There can't be another mistake like this.

On the way back to Konoha Hospital, Zuojing warned himself more than once in his heart.

After two successive mission failures, his evaluation has dropped a level in the hearts of the superiors at the root.

If it is said that the mission of tracking Asami Masumi failed, it can be considered excusable, it is a very strong medical ninja, at least a master at the captain level of the dark part, with a very keen anti-reconnaissance ability, even if his ability is special, he can't do perfect tracking.

But this time it was different, causing Naruto to be kidnapped by a group of outlaws, and such a mistake was far more serious than the failure of the mission to track down Asami Masumi.

The human pillar force is an important military force in the village, regardless of Naruto's own will, from the moment he becomes the Nine-Tails human pillar force, he is the weapon of war that the village must control.

His presence is indispensable to Konoha what the Hokage means to Konoha is.

Especially in this era, tailed beasts are a valuable military resource.

If Naruto really had an accident and was kidnapped by outsiders, even if he died ten times, he would not be able to make up for such a mistake.

I am just a shadow in the darkness.

Thinking of the infectious smile on Naruto's face from time to time, the warm chakra gave him the feeling that it was like a shining sun in winter, dispelling the cold. Zuo Jing couldn't help but fall silent.

Such an existence is quite foreign to me.

In the future, maybe you will have less contact with Naruto to avoid being infected by the chakra aura on his body.

Giving up feelings, names, and life is the meaning of his existence.

If you can't do that, the roots have no value.

While thinking like this, Zuo Jing put his palm into the ninja bag, rummaged through the contents, and suddenly his face froze.

- The picture book is gone!

◎

"Hey, isn't Zuojing here?"

In a single room on the third floor of Konoha Hospital, Naruto, Sakura, and Tenzo came here, and they couldn't help but show surprised expressions when they saw that this single ward was empty.

But compared to Naruto and Sakura's confusion, Tenzo was thoughtful.

Did you go to meet with Tuanzang? Tenzo can only guess.

Sakai is not an ordinary shinobi, and even in Konoha's ninja file, there is no record, just like those orphan ninjas who have been secretly cultivated by the roots, except for the records in the roots, the village knows nothing about their past.

Even the name Zuo Jing is false.

It shows how much control the group has over the roots.

Such a major thing happened, Zuo Jing must not have recuperated from his injuries at the first time, but went to Tuan Zang to ask for guilt.

Tianzang sighed helplessly, although he knew that the root of this organization was not shallow, but with his strength, he was really powerless to compete with such a behemoth.

Even Tsunade, who looks extremely tough at this time, can only overwhelm the root on the surface, but if you secretly want to do something to the root, it will definitely cause a catastrophe.

The current root, not only the root itself, but also the strength of the martial arts faction, from the perspective of power, will not be too weak than the Hokage faction.

It is impossible to change Zuojing's situation.

The roots are not charities, and the dark side of their Konoha is nothing to do with love.

Bloody, cruel, unscrupulous, is synonymous with them.

It's like selecting more than 20 babies with excellent qualifications to become test subjects, and conducting experiments with Orochimaru on Mu Dun.

They really have no lower limit on rules and human ethics.

They need the end result, not the process.

As long as he can be strong, in their eyes, the Hokage may be able to sacrifice and betray at will.

"Could he be out for a walk, is his body okay?"

Here, Naruto guessed again, and put the basket of fruit in his hand on the cabinet next to the hospital bed.

"However, his injuries did not allow him to move freely for too long......"

As a medical ninja, Sakura naturally knows how serious the injuries on Zuojing's body are, and although she can act, for the sake of health, she still doesn't recommend that the other party get out of bed so quickly.

As a result, Sakura frowned, a worried look on her face.

"You two don't worry, Zuo Jing may have something going on, I believe he will be back soon."

Tianzang comforted beside him.

In fact, he has no confidence in his heart, because the crime of causing the disappearance of the human pillar force is very big, and he is okay on his side, although Tsunade's punishment for him is severe, it is also a punishment within the rules.

But the roots are not the rules of the village, but a set of rules that run themselves.

Whether Zuo Jing can come back safely can only expect his own value.

If his own value is not high in the eyes of the superiors of the roots, it is absolutely impossible to spare such a major mistake easily, and even let the rest of his peers in the roots replace him and rearrange him into the seventh class.

"Really? What a problem, doesn't he know that we are coming to visit him? ”

Naruto went to the window and opened the window to ventilate the room.

