The first night passed without movent.
During the day, Chizumi didn't let anyone relax.
They rotated rest shifts, rotated watch over the village, and even ate with their voices lowered. Shizune found ti during the day to visit the southern reception point and confirm that the villagers had all been settled. When she returned, she brought back news: although the villagers were still shaken, at least they were alive, and food and lodging had been temporarily stabilized.
At dusk, just as the horizon began to redden, Neji suddenly activated his Byakugan and said quietly, "Soone's here."
Everyone looked up at once.
"How many?" Chizumi asked.
"Seven, outside the northern forest. They aren't villagers, and their chakra signatures don't seem like Konoha's." Neji locked his gaze onto the distance. "They're watching the village. Not entering."
Kakashi's eye narrowed slightly. "Advance scouts."
Everyone imdiately fell silent.
Neji kept watching. "They're spread out. Two in the trees, three on the ground, two farther back as cover. They've stopped… watching the village entrance."
Shikamaru slowly sat upright.
"They've arrived."
Shizune subconsciously tightened her grip on the record board in her hands.
In truth, nothing could be seen clearly from this far away. All they could make out was that the northern tree line outside Bamboo Village seed darker than usual. But everyone here knew that soone was already watching that empty village from within those shadows.
Neji said again, "They watched for a while. They didn't enter. Looks like they're morizing positions."
Chizumi remained calm. "Let them look."
"Mm." After a while, Neji added, "They're retreating. They didn't approach."
Shikamaru let out a breath.
"More cautious than expected."
"Normal," Chizumi said.
That night, the Allied advance scouts did not approach again.
The next morning, however, a second group ca.
This ti there were more of them—twelve people.
Neji stared into the distance, his brows tightening.
"There's a sensory type. And one of them has very steady chakra. Seems like a jōnin."
Kakashi said quietly, "This ti they'll move in a little."
Sure enough, not long after, Neji said, "They're moving. Two are going first. They stopped at the village entrance… looking at those two houses."
The corner of Shikamaru's mouth tugged faintly.
"They saw the fake traces."
Neji continued reporting. "One entered the house on the left. Another is guarding the door. The one inside crouched down… he's dismantling the tags."
Shizune instinctively held her breath.
"Can he remove them?"
"He can," Neji said. "They weren't ant to be hard."
Shikamaru said lazily, "Of course he has to remove them. Otherwise, how will the act continue?"
Neji's gaze didn't move.
"Soone entered the house on the right too. Also dismantling."
The distance was strangely quiet.
No explosion. No fire. No sign of anything unusual.
That Allied advance squad clearly relaxed a little more. After a while, Neji said quietly, "Three more have entered at the village entrance. One is checking the alley, one is checking the well, and one is outside directing."
Chizumi still didn't move.
Kakashi tilted his head and glanced at him. "Still not triggering?"
"Not yet."
Neji kept watching. "They're pushing deeper. Four more entered, split into two groups. Two are walking down the main lane. Two have gone outside the western well courtyard."
Shizune's heart climbed higher and higher.
Shikamaru said softly, "Still just a little short."
"Short of what?" a young ANBU nearby couldn't help asking.
"Short of the mont when they feel like they've 'basically figured it out.'"
Sure enough, a while later, Neji suddenly said quietly, "The one who looks like a jōnin has entered too. He's standing at the entrance of the main lane, observing."
Shikamaru's eyes shifted.
"That's about it."
But Chizumi still didn't move. He only asked, "How many in the well courtyard?"
"Two outside the courtyard, three inside. One has gone to the well."
Chizumi lifted his eyes and looked toward that village, which was far too quiet.
The wind blew past, and the old osmanthus branches swayed softly.
"Wait three more breaths."
Shizune felt even her breathing slow down.
Neji reported softly, "The one by the well has crouched… looks like he's checking the stone rim. Another is checking the woodshed. The one at the main lane entrance took one step forward…"
Chizumi's finger rested on the trigger talisman in his palm.
"Now."
The next instant, he pressed down with his finger.
In distant Bamboo Village, there was a mont of silence.
Then, inside the house on the left side of the village entrance—the one where the fake tags had just been dismantled—a brief white flash suddenly lit up.
The light didn't co from the doorway or the wall corner, but from deep beneath the foundation.
Before the Allied ninja inside could react, the entire floor of the house seed to be lifted from below.
Boom!
The first explosion wasn't the largest, but it was sudden enough to make the heart jolt.
Wooden boards, earth, stone, and shredded window paper blasted outward. The man at the door didn't even manage to retreat before the shockwave flipped him away and slamd him into the courtyard wall.
