Senshi’s words made Mui freeze for a moment.

  He took a closer look; sure enough, the young man in the distance was indeed Muku. But almost immediately, his pupils tracted sharply!

  Muku’s body began ging at high speed. Only moments earlier, he’d been fine, yet in the blink of an eye, darkness pletely swallowed him up.

  And then, a hideous monster—oh four sharp, snow-white fangs, no head, a face merged with its abdomen, and huge wings—appeared before them.

  This creature was called “Satori”, and it possessed the ability to read people’s minds and beguile them. Because it could see into others’ thoughts and move at high speed, it could almost evade any attack. Even more terrifying was its astonishing physical power.

  Mui was so shocked by its appearahat he momentarily lost himself. He couldn’t accept this oute. Even the legendary ninja tool of the Sage of Six Paths couldn’t bring his son back to life…did that mean he would never see his son again? Also, what was the e between this monster and his child? Had the Box of Ultimate Bliss transformed his son into that thing?

  On top of that, Mui also had a deep question: how did Senshi know so much about the Box of Ultimate Bliss? After all, it was a secret treasure of Kusagakure, and even Mui himself didn’t know many of its mysteries. Yet seeing how things pyed out, it was exactly as Senshi had foretold!

  Just then, Senshi’s voice rang in Mui’s ear, pulling him out of his thoughts.

  “Mui, that monster isn’t your son. Don’t get fused. Fall back—I’ll ha.”

  Before he had even finished speaking, Senshi’s entire body was already enveloped in Lightning-Style chakra. With a fsh, he unched himself at “Satori.”

  Ihis monster’s power to read and beguile people’s minds was no joke. The moment Senshi attacked, it predicted his strike and flew skyward to escape. However, faced with someone as fast and strong as Senshi—“a humaails,” so to speak—Satori’s mind-reading ability wasn’t so helpful.

  First of all, it couldn’t keep up with his speed. And sedly, it would soon uand true fear.

  “You won’t be able to hit me!”

  After dodging one of Senshi’s attacks, Satori’s voice echoed. Hearing this, Senshi broke into a grin.

  Just now, he’d merely beeing out Satori’s capabilities, u how he wao deal with it. Satori had solid abilities and strength—worst case, maybe it could be turned into a rare summoni. That said, if it were killed, it would simply retreat bato the Box of Ultimate Bliss. Senshi po see if, after beating Satori down, it might surrender willingly.

  “Lightning Style: Horizontal Chop!”

  Senshi’s figure reappeared right in front of Satori. This time, Satori clearly sensed a flood of terror. It had read Senshi’s i, but it simply couldn’t match his speed and had no way of dodging this blow!

  Boom—

  A hand-chop wreathed in crag Lightning chakra sshed down brutally. The power behind it was both mighty and razor-sharp!

  Satori’s strengths y in four key areas: powerful attacks, swift movement, mind-reading, aal manipution. While fighting Senshi, it could see everything going through his head—enabling it to dodge the moment he initiated an attack.

  Unfortunately, in both speed and raw power, Senshi was superior. He was a true master of Lightning Release. Furthermore, ever since he’d enhanced his body with the “Rumble-rumble Fruit”, he was all but immuo aal maniputions. Another ninja might have found Satori extremely tricky; but against Senshi, Satori was pletely outmatched.

  Using the “Horizontal Chop,” Senshi’s hand struck Satori’s shoulder with immense force, knog the monster out of the air and smming it down onto the ground below.

  Crash—

  With a heavy thud, Satori crashed into the earth.

  Whoosh!

  Spreading its wings, it tried to take off again. At the same time, it realized Senshi inteo close in for a rapid flurry of attacks using “Lightning Brutality Horizontal Chop.” Though Satori knew Senshi’s pn from reading his thoughts, it still couldn’t dodge in time.

  Senshi’s voice rang out: “Lightning Style: Lightning Brutality Horizontal Chop!”

  Ssh! Ssh! Ssh! Ssh!

  This time, lightning arced across Senshi’s entire body. His internal Lightning-Style chakra was surging nonstop.

