New Base

Shiki already knew Mount Shumisen was woefully undefended and that Hiruko considered secrecy to be his greatest protection until he was ready to execute his plans.

As such, he was severely lacking in terms of defensive forces with only his three subordinates along with their chimera servants to defend his small territory deep within the mountains at the core of the Shumisen region.

With such poor defenses and the extreme difference in power taken into consideration, Shiki's plan of attack could not be more simple.

Teleport in, kill Hiruko, ffer his three subordinates a chance to live in exchange for absolute servitude and deal with them if they did not accept.

Hiruko was calmly giving orders to his subordinate trio, giving them a list of targets for capture including kekkei genkai users and beast for use in experiments but, just as he was about to dismiss them, a cloaked figure flickered into existence in the large room.

The four immediately took up battle stances before Hiruko asked with suspicion once he saw who had just appeared in his domain.

"What does a fellow traitor of Konoha want here?"

"Ah. Even an old timer like you knows who I am. I must be getting quite famous." Shiki under the guise of the Reaper responded.

"Only only ask one more time. What do you want Reaper?" Hiruku repeated his previous question with a more ominous tone.

Shiki chuckled in response and then said in a tone far more chilling than Hiruko's.

"Your soul."

Shiki's Rinnegan activated and he flashed in front of Hiruku instantaneously and, with Ningendo's jutsu ripped his soul out, instantly killing him.

The three cronies jumped away in fear and looked on with shock and terror as their leader's body crumpled to the ground dead as dead can be.

"As for you three . . ." Shiki turned towards them.

"I'll give you a choice." He said and they all gulped.

"Become my slaves and live . . . Or suffer for your refusal." Shiki gave an ultimatum.

All three of them froze, wondering if they should take the offer or try to escape.

Ichi and San were twin brothers and far closer to each other than Nii the third member of their team and, in their glorious stupidity, decided to go against their attacker.

""We think neither!"" They said in tandem.

""Chimera no Jutsu!"" Both shouted and fused together summoning their beasts as well and turning into an enormous monstrosity.

Shiki let them, merely using both of his doujutsus to observe the transformation with interest.

"You only defeated Hiruko same with a surprise attack! Now that we are prepared, you will not be able to take us down!" The chimera spoke.

"One can always dream . . ." Shiki shook his head.

The chimera suddenly froze in place as countless cursed seals rapidly covered its body, immobilizing it and sealing its chakra.

"W-What did you do to us!?" It asked with outrage.

"I place cursed seals on you when I passed by to kill you now dead master." Shiki answered before sealing the chimera in a sealing pot and turning towards Nii.

"What about you?"

If she was being honest, she was of the same mind as her teammates, the only difference was that they moved faster than her, that is all. Now though, seeing her fate looked grim should she resist, Nii took the obvious move.

"I accept to serve you." She said as she collapsed with all of her strength drained.

"Excellent choice." Shiki commented and gave her an even harsher contract than the one Orochimaru and his ilk got when they joined.

In the end, all three were assigned to the R&D department so that their jutsu could be studied. Nii would be Orochimaru's assistant as Kabuto was already working as an independent researcher and Ichi along with San were reduced to living test subjects for the mad scientist's experiments.

As for Mount Shumisen, Shiki summoned numerous automata to start remodeling it, while he opened up an access point for the leyline underneath the main mountain, after which a large scale barrier with it as the powersource would be created.

In the spirit of don't fix what ain't broken a reproduction of the Desert Fortress would be made her but, with the less remote and hidden, well, less than the middle of a giant desert anyway, but a more defensible and rich in resources region, the scale of the facilities here would be larger.

The main fortress would be built in the style of the Desert Fortress but various other facilities and fortifications would be established in the mountain ranges surrounding it, making this place into an impregnable fortress.

Sooner or later, this location would be discovered by others after all the stuff is built in it will serve as the official headquarters of Mugetsu and Shiki was planning on having the core members base themselves here while the smaller and less strategically positioned Desert Fortress would assume the role of a backup HQ.

Meanwhile, AIon had received the directive to lend assistance to two criminal groups but making sure neither the groups themselves, nor anyone else figured out the assistance was coming from Mugetsu.

These groups were the reborn Land of the Sky under the command of an old man named Shinno and the group of followers of an ancient demon know as oryo, that were led by a man named Yomi.

The purpose of this act was no hasten the hatching of their plots so that they occur in the following year when Shiki does not have much to worry about and not smack down in the middle of shippuden's events like they would otherwise.

After Shiki was done with the tapping if the leyline and establishment of the main barrier, he felt confident in leaving the rest to the many automata and let Karin finish setting up the rest of the barriers much to her delight as beforehand, she had only received such duties for less important hideouts.

Now, he was thinking about paying Nagato a visit to have a "discussion" about his attack on Mugetsu's holdings.

At first Shiki was just intending on pushing him around a little and warning him to back off but now . . . He was wondering if he could turn him and deny the akatsuki one of their major sources of military might.

'It will be no easy task but I have no reason to not try and talk with him. With my genjutsu prowess, I can make him forget everything in case it goes badly . . .' He thought.

Shiki was of course presupposing Nagato would not be open to using a Soul Contract Tag with him from the get go.

There was also the fact that Nagato was one of the Akatsuki's original founders, regardless of how he organization turned out or what it became. As such, that might turn into another obstacle to making him see things Shiki's way.

'Hmm . . .' Shiki was pondering on which way to steer the conversation.

'Let's not invite him to join, at least not directly for now.' He decided.

'I'll just bombard him with truth after truth about various matters relating to him and try to make him see the error of his ways and then I'll decided on how to proceed based on his reaction.' SHiki concluded his musings.

Having sorted out his plans for the talks, Shiki moved towards Amegakure where Nagato resided. Mugetsu didn't actually have a presence there since Nagato had too tight a grip on the whole village, making the establishment of a base impossible.

The constant rain created by his sensory jutsu also made infiltration difficult since he kept it going almost all of the time and only stopped when he left the village or when he needed Konona to use her own jutsu for more precise tracking.

Shiki however, had his ways and although he could not move undetected in the village since the rain would pick up his signature, he could hover in the sky above it, beyond the clouds and use his White Eye of the Kagura to survey the entire village with detail and just teleport in from on Nagato.

'After all, the art of the dramatic entrance can let others know how powerful and awesome you are and thus lend credence to your words.' Shiki convinced himself he didn't just want to act cool.

'Okay, let's do this.'

And with those words, Shiki flashed towards Nagato's position where Konan was tending to him who was strapped to a hard to move machine all the time.

"Hello Pain, or should I say Nagato." Shiki greeted.

Instantly, Konan turned around battle ready while Nagato glared at Shiki with his Rinnegan.

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P.a.t.r.e.o.n is officially up!

The link is: https://www.p.a.t.r.e.o.n.com/lusoba without the extra dots of course.

You'll get to read up to FOUR week ahead, a full month, but I'll still post here.

There's also my other novel Archon of DanMachi, do check it out!

I would greatly appreciate any support since this is going to be my breadwinner.