Chapter 73: 73: Returning to Konoha

"WHAT?! Why is Zabuza here?!"

After Sasuke woke up,as soon as he saw Zabuza he started getting angry.

"Calm down, Sasuke. He became our ally. His previous employer had an ... accident, so Zabuza no longer cares about the bridge."

Sasuke immediately glared at Kakashi.

"Is this true? Weren't you two fighting each other to the death? Is this really fine?"

Kakashi, however, only shrugged his shoulders.

"It's not like we have a grudge against each other. Zabuza was hired to kill Tazuna and I was hired to protect him. Now that he no longer wants to kill Tazuna, there is no longer a need to fight. It is that simple."

Although Zabuza didn't say anything, he nodded his head in agreement. This was what the life of a shinobi was like. No eternal enemies and no eternal allies either. In most cases, it was like that.

"Fine, and what about that woman over there."

This time, he looked at Haku who was sitting a bit further away from the group and was currently talking animatedly with Yuna about something. Sasuke found it weird that he couldn't hear their voices at all despite them being rather close, but he didn't pay much attention to it.

"That is Haku, I guess he can be considered part of Zabuza's group, so he is in same circumstances."

"He?"

"Haku said he is male, after all."

"WHAT!?"

This seemed to surprise Sasuke even more than the fact that Zabuza was here. His eyes kept shifting repeatedly from Haku to Kakashi and then back to Haku again.

Kakashi chuckled a little when he saw Sasuke's confusion but decided that he wouldn't say more than that. He, himself, had some doubt about Haku's gender but he wouldn't bother digging any deeper. It wasn't his business after all.

A few moments later, the door opened and Naruto, Tazuna, and Sakura walked in. While Naruto and Tazuna seemed to be completely fine, Sakura seemed to be totally exhausted and barely able to stand.

"Yo, we are back."

Kakashi scanned the group and noticed Sakura's condition.

"Welcome back. What happened? Were you attacked?"

Naruto shrugged his shoulders.

"Yeah, but they were just a bunch of small fry. I guess they were the remains of Gatou's group. I let Sakura fight most of them."

Sasuke almost made a spit take when he heard that Sakura was the one that actually did the fighting.

'What the hell happened while I was unconscious? Sakura fought someone and even won?'

Kakashi noticed Sasuke's bewilderment but didn't say anything about it.

"Good job, Sakura. You should rest now."

Sakura smiled happily, nodded her head, and then went upstairs.

"How much longer do you think you need to finish the bridge, Tazuna-san?"

Tazuna thought for a moment and then gave his answer.

"I guess I'll need around another week."

Kakashi nodded his head and then prepared the protection schedule for the next week. He couldn't wait to finally get this mission over with. There were simply too many surprises for a single mission.

Another week passed without any significant incident happening and it was finally time for the two Konoha teams and Haku to return home. Yuna had already told Zabuza to stay here and protect Tazuna. At first, he was vehemently against letting Haku go alone, but during the last week Haku became friends with Naruto and Yuna, so Zabuza concluded that it wouldn't be bad to let Haku stay with some people that were at least similar in age for a while.

"You better take good care of Haku. If you don't, I will come and hunt you down no matter where you are."

Seeing how Zabuza was acting like an overprotective parent, Yuna could only shake her head and smile wryly.

'Wasn't he acting all high and mighty previously? Saying stuff like "Haku is my weapon". Seems like all of that was bullshit.'

Yuna smirked at Zabuza and answered him.

"Hehe, I will take good care of your so-called "weapon"."

This caused Zabuza to glare at Yuna even harder, but he didn't say more than that.

After saying their farewell to Tazuna and most of the villagers, the group started to make their way back to Konoha. Now, that they didn't have to travel at a civilian's pace, they would make the trip much faster than during their trip into the Land of Waves.

"Tazuna, what do you think the bridge should be called?"

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"Hehe, what about the Great Tazuna Bridge."

The people around him all glared at him which caused him to cough awkwardly.

"Hehe, I was just kidding. How about the Great Konoha Bridge, since it is our connection to the Land of Fire and Konoha's shinobi were the ones to make it possible."

"Ohh, that one is pretty good!"

"I agree, Let's go with this."

