Kakuzo's brain raced, trying to analyze the deeper aning behind Kisa's abrupt question.
Attacking comrades? This seed to be... that's right! When Hoshigaki Kisa was still in Kirigakure's ANBU, one of his most widely known "deeds" was unhesitatingly killing comrades who might be captured to ensure mission secrets didn't leak.
Could it be... Kisa wanted to find a sense of recognition here, from another "kindred spirit" who'd also attacked comrades?
Though his own actions were purely from perverted urges while Kisa's back then were more mission-oriented... perhaps motivations didn't matter—the essence of the behavior itself could resonate?
Kakuzo felt that in this situation, speaking honestly might better trigger the other's "understanding," or at least so level of resonance.
He tried making his voice sound calm, even carrying coldness. "...Killing comrades, does that need any special reason?"
Kisa's voice revealed no emotion. "...Why do you say that?"
Kakuzo spoke faster, attempting to connect his behavioral logic with the other's "rationalized" past. "Survival of the fittest, nothing more. Even with comrades, this concept and the act of killing them don't contradict each other in my view. What I did... compared to what you did during your ANBU period, probably doesn't even co close, right? Eliminating those 'comrades' without value, who'd even drag you down—isn't this precisely the philosophy you've always upheld? We just differ in thods, but the essence..."
He couldn't finish his words.
The playful expression on Kisa's face completely vanished, replaced by indifferent calm. "Mm, I understand." He cut off Kakuzo's words.
"Then, we can begin."
Kakuzo froze. "What? Begin wha—"
Kisa raised his hand and began forming seals. Massive chakra started surging violently around him. "A world without falsehood... doesn't need scum like you."
"Wh-what?! Wait!" Kakuzo's expression drastically changed. "I told you the truth! I, I can bring benefits! I'm useful! Senior, you also need—"
"Water Style: Great Exploding Water Colliding Wave!"
Kakuzo didn't even have ti to fully extract the specially-made chakra threads hidden in his sleeves before his vision was swallowed by an overwhelming expanse of blue.
---
Kisa stepped across muddy ground, gaze sweeping over the chaotic battlefield. Soon, he found the target's lifeless, mangled corpse among a pile of broken tree trunks and sludge.
"Found it. Looks like Kakuzu won't need to throw a tantrum this ti."
Although this operation's main purpose was "cleanup" rather than bounty collection, the organization's finance manager with an obsession for money—Kakuzu—his temperant was well known.
Any target carrying a bounty whose corpse or proof wasn't brought back for exchange could trigger his temper. Though Kisa wasn't afraid of him, he was too lazy to invite unnecessary nagging over such trivial matters.
Casually tossing Kakuzo's corpse onto Sahada's broad blade, Kisa turned back toward the rogue shinobi stronghold.
When he returned to the now-silent stronghold, internal cleanup work was nearing completion.
Most rogue shinobi had beco cold corpses, lying scattered in pools of blood and battle traces. A few severely wounded or subdued individuals still clinging to life were restrained by ANBU shinobi, prepared to be taken back as prisoners—perhaps still holding so interrogation or utilization value.
An Uchiha ANBU shinobi wearing a fox mask quickly approached, reporting the situation.
"Captain, the base has been fully cleared, primary targets confird eliminated. Additionally..." His voice lowered sowhat. "We discovered the... whereabouts of the kidnapped villagers."
Kisa nodded slightly, signaling the other to lead the way.
Following the ANBU through the chaotic main hall, they entered a dark, narrow side passage. The air began filling with a sll of blood and... so sickeningly sweet, rotting complex odor.
At the passage's end was a stone chamber roughly excavated, with traces of crude barriers for reinforcent and sound isolation remaining at the entrance.
The mont he stepped into the stone chamber, even Kisa—accustod to bloodshed—couldn't help his gaze freezing slightly.
This was a crude yet "professional" torture chamber. Torture implents of various kinds stained with deep brown marks hung on walls and scattered across the floor.
But the true impact ca from the stone chamber's corner. There were no traces of careful handling, only the most savage "piling." Corpses in varying stages of decay—so with flesh still present but already blackened and bloated, others reduced to stark white bones—were indiscriminately heaped together, forming a nauseating mound.
Kisa silently observed this scene. He recalled the question he'd asked Kakuzo. Perhaps that question had been sowhat unnecessary after all.
"...This isn't within our mission scope."
