Naruto : Chapter 96

Haku just finished his part of the report to Gai while Gai's team listened in. Naruto had done his part first and now they finished the rest of the report.

"Well, that was a very youthful information gathering, Haku and Naruto," 'Gai declared.

"What are we going to do now, Gai sensei?" Lee wanted to know.

"If we want to act, we should first find out what the captives that Haku and Naruto brought with them know, but I'm not that good at interrogation," Gai frowned.

"I can take care of that with Neji's help," Naruto spoke up.

"I'm no specialist in that area, but I know all the techniques one can use for it. And with his byakugan he would be perfectly suited to spot if a prisoner lies to me, not to mention that his abilities with the gentle fist can be used to disable certain nerve clusters to make the prisoner talk more easily."

"That's true and I was taught how to do exactly that by Hiashi Sama after the finals of the chunin exams," Neji spoke up, "He called it something that any Hyuga that goes on missions of C-rank and above regularly needs to be capable of to ensure mission success."

Naruto nodded.

"I'll also have two clones draw maps of the fortress so that you can work with Haku on plans to enter it for a direct attack against Doto," Naruto told Gai.

"Very good, Naruto. Your flames of youth burn brightly!" Gai declared.

Naruto didn't comment, but took Neji to a distant room where they could start interrogating their captives. It wouldn't do to have Haku or Lee watch what exactly they would do.

Both didn't like violence, even if Haku was less naïve that ninjas often had to use it. Naruto hoped that the drugs he had available would be enough to get the answers that he needed. Otherwise this would become nasty.

...

It took eight hours for Neji and Naruto to finish questioning their prisoners. The rest of the team had worked on the plans for attacking Doto. But it wouldn't be easy. While Haku and Naruto had managed to infiltrate the fortress, it would be much harder to do so with a whole team, in which most of them weren't specialised in infiltration.

Not to mention that the security around Doto himself was much harder to crack than the overall one of the fortress. Otherwise Naruto and Haku would have acted while they were there.

But Doto's personal guards were specially selected men that used codes and other methods of identification to assure that no assassin could get close to Doto. They were also a good bit above the level of the normal guards there. Especially Nadare would pose a problem. He was a high-level jonin and had shown that he shouldn't be underestimated in his fight against Gai.

When Naruto and Neji returned to the group, the prisoners were sealed in the prisoner scrolls again, in worse state than before, Gai asked them what they had found out.

"Most of the ones that were caught didn't know a lot about the security around Doto. They are the ones that keep the low and middle areas of security watched. The group leaders mostly supplied us with the normal procedures of the guards, which are basic ones that we learned of in the academy, and some specifics about one or two areas they knew about.

There is a secret passage from the basement to the laboratory that is only known to the guard force leaders, which is mostly used to get secret supplies to the scientists without the majority of the workers there having a clue.

It is secured with a number code, but I suspect that the one we got will be changed soon, after all, the break in was noticed," Neji stated and Haku and Naruto nodded, agreeing with that assessment.

"More interesting was one man that was degraded after messing up. He had once been part of the outer guard around Doto and he told us that the guards change passwords every two days and that the inner guards have a tattoo on them that identifies them as such. The tattoo is a white circle with a red, four-pointed star on the inner side of the left underarm.

To enter the throne room you have to give the password and have the tattoo inspected by an expert. Any fake is detected. Even transformation jutsu doesn't work for a reason. I guess they use a special kind of ink for the tattoos," Neji continued.

"The outer guards are the first line of defence if an attacker gets past the normal guards of the fortress. Most of them are ninjas of chunin rank from Snow Country's ninja village.

They rotate every week. The inner guard are mostly jonin with Nadare as their leader," Naruto now said, "Getting into the building isn't the problem. I left some of my flying thundergod seals in there in about ten places. I can take one of you with a clone each to get us in, but from there the problems start.

While we don't have to worry about too many opponents with the chakra armour for now, the ones that we didn't hit with the explosive tags are still a concern. And I bet that they had a good number of other storage facilities that they are now contacting for replacements."

"Why did you blow the stock up then?" Tenten asked.

"Distraction. My intention wasn't simply taking the armour out of the equation, I wanted to make them split up their already decreased forces. Doto knows that Princess Koyuki is back and he wants her for some reason. We didn't find out what reason that was exactly, but rumours went around about some royal treasure. No idea if that information is reliable.

If Doto had all of his forces available with chakra armour directly at the base, he would have much more options to act against us and kidnap the princess. Now he has to work around the false death state that Haku put his guards into and, without a medic, you need two weeks to fully recover from that. With a medic you need a week.

"As far advanced as their technology is, I bet that we have at most a week to use the loss of manpower. And the machines that they have built, are difficult to overcome. I know that they have something called a train that they equipped with kunai and shuriken launchers. They are capable of launching a thousand kunai at their opponents with a simple shot.

It doesn't have the accuracy a ninja would have, but honestly, you would need a defence like Neji's rotation to protect yourself and others from that onslaught. And very few ninjas have such good defensive jutsus," Naruto pointed out.

The others nodded. They knew that it was true.

"What do we do about the security of the Princess?" Haku asked.

"I think we should leave her in yours and Neji's care. You have your Ice release, which gives you an immense advantage and Neji can see any attacker from afar. Not to mention that he knows rotation in case they decide on a long-distance attack with kunai, like Naruto described," Gai pondered.

"Lee, Tenten and I are best suited to go against the ones using the armour and I think Naruto could succeed getting close to Doto. He has the ability to get close to him if he can get a flying thundergod seal onto one of Doto's guards or a place where Doto will appear for sure."

"That would be a possibility, but contrary to my Dad, I haven't mastered the ability to simply attach the seal onto a person just by physical contact yet. I need to place a seal tag somewhere or use one of my special kunai," Naruto admitted.

"It could still work," Tenten spoke up, "You would only need to have a good enough distraction. For example we could place a seal tag like that on one of our prisoners and let him be taken back.

They wouldn't know to look out for it, instead they would interrogate the one we let escape. Doto will probably want to hear the report of the escapee in person and then you could strike."

"That could work. And the ones we interrogated have no idea how Neji and I look like, as we kept them blindfolded. They wouldn't know that there was a possibility to be confronted with that jutsu.

I'm the only one who knows it after all and while I gained a reputation, it would be improbable that I was recognised during the fight on the iceberg by Nadare. He was after all busy with Gai," Naruto agreed.

"I think it is worth a try," Gai nodded.

Over the next hour they worked out the details of the plan.

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