>>5943445>>5943472>>5943477>>5943491>>5943498>>5943513>>5943547“Why did you execute him?” You ask, gesturing to the corpse of the masked man.
“Because he was my target.” Eyepatch answers. “The whole point of us running this charade was to lull him into a false sense of security so I could take his head.”
“It didn’t look that way to me.” You say, fingers investigating your still-bleeding thigh.
“Of course not. That man is- was a jonin level assassin. He was alert enough that he wouldn’t have been willing to expose himself unless he was totally confident in victory, and his specialty was killing without even being seen. The plan was that we were going to let him paralyze you with his senbon, and then while he was focused on searching your body I was going to sneak up and cut his head off. That plan was thrown off when you managed to defend yourself, and when your sensei arrived. That's why I was just standing here not doing anything but defending myself. I'm a jonin as well, and a better fighter than Hihari at that. The only reason I needed to trick him is because he's faster than me and could have escaped with tales of my treachery if I couldn't down him in one sure blow.”
“Then why did she try to kill me?” You say, pointing at Fins.
She offers you an apologetic wince “Because he was seconds away from killing you, straight up? By attacking you myself I gave him a reason to wait, and I knew from eavesdropping on your conversation with your master that you had a seal in your pocket you needed to break. I didn’t mean to cut you as bad as I did, but I knew something good would come from breaking the seal and that you couldn’t do it yourself. You think that was an accident?”
You shake your head. “This all sounds a little too neat. He didn’t even seem like a jonin level assassin when I struck him with my water bullet.”
“His specialty was maneuvering into position to silently kill someone who was defenseless or didn’t see him coming. He was weaker as an outright fighter, but he needed to feel comfortable enough to reveal himself and lower his guard for anyone to get a chance. Otherwise you would have just never woken up one night and nobody would have ever known why.”
“Speaking of why: Why?! I don’t understand why you’d try protecting me, and if you really were, I don’t see why it got botched so badly!”
“I was trying to protect you because Izumi saved my life and died before I could return the favor. It’s gnawed at me for over a decade. That’s why I volunteered to kill your fucking whore mother.” He says, spitting on the ground. “I didn’t even know you existed until I met with Hihari and he explained he wanted you terminated first. Right then I knew I had to kill him, and I tempted him into making us an asset. I had Miyako follow you to make sure she could react if Hihari decided to go for the kill too early.”
“So that’s why she was watching me the other night.”
