Chapter 15: Tumult and Tension
The atmosphere across the shinobi world grew increasingly tense and somber.
Following Konoha's passive military deployments, relations between the major villages had grown dangerously delicate. Konoha's shinobi had already begun tentative clashes with both Kumogakure and Kirigakure forces along their shared borders. The air was thick with the scent of war—it was no longer a question of if, but when.
Every village was holding its breath, waiting for the first strike.
The entire shinobi world was like a taut string, drawn to its limit, needing only a final pluck to snap completely. All that remained to be seen was which side would make the first move.
Yet while such tension brewed beyond the village walls, Kakashi had little time to concern himself with these larger shifts. Ever since joining the ANBU, his life had changed dramatically.
As a special forces unit directly under the Hokage's command, the ANBU's primary duties were safeguarding the village's innermost secrets and conducting covert surveillance. The most elite even served as the Hokage's personal guard.
After a single night of rest, Kakashi was officially deployed into active duty.
His squad had been assigned to rotating patrols in the eastern sector of the village. Under normal circumstances, this sort of security was handled by the Uchiha-led Konoha Police Force. But the truth behind that was far more complex—this "responsibility" was a trap cleverly crafted by the Second Hokage, Tobirama Senju, and the current leadership had no real trust in the Uchiha clan.
Critical areas would never be entrusted solely to them.
Even if, hypothetically, every member of the police force were loyal to Hiruzen Sarutobi, a village of this scale required layered defenses—light and shadow, overt and covert. Only with such redundancies could Konoha truly ensure its internal safety and neutralize threats before they became problems.
And among those shadows, the ANBU stood as the most vital line of defense.
In times like these, the ANBU held a rare authority: to act first and report later.
Especially now, as the world inched ever closer to the brink of war, their presence was irreplaceable.
---
"Whoosh!"
"Bang!"
In a desolate forest on the village's eastern outskirts, a small figure clad in ANBU gear—complete with a cat-faced mask—twisted in mid-air. With a swift and brutal motion, Kakashi's right leg slammed into the chest of a man clad in stealth attire.
"Urgh!"
The man groaned, pain etched into his voice as he was sent flying backward.
"Thud!"
He crashed into a tree with a bone-jarring impact, coughing up blood from the double blow.
Kakashi landed without hesitation, cold resolve flickering in his lone visible eye. Though he had confirmed that the man was not a shinobi, merely a civilian operative, that changed nothing.
An enemy was an enemy. There was no distinction of strength.
The man struggled to rise, but before he could even think of resisting, Kakashi stepped forward with practiced efficiency. He raised his hand in a chopping motion and brought it down hard on the man's neck.
"Thwack!"
The force surged through the man's body. His vision blurred, his mind blanked—and he collapsed in unconscious silence.
Kneeling beside the body, Kakashi quickly and carefully searched him.
Soon, he found a folded slip of paper hidden within the lining of the man's inner garment.
His brow furrowed slightly.
"Coded message? Or just a decoy?"
With tensions mounting across the shinobi nations, the number of spies dispatched into rival villages had increased significantly. In just under two weeks with the ANBU, Kakashi had already captured several enemy agents. Most, however, turned out to be decoys or bait.
None were high-level operatives.
"Whoosh."
Just as he finished searching, a shadow flickered in beside him.
Another ANBU, clad in identical gear, appeared—his mask shaped like a fox, brown eyes peering through the slits.
"Anything useful, Shadow?"
He called Kakashi by his ANBU codename.
"Somewhat," Kakashi replied, lifting the coded message. "But I suspect he's just another decoy."
"Tch. These rats just keep scrambling around."
The fox-masked ANBU clicked his tongue in irritation.
"Still, we'll hand this one off to Interrogation. Maybe the captain can extract something useful."
With that, Kakashi wordlessly hoisted the man over his shoulder, despite the fact that the captive was more than twice his size.
Such was the advantage of chakra.
In Kakashi's previous world, where child soldiers did exist in the darkest corners of humanity, even the most hardened boys still couldn't compete with grown adults in pure physical conflict. Only through firearms or deception could they hope to kill.
But here, in the shinobi world, it was different.
A single child who had mastered chakra—however weak by shinobi standards—could easily eliminate multiple adults.
Speed, strength, reflexes…
Chakra enhanced it all.
Against anyone short of trained ninja or elite soldiers, there was no contest. And once a shinobi reached the level of a Chunin or higher, entire battalions of conventional troops stood no chance.
In this world, chakra was divine power.
Kakashi was deeply aware of how fortunate he was to have fused so perfectly with his past life's soul. Without that foundation, learning to harness chakra from scratch—let alone refining it—would've set him back considerably.
"Alright. Let's go."
The fox-masked ANBU nodded.
With twin flickers of movement, the two vanished into the forest's shadows, Kakashi carrying the unconscious spy as they returned to the nearest ANBU outpost.