The sky was cloudy, heavy with rain bearing clouds but the heat made every fisherman working curse profanities.
Keiko couldn't get over the annoying mild fish smell which permeated the air, her eyes observed the Shizunami village from the height of a large tree.
Hiten turned his attention to a large ship that was arriving near the port, bringing his attention to more than a hundred boats ands ships, lined up side by side.
Tatsuo was confused by how almost a thousand people worked in the port with such ease. The moving of cargo, the loading of ships and the opening and distribution of crates.
It was akin to watching ants swarming around and carrying away a piece of sugar cube.
And also the fact that everyone seemed as small as an ant from how far they were.
"Come on. We need to find the target." She told Tatsuo, who was lost in the view. "Hiten, go ahead."
"This is racism! Not every person with eye powers can see far away. That's the byakugan, not the Sharingan."
"Fine...we will get closer and investigate on foot." Keiko jumped off the tree.
---
"Kaiyo Harvest. It should have have wave as their logo. It shouldn't be that hard to find, we will split up and return in two hours." Keiko body flickered away.
Hiten turned to look at Tatsuo, who was as clueless as one could be.
"You'll accompany me, don't worry about getting lost or anything." Hiten took out some sunglasses.
"I'm more concerned about questioning people without getting caught. What if they have sensors who can notice us entering?" Tatsuo said as he folded his hands.
"Sensory jutsu which can differentiate a person's identity from another is very rare. There are already people who use chakra among that crowd, we will be just another senbon in a haystack."
Hiten grabbed Tatsuo's shoulder and body flickered away.
"We begin with asking around, civilians, shinobi stationed here or just any workers of that company we see moving around." Hiten used transformation jutsu to appear like a tourist.
Tatsuo mimicked him and transformed, before following Hiten into the bustling market.
Tatsuo scrunched up his nose as the smell of dead fishes intensified. All he could smell was fish and all he could hear were fishermen.
'I cannot wait for this to be ov—' Tatsuo's thoughts were interrupted as heard Hiten.
"Here's a tip! Pretend to be a buyer who is very conscious about what they buy. People become less suspicious when they know the 'why?' behind the questions." Hiten adjusted his sunglasses and activated his eyes.
"Watch and learn!" Hiten walked towards a stall owner.
Hiten, in his totally tourist looking clothes walked past the stall, eyeing the fishes and various other seafood placed in tubs of salt and ice.
"Hey, boy! C'mere!" The stallowner said, taking a puff from his tobacco pipe.
"Huh?" Hiten faced the man, before looking away, as if not interested in what the man had to sell.
"C'mon, I'll give you a good offer! My fresh eels are known throughout the village!" The man opened a box and showed a beautiful large eel.
"It's size...is huge. Is it a female? Do you sell male eels too?"
"You know your eels well, boy! This one is a hot commodity, if you buy it for 500 ryo I'll throw in two male eels too, free of charge, of course!"
The man took out another tub that was filled will male eels. Hiten lightly touched the eels as the man didn't stop him.
"Eels are not only nocturnal creatures but they also live more than four kilometers under the water! How did you find eels of this good quality? This is amazing!" He was genuinely impressed by the quality.
Hiten's eyes glowed red for a fraction of a second, as the man began speaking.
Hiten gave him the money and took the eels for himself as he left. He returned back to an alleyway from where Tatsuo had observed everything.
"Why didn't you just put him in a genjutsu and come back? Why waste money on those slimy things?" Tatsuo shuddered and back off from the eels.
"You have to make sure your conversation are sounding natural, in case there is an eavesdropper. You can't really blame me when the eels are of this good quality!" Hiten said while bringing the eels close to Tatsuo's face.
Tatsuo jumped back and almost gagged at the sight of the eels. Hiten laughed as he closed the tubs.
"At least we know where it is now, right?" Tatsuo asked, turning to face away from Hiten.
"Nah, it's not in this village. We came to the wrong place." Hiten said with a deadpan expression.
"What the f—"
---
"What do we do now? This village only has a branch established here, the main headquarters is in a different village." Tatsuo asked, turning to Keiko for guidance.
"We go to the village that has the headquarters, that's it." Keiko replied while packing her tools and preparing for travel.
"How do we know that it's not this village which has the chakra users? The scroll mentioned this village, not the headquarters." Hiten challenged.
"Workers capable of using chakra are too valuable to keep at a branch instead of their main village. It's obvious that they would keep their best assets close to the management...or whoever is teaching them."
