After ending the battle with Sasori of the Red Sand, Shisui Uchiha did not go far.
Instead, he dug Matte, the former Sunagakure special jonin who had followed Sasori, out from beneath a stretch of ruins and began trying to pry more information about these assassination incidents from his mouth.
As a shinobi kept and used by Sasori of the Red Sand, responsible for most of the intelligence work under his command, Matte's resistance when facing interrogation was extremely stubborn.
Unfortunately, even Sasori of the Red Sand himself could not resist Shisui Uchiha's Sharingan genjutsu. So no matter how many methods Matte had prepared to resist interrogation, they all ultimately became useless in front of Shisui.
"As expected, I was still too naive to hope that a person who no longer has any restrictions of human morality would leave his captives alive."
After obtaining the unsurprising information from Matte's mouth, Shisui Uchiha sighed and used genjutsu to control him again.
Then he took out several blank sealing scrolls and began collecting the remains of the human puppets he had destroyed during the battle.
Aoba Yuki's remaining head had to be brought back to Kirigakure to give an answer to the people of the Yuki clan who were waiting for news of him.
The broken puppet body of the Third Kazekage might be somewhat shocking to the people of Sunagakure, but in the end, it was still an answer they had to face.
And then there was Sasori of the Red Sand's human puppet body. Letting it return to Sunagakure's hands and allowing him to atone for the village he had once dragged into war was not a bad option.
As for Matte, his life still had to be preserved until Konoha's investigation team arrived, so that the information about the remnants of Root participating in this assassination incident could be handed over to them in full.
And just as Shisui Uchiha was sorting through the puppet remains on the battlefield and arranging them by category, the tracking team formed by Nagato and Granny Chiyo followed the clues Sasori of the Red Sand and his intelligence personnel had intentionally and unintentionally left behind, arriving at this stronghold.
When Shisui first discovered their arrival, he instinctively became alert.
But when he saw the mysterious and dignified Rinnegan in Nagato's eyes, he could not help letting out a breath of relief. He then took the initiative to speak to Nagato, who was scanning the surroundings with surprise.
"Rinnegan? You should be Nagato, the leader of Akatsuki mentioned by the Fourth, correct? I am Shisui Uchiha, one of Kirigakure's new Seven Ninja Swordsmen. This is our first meeting…"
"Shisui, is it? I am Nagato. When exchanging intelligence with the Fourth Mizukage earlier, I heard him mention your name."
Because he had long since learned of the other party's existence through Rei Kaguya's channels, Shisui Uchiha and Nagato, two boys whose personalities and pursuits bore some similarities, easily got along.
"But should I say, as expected of a shinobi he took interest in? In terms of time and resources, I was clearly the one who held the advantage after cooperating with Sunagakure. Yet in the end, you, who investigated alone, were the first to find and defeat the exposed enemy…"
Because they already knew of each other through Rei's channels, Shisui Uchiha and Nagato, two young men whose personalities and goals were somewhat similar, quickly warmed to each other.
But the information revealed during their conversation truly gave Chiyo, who had lived from the early days of Sunagakure's founding until now, a tremendous shock.
"Shisui Uchiha… If I remember correctly, you should be the Uchiha bloodline who was taken by the current Fourth Mizukage on the battlefield between Konoha and Kirigakure, yes?"
Chiyo's voice was low and hoarse, carrying suppressed shock and incomprehension.
"Have you already been completely… brainwashed into Kirigakure's shape?"
"Brainwashed? I do not think so."
Shisui Uchiha shook his head. On his young and childish face, a maturity and firmness inconsistent with his age appeared.
"I chose to follow Fourth Mizukage Rei Kaguya of my own will. I acknowledge that his ideals can bring unprecedented change to the shinobi world, and I am willing to offer my strength, reputation, and even life to help him achieve his goal. This has nothing to do with brainwashing, genjutsu, or anything of that sort."
"To you, is he truly such an attractive person?"
Granny Chiyo's face still carried an expression of disbelief.
"For the proud Uchiha clan to say something like being willing to give everything for someone who is neither family nor comrade…"
"Did you not already meet the Fourth Mizukage once before, Granny Chiyo?"
