Chapter 109: Takemi is Akatsuki's Archnemesis?

"Why is there still no news?" Konoha, Root's base. Danzo was quietly awaiting Orochimaru's reply. More than a week had passed since Orochimaru had agreed to his request. His money and supplies had already been transferred, and now he could only wait. He actually didn't want to transfer the money first, but after cooperating with Orochimaru for so long, this mode of cooperation had already been established. At least, there were results before that. "I hope nothing goes wrong." Danzo muttered to himself, but just then, he suddenly heard a furious roar. "Danzo, get out here!" This voice immediately made Danzo shiver. He was both familiar and unfamiliar with this voice. He knew it was his old friend's voice, but he hadn't seen his old friend so angry in a long time, had he? As he was thinking, he saw Sarutobi Hiruzen walk in with a grim expression. Several Anbu followed beside him, which immediately made his heart tremble. Was Root going to be surrounded again? "Hiruzen, what's wrong?" Although his heart was filled with suspicion, he remained calm and stood up to ask. "What's wrong?" Sarutobi Hiruzen felt dizzy at the thought of the report, and could only suppress his indignation and ask, "How much did you hide about what happened in the Land of Rain back then?" Hearing these words, Danzo's heart immediately flared up. Every time he thought about it, he felt terribly uncomfortable, and he didn't quite understand why Sarutobi Hiruzen was bringing it up again now. "What happened? Why are you suddenly asking about this?" Although he was angry, Danzo looked at Sarutobi Hiruzen's expression and immediately calmed down. "Jiraiya met Orochimaru." Sarutobi Hiruzen took a deep breath and said with a very solemn expression, "Orochimaru revealed some information. Some members of that mysterious organization were the targets you and Hanzo purged back then, so what exactly happened?" "..." Danzo's pupils widened at this moment. He hadn't expected Jiraiya to run into Orochimaru. Wasn't Jiraiya going to find Tsunade? What exactly happened in there? But no matter what happened, Danzo knew that this question was critical now. He had suspected that the person who destroyed his Root was a member of the Akatsuki, but the personnel didn't match. Danzo said with a gloomy face, feigning helplessness, "I don't know much about this. Hanzo invited me to wipe out a resistance organization back then and promised to give us support later." "For Konoha, I participated, but there was a big problem. Hanzo told me they had been completely eradicated!" "Eradicated?" Sarutobi Hiruzen's gaze remained fixed on Danzo. "If they were eradicated, would something like this still happen? And do you know who those people actually are?" Sarutobi Hiruzen really couldn't hold back now. Danzo hadn't told him any of this. Those people were actually Jiraiya's disciples, but Jiraiya had never told him at all. After the war, Jiraiya disappeared for several years. Both Orochimaru and Tsunade only said that Jiraiya went to relax. Who knew that these two actually conspired to deceive him, and it ended up like this. "Who are they?" Danzo looked at Sarutobi Hiruzen in confusion, but Sarutobi Hiruzen waved his hand and turned away directly. "Since things have come to this, I don't want to say more. I have only one request: you must contact Hanzo!" "Didn't you say it was for Konoha? I'm giving you the order now. I want to find out what happened to those people." "Where are they, and do they hate Konoha? If you can't even do this, I'm sorry, I can only let you resume your retirement life." After saying these words, Sarutobi Hiruzen suddenly felt much of the oppressed feeling in his chest dissipate. Just now, he really felt like the sky had fallen, and at that moment, he really wished he could just faint. But alas, he couldn't faint no matter what, so he could only deal with what he could first. "Is this venting?" Sarutobi Hiruzen felt a bit strange in his heart, but no matter what, he felt much better now, even if he was a little sorry for his old friend. And Danzo's heart was now half-cold. He opened his mouth to say something, but alas, Sarutobi Hiruzen turned and left, not giving him a chance to refute. Resume retirement life? Wasn't this basically killing him? "Orochimaru, that bastard!" Looking at the retreating figures of Sarutobi Hiruzen and his Anbu, Danzo couldn't help but curse inwardly. "And Hanzo, you're hiding so deep, could it be that you're really dead?" — — — "Hey, is there a mission?" Amegakure, inside the Akatsuki base. When the shadows appeared one by one, Hidan shouted. Kakuzu glared at Hidan from the side, but found it useless. Fortunately, Pain spoke at this moment, "This time there's an urgent mission in Sugi Village. Those who are free can participate." "Sugi Village?" Itachi frowned, and he asked in confusion, "Is something happening there?" Pain said coldly, "We've encountered some minor troubles, and the target personnel are in Sugi Village." Sweeping his gaze across everyone present, he said in a cold voice, "And those guys have been investigating us quite deeply recently, and you've even run into them quite a bit." "Run into them quite a bit?" Sasori raised an eyebrow, and suddenly he realized something. "Those Konoha guys? That kid named Takemi?" Takemi's name might not have spread throughout the Ninja World yet, but within the Akatsuki, everyone knew it. Itachi and Jūzō initially encountered him and suffered a great loss. Then Kisame was ambushed in the Land of Water, followed by Kakuzu and Hidan encountering him, and Kakuzu had several of his hearts destroyed. Finally, Sasori, during the Iwagakure mission, was beaten by Takemi, almost losing all his puppets, and his identity was likely exposed. Furthermore, his own body and the Third Kazekage's body were severely damaged by him, which almost cost him most of his combat power. The Iwagakure mission even led to Ōnoki's arrival, and Deidara was abducted to Konoha, which essentially made them lose Iwagakure as a major client. If Obito is also counted... These are all blood feuds! Sometimes they couldn't understand why their organization kept stumbling over this kid. But it also had to be said that this kid named Takemi was truly somewhat powerful. "That's right, Takemi is there, Kakashi Hatake is there, and even Jiraiya and Tsunade, they are all there." Pain nodded. This information was given to him by Obito, and he didn't think there was any problem with it. "They're all familiar faces, aren't they?" Kisame bared his teeth, Itachi seemed a bit silent, while Kakuzu and Sasori were full of resentment. But after a while, both of them shook their heads. Kakuzu said, "I haven't recovered yet, so I can't go." Sasori also said, "My puppets still need to be collected, so I can't act this time either." Hearing these two's words, Pain nodded, not surprised. He said, "In that case, you two stay, and Hidan, you stay as well and assist them with their recovery." "Tch, good, I'm too lazy to participate anyway." Hidan nodded indifferently. He hadn't run into Takemi much, but that damn 'Kappa' had left a deep impression on him. However, that guy wasn't there either, so he didn't care. "It seems it's just the two of us and the leader?" Kisame glanced at Itachi, then asked with a smile. "But the number of people doesn't seem to be enough, and we're still quite far from Sugi Village right now." Pain gently shook his head, and he said calmly, "It's fine, it's not just us." "Another guy will participate. They will send you there when the time comes."