Chiba Shun thought about it for a moment. The Rabbit Goddess was Kaguya, the progenitor of chakra itself. He had never expected that people in the ninja world were still worshipping her.
Was this devotion something that had sprung up on its own? Was Black Zetsu behind it? Or had Kaguya herself somehow influenced the world? Could her power really still reach into the ninja world?
Driven by that curiosity, Chiba Shun agreed when the three children asked to stay and take part in the festivities.
The three little ones were not especially interested in the Rabbit Goddess. Their attention was fixed on the snacks, the acrobatics, and the noisy performers weaving through the crowd.
Shun, meanwhile, carefully studied the statue of the Rabbit Goddess in the center of the town shrine, along with the old shrine priestess who looked to be in her fifties or sixties.
The statue was very different from the Kaguya he remembered. It was somewhat plump, almost gentle-looking, with a soft, benevolent face.
Its eyes were not the pale, inhuman eyes he associated with Kaguya. They looked ordinary.
Her robes, however, were ancient and elegant, carrying the same classical air as the Kaguya from the old stories.
What unsettled him most was the ornament carved into the statue's forehead.
Shun had read the tale of Princess Kaguya in his previous life, and the moment he saw that carving, his skin prickled. To him, it did not look like a mere ornament at all. It looked far too much like an eye. The Rinne Sharingan.
Whether it was only his nerves or something more, he could not tell. But Shun had the strange, unmistakable feeling that the statue was staring back at him through that eye.
After only a brief look, he stepped away from the shrine and went off with the three children to browse the stalls.
Yet the moment he left, he felt it again.
Someone was watching him.
This feeling was different from the eerie discomfort he had felt from the Rabbit Goddess statue. That could have been his imagination. This could not.
Shun turned abruptly and looked back in the direction of the old priestess.
She did not seem to be looking at him. Had he imagined it? Or had she noticed his suspicion and already looked away?
Before he could sort out the answer, Ayana was already tugging at him and urging him to hurry.
Shun forced himself to let it go. Without lingering, he led the three children farther from the shrine that had unsettled him so badly.
At the fair in the Land of Iron, one stall was selling longswords. That immediately caught his eye.
Most of the swords he carried were ordinary blades. He still could not afford a true chakra-conducting weapon, so he hoped he might at least find something sturdy and worthwhile here.
After checking several shops, he finally spent twenty thousand ryo on a decent sword of acceptable quality.
The rest of the wares failed to impress him. Either they were overpriced, or they simply were not worth buying.
The three children, on the other hand, bought an entire pile of snacks.
Shun never objected to food. To him, food was part of a ninja's strength, something that could be turned directly into stamina and chakra. He paid for their purchases without hesitation.
After a full day of wandering the festival, the four of them returned to their inn. They rested for the night, and at dawn, Chiba Shun led the three children onward toward the Land of Waterfalls.
Beyond the Land of Iron lay the Land of Waterfalls, the only medium-sized country that possessed a tailed beast.
Because of that, Takigakure's view of itself was somewhat strange.
It desperately wanted to be seen as standing on the same level as the Five Great Nations. Unfortunately, it did not have the strength to back that ambition. In truth, it could not even compare with Amegakure at its height.
Still, there was one good thing about the Land of Waterfalls.
Its security was far better than that of the Land of the Moon or the Land of Hot Water.
For several days after entering Takigakure's territory, Shun and the three children encountered no enemies at all.
Just when Shun began to think they might pass through Takigakure in peace, a violent surge of chakra erupted far off in the distance.
All four of them turned at once toward the source.
The three little ones could not make out anything from so far away. Their eyesight and perception were too limited. Shun, however, understood almost immediately.
Someone was fighting with Fire Release and Wind Release.
From the pressure of the chakra alone, Shun judged that both those techniques far surpassed his own A-rank Earth Release: Mountain Earth Technique.
Wind feeding fire, fire amplified by wind—together, the two created a level of destructive force that could be felt even across several mountain ridges.
That was absolutely Kage-level power.
In this era, the number of Kage-level fighters in the ninja world was far smaller than it would be later.
Shun ran through the possibilities in his mind.
Based on chakra attributes alone, he could immediately rule out the Third Raikage, the Third Kazekage, the Third Mizukage, Danzo, Tsunade, Chiyo, Hanzo, and the jinchuriki.
That left Hiruzen Sarutobi, Onoki, Jiraiya, Orochimaru… and Kakuzu.
Kakuzu.
It had to be Kakuzu.
Kakuzu, with the Earth Grudge Fear and his five hearts.
Shun's blood ran cold.
His ten-million-ryo bounty on the underground market was more than enough to attract someone like Kakuzu.
An ordinary bounty hunter might be fooled by a disguise. Kakuzu would not.
Whether Kakuzu was already targeting him or not, Shun knew he had to prepare for the worst.
He did not dare entertain even the slightest thought of facing Kakuzu head-on.
At this point in time, Kakuzu's ninjutsu, taijutsu, battle experience, and tactical sense were all far above Shun's own. Even Kakuzu's Body Flicker Technique would likely outmatch his.
If Kakuzu caught up to him, Shun felt he had almost no chance of survival.
Worse, he was not even sure he could break Kakuzu's defenses.
He did not possess the lightning attribute. Could his Earth Release really penetrate Kakuzu's hardened body? He doubted it.
Once that conclusion settled in his mind, Shun stopped wasting time.
