>>5941147>>5941161>>5941172>>5941197>>5941215>>5941245>>5941248>>5941461>>5941849>>5941907This situation was fishy.
You narrow your eyes and decide to examine the situation for a moment before committing to a course of action. A ninja must see the underneath of the underneath.
Was this a genjutsu? You take out a kunai and prod yourself in the palm. Nothing changes. Okay, not a genjutsu. But it could be a transformation ploy. You would be able to check that out easily with sensing water sphere jutsu. You quickly summon it and take stock of the chakra readings.
Two. Coming from the two men down below. They were for sure expending chakra, which means for an absolute fact that these people were ninja. And since they looked like peasants squabbling in the woods, they were definitely transformed. This whole scenario was a ploy to draw you out and surprise you.
There are some more facts that you can intuit though, and they make your blood run cold: They were close enough to your location that they knew where you were from the beginning. They couldn’t have gauged the appropriate distance for this show to be exactly within earshot otherwise. So, they not only knew where you were, but exactly where.
… But why then? Why go through this at all instead of just attacking your outright? The only explanation was that they wanted to keep you distracted with something to look at and think about while-
You whirl around and look behind you with the urgency of someone he senses their imminent death creeping up behind them. A man is crouches on another branch a short distance behind you, a masked man holding a needle coated in a thin sheen of grease. As soon as you see him he lunges forward, attempting to drive the needle into your neck. Raw instinct causes you to throw up a hand to block him, narrowly stopping his arm at the elbow before the needle plunges into the flesh of your throat. He’s strong though, he’s going to overpower you and stab you anyway unless you make distance fast.
You snap out a kick. The man uses his other hand to block it, and for that brief moment his body weight isn’t pressing the needle inexorably towards your neck.
You jump, launching yourself backwards away from this guy. A blind leap of faith because you can’t take your eyes off of him. It’s a good thing you don’t take your eyes off of him too, because that same poisoned needle gets thrown at you.
You deflect it by blasting a water bullet, washing it away into the woods just before you land heavily on the forest floor below.