Hiten took a step forward, taking his hands out of his pocket.
"You know what else is obvious? How much of a attention attracter those chakra enhanced workers are! A common civilian sees a scrawny guy boast about catching a whale and suddenly...BOOM! there's a police raid!"
Keiko clicked her tongue as she began pacing to and from.
"Why would someone boast in the first place?" Tatsuo whispered, allowing Keiko enough space to think.
"We have been training since childhood, so we wouldn't understand, but if a random person gains the ability to manipulate chakra...you have no idea of magnitude of the 'power high' they would receive from it."
"Oh...that does make sense." Tatsuo snapped his fingers
Keiko looked at Tatsuo, before throwing a glance at Hiten, before gritting her teeth.
"Hey, what are we doing?" Hiten asked, his eyebrow raised in concern.
"We need to split up."
"Split up? Is one of us staying? Are you sure you want to divide our manpower like this?" Hiten's brows furrowed.
"The mission report says there are many of them. It isn't impossible that both of these villages have them."
"Who is staying, then?" Tatsuo butted in.
"Hiten."
"Understandable. What do I do here?" Hiten sat down on a cut stump of a tree.
"Verify that there are enhanced individuals in this village, eliminate them and come help us. If you don't find any—come anyway." Keiko said, wearing her pouch on her hip.
She picked up her sword and left. Tatsuo followed her, leaving him all alone.
Hiten looked at the village from the roof of the tall tree, before sighing, 'I really hope these bastards are here and not there...guess I'll have to find out.'
---
"The entire information we have about this mission came from someone who—saw some and said something." Hiten muttered, walking through the markets of Shizunami village.
His eyes, hidden behind his shades, scanned everyone like a facial recognization system.
Finding regular workers of Kaiyo Harvest was easy from finding men wearing their uniform. Finding the building where they worked was even easier as he followed the men from far away.
Hiten took out his rations bars and sat down on a tree branch, eyeing the building with borderline disinterest.
'I should've gone with Tatsuo...'
The humid, hot climate made the existence of several windows necessary, removing the need for Hiten to enter and storm the building.
'Men wearing fishing equipment come hear occasionally, but it's just regular people in kimonos...' Hiten's eyes drooped, forcing him to rub them once in a while.
Hiten stood up from his tree branch and chose a different angle from a different tree branch.
'Maybe the office rooms on the other has something...'
---
"It's my fault for keeping my hopes up." Hiten muttered, rubbing his forehead.
There was nothing suspicious worth watching...since the the man who Hiten was observing began having intimate acts with his secretary?...servant?... maybe maid?
'Beard man really is showing no restraint... I wonder what promised her...' Hiten smirked, he had nothing to entertain himself with except his own jokes.
Hiten left the area to head for the port, hoping for a lead to follow up on, instead of watching...what he was watching.
Within minutes he reached the port and looked around, finding a restaurant which had an open terrace for those who want a tan while enjoying their food.
'Who would even want to get a tan while eating? Anyways, it's a nice spot for a stakeout for long hours.'
Hiten didn't waste time and took the stairs to the terrace, grabbed a bottle of sunscreen and ordered some food.
"No one will suspect me, if I play the part...it's not like I actually wanted this..."
One of the many things Hiten had learnt from his brother was that, too much information can cause burnout. Its better to take a small part and go deep into it.
"Boat no. 22 and 34 are leaving. Boat no. 98 and 76 are coming back." Hiten took a sip of his cold tea, "Guess I'll track them."
Boat no. 98 and 76 quickly unloading their catch, and the fishermen rested, helped others, or joined other boats and left for sea.
Hiten watched as both ships completed unloaded, the fishermen gathered around and took out money.
'Betting on who got more, huh? Mine is on 98!' Hiten thought, his curiousity peaking.
"Damn it! 76 won!"
Hiten observed the fishermen for a few more hours, his sharingan picked up minute details as time went on.
'That red shirt guy has taken only two breaks till now, and still more fuel in the tank...still its not enough to be considered abnormal.'
His attention was taken away when Boat no. 34 returned and no. 22 was nowhere to be seen.
The unloading revealed they had brought so many fishes that it brought but larger crews with larger boats to shame.
"How? They crew members have about the same people and they seem to have the same equipment too." Hiten softly said.
The moment nightfall hit, the workers began leaving the port, their boats left safely under the supervision of security guards.
Hiten brows furrowed as he tried to think of what it could be, what could possibly allow a crew to be so productive? There's no way that everything could just boli down to skill...then what is it?