Chapter 511: Reasons to NOT use Shadow Clones!
While Fujin and Danzo had their little confrontation, Hiruzen met with the clan leaders and informed them of the situation. While they were displeased about their clan compounds being searched, no one opposed Hiruzen. After all, if someone who could silently eliminate 15 Root ninjas hid in their clan compounds or secret bases, then their entire clan could be in danger.
Without any restrictions, Fujin's clones searched the entire village methodically. Needless to say, it was all an act. With his Space Time Sensing Technique, there wasn't much that could hide from him anyway. Not to mention, the culprit was him. How would he find anyone else?
He merely took the opportunity to check out all the secret bases inside Konoha and left the Flying Thunder God mark secretly whenever he could. He had already put thousands of marks inside the village. However, now he could truly claim that he had marked the entire village! Once his range increased, he could appear almost anywhere inside the village. Unless the village was destroyed, Fujin could soon be considered as invincible inside Konoha!
Of course, his search wasn't entirely unrestricted. While the clans didn't stop him like Danzo, their ninjas still followed him when he inspected their clan compounds or secret bases. As such, his clones couldn't brazenly mark every place there.
Regardless, he was long satisfied with what he had done. After all, these were unintended benefits of his move against Danzo. Besides, this search had become common knowledge among the ninjas. Almost every clan ninja became aware of such a search despite not knowing the reason behind the search.
A few civilian ninjas noticed as well. The ones who didn't notice would soon come to know of it from their friends who were a part of ninja clans. Within a few days, the fact that Fujin could sustain dozens of Shadow Clones for hours and his Grandmaster attainment in Fuinjutsu would be known to every ninja in Konoha!
One of those civilian ninjas was Katsuhiro. He was dumbfounded by what he had discovered. He immediately realized, 'So this is why Danzo seemed so annoyed. How did he suddenly get the authority to do something like this? Shit, if he is a Grandmaster in Fuinjutsu, then taking his seat will be extremely difficult. Everyone wants to have a good relationship with a Fuinjutsu Grandmaster. However, how did he become a Grandmaster out of nowhere? I didn't even know that he was a SealMaster, let alone a Grandmaster. What do I do now?'
Needless to say, the spies would learn of this as well. However, seeing how tense Konoha was, they didn't dare to send messages until things calmed down.
The search continued the entire evening, continued throughout the night and only ended around late in the afternoon the next day. Fujin was long done with his part, but he still needed to coordinate with the ninjas specializing in sensing and detection to ensure that there wasn't anyone hiding in the village.
While they couldn't find any culprits for obvious reasons, they did find a few spies who were hiding in the Konoha pretending to be civilians. It ensured that the Torture & Interrogation department in Konoha would have fun for a few days.
In the Hokage Office, there were several people including Fujin. Hiruzen and Shikaku were busy going through all the information gathered in case they noticed something others might have missed. The leaders of the sensing team were making reports as well. As for Fujin, he was just sitting on one side of the room, watching everyone work so hard to find the person sitting in that very room.
He looked at Hiruzen and Shikaku and thought, 'While Danzo might be the most tense one, seeing these two lazy fellows work their ass off is a decent benefit as well. Just look at their tired and exhausted expressions. Even under these circumstances, the two of them don't stop acting.'
Fujin couldn't help but admire the two of them. He thought, 'All this work can easily be done within a few minutes by spamming Shadow Clones. Both have more than enough chakra to do so. As for their intelligence, they are probably the smartest people I have met. There is no way either of them can't think of this.
Instead, they just don't do it. If they did it even once, others will ask why they don't do it every time. Once they begin doing it every time, everyone will see how much more free time they have. Then, they'll just pile more work on them. In essence, their workload will increase several times and the amount of time they they have to work will stay the same. No wonder they are this adamant about not using the Shadow Clone jutsu inside this building.
Now that I think about it, Tsunade probably did the same as well. She could use paperwork as a reason to be annoyed and shoo away anyone who'd come to trouble her needlessly. After all, who would want to mess with her when she is in a bad mood?
I need to learn from them as well. This time, the benefits were very high, so it's fine. Next time, I should avoid using Shadow Clones for such tasks. Though I can handle it, it'll be annoying if it gets requested too many times.'
The work in the office continued for another 3 hours. Fujin's job was just to map the locations hidden with seals. He was long done with it. Hiruzen just made him stay in case he noticed any discrepancy in the information reported by the sensors.
Once all the data was looked through, Shikaku sighed and muttered, "There are no traces at all. We didn't find any new base. The abandoned bases don't have any traces of someone staying there. Even scent isn't present. Whoever it was, they did a thorough job."
Only Fujin, Shikaku, Hiruzen and the Anbu Guards were still in the room. The rest had left. Hiruzen sighed as well and said, "Yeah, there is nothing. The job is too clean."
His expression became serious as he muttered, "The attacker was so thorough that it in itself is suspicious."
Shikaku agreed with Hiruzen's words but didn't voice his opinion. He thought, 'Looks like he is already suspecting someone.'
Needless to say, Hiruzen was suspecting Danzo. However, just like Danzo, he too could see some issues. He thought, 'It is likely that only someone like Danzo can do something like this. An enemy village or even Orochimaru doing any of this will leave some clues. But, with Danzo's expertise, it wouldn't have been an issue for him to plant some evidence to divert my attention elsewhere. Why didn't he do that?'
He couldn't think of a reason. Seeing the two of them in thought, Fujin yawned and said, "I haven't slept for nearly two days. Also, using that many clones is giving me plenty of headaches. I'll take my leave for now. Call me if you two need anything."
Hiruzen nodded and said, "Good work in the past couple of days. You can leave."
Fujin nodded and disappeared from the room. Meanwhile, Shikaku wondered, 'Was he really tired or was he taking clues from us? Such a troublesome youngster...'
Fujin returned to his house after flickering a few times. He activated his Space Time Sensing Technique and surprisingly, there was no one around keeping an eye on his house. He wondered, 'Did Danzo decide to not confront me? Or is he planning to attack in some other way? Oh well, I'll handle it when the time comes.'
While Fujin learnt from the two of them, he was indeed quite sleepy. He hadn't consumed any soldier pills this time. He quickly entered his house, cleaned up and fell asleep. While the village was quite tense, Fujin didn't have a reason to worry.
Unfortunately, his speculation wasn't correct. An hour after he fell asleep, 5 Root ninjas led by Torune began spying on his house. Since none of them used chakra or stared at the house for too long and they stayed quite a long distance away, the seals on his house didn't pick up anything. After all, Torune had tried spying on Fujin earlier. He knew how crazy his house was. All Root ninjas knew that the real spying would only be conducted when Fujin wasn't in his house.
Since he slept quite early, Fujin woke up early as well. It had only been 3 AM when he woke up. He stretched and was about to go freshen up when he activated his Space Time Sensing Technique out of habit. Suddenly, all the laziness disappeared as his eyes became serious.