"Besides, if it weren't for you, Zuo Jing wouldn't have been so seriously injured. You have to thank people. ”

Sakura glanced at Naruto reproachfully.

"I—I know, I'm a little reluctant to go now."

Naruto's mouth hardened.

"I can't see it at all. Moreover, your performance in the mission was too inferior before, listening to Captain Yamato, the strength of those people should not exceed you too much, and you can be entangled for a while, but you were knocked out of the stick all of a sudden. ”

"Damn, who would have known that they would be so insidious, they didn't give me a chance to fight in full gear at all, and they didn't follow the rules! It almost hurt me to pee my pants at the time! ”

Naruto was angry at the thought of this, and was in the middle of a small relief, only to be suddenly attacked at that time, and if it wasn't for his quick enough reaction, he almost peed on his pants.

"Hey, don't talk about it! Besides, this is not a mid-ninja exam, it requires a one-on-one fair duel, and you have to say hello before going to war. Are you overthinking? ”

Sakura was speechless.

Is Naruto's strength strong? In a way, he is very strong, and even ordinary shinobi can't easily hold him.

"Heaven Descends"

But the other side is weak.

His nerves were too coarse, and his alertness to encounters was too poor, not much like normal shinobi, or even worse.

But there is no way, the actual battle is not the same as the exam.

The exam is a practical assessment of the candidate, but there are many differences from the real battle.

In encounters in the wild, it's normal for both sides to sneak up on each other.

The real battle will not be a one-on-one duel, and there is no rule that you are not allowed to kill the opponent, and there is no referee on the side, reaching out to stop when the candidate is in danger, so as to ensure that the candidate's life is worry-free.

Being preached like this by Sakura, Naruto shrugged his face and did not refute.

Sakura then pulled something out of her ninja bag, attracting Naruto and Tenzo's attention.

"What is this? Why is it so familiar, it seems to be the ...... of Zuojing"

Naruto saw clearly what Sakura was holding, it was a palm-sized drawing book.

The cover and bottom of the picture book are two Q version characters with cute painting styles.

One of them resembles Zuojing, and the other is unknown, but the hairstyle is very similar to Zuojing, except that the hair color is white.

"This is Zuojing's sketchbook, I remember that Zuojing accidentally fell down during the pursuit of the Four Celestial Elephant Man."

Tenzo thought of the source of this picture book and spoke.

"Well, I think this picture book should be a very important thing for Zuojing, and I asked him not to let us see it before, so I brought it with me."

Sakura nodded, she was still very curious about the book.

Sakai's form of ninjutsu appears in the form of ink painting, and creates physical objects to attack or restrain the enemy, and the effect is remarkable.

In addition to this, it also has extremely strong reconnaissance and intelligence transmission capabilities.

In actual combat, the functions are very comprehensive, and it can almost be said that there are no weaknesses in the secret arts.

"What's in there, that guy was mysterious before, and he has been holding this picture book in a daze, and he doesn't know what's in it."

Naruto asked curiously.

"I don't know, I haven't seen this picture book yet."

"Then hurry up and open it and take a look. I'd like to see what the guy drew in there. ”

Naruto took Sakura's sketchbook and flipped through it to himself.

"It's a bit immoral to look at other people's things like this without their permission, right?"

That being said, Tenzo's body came up very honestly, and like Naruto and Sakura, he focused his eyes on the drawing book.

He thought that it would be good if he learned something about Zuojing through this sketchbook.

At the very least, it can benefit the team spirit of Class 7.

After all, if he didn't know Zuo Jing well, it would be difficult for him to really entrust his back to Zuo Jing.

"Strange, what kind of composition is this?"

Then, Naruto, who had roughly flipped through the contents of the drawing book, had a strange look on his face.

Although the style of painting is very cute.,From an outsider's point of view,,There's basically no problem.,But I don't know why.,It's always a very strong sense of disobedience.。

Sakura pointed to the contents of the picture book and pointed out the interesting things she found:

"This should be a record of the growth history of the two teenagers, for example, the right page from both sides, the cover and bottom of the boys, but only the left page keeps changing enemies, and every time they change, the two teenagers will take away the opponent's equipment and weapons on the left page for the next battle."

After Sakura's analysis, Tenzo nodded approvingly.