Nagato lightly patted Granny Chiyo on the shoulder. His expression carried some emotion as he said,
"Even if you only met once and discussed one topic, you should be able to tell that Rei Kaguya is someone whose way of thinking and ideals are completely different from those of a 'shinobi,' right?"
"…The fantasies of young people, nothing more."
Granny Chiyo fell silent for a while, then gave up continuing this topic with Nagato and Shisui, two brats who had both been drawn in by Rei Kaguya.
She turned toward part of the puppet remains Shisui Uchiha had already sorted, changing the subject.
"These were all left behind from your fight with Sasori?"
"More or less."
Shisui Uchiha nodded.
"Including Sasori of the Red Sand himself and the Third Kazekage's human puppet, there are fifty-seven puppets in total. Aside from Senior Aoba Yuki's puppet, which I must bring back, the other fifty-six human puppets can all be handed over to Sunagakure."
"…What did you say?"
As if struck head-on by an S-rank Lightning Release, Granny Chiyo froze on the spot because of Shisui Uchiha's words.
The fact that Sasori of the Red Sand had transformed even himself into a human puppet was, for Granny Chiyo, unexpected yet also reasonable.
If Sasori had not poured an abnormal amount of emotion into puppets, she would not have presided over the development of a forbidden technique like One's Own Life Reincarnation.
This time, when she came with Nagato to pursue Sasori of the Red Sand, part of her had also wanted to persuade him to turn back.
But when the words "Third Kazekage's human puppet" came from Shisui Uchiha's mouth, and when her vision indeed fell upon a broken puppet whose appearance alone was enough to remind one of the missing Third Kazekage, with a large amount of iron sand still lingering around it…
Her emotions instantly reached the edge of collapse.
"Sasori… So it was you who killed the Third?"
"So that is why the village dispatched so many people, yet failed to find even the slightest trace of the Third. No wonder you suddenly left the village without saying goodbye afterward and vanished from then on…"
"Why… Why did it have to be like this…"
Watching Granny Chiyo stagger over to the broken puppet of the Third Kazekage with a lost, hollow expression, Nagato shook his head and pulled Shisui Uchiha back more than ten meters.
Then he asked Shisui Uchiha, who seemed to have developed a slight emotional resonance with Granny Chiyo, in a low voice.
"Is Sasori of the Red Sand dead?"
"I do not know."
Shisui Uchiha shook his head.
"I transferred his final flesh body, the regeneration core of his human puppet, to the Fourth through the Summoning Technique. If that person believes Sasori of the Red Sand would be better off dead, then he is probably dead by now."
"What about the intelligence? Have you confirmed that people from Root created these assassination incidents?"
"It has been confirmed that they were responsible. But for now, only their identity has been confirmed. As for which specific members Root has, where their bases are, or how to find their intelligence network, there are no real leads yet."
Listening to Shisui Uchiha's answer, Nagato nodded lightly and said in a deep voice,
"Although this is only the beginning, it is already enough for us to temporarily join forces with Konoha's investigation team… After Granny Chiyo recovers, Shisui, come back to Sunagakure with me first and wait for Konoha's investigation team to arrive. Since the enemy has already been confirmed to be Root from Konoha, then allowing the Konoha ninja who understand them better to join our team is the only way we may be able to drag them out of the darkness completely."
"You want to borrow the official power of Sunagakure and Konoha?"
Shisui Uchiha looked at Nagato in some surprise. Only then did he notice that the other party was not even wearing a forehead protector symbolizing Amegakure on his forehead.
"Will that not be somewhat inappropriate?"
"There is nothing inappropriate about it. Everyone is trying to uncover the truth behind the assassination incidents, give the victims rest and peace, and prevent the war that finally ended with such difficulty from being provoked again. If we have the same goal, then even if we each have different identities and positions, we can still walk forward hand in hand."
Nagato spoke calmly.
"So that is why you do not wear a ninja forehead protector?"
"Akatsuki is a peace organization. What would it look like if I wore a ninja forehead protector?"
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