Almost imdiately after the first blast, a second point along the main lane lit up.
Not at the exact sa mont, but close enough to chain together.
Boom—!
This one was heavier.
An ordinary-looking courtyard wall at the alley entrance was blown apart from its base. Half the wall, broken wood, and chunks of mud burst outward together, smashing straight toward the two pathfinding ninja who had just started to retreat. The alley was already narrow, and smoke, dust, and shattered stone instantly blocked all vision.
Soone shouted furiously in the distance, "Fall back! Fall back!"
But just as they shouted, the well in the western courtyard erupted with a third thunderous blast.
Boom!!!
The stone rim shattered completely. The heavy charge hidden along the well wall and beneath the ground detonated almost directly underneath. The man crouching by the well took the brunt of it, half his body swept away by the shockwave and flying shards of stone. The two people nearby didn't even have ti to pull him away before the delayed explosive pack in the woodshed detonated too. Firewood, sparks, and explosive dust were hurled into the air, and the entire courtyard looked like it had been slapped down by an invisible hand.
"Ambush!!"
"Not explosive tags! These aren't ordinary explosive tags!"
"Retreat! Retreat first!!"
The empty village dissolved into chaos.
But it wasn't over.
At the other end of the main lane, the beams of an unremarkable side room suddenly snapped. Half the roof collapsed with a crash, landing right in front of two Allied ninja who were frantically falling back, completely cutting off their route. On the other side, in the second-row eastern courtyard, the second-layer explosive point—delayed by only a heartbeat—was dragged into the chain and exploded, blasting open the courtyard gate and half the surrounding wall, sending mud and dust surging into the sky.
In that instant, Bamboo Village seed to co alive.
Not the life of living people.
But the kind of malicious life that hid teeth everywhere and suddenly opened all its mouths at once.
Even from the distance of the western slope, everyone could feel the tremor from that chain of heavy explosions. The earth under the grass roots quivered faintly, and their ears were filled with muffled booms rolling toward them, mixed with the suddenly chaotic shouts and curses of the Allied advance team.
Shizune instinctively closed her eyes.
When she opened them again, the distant village was already full of smoke and dust.
"This… this strike—"
Kakashi looked at the chaotic shadows inside the village, his eye curving faintly.
Neji kept his Byakugan active and reported quickly in a low voice. "Two down at the village entrance. The one in the left house is alive, but he can't get up. The three in the main lane are scattered; one has a broken leg. The well courtyard is the worst. The chakra of the one crouching by the well is already very weak. Two outside the courtyard are dragging people out… The jōnin behind them is retreating. He's looking for the source of the explosions."
Shikamaru stared at the smoke and dust and clicked his tongue.
"They really did enter pretty deep."
Chizumi still had his finger pressed against the trigger, his expression calm.
"Wait until they retreat two more steps."
Neji imdiately said, "They're withdrawing. That jōnin is directing the survivors out of the village. Soone is trying to climb over the rear wall… stopped. There's an explosive point near the wall too."
Almost the instant he finished speaking, the pressure-wall point at the end of the southern lane exploded too.
It wasn't the largest blast, but it forced the two n trying to leave by the rear wall to dive back into the alley, looking so wretched it was almost as if soone were chasing them with a stick.
Even Shikamaru felt bad for them watching it.
"Now they've really lost face."
The shouts from the Allied side completely changed tone.
Earlier, there had still been a sense of cautious probing. Now it had beco pure embarrassnt, the kind of panic that just wanted to drag everyone out first. The jōnin holding the rear clearly had so skill. He forcibly stabilized the few uninjured n and, while retreating, raised his hand to release a Wind Release technique, forcibly sweeping smoke and dust from the alley ahead.
But the smoke cleared quickly, and what it revealed was even more unsettling.
Empty houses, empty courtyards, empty wells. Broken wood and ash drifted in the wind. Bodies blasted onto the ground, twisted door planks, and nobody could say whether another trap waited behind a wall, inside a house, or around a corner.
The jōnin gritted his teeth and shouted, "Everyone withdraw from the village! Not one person stays!"
This ti, they really retreated.
Neji watched and said steadily, "Six can still move. They're dragging three wounded. Two others weren't dragged out… likely dead."
Shizune's fingers slowly tightened.
It wasn't that she had never seen dead people, nor had she never seen battlefield injuries. But watching an empty village suddenly bite into people like this felt different.
In the distance, the advance squad finally retreated out of the village in a sorry state, only stopping near the northern tree line.
No one dared step into the village again.