  Bang! Bang! Bang!

  As each of Senshi’s hand-chops rained down, Satori predicted them all but still couldn’t get out of the way!

  “Lightning Style: Thunderbolt!”

  After dishing out a flurry of hits, Senshi seized Satori in a sudden grapple. Lightning chakra roared across his entire body. In an instant, Satori was driven down from midair, hurtlihward like a falling star.

  Boom—

  Rumble…

  A deafening explosion shattered the surroundings. Dust flew in all dires. ks of rock, bsted apart by the impact, hurtled through the air. As the dust cleared, Senshi of course stood there unharmed, while Satori y sprawled on the ground, dazed and its chakra in disarray.

  Even then, Senshi didn’t let up. He attacked once more.

  “Lightning Style: Bad Chop Assault!”

  Boom—

  Left and right, Senshi pouhe monster with a dozen punches. Satori let out a series of pierg shrieks and then dissolved into a mass of bck chakra, fleeing bato the Box of Ultimate Bliss.

  g! Cck!

  When Satori’s chakra returhere was a sound of meical movement from ihe box. Moments ter, the box snapped shut again.

  Senshi watched Satori’s final retreat as it transformed into bck chakra and slipped baside, p thoughtfully.

  “So this thing is a chakra-based life form, like a tailed beast? Ial form, I guess I could also be sidered a chakra-based life form.”

  In a, Senshi had dealt with Satori in just a few moves. Mui and the others were still somewhat dazed. Although Satori had been utterly suppressed the eime, they could see it was undoubtedly dangerous. From their vantage point, Satori had predicted all of Senshi’s attacks, but because Senshi’s Lightning Release far outcssed Satori’s speed, it never had a ce.

  Mui had briefly pictured himself fag Satori and realized that with his own attad jutsu speeds, he’d hardly stand a ce of nding a blow.

  When Senshi sent Satori pag bato the box, Mui and the others approached, all wearing grim expressions. Mui, in particur, looked awful. He had spent years pnning to resurrect his son through the Box of Ultimate Bliss, only to discover the truth was nothing like what he’d imagined.

  Gazing at the box in the distance, Mui began thinking about how to handle such a dangerous item.

  “The Box of Ultimate Bliss be fully charged if it absorbs a rge amount of chakra. If it ever opens on its own and that monster Satori es out again, that’ll be a nightmare. Maybe I should just sink it to the bottom of the o? Or keep researg it?”

  He immediately abahat sed notion—there was no point in studying something so dangerous. While Satori was irong enough to be worth researg, to Senshi, it was almost trivial. There was no reason to risk their lives over something so useless for their level.

  As Mui was wrestling with his thoughts, Senshi smiled and said, “Mui, the Box of Ultimate Bliss really is a relic of the Sage of Six Paths, but as you just saw, it ’t grant any wish. O’s opened, it simply releases a terrifying monster. It runs very deep—and I’m not sure Kusagakure is equipped to ha.”

  Mui nodded gravely. Given Kusagakure’s current strength, dealing with Satori would be exceedingly difficult. Even after a period of development, fag that monster would bring heavy casualties.

  Frowning, Mui looked at Senshi and asked, “Lord Senshi, do you have any good ideas for dealing with this dangerous tool?”

  Senshi nodded seriously. “Hand this relic over to me!”

  Before Mui could respond, Elder Guima—wearing a horse-themed mask—immediately objected. “Absolutely not! This is a Kusagakure treasure, no matter what! Besides, you just said it’s incredibly dangerous. Why do you want it?”

  Senshi snorted dismissively. “Elder Guima, if you had any idea what goes on outside this vilge, you wouldn’t ask such a naive question. Yes, I’m well aware that this relis deep, and you guys ’t ha. But I’m different. In the Kirigakure bck market, I’m known as the ‘O of Missions’—this is nothing.”

  “So let me take this dangerous ninja tool off your hands.”

  Of course, Elder Guima was relut to let such a powerful relic go so easily. But Senshi shut him down with just a few words.

