Chapter 5: Clearing The Bandit Hideout
Kenzo continued circling through the trees until he had a clearer view of the camp.
Dry leaves shifted softly beneath his sandals, but his steps remained measured and controlled.
From this new angle, more of the hideout became visible.
The faint smell of smoke lingered in the air, likely from a poorly maintained cooking fire.
A crudely made wooden hut, with a few crude tents made from patched cloth, could be seen clearly through this angle.
The structure leaned slightly to one side, its wood uneven and weathered from exposure.
Uchiha Kenzo made hand signs, and with a puff, two shadow clones appeared, sending them to scout the area and to check if there were any bandits nearby.
The clones dispersed soundlessly in opposite directions, vanishing between the trees.
Uchiha Kenzo, meanwhile, hidden in the dark, silently and stealthily moved towards the wooden hut.
His breathing was even, his heartbeat steady, his senses focused only on movement and sound.
Inside, loud laughter could be heard, accompanied by other crude sounds.
The rhythm of careless living echoed through the thin wooden walls.
After checking through the windows, Uchiha Kenzo made another shadow clone and sent him to incapacitate the enemy.
The clone slipped through the entrance without hesitation.
few moment later…
Inside, the usually boisterous bandits lay incapacitated.
Their earlier laughter had been replaced with unconscious silence.
After that, Uchiha Kenzo made his way in through the door,
where the bodies of the bandits were neatly tied. The work of his shadow clone.
Their weapons had been kicked aside, resting uselessly near the walls.
"Go and make quick work of the other bandits in front."
The shadow clone nodded and disappeared with a Body Flicker.
Uchiha Kenzo, however, made his way towards the bandit leader.
The man's breathing was heavy, still trapped between unconsciousness and awareness.
He grabbed his hair and slapped him across the face.
With a jolt of pain, the bandit leader woke up from his stupor.
Confusion flickered in his eyes before fear quickly replaced it.
The bandit leader looked at him, full of fear.
"Shinobi-sama, I—"
Before he could finish his sentence,
Kenzo activated his Sharingan and looked directly into his eyes.
The bandit leader immediately fell into a genjutsu.
His body slackened as his mind was dragged elsewhere.
Kenzo easily got all the information he wanted.
Routes, numbers, supply caches — all of it laid bare without resistance.
After getting all the information out of him, with a single controlled chop at the back of his neck, the man fell unconscious again.
His body slumped forward, restrained by the rope that held him in place.
And with that, he silently made his way towards the other tents.
His footsteps were no longer concealed, but neither were they rushed.
This time, he wasn't so cautious.
Though shinobi had some physical strength, in essence they were still glass cannons. It would only take a single well-placed explosive tag to end it.
Carelessness was fatal — but only to those unprepared.
After entering the tent, immediately a foul stench hit him like a physical blow.
The air inside was thick and stale.
Inside, a couple or so women lay in tattered clothing with hollow eyes and a lifeless look in their eyes. Bruises and dirt covered their bodies.
The silence around them felt heavier than the forest outside.
Uchiha Kenzo gave them a cursory glance before looking his way towards the bandit.
There was no hesitation in his movement.
The bandit, still in a disoriented state after last night's activities, hurriedly tried to get up from his makeshift bed.
His movements were sluggish, unprepared for danger.
But before he could even make a move, he looked into a pair of blood-red eyes.
Instantly, he fell into a genjutsu.
His resistance dissolved without struggle.
After tying him up as well, he finally looked at the lifeless women on the ground.
He walked there with an unhurried pace, checked their pulse, confirmed they were dead, and left to do the same to the other tents as well.
Each confirmation took only seconds.
If this was some other transmigrator, they would have gotten enraged and killed the man out of anger, or shown at least some sort of reaction like burying them and giving them a grave or presenting their heads to there lifeless body's for some sort of repentance.
However, Kenzo was completely and utterly indifferent.
To him, it didn't matter whether they were innocent or not. What mattered was only one thing: whether they were useful or not.
If the women was alive, then she could have been used as an experiment in testing the system. If not, then so be it.
He did not care what their past experiences were. Only fools pity the weak. The reason the weak stay weak is because of their own incompetence.
If she had chosen the hard path, made her own merchant association, and carved her path to the top with ruthless means, would she have died like this?
Sure, you could argue that if she went that path she would die sooner, but wouldn't she die eventually, whether it be with time or any other reason? Eventually, she will die, so why hesitate?
The reason was simple: because she choose an easy way out, and that's the reason she died such a horrible death today.
The weak stay weak because they choose to do nothing with their time. They live in comfort while expecting others to protect them, while not realizing that in this world you are the only one who can protect yourself.
Without further ado, Kenzo cleaned up the other tents and went inside the wooden hut.
The forest outside had grown quiet again.
After his shadow clone brought back the other bandits, he finally started testing the system for real.
The hut was secured. No interruptions.
The screams of the bandits went on for several long, grueling hours inside the wooden hut.
The sound did not reach far beyond the trees.
When Kenzo was finally done, the screams of the bandits had already ceased.
Only stillness remained.
Now, he could make a full primary assessment of the system.
the system's path of killing's developments in three different ways:
First is the intent/reason behind it.
For example, when he gave the bandit a kunai and told him to attack him while in a defenseless state, in that moment of life and death he killed the bandit for survival, the system's increase was exponentially more than any other reason so far. Of course, he had created that scene artificially by hiding some traps for the bandit and using his Sharingan to make him forget them temporarily.
Manufactured danger still counted as danger.
Second is the chakra amount and density.
When he gave the bandit a basic chakra molding technique from the Academy and forced him to squeeze out some chakra and then killed him, the percentage increase was slightly higher.
Meaning the fluctuation in energy had a measurable impact.
Third is life force/soul density.
After another series of testing, he found out that even the soul affected the increment. The higher the soul density, the higher the increments. As for how, it was simple: he caught some wild animals and compared the numbers and realized life force was not the only thing affecting the percentage of increment.
There were variables beyond mere physical vitality.
And now, as for the rewards, he got some minor enhancement to his physical strength and an almost negligible amount of chakra.
The gain was present, but unimpressive.
Which gave basically no boost to his combat strength.
Meaning he will first have to increase his understanding of the path of killing to get any meaningful rewards which could actually boost his combat strength.
Efficiency would require refinement.