He ordered the three children to turn around and run straight toward Takigakure.
As he ran, he could not help feeling grateful to whoever had drawn Kakuzu into that fight and forced him to reveal such powerful techniques.
If that unknown person had not delayed him, Shun would have been done for the moment Kakuzu reached him.
The three little ones did not understand what was happening, and they were too frightened to ask. They could only follow him.
Hayata had far too little chakra. After running only a short distance, he was already exhausted, and Shun had to hoist him onto his back.
Fortunately, Shun and the three children had already crossed into the central region of the Land of Waterfalls. They were not far from Takigakure itself.
Kakuzu still needed time to track them down, and that bought Shun exactly what he needed.
Before Kakuzu could catch them, Shun reached the entrance to Takigakure.
The two Chunin on guard saw someone rushing toward them and immediately shouted for him to stop.
Shun halted at once. Without waiting for them to question him, he snapped, "Kakuzu—the S-rank rogue ninja from Takigakure—has returned. He wants revenge for the betrayal back then!"
The two Chunin exchanged blank looks. Neither of them had even heard of Kakuzu.
Shun added sharply, "He's a monster with power on the level of the great villages' Kage. Go report to your leader immediately."
That finally got through to them.
They wanted to ask more questions, but Shun was already moving again, taking the three children and veering to the side to bypass Takigakure entirely.
The two gate guards hesitated for a moment. Then one of them said, "You stay here. I'll report to the leader."
The other looked like he wanted to protest. Staying behind sounded far too dangerous.
Shun did not know what kind of chaos his warning caused among Takigakure's leadership.
By the time he had run several more li with the children, he heard the commotion behind him.
As he glanced back while running, he swallowed hard.
The Seven-Tails.
Takigakure… thank you.
At that point, Shun was basically certain of it. Kakuzu had absolutely been coming for him.
Kakuzu must have followed the trail Shun left behind to the outskirts of Takigakure, only to clash with the village's panicked forces.
The three children finally realized just how bad things were.
The chakra pressure of a tailed beast was beyond anything they had ever imagined. Even at that distance, it made their breathing seize and their legs weaken.
Only because Shun kept pushing them forward did the three manage to continue fleeing from Takigakure.
Determined to put as much distance between themselves and that battlefield as possible, Shun even took out soldier pills.
Not for himself. For the children.
The three of them were excited at first. It was the first time they had ever eaten soldier pills.
There were, after all, medicines in this world capable of instantly restoring stamina and chakra.
That excitement vanished almost immediately.
Because soldier pills had side effects.
Not long after the four of them entered the Land of Grass, the effects wore off. All three children were hit by crushing waves of fatigue that seemed to rise from deep inside their bodies.
Shun disguised himself as an ordinary traveler and led them into a city in the Land of Grass, where they rested for five full days.
Only after five days of food and recovery did the three little ones finally regain their strength.
Once they had recovered, Ayana finally dared to ask about Kakuzu.
Shun answered calmly, "He's an S-rank rogue ninja. In terms of strength, he's comparable to the Raikage."
He paused, then added, "And because he loves money, he was probably after the bounty on my head. He wanted to kill me for it."
"Fortunately, Takigakure helped hold him back. Otherwise, we would've been in real trouble."
The three children's faces, which had only just regained some color, immediately turned pale again.
The ninja academy textbooks did mention S-rank rogue ninja.
Shun had written those sections himself. In the textbook, he described S-rank rogue ninja as monsters even ninja villages could not handle—powerful, cruel, and utterly evil.
He had written it that way partly because he knew the future. S-rank rogue ninja would appear not only in Kumogakure's stories, but in Konoha, Sunagakure, and Iwagakure as well.
When the children compared them, they would naturally conclude that only Kumogakure was truly righteous. Every other ninja village would look like a breeding ground for demons.
Still, when Ayana and the others heard him say that Takigakure had "helped" drive Kakuzu away, all three of them wore strange expressions.
After all, it was Shun himself who had shamelessly run to Takigakure and dragged them into the mess.
Just then, Ayana remembered something and asked, "Shun-sensei… what was that huge monster?"
"The chakra was so overwhelming I could barely breathe, even from that far away."
Shun thought for a moment before answering. "That isn't in the village textbooks. But it's something you should know eventually."
"Those are tailed beasts. There are nine in the ninja world. One-Tail, Two-Tail, all the way up to Nine-Tails."
"Apart from the Seven-Tails of Takigakure, the others are all in the hands of the Five Great Ninja Villages."
"Our Kumogakure has two of them. The Two-Tails and the Eight-Tails."
Ayana stared. "Shun-sensei, have you ever seen one of our village's tailed beasts?"
Shun remembered the helplessness he had felt during the Eight-Tails' rampage. He nodded once.
"I saw it once," he said. "That time, when the Eight-Tails went berserk, the village lost several hundred ninjas. It was in that battle that the Raikage promoted me to Jonin."
The three little ones nodded as if they understood, though clearly they only grasped part of it.
Then Hayata suddenly asked, "Shun-sensei, where do those monsters come from? Why didn't we see it at Takigakure's gate before?"
"It was so huge. Was it hiding underground?"
Shun shook his head. "Tailed beasts are usually sealed inside ninjas by the great villages."
"A ninja who has a tailed beast sealed inside them is called a jinchuriki."
"And a jinchuriki can draw on part of the tailed beast's power."