"Everyone, compile the intel you've gathered." Seeing the squad members all present, Mokgetsu spoke.
"Our team scouted the guard forces around the Grass Village leader's office building. I don't know if it's because that Leader of the Grass Village is very confident in his own strength or what, but there actually aren't many Ninja guarding the place." Nara Suzaku stepped forward and reported first.
In truth, their intel gathering mainly relied on Aburame Shikuro's Secret Technique, but since Aburame Shikuro wasn't someone who liked to talk, Nara Suzaku acted as his mouthpiece and did the reporting for him.
Then Nara Suzaku handed Mokgetsu a rough layout diagram of the Grass Village office building.
Mokgetsu took it and glanced over it. Not only had they mapped out the internal structure of the Grass Village office building, many rooms even had their functions marked.
Sarutobi Hiruzen clearly intended to go all-in on Grass Village; the teammates he'd picked for Mokgetsu each had some trump card and definitely couldn't be considered ordinary Jonin.
It was only the first day, and they had already almost fully probed the Grass Village office building.
"Although there aren't many Ninja in the office building, we don't know how strong they are. My idea is to locate the Anbu Department Base; there might be the classified information we need in there." Nara Suzaku said.
If they were going to launch a direct assault on Grass Village, there'd be no need for all these tricks—they could just scout the office building, infiltrate, and start fighting. But first they had to figure out whether Grass Village had actually started cooperating with Hidden Rock.
"Mm, nicely done." Mokgetsu nodded in approval.
Nara Suzaku's thinking was basically the same as his. As the most secretive division of a Ninja Village, Anbu would almost certainly be involved in something this covert—practically a hundred percent.
Obito scratched his head, feeling a bit embarrassed.
The other teams sounded way too professional, and their gains were huge.
Obito suddenly felt that not being the team leader wasn't so bad—this way he didn't have to do the reporting himself, and it was a bit less embarrassing.
"Our team first investigated the main district of Grass Village and found that lately the Grass Ninja all seem extremely busy, with heavy mission loads.
And when our team later went to the outskirts, we discovered Grass Village seems to be short on manpower. Facing over a thousand refugees, they only sent a few Grass Ninja to manage them." Kakashi reported with a serious expression.
"Looked at this way, Grass Village is highly suspicious. It's very possible they've dispatched some of their more elite Grass Ninja to the front lines to support Hidden Rock, which has led to the manpower shortage and heavy mission pressure back in the village." Nara Suzaku analyzed.
Just the fact that the office building's guards were few wasn't enough to prove anything—there weren't many of them, but they could all be elites.
But combined with what Kakashi had just said, Grass Village became very suspicious. It couldn't all just be coincidence, right?
"In addition, our team also discovered a refugee who is very likely a survivor of the Uzumaki Clan. She was almost driven out by the Grass Ninja, but for some unknown reason the Leader of the Grass Village insisted on keeping her. To avoid exposing ourselves, we didn't make contact with her." Kakashi continued.
"A refugee from the Uzumaki Clan?" Maruboshi Kosuke looked shocked.
He was the oldest Ninja on this mission, and he knew full well the relationship between the Uzumaki and Konoha.
The most orthodox Konoha Fuinjutsu is actually Uzumaki Fuinjutsu, because Konoha's Fuinjutsu was developed on the basis of Uzumaki Fuinjutsu. Back then, the Uzumaki Clan's Clan Leader personally came to Konoha to teach the Sealing Ninja Uzumaki Fuinjutsu.
To commemorate that friendship, the Konoha Ninja's uniform bears the crest of the Uzumaki Clan.
"Maybe he wants to get his hands on the Uzumaki Clan's Fuinjutsu?" Nara Suzaku was certain the Leader of the Grass Village had nothing good in mind.
When it came to the Uzumaki Clan's powerful Fuinjutsu, let alone an ordinary Ninja Village like Grass Village—even Great Ninja Village–level villages among the Five Great Ninja Villages coveted it. Only Konoha, which had formed an alliance with the Uzumaki, could remain calm about it. The fact that the Uzumaki Clan suffered annihilation was, to a large extent, because of their Fuinjutsu.
"Your caution is correct. Since the Leader of the Grass Village personally ordered that Uzumaki refugee be kept, he's definitely plotting something." Mokgetsu thought for a moment and said.
He guessed that Uzumaki refugee was very likely Karin's mother from the original story.
Given this point in time and this being the Land of Grass, the only person he could think of was Karin's mother.
Based on the intel they already had, Mokgetsu could basically confirm the Leader of the Grass Village's aim: he was probably planning to feed Karin's mother to the Box of Bliss.
For that box that could absorb Chakra, members of the Uzumaki Clan, who possessed powerful Chakra, were practically the best nourishment.
The Leader of the Grass Village, who was eager to open the box, wouldn't let a Chakra source that delivered itself to his doorstep slip away. So there were probably Grass Ninja monitoring Karin's mother right now, making it indeed difficult to approach her casually.
Obito stared at the fluent, detailed report Kakashi was giving, then looked at Mokgetsu's fully approving expression, and was dumbfounded.
So their team had actually gathered that much intel? How come he didn't know any of it?
Or was the Kakashi who'd been by their side the whole time actually a Shadow Clone, and the real Kakashi had long since gone off alone to gather intel?
Even though Obito was full of doubts, he knew this wasn't the time to be asking questions.
Because if he asked now, it would make him look not very smart, and like he'd been slacking off, not even knowing what his own team had been doing.
"The Uzumaki Clan is Konoha's ally. Although the Uzumaki Clan is now gone, we can't ignore the friendship that once existed between the Uzumaki and Konoha. As for survivors of the Uzumaki Clan, as long as it doesn't affect the mission, we'll do our best to help her." Mokgetsu concluded.
Maruboshi Kosuke nodded inwardly, gaining a bit more goodwill toward Mokgetsu.
Mokgetsu's way of handling it neither lacked in human warmth nor violated Konoha's regulations.