Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve: CH_571: Final Preparations (Patreon)

In the bathroom of the safehouse, a bare-chested Takuma stood before the mirror with a small basin of clay slip on the counter. He had brought it from home with him. After nearly a year of pottery, he had learned much about the element of earth; it was partly why he had picked up pottery in the first place, and he had come to love it as its own thing afterwards.

He wove a set of hand seals and felt chakra rush to his face and hands. He dipped his hands into the slip and brought it to his face. The wet clay firmed on contact with his face while somehow retaining some of its malleability. He picked up the wooden modelling tools and began sculpting the clay on his face. He carved away the extra mass, smoothed the edges, reapplied more where needed, and added details with fine brushes.

After forty-five minutes, brownish-grey clay covered most of his face. He leaned close to the mirror to check every corner of his work and then wove the final set of hand seals that saturated the clay with chakra.

Earth Release: Phantom Noh’s Mask

He felt the clay almost fuse with his skin as though it were trying to reach the muscles underneath.

Soon, a face different from the one he had gotten used to stared back at him in the mirror. His nose was wider, his jaw had been made more square, his eyes looked more sunken, and even his ears had been changed so now they looked like he had untreated cauliflower ears. Takuma moved his facial muscles, and the clay mask seamlessly portrayed his emotions. He again leaned towards the mirror to check the clay that had now assumed the colour of his skin and could spot some slight discolouration due to his insufficient skill with the jutsu, but nothing that couldn’t be fixed with some makeup.

Satisfied with his work, he stepped out of the bathroom.

“Sorry, I made a bit of a mess if you’re going to use the bathroom,” Takuma said when he spotted Tern in the living room, which was full of documents they'd received from Kurosawa about the party at the Hewn Stone Estate. They had spent hours poring over the blueprints, the Kikyo core roster present at the location, the guest list, and a dozen other things to account for in the plan.

“No problem, I’m done here, I think…” Tern turned around and wordlessly stared at his face in surprise. “Wow, you’re really good at this.” She stepped closer and raised her hand to touch him when he gave her permission. The mask felt wrong to touch, but it indented when she poked it before springing back just like skin would, and it even handled her pinching his cheeks perfectly. “How do you even learn something like this?”

“You spend time with prosthetic and makeup artists at the theatre, tailing them as they do their work in hopes that some of their skill will rub off on you. Then you spend hours practising, telling yourself it was time well spent because you’ll need this skill one day. Then you learn how to handle clay by pouring more hours into pottery, glad that it’s therapeutic and that you can make gifts for your friends as an apology for barely having a social life.”

“Doesn’t sound worth it,” Tern said, still admiring his new face. “How does it feel?”

“Sticky,” Takuma said. “How does it look? What’s your impression of the face?”

She stepped back a few steps to gaze at his face and nodded after a few seconds. “It’s a forgettable face, and you look older now. Thank God this gets rid of your dark circles, because they’re harrowingly eye-catching.”

“Alright, no unnecessary comments,” Takuma said. Just a month back, a kid had looked at his face and asked if he was dying while on the verge of tears.

“That’s a very nice dress,” he said, looking at the violet, high-collared satin evening gown still wrapped in plastic on the table with the documents underneath it.

“I’ll put it on at the base; don’t want to run there in this dress,” Tern said. Since she was Kurosawa’s partner for the party, they were going to take a carriage to the Hewn Stone Estate from the Ashwood Annex.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

Takuma shrugged. “You can prepare to death and still have all your plans thrown out the window at first contact. It remains to be seen how alert Kikyo will be during the party or what their security measures look like…”

“Better not to overthink it at this point,” she said.

“If things do go wrong, I’ll just wing it,” he said, winking with his new face.

She didn’t think that his joke was funny.

Tern soon left for the base. Takuma fixed the imperfections on the mask with makeup and did some last-minute revisions on the documents for the next hour before finally putting on the crisp black suit prepared for him. He looked at himself in the mirror, and except for his face, the rest of him was still the same, but that wasn’t a problem because no one knew him or his new identity. His voice sounded young, so he hummed, slowly lowering his voice until it sounded age-appropriate. He couldn’t naturally shift his voice like Tenzo—that took too much training—but he had plenty of experience with voice modulation and knew a chakra technique that could do the trick.

“Check. Tobi. Azami. Kurosawa. Amakura,” he said to himself, confirming his new voice.

Satisfied with his disguise, he walked to his bedroom and opened the door, peeking inside to be hit by multiple instances of his original voice as his clones talked and argued amongst themselves. They had a heavily marked map of the inner city open between them.

“I’m leaving,” he said.

“Don’t screw it up,” four of them said together before returning to their conversation.

Takuma shook his head and then left the safehouse to meet his ticket into the Hewn Stone Estate.

———

Takuma gazed at the Japanese castle peeking over the trees and everything else in the distance. The main keep was several storeys tall, with the residential palace—half of the keep’s height—standing beside it. They were surrounded by other structures like watchtowers and storehouses, and all of it was protected by a wall.

Once upon a time, castles were exclusively built as fortifications at the core of settlements. That was still true to some extent, as many castles still functioned as defensive hubs, but simultaneously, it had been several decades since the construction of a true castle in the Land of Fire. Since the unification of the shinobi clans under the Hidden Leaf and the consolidation of samurai power under the Fire Daimyo, large-scale conflict inside the country had all but died, erasing the need for castles.

However, castles were still seen as symbols of power. Even though they were no longer needed for their intended purposes, people still wanted to be associated with what they represented, so they started fashioning their homes in the image of castles. A few decades back, it became a trend among the rich and powerful, who started to buy land and erect castles on it to use as their residences, just like the warlords of the past did.

