"Sometimes, the sea doesn't roar. It just... takes."
The Land of Waves awoke beneath a muted sky, its coastal breeze crisp but quiet. Morning fog clung stubbornly to the trees and rooftops, ghosting over clay tiles and thickening like breath on glass. Yet the village stirred with routine energy, clattering pans, shouting merchants, sleepy fishermen hauling nets out to dry.
Hajime stepped out from his modest hut with a scroll tucked in his satchel and a few coins in his pouch. He wore his usual loose robe and a calm, thoughtful expression. To any passerby, he looked the part of the village's friendly scribe, maybe a little odd, maybe too quiet, but liked enough.
The market greeted him with the usual flurry of smells and sound: grilled rice balls, stewed seaweed, the sizzle of battered octopus over flat iron. Children darted through the stalls, adults bartered in half-shouts, and sails rippled down by the docks.
But Hajime wasn't strolling today. He was listening.
Two fishermen near a vegetable cart muttered about the main port shifting owners soon.
"Some shipping company," one said, lowering his voice. "Real money behind it. Bought out a warehouse last week."
The other man shook his head. "Land of Fire money. Means shinobi, maybe."
Hajime didn't react outwardly. But inside, a cold coil tightened.
Gato.
That night's rumors had haunted him, and now they were solidifying. A creeping influence was seeding itself through the island, and few seemed to notice. Hajime moved on, helping an old woman pen a letter to her nephew across the sea. He smiled. Thanked her for the food.
But as he passed the old, unused northern dock later that day, his expression darkened.
It was supposed to be abandoned, cracked ropes, weathered posts, the smell of damp mold clinging to everything. Yet today, he saw fresh footprints in the sand, several sets, overlapping. And among them, one smaller, lighter…
A child's sandal lay half-buried by the piling. Next to it, the edge of a torn ribbon.
Hajime knelt and examined the patterns.
Three adults, at least. Possibly four. Small feet. Struggled. Carried away.
He didn't move for a while, staring out across the black-glass ocean. Even the gulls had gone quiet.
---
By evening, the market was different.
Villagers weren't shouting, they were whispering.
A mother cried by the well, her voice cracked with panic. The headwoman stood nearby, organizing volunteers to search the forest paths and coastline.
"Koji's missing," someone said. "Last was seen near the market."
Hajime froze.
Then another voice added
"…not just Koji. Three from the west side, too. And the Minato twins… that's six children."
"No, it's more," someone else whispered. "At least a dozen now."
No storms. No accidents. Just vanished.
Hajime turned and walked away quickly, heart pounding.
---
By nightfall, he was deep beneath the earth again.
His base, lit by chakra lanterns and carved with months of carem felt colder than usual. The training pillars, the Rasengan marks scorched on the stone, the silent sealed scrolls, and written plans, they were all echoes of preparation.
But now, it was time to act.
He sat heavily at his table, unrolling the scrolls he had written days ago. His notes on chakra, on politics, on Konoha infiltration. They all seemed distant now.
"I was thinking too far ahead. Plans can't keep with the changes. "
He stared at a new parchment. Dots of ink bled into the fibers as he slowly wrote out a new name.
---
Target: Gato
Known Role: Head of Gato Company
Base of Operation: Port warehouses, likely recently acquired
Likely Motive: Human trafficking, ransom, coercion
Pattern: Children vanish near shorelines, old docks
Estimated Timeframe: Active within past 1–2 weeks
Number Taken: 12 confirmed, more suspected
---
He dropped the brush and pressed both hands against his temples.
*Should I move now? Should I fight?*
But doubt gnawed at him.
Zabuza.
There was still no sign. No massive blade-wielding stranger. No corpses fished from the sea. Could Gato really have hired him yet? Maybe not. Maybe Hajime still had time.
He whispered aloud, to the stone around him.
"If Zabuza was here… I'd have seen it by now. Or felt it."
He hoped he was right.
Because if the Demon of the Mist was already stalking this island, then this wasn't a mission, it was a suicide.
---
He stood, gripping the wall for a moment.
Then walked to the sealed storage chamber. Within were few weapons, mostly experimental: kunai with seal tags, shuriken sharpened by chakra shaping, a spool of chakra wire.
He took what he could carry, rolled up the combat scrolls, and set them beside his coat.
"I won't let them vanish."
He looked down the dark tunnel leading to his outer exit—a sealed vertical shaft he could open and close with a thought.
"Not the kids. Not Koji."
---
Outside, under a starless sky, a merchant was meeting a cloaked man by the dock.
A bag of coin changed hands. A low voice asked, "When's the next pickup?"
The merchant glanced toward the sea, then whispered:
"Tomorrow night. They'll be ready. Just keep the blade hidden. Gato says not yet."
The cloaked man grunted and vanished into the mist.
Far beyond, deep beneath the trees, Hajime was already on the move.
And this time, his not training his making preparations, for days he's been preparing.
---
End of Chapter 9