Indeed, from this point of view, they are two different teenagers, but they have very similar growth histories. It's all about growing by defeating enemies...... But if it goes on like this, the two people in the story will meet sooner or later. Sakura, flip to the middle and take a look. ”

"Okay."

Sakura flipped to the middle part, and the expressions of the three of them were stunned.

The picture on the right page is a dark-haired teenager with no face, while the picture on the left page is blank and without any characters.

It stands to reason that the two people who keep defeating the enemy will eventually meet on the drawing in the middle, but only one person appears, still a faceless person, and the left is a blank picture.

There is no doubt that this black-haired boy who did not draw his face is Zuojing.

The white-haired boy did not appear on the left page.

"What's going on? Why does this teenager who resembles Zuo Jing have no face? And where is that white-haired boy? ”

Naruto blinked, dazed by this.

Sakura and Tenzo were slightly silent, perhaps thinking of something.

No face, which means no expression, is reminiscent of the false smile that Zuo Jing hung on his face from time to time at that time, strictly speaking, isn't it a face that does not need to exist with expression?

The Faceless.

Expressionless people.

Lose your name, lose your feelings.

There is no past, and there is no future.

This is the root.

"I can't think of the final ending, so I haven't started to paint?"

Sakura closed the book and let out a long breath.

The white-haired boy who appeared above was a very important person to Zuojing.

"It seems that the relationship inside is more complicated than we imagined."

Tenzo scratched his head and sighed.

He had some guesses of his own, but there were some things that he couldn't be sure of for sure.

However, only one thing is very clear, Zuo Jing did not completely cut off his past like the people at the root.

In his heart, he kept a memory that he could not part with no matter what.

"Captain Yamato, what kind of organization is the root?"

This was Sakura's first time asking such a question.

She realized that she didn't know as much about this organization hidden in Konoha as she imagined.

I can only get a general idea from the words of others - that is, the power of the roots is very large, so large that the Hokage has to be restrained when dealing with them.

And such a description is enough to prove the terrible root.

A huge force that can compete with the Hokage, it can be regarded as the second largest government in Konoha.

And their leader, maybe the power is not weaker than the Hokage, he belongs to the darkness, the second 'Hokage' in Konoha!

Tianzang was about to answer, when this sentence came from the door of the ward:

"The root is the private organization of the Tuanzang Lord, and joining this organization means giving everything, dignity and even life for the Tuanzang Lord. For the members of the organization, Danzo-sama's orders come from the will of the gods. ”

The three of Naruto turned their heads to look at the door of the ward, and found that Sakai had quietly appeared there at some point, with his usual smile on his pale face.

"Left well? When did you come? ”

"Hmm...... I just came back from a walk, thank you so much for coming to visit me. ”

Zuo Jing walked in with a smile.

Sakura, on the other hand, stepped forward and handed the sketchbook in her hand to Sakai.

"Here, it's something precious to you."

“……”

Sakai lowered his head, and only then did he notice that the painting book in Sakura's hand was the one he had lost.

For a moment, the smile on his face became much more real.

The joy of regain, although not shown on his face, did fill his ribcage and made him feel reassured.

"Thank you."

"Actually, no...... Sorry, I read the above without your permission. ”

Sakura smiled awkwardly.

In this regard, Zuo Jing did not express any opinion.

Compared with the joy of losing and regaining, this little mistake, he didn't need to dwell on it.

Besides, even if the above things are known, there is nothing, and at most the stories he draws will be very boring.

"Then again, you are the person on one side of the top, but who is the person on the other side?"

Naruto asked.

To Naruto's question, Sakai was silent for a moment and replied, "It's my brother." ”

"Brother?"

His answer surprised the three of Naruto.

They didn't expect Zuo Jing to have a brother.

"However, it's not my brother who is related by blood, it's my brother who grew up in the roots together. He and I are both orphans, and in order to better survive in the roots, we chose to rely on each other for our lives and rely on each other for warmth. ”

There was a hint of darkness in Zuo Jing's eyes.

Without being in the roots, you can't know the suffocating darkness there.

The Danzo he is loyal to is a ninja dark who will stop at nothing to achieve his goals.

Root is also not a charity for the adoption of orphans, and only powerful orphans can escape from being abandoned and used as test subjects.

The strong survive and the weak die, it is an incomparably dark primeval jungle.

"Really? It can be seen that you have a good relationship with your brother. ”

Sakura didn't know how to answer, so she could only say that.

"Of course, he taught me how to survive in my roots, and I have a lot of respect for him."

