A-rank techniques he had insisted on were both earth-element techniques that suited him perfectly.
Danzo moved quickly.
Not long after the terms were finalized, the Kurama clan Root operative used that strange illusion-based method again to deliver a scroll to Chiba Shun. He opened it at once and checked every line.
There were indeed thirty-seven techniques recorded on it. The numbers, ranks, and elemental types all matched the deal. The techniques Chiba had specifically named were also there.
But he noticed the catch almost immediately.
Every single one of them was in its rawest, most primitive form.
One of the A-rank techniques, for instance, required thirty-nine hand seals just to activate. There was no mention of streamlined seal sequences, no notes on refinement, no senior annotations, no hard-earned shortcuts.
Nothing.
Chiba clicked his tongue but raised no objection.
The jutsu were already in his hands. That was enough. Pushing further now would only invite trouble.
***
Once the exchange ended, Danzo turned his attention to arranging White Fang's downfall.
As for Chiba Shun, he made his own decision almost immediately.
He would leave Konoha the very next day.
Now that the deal had just been struck, Danzo's desire to kill him was probably at its lowest. This was the safest moment he would get. If he delayed, that moment would pass.
So, lying on the bed in the room Konoha had assigned him, Chiba began replaying the entire trip in his mind.
It had been absurd from beginning to end.
At some point during that reflection, he realized he might never see Namikaze Minato again.
The thought made him unexpectedly sad.
Then he found himself laughing under his breath.
Earlier that very day, he had been sitting with Minato, grinning like an old friend, discussing the Will of Fire and the Will of Lightning as if they were two earnest boys exchanging ideals.
And that same night, he had turned around and made the filthiest deal possible with Danzo in the shadows.
The contrast was ridiculous.
Then another thought hit him, and cold sweat broke out across his back.
What if Minato Namikaze was doing the same thing somewhere else right now? What if that sunny smile hid conversations just as dirty as his own?
Chiba stared at the ceiling in silence.
Terrifying.
Then he shook his head hard.
No. He was probably just being cynical and judging others by his own standards.
The next morning, Chiba Shun gathered the twenty-four children and stood with them at Konoha's gate to say farewell.
Minato Namikaze came to see them off.
Chiba gave him a bright smile and said, "Minato, thank you for taking care of us these past days. And thank you for your guidance in ninjutsu. Your ideas were incredible. Farewell."
Before Minato could even respond, Chiba turned at once and ordered the children to move out.
The two elite squads assigned to escort them quickly followed.
Minato stood there, momentarily stunned.
When did I guide him in ninjutsu?
And what ideas of mine is he even talking about?
He wanted to call after Chiba and ask for an explanation, but by the time the thought formed, the Cloud delegation had already gone too far.
In the end, he could only scratch his head and head back to report to Hiruzen Sarutobi.
***
The trip out of Konoha was uneventful.
Danzo did not send anyone to assassinate Chiba this time. Whether it was because the deal had temporarily cooled his hostility or because the risks were too high, Chiba did not know.
Either way, he had no intention of questioning his good fortune.
After several days on the road, he and the children finally crossed out of the Land of Fire.
Waiting for them was the same escort force that had brought them there in the first place.
And among them, as eye-catching as ever, was Yotsuki Ai.
The future Fourth Raikage inspected Chiba and the twenty-four children carefully, clearly checking whether Konoha had tampered with them in any way.
But what he found only deepened his confusion.
No one was missing.
Not only that, the chakra levels of both Chiba Shun and the children had noticeably risen.
Yotsuki Ai said nothing, but the look in his eyes made it clear he found the whole thing deeply suspicious.
Then the eight Kumo shinobi escorted Chiba and the exchange group through the Land of Hot Water and the Land of the Moon, all the way back toward the Land of Lightning.
Up to that point, everything went smoothly.
Too smoothly.
Chiba had expected danger in the Land of Fire. He had expected danger in the Land of the Moon.
He had not expected disaster to strike only after they had almost reached home.
The attack came at night.
Four elite squads descended on them in a coordinated ambush, each one led by a jonin.
Their target was clear from the first instant.
Chiba Shun.
And the children.
Those children had barely refined any chakra. Against a strike force of that level, they were as fragile as paper.
The first wave alone turned the camp into a slaughter.
Twenty-two of the twenty-four children died on the spot.
The only reason it was not a complete wipeout was because Chiba reacted fast enough to snatch one child away from certain death, while Yotsuki Ai moved like lightning and saved another.
Everyone else was killed.
The battle erupted in full an instant later.
Even while forming seals, Chiba shouted to Yotsuki Ai beside him, "It shouldn't be Konoha! If it were Konoha, they wouldn't waste effort killing the children. They would've come straight for me."
"The people in Konoha know those kids don't actually know anything!"
Whether Yotsuki Ai heard him or not, Chiba could not tell. The future Raikage was already watching the battlefield with terrifying intensity.
