As soon as he arrived at Hokage Office, Kuroto found that the place was filled with ninjas. On a rough count, there were more than 100 shinobi of the upper chunin to elite jonin class.
'The fact that Hokage-sama summoned so many elites indicate that the seriousness of the situation is beyond doubt.' – Kuroto thought silently as he walked over to the place where Class-11 was.
Guy greeted in his usual cheerful manner and asked, "How come so late? We have been waiting for you to come for quite some time."
Kuroto didn't explain that he came from the Forest of Death, and instead asked, "Is there any information why Hokage-sama called for an emergency summon?"
However, no one seems to be aware of the reason and shook their head negatively.
No one is clear about the exact reason for the emergency summon.
At this time Shisui suddenly spoke, "Could it be related to Rock Village?"
"Most Likely." - was Kakashi's reply.
The battle between Konoha's Class-11 and Rock's Beheading Troops in the Land of Bear gives Rock Village a perfect excuse to cause trouble to the weakened Konoha, therefore all the four shinobi of Class-11 have been psychologically prepared for the upcoming battles.
Because of the issued password, Class-11 didn't discuss this topic anymore but diverted towards some casual chat.
Not long after, Hokage-sama, Mitokade Homura, and Utatane Koharu of the Konoha Council along with Ino-Shiko-Cho Clan heads, and Hyuga Hizashi of the Hyuga Clan appeared, one after another.
With Hokage-sama's arrival, the venue immediately became quiet as everyone could judge that matter was serious from the solemn expression on his face.
Hokage-sama took a step forward and announced to the ninjas present, "We have received news from the border about 2 hours ago, according to the news a raid party of the Cloud Village has breached the border of Land of Fire about 3 days ago."
Suddenly hearing such shocking news, the quiet meeting place suddenly became extremely noisy.
The news about Cloud Village's sudden raid reminded everyone present here of the Third Shinobi War that ended not long ago.
And everyone couldn't help but shudder thinking of that terrible war. There are too many painful memories attached to it, no one present here wants to experience such a thing again.
However, Class-11 was more surprised than shocked.
Guy muttered, "Shouldn't it be Rock Village, how come Hokage-sama mentioned Cloud Village?"
Kakashi also frowned, "This is really not good!"
Shisui also whispered, "It shouldn't be the case that Cloud Village and Rock Village join forces, right? If that happens…"- he didn't finish his words, nor was there any need to finish, because everyone knows that if such a thing really happened, it would get close to impossible for Konoha to resist the joint attack, and in that case, Konoha might even cease to exist.
However, Kuroto shook his head negatively, "Things won't get so bad. Remember, the third Raikage died in the hands of Rock Shinobi! So how could Cloud Village agree to form an alliance with Rock Village? Not to mention even if they did, Rock Village wouldn't trust Cloud Village. So even if Rock Village did have some plans of attacking Konoha, Tsuchikage would opt to watch Konoha and Cloud fight while waiting for a suitable opportunity to strike a hard blow to both the villages at the same time."
This isn't just Kuroto's speculation, but because he was reminded of the information that even in the original series, Konoha and Cloud did have some small-scale conflict after the third shinobi war.
Later, when the representatives of Cloud Village came to Konoha to sign a peace agreement, the Head Ninja responsible for the mission died at the hands of Hyuga Hiashi.
It was also this incident that led to the sacrifice of Hyuga Hizashi.
Therefore, Kuroto thinks that even if the conflict against the Cloud may not be on a small scale, it shouldn't develop to the level of an actual war involving several villages.
After hearing Kuroto's analysis, every one of Class-11 thought about it and found it reasonable, which greatly relieved them.
Hokage-sama standing on the stage raised his hand to calm down the discussion on the field, and then said with a solemn expression, "Based on the current information, the commander leading Cloud Village's charge is Hachibi's Jinchuriki, Killer Bee along with 3 head ninjas as well as Nibi's Jinchuriki Yugito Nii is part of the raiding unit."
Hearing that Cloud village had sent both of their Human Column Force at the same time, Konoha shinobi at the field were both indignant and worried.
Seeing that everyone was a little demoralized, Hokage-sama ordered in an indisputable tone: "You all present here will form an advanced team responsible for preventing Cloud Village's invasion!"
"Yes!"
Konoha shinobi seemed to have recovered some confidence from Hokage-sama's majestic voice and bowed their head respectfully.
With the return of morale and confidence in his shinobi, Hokage-sama nodded and continued: "Until Jiraya's arrival, Nara Shikaku will temporarily serve as the commander while Hyuga Hizashi will be the deputy commander of the advanced team."
Both Nara Shikaku and Hyuga Hizashi immediately appeared and accepted the appointment of Hokage-sama.
Finally, after one last glance at everyone, Hokage-sama said, "Anbu stays, rest will go back and prepare to depart!"
"Yes!"
...whoosh… whoosh… whoosh...
With Hokage-sama's orders, the group of Shinobi left the venue one-after-another with quick body flicker.
Now there were only Hokage-sama and two elders of the Konoha Council, as well as 16 Anbu ninjas, including the Class-11 that Kuroto was part of.
At this time, Hokage-sama took four scrolls from the hands of Mikado Homura and handed one of them to each captain, with the order, "Your tasks are all recorded in the scrolls. This time the safety of Konoha is at stake, you must put all your effort!"
The 16 Anbu kneeling in front of Hokage-sama replied in a unison, "Please rest assured Hokage-sama, we will definitely complete the task!"
Sandaime-sama nodded: "Class-11 stays back, rest leave for the preparation!"
With a quick bow again 12 Anbu disappeared with a quick body flicker.
...whoosh… whoosh… whoosh...
Now with only Class-11 left, Hokage-sama led them to the Hokage office.
After lighting up the tobacco pipe, Sandaime-sama slowly said, "According to the regulations, it is only allowed to apply for advanced Jutsu after serving for 1 year in the department. However, this time considering that the difficulty of the task is very high, I am giving special authorization for you all to apply to learn an advanced type of Jutsu."
The authorization here only applies to Kuroto, Guy, and Shisui.
As for the captain of a Class-11 Kakashi? He is already an old man in the Anbu Black Ops, so Hokage-sama's words were not for him.
Kuroto didn't expect such benefits to appear, so after pondering for a while, he asked, "Hokage-sama, what rank of Jutsu can we apply for?"
While playing with the tobacco pipe he replied, "Some Rank-A and most of the Rank-B Jutsu are allowed."
After Kuroto heard Hokage-sama's words, he fell into thinking again…
At the border of Land of Fire and Land of Rain
A Konoha messaging eagle swept across a valley as it flew towards the hinterland of the Land of Rain.
The messaging eagle is specially trained by Konoha. A creature of the sky, not only capable of long flights but also fearless of most of the creatures, with close to zero natural enemies.
Konoha's last resort for emergency transmission of information.
The same eagle was now passing through this border when suddenly a shuriken was shot out of nowhere, and it accurately hit the messaging eagle in its high-speed flight.
Bang…
The messaging eagle suddenly fell from the sky on a high mountain cliff.
At this time, the air around the high cliff where the eagle fell distorted into a vortex, and a mysterious man wearing a one-eyed spiral pattern mask walked out of it.
The mysterious man leisurely picked up the dead message eagle, untied the small scroll on its leg, opened it to take a look, and suddenly spoke while laughing madly, "Too bad Hokage, it seems Jiraiya couldn't receive the emergency news!"
And with just a small fire release he burned both the eagle and the scroll and disappeared mysteriously leaving no trace of his existence.
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