The sun had set, leaving only a streak of orange across the horizon.
Kitahara Kaede walked back toward the village, carrying a paper bag of snacks.
Training had ended early today. Hiruzen had gone to the Hokage building for a eting, and the three of them had been dismissed on the spot.
As he made his way ho, sothing caught his eye at the corner of the street.
Orochimaru.
The man who was usually draped in white was wearing a wide black cloak today, hugging the walls as he headed toward the village outskirts. He walked quickly, his head kept low.
Kitahara Kaede popped a snack into his mouth.
With that outfit, he might as well have written "I'm up to no good" across his forehead.
He chewed a few tis and decided to follow. He had nothing better to do, after all. With his current sensory abilities, Orochimaru wouldn't notice him as long as he kept a distance of twenty or thirty ters.
The two of them crossed the village gates one after the other and reached the riverbank outside the village.
Before he even got close, Kaede heard Tsunade's voice.
"Five thousand ryo! A whole five thousand ryo!"
Tsunade was crouching by the river, clutching a deflated wallet, her face twisted in a sour grimace.
"Gone before I even saw a splash—those casino owners are definitely cheating!"
She picked up a pebble and hurled it violently into the center of the river. Water splashed high, but her anger didn't subside.
Kitahara Kaede found a suitable tree, leaped up, and perched himself on a branch. He tore open the paper bag, took out a senbei cracker, and watched while munching away.
Across the river, Orochimaru was crouching behind a pile of rubble, looking down to confirm sothing on a piece of paper. A mont later, Orochimaru pulled on a black mask and fished a smoke bomb out of his tool pouch.
His aura shifted instantly.
Kitahara Kaede paused his chewing.
'Acting?'
*Boom.*
A cloud of thick smoke erupted by the river.
"Who's there?!" Tsunade leaped up, instinctively jumping back two steps.
"Hehe, little girl, it's not safe to be daydreaming here all alone."
Orochimaru stepped out of the smoke. He had lowered his voice by two octaves and intentionally adopted a flippant gait, spinning a kunai around his finger.
'That acting...'
Kitahara Kaede gave him a ntal rating—eight out of ten. The voice, the posture, and the control of his killing intent were all quite good.
The only problem was that he had picked the wrong target.
The woman in front of him had just lost five thousand ryo and had spent the entire afternoon with nowhere to vent her rage.
Tsunade stared at this "Missing-nin," blinking in stun for a second.
Then, she smiled.
It wasn't a normal smile. It was the smile of soone who felt like the whole world owed them money and had suddenly found soone volunteering to be a punching bag.
"Perfect timing."
Tsunade clenched her fist, the pebbles beneath her feet cracking under the pressure.
"I'll take the money I lost today out of your hide."
Orochimaru's brow twitched.
The script wasn't supposed to go like this. According to Jiraiya's arrangent, he was ant to create a sense of oppression, force Tsunade into a disadvantage, and then that white-haired idiot would descend from the heavens to save the damsel in distress—
Tsunade had already charged.
There was no wind-up, no wasted movent. Just a single punch delivered with unreasonable speed.
At the last possible second, Orochimaru's body folded backward, the wind from the punch grazing the tip of his nose.
The ground beneath him wasn't so lucky.
*Boom—*
Earth and stone exploded, debris flying half a ter into the air. Orochimaru was blown back three or four ters by the shockwave, sliding along the ground with one hand planted to stop himself.
He looked back at the crater. Half a ter deep.
Then he looked at Tsunade.
Tsunade stood with her head low, her shoulders rising and falling slightly. The aura surrounding her felt as if it were pressing the river water down by several inches.
Orochimaru ntally revised his prediction for the evening.
Sothing was wrong. Very wrong.
"Fast reflexes," Tsunade noted.
She lunged again, lifting her right leg. Her heel surged with power, descending like a mountain crashing down.
Orochimaru didn't dare hold back anymore. He used a Body Flicker to flash to the side just as Tsunade's heel slamd into the rocky shore, making the entire riverbank shudder.
She turned and chased him again. Orochimaru dodged continuously among the rubble; his movents were elegant, but his posture was no longer composed.
