Inside the office, the atmosphere was a little strange.
Kurō sat behind the desk, fingers interlaced on the tabletop.
His usually gentle face was now full of seriousness.
“…So what you mean is, before you reported the matter of the Uzumaki ruins to me yesterday, you had already commissioned that underground mercenary group called Akatsuki, correct?” Kurō forced down the speechlessness in his heart and put on a stern expression, like a superior questioning a subordinate.
“Well… strictly speaking, I commissioned the mission a while ago.
I only received their reply accepting it last night.” Mei Terumī said this in a small, guilty voice.
Her voice was much lower than usual.
Her emerald-green eyes did not dare meet Kurō’s gaze.
“Actually, after I finished talking with you last night, Sora, I was already planning to cancel it.
“But it was too late.
Akatsuki’s rules don’t allow cancellation after a mission is accepted, so…” “And you think that makes sense?!” “No.” Mei honestly lowered her head.
Her ears were faintly red, and a rare trace of embarrassment appeared on that usually cool and beautiful face.
Kurō looked at Mei, who was obediently lowering her head and admitting fault, and sighed helplessly.
‘A superior takes a side job, and the client turns out to be his own subordinate?
What kind of mess is this…’ He rubbed his temples, then sat up straight again.
The helplessness on his face shifted into seriousness.
“Putting everything else aside for now, I have two important questions for you.” Mei carefully raised her head.
A trace of nervousness flashed through her emerald-green eyes.
She looked at Sora.
After confirming that he did not seem too angry, she lightly nodded, signaling for him to continue.
“First…” Kurō raised one finger.
A cold glint flashed through his black eyes.
It was faint and gone in an instant, but it still made Mei’s heart beat slightly faster.
“How did you learn about Akatsuki?
And why did you entrust such an important mission to them?” He paused, his voice becoming a little more cautious.
“As far as I know, they are not only extremely mysterious, but also very dangerous.
“Getting in contact with them is not simple.” As Mei listened to Kurō’s question, the nervousness in her emerald-green eyes gradually faded, replaced by the calm sharpness of a Kirigakure ninja.
She instantly switched into work mode.
The timid, guilty look from earlier vanished at once.
She straightened her back and answered seriously.
“Akatsuki is very famous in the underground black market.
Even the gray areas of the Land of Water have rumors about them, so Kirigakure’s intelligence division naturally has information on them.” Her voice was steady, her pace neither too fast nor too slow.
“Back when I served in the intelligence division years ago, I had already paid attention to information about them.” Kurō’s brow rose slightly.
“And the reason I wanted to give this commission to them is because of one member of Akatsuki.” Mei paused.
A complicated emotion flashed through her emerald-green eyes.
“Uchiha Kurō.” Kurō’s brow twitched slightly.
‘She brought me up?’ He muttered inwardly, though his face showed no change at all.
“Go on.” A trace of wariness flashed through Mei’s eyes.
It ran deep, as if she had remembered something unpleasant.
“Near the end of the Third Great Ninja War, I once led a small squad and had brief contact with him near the border of the Land of Fire.” “Uchiha Kurō, huh…” Kurō pretended to rub his chin.
An expression of “I’ve heard of him” appeared on his face, and his tone carried a bit of admiration.
“Uchiha Kurō.
I’ve heard of him.
During the middle stage of the war, he and Hatake Kakashi were known as Konoha’s Black and White Blades.
Later, he was singled out by the title Black Lightning.” The corner of his mouth rose slightly.
His smile carried a bit of pride and narcissism.
“He must have been quite an excellent ninja!” He silently waited in his heart for Mei’s praise.
However… “He was not.” Mei instantly refuted him, her voice carrying undisguised disgust.
“That man was a complete bastard!” ‘Damn you.’ The smile on Kurō’s face stiffened.
Mei’s pale cheeks flushed slightly with anger, as if she had remembered something that made her grit her teeth.
Driven by emotion, her voice immediately sped up.
“He didn’t take the fight seriously at all.
He kept making comments about a woman’s figure and looks, smirking like he thought he was charming while acting like a show-off.
And that kind of person was a Konoha ninja?
“A ninja from the Uchiha Clan, no less, the clan that was supposedly serious and disciplined?” “It was unbelievable!” ‘Hey, hey, that was just psychological warfare!
Don’t judge the whole person by one incident!’ Kurō complained wildly in his heart, while his face still maintained that gentle, attentive expression.
‘Besides, that so-called clash was just for show, wasn’t it?
‘The ceasefire agreement between Konoha and Kirigakure was almost signed at that point.
Everyone knew we weren’t really going to fight, right?
‘I only trash-talked you a little to make it look convincing.
Why are you still mad…’ As he thought about it, he suddenly felt a little guilty.
