Reborn in a Daimyo's court in Naruto

Part 38

Chapter 38

HIRUZEN SARUTOBI

Hiruzen seethed in rage as he looked at the bloodied remains of his comrade.

"How could you let this happen?" he questioned in a steely voice as the ANBU captain knelt behind him.

"We are not sure yet. It was as if we were under a genjutsu," he excused, and Hiruzne's gaze turned toward the head of the Yamanaka clan head.

"Inoichi, have a full workup done on everyone guarding this place and have the report on my table by the hour," he ordered. The head of the Konoha intelligence division vanished as Jiraiya sat beside Shimura's remains with a complicated expression on his face.

"What is it?" he questioned as Jiraiya continued to look around the room at the two bodies lying there.

"This is a ROOT agent," he said as he pointed towards the masked nin lying dead beside Danzo.

"Do you think the ROOT agent killed Danzo," and Jiraiya shook his head.

"No, this is the work of a third party," he said as his eyes narrowed.

"Shimura was poisoned before he was killed, and I have seen that poison before," Jiraiya said with thin lips.

"Where?" he questioned, and Jiraiya looked him in the eye.

"Orochimaru," and Hiruzen was shocked by that word.

"You cannot mean," and Jiraya nodded.

"I do, it seems this was Orochimaru's doing," and Hiruzen felt that with passing hour the day was becoming more and more troublesome.

"Lion!" he uttered, and the ANBU captain appeared behind him.

"I have a mission for you. Alert all the ANBUs. Run a full sweep over all of the territory, find and arrest Orochimaru, and confiscate all his holdings and laboratory. And also have his apprentice brought into T&I," he ordered, and the ANBU captain vanished as he sighed.

"You will not find him," Jiraiya said as he sat down near the whitened woody mass that was wrapped around Danzo.

"Shimura died hours ago, and whatever this whitish thing is was mimicking his chakra signature well enough to fool a Byakugan. By now, he would be far, far away," he said as he began to take out a sealing scroll.

"What even is that thing?" he questioned as he observed the humanoid-looking whitish mass.

"I do not know, but I plan to find out," he said as a seal erupted on the ground and engulfed the body and took it in.

Jiraiya pocketed the scroll.

"Let me ask around about this, but we have another problem now," he said, and Hiruzen nodded, realizing what Jiraiya was eluding towards.

"Send a missive to Tsunade and Minato, have an account of Shimura's death conveyed to the new daimyo," and he sighed.

"This will not reflect good on us," he complained, and it could be even worse.

"The new daimyo could suspect bad faith and could suspect us complicit in this," he said, and Jiraiya nodded.

"He could now let us hope that Tsunade is able to convince him otherwise," Jiraiya began as both of them looked into each other's eyes.

"Orochimaru," he spoke half in pain and disappointment.

"Orochimaru," Jiraiya agreed, his lips quirked into an angry snarl.