Zuo Jing nodded, not denying it.

"So, what about him now?"

"Dead, the cause of death is illness."

Zuo Jing squinted and smiled.

This smile made Naruto and Sakura feel a little uncomfortable.

"Well, then again, I'm really going to thank you this time, if it weren't for you......"

To ease the tension, Naruto began to thank Sakai.

"You're welcome, I'm just tasked with protecting you."

Sakai looked at Naruto with a smile and said this calmly.

"Zuojing, you ......"

Naruto frowned.

He felt that the left well in front of him was like a cold machine that was constantly working, without the slightest taste of being a living person.

"Zuo Jing is just a fictitious name to integrate into the seventh class, which can also be said to be a code name. I don't have a name, I'm the hands and feet of Lord Tuanzang, I'm the minions of the root, I'm ...... It doesn't exist in this world. Naruto, whether you admit it or not, in this village, there are things that you can't destroy. So, don't try to change me, as a ninja of the root, you don't need feelings and bonds. ”

Sakai faced Naruto and interrupted what Naruto was about to say.

Even Sakura and Tenzo, who were bystanders, could feel the tension between the two sides.

"Hey, how can you say such a thing? Ninjas are also human beings, how can they give up their feelings? ”

"So...... Your past teacher, Kakashi Hagi, betrayed Konoha. ”

As Sakai said this, Naruto and Sakura-chan shrank and clenched their fists.

As if not noticing the ugly expressions of the two at the moment, Zuo Jing continued to smile and said, "Kakashi's father, Konoha Hakuya, committed suicide precisely because of the drag of this bond, and he committed suicide under the accusations of the villagers. If that Konoha White Fang had chosen to prioritize his mission instead of choosing to save his companions, this would not have happened. Even your teacher, Kakashi Hagi, will not betray Konoha and eventually become the murderer of the three generations of Hokage. These are all tragedies that happen because they are too focused on emotions and forget what the task is. ”

“…… You shut up! Kakashi-sensei, he's not what you say......"

Naruto's tone sounded like gritting teeth, trying to suppress the anger inside.

"But Konoha White Fang committed suicide, and Kakashi Hachiki killed the Hokage and defected, and this is ironclad evidence. So, please advise me in the future, Naruto Uzumaki. Rest assured, this incident will not happen again, because I will protect you to the death! This is my life and my mission! ”

Sakai smiled and held out his hand in a friendly way, as if he wanted to get to know Naruto again.

"Won't you think about it for yourself? Such a task ......"

The anger on Naruto's face was palpable, and he stepped forward and grabbed Sakai by the collar, as if he wanted to teach the other party a lesson.

However, Zuo Jing did not panic at all.

"There is no need to be so heart-rending to refute, in this world, there is no equality between people. In the eyes of the upper echelons of the village, your life is worth more than mine. Whether it is the past, present, or future, the fact that UU Reading Books is unlikely to change. Life is valuable, and the initial cost is very low. The ultimate purpose of everyone's efforts is to raise the price of their own lives, so that they will not be easily abandoned in the end. ”

Then, Sakai looked at Tenzo and said with a smile, "I think the captain has received a similar order to me." For example, the Hokage ordered to fight to the death to protect Naruto's safety. ”

Naruto, who heard this, looked at Tenzo in disbelief.

Tenzo was a little silent about this, although Tsunade had not given such an order, but as a middle and senior cadre in the dark department, he had to take the initiative to do a good job in this regard.

"Naruto, don't blame Sakai too much. His words are hard to hear, but for this era, there is nothing wrong with his words. Your presence is unique to the village. If that time comes, I will make the same choice as Sakai. ”

Tenzo couldn't bear to deceive Naruto, and that was the case in this era.

Out of Konoha is a world of complete disorder.

If people want to survive better, they can only rely on the most primitive violence, which can protect themselves and plunder the wealth of others.

Because where order is not contained, violence is the most powerful solution, and there is no one.

"How could it be ......?"

Naruto took a step back in some despair.

Sakura stood aside and wanted to say something, but thinking about something, she couldn't help but say nothing.

"However, Zuojing, it's better to say less about this kind of thing in the future. Naruto, Sakura and Sakura are not the same as you, don't use your standards to judge others. ”

Tenzo turned his head to meet Sakai's false smiling face, and solemnly warned him of this.

"Don't worry, I'll take care of it later, Captain."

Zuo Jing smiled and nodded.