  “That monster Satori isn’t dead—it fled bato the box. Who knows when it’ll reappear? Are you sure you don’t wao take this ninja tool away?”

  Hearing this, Elder Guiniu and the others looked at each other, expressions ging. After a brief exge, Guiniu spoke up:

  “Lord Senshi, if Mui has no obje, then please take the box for safekeeping.”

  Senshi might be fearm, or he might be telling the truth. Either way, if Satori came out again, Kusagakure might be doomed. In that case, it was much wiser for them to hand over the relic to Senshi, f a stronger allian the process. And everyone could see Senshi already had a good retionship with Mui, who basically held all the power in Kusagakure. Giving him the relic as a gesture of goodwill would only streheir ties. Having a powerful ninja like Senshi as an ally was worth more than some finicky old artifact.

  Seeing Guiniu’s stance, Senshi turned his gaze to Mui. With a slow nod, Mui agreed. Keeping it in Kusagakure would be a tig time bomb—nobody here was strong enough to defeat that monster.

  “ht—Mui, this pletes your ission, yes?”

  At that, Mui took out a check worth twenty million ryō (which could be cashed at a money exge) and ha to Senshi. Senshi accepted it and heard the system prompt in his mind:

  [Long-term ission plete!]

  [Employer: Mu

  [ission Objective: Capture a Tailed Beast]

  [Reward: 20 million ryō]

  [Mission Rank: S-rank]

  [Mission Reward: 4,000 Employment Points, plus one ‘Super Draw’]

  At this point, his Employment Points were quite substantial—he had already made a huge haul from Kirigakure. The total had exceeded five figures, enough to do 120 “ten-times draws” and still have two Super Draws. He’d ear more once he handed over the tailed beast to Pain. He ractically swimming in rewards.

  Afterward, Senshi released the Three-Tails from his Summoning trad stored the Box of Ultimate Bliss in his system’s space-time dimension. Mui had seen him use dimensional ste jutsu many times before, so it no longer surprised him.

  With Kusagakure matters settled, Senshi wasted no time. Together with Kakuzu and Karin, he departed for Ame.

  After traveling for a while, Senshi stopped. Kakuzu looked at him curiously and asked, “What’s wrong?”

  Senshi replied offhandedly, “One of my Wood-Style es accepted an esission. The caravan should be along soon, so let’s wait a bit.”

  Kakuzu, long aced to this, said nothing further. Uaking missions tinuously while on the move was simply part of Senshi’s nature by now.

  The route from Kusagakure takure had once been perilous, but tely it was much safer. Why? Because after Kusagakure and Amegakure allied, there was a lot more traffic. Both vilges had stationed plenty of ninja along this vital road.

  Without any trouble, the three reached Amegakure again. Senshi went straight to Pain to deliver the captured tailed beast.

  Word had already spread through the Akatsuki that Senshi, Kakuzu, and Kisame had mao capture a tailed beast. This time, in the open area of Amegakure, not only Pain and Konan arrived—several other Akatsuki members showed up as well.

  “Summoning Jutsu!”

  Boom—

  White smoke gushed upward and billowed out in all dires. A momehe Three-Tails Isobu appeared before everyone. But its appearance had ged dramatically.

  Seeing the Three-Tails now so emaciated—practically skin and bones, and much smaller than before—everyone’s expressions turned peculiar. Konan, her gaze on the wasted-looking Isobu, couldn’t help but twitch at the ers of her mouth.

  What in the world had that guy doo the beast?

  In a room atop Amegakure’s tower, Nagato—hooked up to his life-support system—was equally stunned.

  “Just a few days without seeing Uzumaki Senshi aurhe tailed beast into a starved husk?”

  The rest of Akatsuki looked at Senshi with doubt and fusion. Kakuzu, who khe truth, couldn’t be bothered to expin. He simply found a nice spot to sit and recover his strength. Partnering with Senshi meant you o seize every ce to rest—otherwise you’d die of exhaustion sooner or ter.

  Bleam