Well, thinking back now, he had basically used Mei herself as the center point and mocked her in a full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree sweep, from her figure, family background, strength, teammates, and Kirigakure itself.
Although he felt it was not that bad at the time, his level of trash talk, placed in the ninja world, did indeed seem… Well.
Maybe it had been a little overtuned.
Thinking of this, Kurō could not help feeling sweat gather on his back.
Looking back now, perhaps the reason he had gone that hard was also because of some subconscious desire to vent his emotions.
Remembering thirteen-year-old Mei staring at him with a red, furious face, forced to hold herself back because of orders from above, Kurō felt another burst of guilt.
‘Good thing she managed to hold back… Mei Terumī, you were the real ninja.’ Seeing that Mei was still continuing her rant with absolutely no intention of stopping, Kurō quietly coughed.
“Ahem.” Mei instantly came back to herself.
Her torrent of words stopped abruptly.
Her mouth remained slightly open, and her expression shifted from anger to embarrassment.
A faint, unnatural blush appeared on her cool, beautiful face.
“Sorry…” Kurō waved his hand and said casually, “Don’t worry about it.” His expression returned to its usual gentleness, but the light in his eyes was now a little more serious than before.
“If you dislike that Kurō so much, why entrust the mission to Akatsuki?
“After all, according to what you just said, even if Kurō has the Sharingan Kekkei Genkai and might be helpful in exploring the Uzumaki ruins, he is not exactly someone reliable, is he?” Mei fell silent for a moment.
After a while, she slowly shook her head.
“No.” Her voice was soft, but unusually firm.
“Although my impression of that man is indeed terrible, most of that came from the positions we were in at the time.” She raised her head.
Her emerald-green eyes shone with seriousness.
“After returning to the village, I investigated information about Uchiha Kurō.
“There was one thing that caught my attention.” She paused, and a complicated emotion entered her voice.
“Most ninja who die on the battlefield have their bodies burned or buried in order to prevent information from leaking and to hide traces of movement.
“Forget the bodies.
The families of the dead often can’t even recover any personal belongings.
“And most ninja don’t care about that.
“After all, on the battlefield, even the comrades beside you can be abandoned if necessary.” Mei’s gaze became distant, as if passing through time and seeing scenes few people remembered.
“But Kurō was different.
After the war ended, he requested to transfer battlefields on his own initiative.
He spent a great deal of effort to retrieve the remains and belongings of the comrades he had known, then sent them back to their families.” Her voice lowered.
“To most ninja, that may seem meaningless.
“But… I don’t think so.” “A person who can do something like that may not necessarily be a good person, but he must have a certain bottom line.” Her tone became more certain.
“Although he is now a rogue ninja, based on the limited information I could find about the missions he has carried out after defecting… “He completed every mission perfectly, and… not a single innocent civilian was caught in the crossfire.” “Although this is only my personal judgment, I believe Uchiha Kurō can indeed serve as support for this important mission.” The office quieted down.
Kurō listened to Mei’s words and fell into a long silence in his heart.
His gaze rested on Mei’s face, on that slightly flushed expression from having spoken so much.
He truly had not expected Mei to have secretly investigated him for so many years.
And relying on fragmented information, she had actually seen some things about him clearly.
‘What a terrifying woman.
‘No wonder she never managed to marry in the original timeline.
Who would dare?’ He silently complained in his heart, with a trace of teasing.
Just then, Mei suddenly shivered.
Her body trembled slightly, and a trace of confusion flashed through her emerald-green eyes.
“Is someone talking badly about me?” Kurō laughed it off.
“You’re overthinking it.
Who would say bad things about you?” He waved his hand, then his expression became serious.
In his black eyes, the laziness, the joking, and all those disguises were temporarily withdrawn.
Only the steadiness and caution of a leader remained.
“What you said does make some sense.” He nodded, responding as if in agreement.
“I also know a little about Akatsuki.
“That organization is currently short on money.
They have been taking high-risk, high-paying commissions and trying to build their reputation in the underground market.
“An ugly act like harming a client usually won’t happen.” ‘At least, it shouldn’t happen now… probably.’ He silently added in his heart.
Remembering how Sasori and Kakuzu had been publicly criticized by Pain not long ago, he could not help lighting a candle for them in his heart.
One had nearly killed a client because he thought the mission reward was too low.
The other had killed a client because he thought the client was too noisy.
Pain’s face at the time had been something else.
Still, on the surface, Kurō maintained his serious expression.
He continued speaking to Mei.
“Then next comes my second question.” His gaze became sharper.
“The money you paid for this commission, if I’m not mistaken, came from your own funds, didn’t it?” “After all, no expense that large has ever disappeared from Kirigakure’s accounts.” Under Kurō’s serious gaze, Mei fell silent for a moment.
Her lips pressed together slightly.
After hesitating for a while, she gently nodded.
The office quieted down once again.