Kisa's voice rang out in the silent stone chamber. "However, if Lord nma saw these... he'd probably feel saddened."
He turned toward the ANBU shinobi beside him. "So, I'll have to trouble you. Give them proper burials. Find sowhere far from here, sowhere clean. Rember, don't bury them with that trash outside."
"Yes, Captain." The ANBU shinobi accepted the order without hesitation, imdiately gesturing to summon several companions who began moving those remains long since departed from life.
Kisa didn't continue watching. He turned and left that suffocating stone chamber, returning to the relatively "fresher" ground surface. He sighed softly, even surprising himself.
Killing and combat—he didn't detest them, could even say they were part of his "way of survival."
However, witnessing such purely desire-satisfying, aningless cruelty even carrying traces of "enjoynt," a nauseating discomfort spread through his heart.
He hated aningless slaughter. But if swinging the butcher's blade could sever chains of falsehood, could establish a true, beautiful world without lies.
Even if that world required blood to build, Kisa willingly played the butcher's role. But maggot-like atrocities like these only made him feel... disgusted.
This was one of [Ember] organization's "routine missions." Due to nma's overwhelming deterrent power, his core principle of "using absolute military force to intimidate great nations, forcing all parties to maintain a balance of terror, thereby preventing large-scale war outbreaks"—in actual execution... the effect was "good" to excess.
Aside from the recent "Konoha Crush" incident Orochimaru stirred up, the great nations bizarrely maintained a tense yet conflict-free "peace," with even heated diplomatic friction rarely occurring.
Thus, watching a group of top-tier powerhouses in the organization beco sowhat "idle," nma issued new directives—go "clean up" the true scum of this world.
But nma's orders were very clear and carried strict standards—they couldn't wrongly accuse good people. Therefore before operations, thorough investigation was mandatory, carefully distinguishing targets—whether they were ordinary people forced onto crooked paths by survival pressures, or purely those who after gaining power felt themselves superior and acted wantonly.
If the forr, only committing actions like robbing food to survive, the handling thod was arrest, then sending them to... well, according to nma's phrasing, undergo "mandatory labor reform"? Things like reclaiming wasteland, participating in infrastructure or material production, using labor to compensate for wrongs while creating value.
Only those whose hands were stained with innocent blood—this point required strict verification—or like Kakuzo, fundantally pure evil who enjoyed inflicting cruelty, would require Kisa, Zabuza, or Deidara to personally make the trip for physical elimination.
An organization rumored in the shinobi world's dark side like a devil incarnate, yet its operational guidelines carried this kind of... "woman's kindness"?
Zabuza and Deidara were both quite surprised when first hearing such ticulous arrangents, but both executed them.
As for Kisa, he felt himself one who understood the truth—he knew that "Lord nma's" identity beneath the mask was the Fourth Hokage who nearly sacrificed himself protecting Konoha. So principles might already be carved into the soul.
When the Uchiha ANBU completed final cleanup work, properly burying the innocent remains on a distant hillside, the conclusion procedures activated.
Kisa led so mbers, carrying Kakuzo and potentially exchangeable bounty proofs from others, toward the nearest secret contact point or underground exchange office.
Next, following established procedures, they needed to deliver the exchanged bounty money, or—if target corpses were too mangled to identify—the organization would directly allocate funds, sent in the organization's na to villages once victimized by these rogue shinobi.
This step invariably made the organization's finance manager Kakuzu feel discomfort resembling myocardial infarction.
"We already eliminated the nace! Why must we give away rightfully earned bounty money... even the organization's money, to those weaklings?"
He couldn't comprehend this "extra expenditure" logic. Wasn't eliminating vermin the greatest act of kindness already? But ultimately Kakuzu only sighed a few extra tis while ntally calculating losses, never truly disobeying this order.
For soone like Kisa who had no obsession with money itself, this procedure didn't matter.
Anyway, ever since the organization previously "dealt with" that rchant called Gato or whatever, and "took over" the vast majority of his assets, [Ember]'s controlled resources reached nation-rivaling wealth levels.
Just maintaining organizational operations and mber expenses, this wealth could sustain hundreds of years. Moreover, the organization owned nurous legitimate enterprises continuously profiting. Kakuzu's worries seed to Kisa more like overly stingy conditioned reflexes pained by any expenditure.
***
80 advance chapters at patreon/Eatinpieces
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