While everyone was agreeing to the name, they didn't notice a young boy, Inari, standing inside the crowd while clutching a scroll used for store information. It appeared on his nightstand when he woke up this morning and contained a training schedule that was adjusted to his current age. A small note was attached to it that simply read: "What path will you choose?".

Determination appeared in Inari's eyes.

'I want to become stronger. I want to protect my family with my own hands. I will not falter. I will show it to you, Yuna. I will show you that I can become one of the strong as well.'

The tragic tale of the shunned heroes, Zabuza and Haku.

The duo fought and did everything they could for the betterment of the country, but instead of praise, it earned them only scorn. The higher-ups shunned them for their efforts. They did everything to sully the heroes' good names and finally managed to banish them out of the country.

They traveled the world to see where they could help, but unfortunately, they were tricked by the unscrupulous merchant Gatou, who forced them to work for him by insidious means.

Luckily, a few shinobi from Konoha noticed the injustice that was done to them and cooperated with Zabuza and Haku to defeat the evil merchant Gatou and free the land of Wave from his oppression.

Zabuza decided to stay behind to make up for all the bad he had done while Haku decided to travel together with the Konoha's shinobi to compensate them for their help.

After Hiruzen finished reading the report, his whole face was constantly twitching. Although that wasn't what was actually written in the report, that was pretty much what you'd get when you read between the lines. The report itself was written without a flaw. If he wasn't rather close to getting an aneurysm, he would probably even praise Yuna for how she could write a formal report but give the whole thing a subtle subtext like this. Less experienced people probably wouldn't even notice it and would simply think of Zabuza and Haku in a positive light without even understanding why.

Hiruzen took a deep breath to calm his nerves and then glared at Kakashi. Kakashi, however, seemed to be completely absentminded. He was constantly mumbling something about finally getting his hands on his precious.

Next, Hiruzen glared at Anko, however, she only gave him a bright smile in return.

Seeing his first two targets not showing any reaction, he instead decided to glare at Yuna. She chuckled a little and then turned towards Anko.

"It seems like the old man wants to talk about the report I have written, how about you leave first and I catch up to you guys later."

Hiruzen raised his eyebrows at that.

'What is she planning this time? I guess she wants to discuss something in private. I am getting a really bad feeling about this.'

Since Hiruzen understood what Yuna meant, he quickly dismissed everyone except for Yuna. After everyone was out of the room, Hiruzen's glare got even more intense. Yuna, however, only smiled lightly and didn't make any other reaction.

"What's wrong, old man? I don't think there are any problems with my report, are there?"

"You know exactly what kind of problem I have with that report."

"Hehe, I wonder? How about we make a little deal?"

Hiruzen, immediately, raised his guard even further.

"Haha, no need to be this on guard against me. It's just that we managed to develop a new seal recently, but since production isn't easy, we didn't plan on selling it for now. Maybe you are interested in buying a few?"

This actually DID get Hiruzen interested. If it was something that could help Konoha as a whole, he didn't mind overlooking a single suspicious report. If the one who wanted to enter Konoha was Zabuza, things might be different, but Haku wasn't wanted like Zabuza, so things were less complicated.

"Alright, you got me interested. If it is something good, I don't mind overlooking this."

"Hehe, I knew we could talk this out."

Moments later there was a knock on the door and another Yuna walked in while holding a huge scroll.

"This is it. This a storage scroll that can hold enough food to feed an army for a month."

Although Hiruzen won't deny that this is pretty useful, there currently was no need for something like that. He was just about to deny Yuna's offer when a smirk appeared on her face and she started talking again.

"Additionally, the stored food will be put into stasis while inside the scroll. That means that the food will be kept fresh no matter how long it stays inside. Within reason of course."

This time, Hiruzen's eyes widened a little.

'I see. That means I could already start storing excess food Konoha produces and store it in case of an emergency. No, wait, even more important...'

Yuna smirked when he saw that Hiruzen understood what it meant to have something like this.

"That's right, shinobi can actually eat fresh or even cooked food with this scroll. This will be a significant help in keeping the morale up during long drawn-out battles."

Hiruzen's face became solemn and he nodded his head.

"I agree to your offer. Let's talk about the quantity and the price."

"Haha, of course."

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