Up in the tree, Kitahara Kaede finished his senbei and switched to a rice cracker. He spotted a white figure in the distance rushing toward them.
Jiraiya had arrived, clutching a bouquet of wildflowers.
"Stop! Do not harm my companion!"
His voice was so loud it sent ripples across the river's surface.
When he burst onto the scene, the sight was slightly different from what he had expected.
Tsunade was chasing. Orochimaru was running. Every ti a punch landed, the ground shook.
Orochimaru swept past Jiraiya. In the mont they brushed shoulders, Orochimaru didn't even slow down, leaving behind only three words.
"You're finished."
Then, with another Body Flicker, he vanished into the night.
Only two people remained on the riverbank. Jiraiya was still holding the bouquet of wildflowers, which had been blown askew by the wind.
Tsunade slowly turned around.
She didn't attack imdiately. She looked at Jiraiya, then at the direction Orochimaru had vanished, then back at Jiraiya's attire—the loud shirt, the new hairstyle, the wildflowers, and that stupid face that scread "Everything is going according to plan."
"Ji—rai—ya—"
"Tsunade, listen to my explanation..."
"What explaination?"
Tsunade snatched the wildflowers from his hand and shoved the stems and leaves straight up his nostrils.
"Having Orochimaru pretend to be a Missing-nin so you could play the hero?"
Jiraiya's face went pale.
"Do you think I'm stupid?"
Tsunade threw a punch. A direct hit.
Jiraiya was launched into the air, tracing a beautiful parabola across the night sky. He ended up snagged on a tree branch, less than ten ters away from the tree where Kitahara Kaede was hiding.
Kitahara Kaede looked at the upside-down Jiraiya in the opposite tree. With wildflowers still sticking out of his nostrils and his white hair hanging down, two lines of tears silently rolled down Jiraiya's cheeks.
Kaede finished his rice cracker and brushed the crumbs off his hands.
'That's about enough.'
He dropped down from the tree.
Tsunade was still standing by the river, panting, her fists clenched and her chest heaving. Hearing footsteps behind her, she whipped around—seeing it was him, the killing intent faded significantly, replaced by the embarrassnt of being caught in a ssy scene.
"Kaede? When did you..."
"Just got here."
Kitahara Kaede stepped closer and looked at her hand. The knuckles of her right hand were scraped; it wasn't deep, but it was bleeding. She had put too much power into those punches against Orochimaru and failed to control the impact.
Without saying a word, he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.
Tsunade looked down and only then noticed her hand. She took the handkerchief, wiped it hastily, and muttered, "Two idiots..."
Her voice was much softer than before.
Kitahara Kaede walked to the edge of the riverbank and bent down to pick sothing up.
A wallet. Jiraiya's.
The punch had sent both the man and his belongings flying, and the wallet had landed in a pile of rocks. Kaede opened it for a glimpse. It was stuffed full.
He weighed it in his hand and looked back.
"How much did you lose today?"
"Five thousand ryo," Tsunade said, her tone still resentful. "Why?"
Kitahara Kaede tossed the wallet to her.
Tsunade caught it instinctively. When she opened it, her expression changed.
"This is—"
"His," Kaede said, gesturing with his chin toward the tree. "He probably saved it up for tonight."
Tsunade counted the money; it was far more than five thousand ryo.
She was silent for two seconds. Then, she decisively stuffed the wallet into her own pocket.
"Consider this compensation for my emotional distress."
Kitahara Kaede couldn't help but let a smile tug at the corner of his mouth.
Tsunade caught it. "What are you laughing at?"
"I'm not laughing."
"You clearly are."
"Let's go eat," Kitahara Kaede said, turning back toward the village. "Your treat."
"Why should I pay?"
"Because you just hit the jackpot."
Tsunade gave him a glare, though she couldn't quite hide the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
She quickened her pace to catch up, walking shoulder-to-shoulder with him.
Streetlights flickered to life one by one, their reflections shimring like broken glass upon the river's surface.
From far behind them ca a miserable wail.
"Hey... at least put down first!"
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