The trend’s influence was particularly strong in the Ember Imperial City, and by the end of the decade, the inner city had castles in every direction one could look. They stood out like skyscrapers in the modern world.

Somehow, the trend bypassed the Hidden Leaf. The clan heads and jōnin did live in lavish homes built on spacious properties, but they were modest in comparison to the capital’s castles. Not even the main headquarters of clans were modelled after castles. One would expect at least the most important building in all of the Hidden Leaf to resemble a castle, but even the Hokage’s Office was far humbler compared to a rich noble’s residence.

Takuma was just surprised that the Hyūga hadn’t tried to emulate the court nobles.

He returned his attention to the castle. It had turquoise roofing with golden trim that shone in the afternoon light.

That castle was the Hewn Stone Estate.

He heard the clatter of horse hooves and saw a red and black carriage stop in front of him. He was standing right next to a wooden bridge built over a wide stream. The door to the carriage opened, and a hunk of a man stepped out, dressed identically to Takuma. The man whispered something into the carriage.

Takuma sighed, because he always had sharp ears. He was already done weaving hand seals by the time the man closed the carriage door and walked towards him.

“So, you’re the one we’re picking up.” The man looked Takuma over with an unimpressed expression. “You don’t look like much, eh, little pipsqueak? I’m the Master’s bodyguard. I don’t care about whatever deal you have going on, but I do care about his safety over anything else. And I think you’re trouble and will get him in trouble.”

Takuma had to crane his neck up to look at the tall and well-built man. “Listen, I don’t want any trouble here. I assure you, there’ll be no trouble for your employer. He’s doing me a favour; I’ll keep his reputation as a priority if that’s what you’re worried about.”

The bodyguard stepped even closer to Takuma and glared down at him. “You ain’t coming with us. Get lost.”

———

When the carriage driver saw Riki walk towards the man of much shorter stature, he felt bad for the smaller bodyguard. He didn’t know why the Master was hiring someone new, given that he had enough guys on the payroll for his and the family’s protection, but it wasn’t his place to ask questions like that.

But he had overheard the other guards complaining amongst themselves during a smoke. They were displeased that the Master was bringing a stranger for his protection to the event at the Hewn Stone Estate. They felt insulted because it felt like the Master didn’t trust them. They had complained to Riki, who assured them he’d talk with the Master.

Seeing that the Master had left home only with Riki, their complaints hadn’t made any difference.

It was clear that Riki wasn’t happy and was going to chew the guy out.

But then something strange happened. As Riki intimidated the new guy, the latter walked past him mid-sentence, completely ignoring the chewing-out. The driver hissed, knowing that Riki would be massively pissed, and braced for an angry outburst that, to his utter surprise, didn’t come. Instead, it looked utterly bizarre as Riki continued to talk down to an empty spot as though he hadn’t noticed a whole man walk away.

The driver’s eyes met those of the new guy, who gave him a nod and put a finger to his lips before opening the carriage door and stepping inside.

———

The inside of the carriage was well lit, as the curtain on the door on the other side was pulled back, allowing ample light to come in. It allowed Takuma to see the utter surprise on the face of the ‘Master’, who wasn’t expecting to see him so soon.

Takuma held the door open so the man could see his bodyguard talking to empty air.

“Is this enough proof that I can handle myself? Did I pass your test?”

The old man in his fifties looked taken aback. “What is he doing?” he asked, gazing at his bodyguard.

“It’s an illusion,” Takuma replied as he stepped inside and closed the door. “He’ll snap out of it soon enough. It’s not a particularly strong genjutsu.”

“So you heard me? You have sharp ears.” The man was dressed in a luxurious kimono made from a really heavy silk with intricate patterns hand-embroidered on it, which seemed to be the result of dozens of hours of work by very skilled craftsmen.

“Thank you for agreeing to do this, Lord Diviner,” Takuma said.

Kageaki Amakura was the man Kurosawa had tapped for the task—the court astrologer, known officially by the title Master of Divination. His job was to read the heavens to determine “auspicious” and “inauspicious” opportunities for the Daimyo and nobles, and they consulted with him for things like the best times to sign important contracts, hold events, or travel.

Takuma didn’t know what Kurosawa had on Amakura, but he could guess. Amakura had the Daimyo’s ear and could influence the ruler through his position and weaponised superstition. If the Master of Divination declared that he felt the silk made in the east was more auspicious than that made in the west, it could influence changes in where the upper society of the capital city purchased their silk, bringing great profits to those he favoured.

There were plenty of opportunities for manipulation, and just as many to get caught and be leveraged.

“Worry not about it… What is your name, son?” Amakura asked.

“You may call me Tobi.”

“Worry not about it, Tobi. This, too, was written in the stars.”

Takuma didn’t believe a lick of that stuff, but he just smiled and agreed silently.

The door to the carriage swung open. Riki looked inside at Takuma with wide eyes, like he was looking at a ghost. “Y-You, you—! How did that… What did you do?!”

Takuma turned to Amakura. “We’re running late, Master. We should get moving.”

Amakura smiled and nodded. “Get in, Riki. We must leave immediately. It wouldn’t do well for us to be late; we must arrive on time so we can perform the ritual to ensure that no curse falls upon the guests.”

Riki was baffled, but he didn’t dare ignore the order and got up into the carriage. All his previous bravado and aggression were gone as he seemed to shrink in his seat from embarrassment.

Takuma paid no attention to the large man and began talking to Amakura about what they expected from each other during the party. There was only a short carriage ride until he arrived at the target location, and his body seemed to sense that as it began to heat up, as it always did when he was about to do something important and risky. In the next several hours, he would either have the information he wanted, return empty-handed, or things would go wrong enough that the Hidden Sand and Orochimaru would find out that someone was onto them.

It was time to attend a party.