Then something seemed to register in his senses.
Lightning exploded around his body, and he vanished toward one side of the battlefield in a streak of blue-white force.
Even amid the chaos, Chiba distinctly heard the muffled grunt that followed the impact.
He had no idea whether the person Yotsuki Ai struck had died.
He had no time to care, either.
His own danger had already arrived.
More than a dozen kunai screamed toward him.
"Earth Release: Earth Flow Wall!"
His hands slammed to the ground.
The next moment, earth surged upward around him and the two surviving children. Wall after wall rose and curved inward until they sealed together above their heads, forming a complete dome.
This was no ordinary Earth Flow Wall.
Over the past year, Chiba had only learned one true ninjutsu from Kumogakure - but he had taken that single technique and pushed it as far as he could. He had reduced its seals to five. He had raised his seal speed to four per second. Most importantly, he had reworked its shape.
The classic Earth Flow Wall only defended the front. It was useful in a duel, but in real combat enemies could come from behind, from the sides, from above. So Chiba reshaped it into something closer to a true Earth Wall - a hemispherical shell that sealed overhead and protected everything within.
It could not absorb chakra like certain higher-level earth techniques.
But as a pure defensive barrier, it was leagues better than the original form.
Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.
Kunai hammered against the earthen shell, leaving only shallow marks.
Inside the dome, in total darkness, the two children were crying so hard they could barely breathe.
Chiba continued forming seals as he spoke, his voice firm and cold.
"Calm down. You're the future of the village. Fight like heroes. Don't disgrace Kumogakure in front of the enemy."
The familiar cadence of his voice reached them, and their sobbing gradually weakened.
Then he said, "Stay here. I'm going out to fight."
His fingers finished the next sequence.
And slowly, silently, he sank into the earth.
That was one of the B-rank techniques he had obtained from Danzo.
Earth Release: Hiding Like a Mole Technique.
This was the first time Chiba had ever actually used it.
He had never dared practice it in Konoha. Learning it from the scroll was one thing. Using it under the eyes of Konoha's watchers would have been suicide. So after memorizing it, he had done the only thing he could - he had carried it in his head, turning it over again and again throughout the journey back, thinking through every seal, every chakra pathway, every possible application.
Fortunately, theory was enough to let him force it into reality at the critical moment.
As long as no one interrupted him during the setup, the technique worked.
Outside, the battle raged on.
The Kumo shinobi were outnumbered and were rapidly being pushed back, casualties mounting with every exchange.
But after seeing Chiba and the two surviving children vanish behind the earthen dome, the attackers did not immediately try to break it with powerful ninjutsu.
They did not have the time.
Their priority was Yotsuki Ai and the escort squads.
Their mission was to wipe out the entire exchange group sent by Kumogakure to Konoha.
Originally, they had intended to annihilate everyone in the very first strike, when the group was still clustered together and vulnerable.
Who could have guessed Chiba Shun would escape in the chaos and even save someone?
As far as they were concerned, if Chiba died, then the mission was basically complete. One or two surviving children meant nothing.
As for the child Yotsuki Ai had saved - well, that was different. Ai was a jonin. Of course he could accomplish something like that.
Underground, Chiba formed another sequence of seals and activated his first B-rank sensory technique.
Chakra Sensing.
Moving through earth was only a state. It did not prevent him from using other ninjutsu while submerged. If it did, the technique would be nearly worthless.
Soon, the battlefield above came into focus through chakra.
Fast-moving combatants he ignored. They were too unstable, too dangerous to target cleanly.
But a few figures were holding relatively safe positions in the rear.
Those were his prey.
Without hesitation, Chiba shifted underground toward one of them.
Then he formed twenty-seven seals in rapid succession.
Earth Release: Headhunter Jutsu.
That was another B-rank Earth Release technique he had specifically demanded from Konoha.
Danzo had not thought much of it. To the old vulture, it was a low-tier utility jutsu not worth guarding carefully.
To Chiba, it was priceless.
On the surface, a taijutsu ninja standing guard over two ninjutsu specialists suddenly felt something go wrong.
But he was too late.
His attention was still on the battlefield around him, not the earth beneath his feet.
The next instant, a hand shot out of the ground, seized his ankle, and dragged him straight down.
Not halfway.
Not with his head left sticking out like Kakashi once did to toy with a brat.
All the way down.
Completely swallowed by the earth.
In truth, Chiba's success had less to do with mastery and more to do with the chaos around him. This was his first time using the technique in real combat, and his chakra fluctuations were far from subtle. Under normal conditions, an alert ninja might well have sensed him in time.
But on a battlefield drowning in violence and chakra noise, no one noticed one more pulse beneath the ground.
And, more importantly...
They were fighting Cloud shinobi.
Since when did Cloud shinobi attack from underground?