But they didn't imdiately leave either. Instead, they surrounded the empty village, cursing, watching, and confirming with unwilling expressions just what the hell they had stepped into.
Shikamaru looked at the distant figures that had stopped, then exhaled lightly.
"All right. They've lost all their face this ti."
Kakashi smiled.
"And they'll have to pick it back up themselves."
Chizumi didn't smile. He only looked at the village in the distance, which had fallen quiet again, his expression calm to the point of coldness.
"This is only the first pot."
Shizune turned to him. "You still plan to do more?"
"They won't abandon Bamboo Village just because this one squad suffered."
"But they already know—"
"Knowing there's a trap and not using this location are two different things," Chizumi said. "They'll only beco more cautious and more determined to take this place."
Shikamaru added from the side, "And the more they want to take it, the more they have to deal with this insult first. People are like that, especially right after losing face."
Neji was still watching the distance.
"More people are coming from behind. A dozen or so. They aren't entering, just receiving the wounded outside."
Kakashi said, "The ssage will be sent back quickly."
"Let them send it," Chizumi said.
In the forest belt behind the western slope, the wind pressed very low.
The Allied advance squad outside distant Bamboo Village had not yet completely dispersed. A few people were running back and forth along the outer ring, seemingly checking whether there was any pursuit or a second round of explosive points. So knelt on the ground bandaging their companions, while others stood farther outside, occasionally looking back toward the village. The anger and alarm of soone who had just crawled out of a trap had not yet faded from their expressions.
Shikamaru narrowed his eyes and watched for a while before suddenly speaking.
"They won't let this go."
Kakashi placed his book on his knee and gave a soft "Mm."
"That squad just now was only a probe," Shikamaru said. "Since they took a loss, the next group will only be larger."
Shizune frowned. "But they already know there's a problem with the village. They'll still force it?"
"They will," Chizumi said.
His voice wasn't loud, but it was certain.
Neji kept his Byakugan open, his sight locked beyond the northern tree line. "Another group arrived from behind… this ti there are more, around twenty."
"They're pulling the wounded back and switching in a fresh group," Kakashi said softly. "Fast response."
Shikamaru sat up straighter, his tone slowly growing serious. "They're not just replacing people. They're surrounding it."
Shizune paused. "Surrounding it?"
Neji nodded. "Yes… they're not entering directly anymore. So are circling to the east, and another team is pressing toward the south."
Shikamaru clicked his tongue. "As expected."
Chizumi said nothing. He only watched the empty land outside the village gradually fill with more figures.
In the distance, the jōnin who had first withdrawn had already joined up with the newly arrived team. He stood on a slightly higher slope, making rapid hand gestures as if redistributing manpower.
"They're spreading out," Neji said quietly. "North, east, and south all have people… The west side is still empty."
Shikamaru smiled faintly. "The west is where we are, so of course they won't rush in."
Kakashi looked at Chizumi. "About ti to move?"
Chizumi shook his head. "Not enough yet."
Shizune couldn't help asking, "We're still waiting?"
"Wait until they finish setting their formation," Chizumi said. "Right now, it's still only a probing encirclent."
After hearing that, Shikamaru's eyes shifted slightly. "You want them to move only after they think they've stabilized things?"
Chizumi did not deny it.
Ti passed little by little.
Before the sky fully darkened, there were no longer only a few scattered teams outside Bamboo Village. They had faintly ford a loose encirclent. No one rashly entered the village again, but no one withdrew either.
From a distance, it looked like a beast that had been stabbed, breathing low around the empty village but refusing to leave.
"They're waiting for orders," Kakashi said softly.
As if confirming that statent, not long after, a more orderly unit appeared outside the northern tree line.
Neji lowered his voice. "Soone stronger has arrived… steady chakra, more than one."
Shikamaru's eyes cleared completely. "The higher-ups have stepped onto the field."
That newly arrived unit did not approach the village directly, instead stopping farther out. Several people walked to the center and seed to listen to reports.
Even from this distance, one could feel that the atmosphere over there had beco much more oppressive than before.
Shizune said quietly, "They must be furious."
Shikamaru chuckled. "I would be too."
Chizumi watched for a while, then suddenly turned.
"Withdraw half the people," he said.
Everyone paused.
Shizune instinctively asked, "Withdraw now?"
"Mm," Chizumi said. "Leave the observers. Everyone else split into two groups and retreat deeper into the northwest forest belt."
Shikamaru raised an eyebrow. "You're changing position?"
"Not changing. Baiting."
Kakashi glanced at him, seeming to understand. "You think they'll chase out?"
"They will," Chizumi said. "But not all of them."
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