_________ POV Narration _________

The months rolled by once more.

And they were quite eventful at that. The Noble Families leading the world had yet to respond or retaliate in any way against the Three Corners Alliance. but at least the war was over.

Their agreement had come a bit too easily, and Ken was already preparing for his next steps.

But he was in no hurry now. He wanted the peace to last, and the balance he had created, although sturdy, was also fragile in a sense.

One wrong move from either side and the world would descend into chaos. There would be no winners.

The Blind Monster didn't care about winning, he only really wanted the best for the Brotherhood at that point.

He needed to give them more time to grow. Even more, now that the brotherhood had grown.

Yes indeed, recruitment started as soon as the New Compound was built. They had more space and more houses.

The Land of Iron was more than happy to chime in and help them expand. And before Ken even realized it, their compound was already twice as big as before.

The Leader's office this time was built into the side of the mountain that they used for training, overlooking the entire compound.

At this point, it was fair to call it a small hidden village. It was only lacking in population...

So Tosho got to work, reaching out to his usual channels to look into recruiting more children to join.

Whether they were teens or pre-teens, it didn't matter anymore. Ken wanted the brotherhood to grow, and as long as their recruits were willing to become stronger and join their family, they weren't going to be turned away.

Spies did try infiltrating the Brotherhood, but they were at best Chunin from other villages. Ken could very easily sniff them out. And by that point, Saburo and Tosho likely could as well.

Akira definitely knew. But he didn't feel the need to do anything since Ken was still the best high-end security system ever.

In the end, the brotherhood started growing, and fast. In under two months, their Brotherhood had expanded to around 200 members. And that was without counting Saburo's clone army in the equation.

The recruitment was much easier on Tosho as he had gotten some help from their allied nations.

With their help, he was able to cover a much wider area in his recruitment. And with the war that had just wrapped up, it wasn't that difficult to find more and more War Orphans and potential candidates.

Now, neither Ken nor his Blades were sure that all of the new members would remain by the end of the year.

Not everyone in the current batch of children was going to be as motivated as the last one. There was also the issue of integrating them into their community.

But that was solved easily as the children remaining from the first batch of recruits were more than welcoming.

There was also the obvious fact that they all came from very similar backgrounds, which helped them relate to one another and get along much easier.

Of course, there were the usual suspects who preferred to be quiet and closed off in their shells. But they were sure to open up one day with the right guidance.

It was going to take time, but Ken remained confident that everything would end up well.

Other than that, the Information Guild had already gathered the necessary assets to create a 'Bloodline Dictionary'.

It took a lot longer than initially expected. The closer they thought they were to the end, the more obscure clans they managed to find.

The Blind Monster didn't mind the extra wait, he very much appreciated their efforts.

After receiving their reports and scrolls, Ken handed everything over to Saburo, alongside a sample of his own DNA, and told the mad scientist to get to work.

He had yet to hear results regarding that, but it had only really been a few weeks since that had happened, so it was to be expected.

For now, there was not much else for the Blind Swordsman to do besides actually sleep for once.

And it was a long sleep. Without even realizing it he had managed to sleep for 2 days straight.

Ken yawned as he slowly dragged himself out of bed.

It had been quite a while since he had slept, and for some reason, he woke up feeling more tired than when he had gone to sleep.

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It was as if his body was begging him for more, but that was only the case for a few seconds. Ken breathed and felt more and more natural energy rush into his body, giving him his usual high.

His body was already more than accustomed to it. His muscle fibres had already been strengthened beyond any human limitations.

His mind was also different. Ken had already asked Saburo for a medical examination, and it was obvious from the scans that his brain was not the brain of a regular human.

It had deformed in some way, seemingly more deformed. But his thought process didn't seem to be affected.

Saburo had stated that any normal human would've either been dead or brain-dead if their brains were to be deformed in that way.

But to Ken hearing such phrases had already become natural.

At some point, he had realized it, but he was no longer a human. He had embraced his new form and body without any hesitation at first, but now that the Brotherhood was recruiting more and more children for him to look after, he was starting to worry.

After all, there was always the chance that he would also lose his touch with humanity, just as his body was.

How would he go about guiding others to being better humans when he himself was becoming less and less of a human each day?

Ironically, at some point, the Blind Monster realized that his worries were rather moot.

He had yet to fully realize it at that point, but his progression in his current life was mirroring that of his previous.

That meant that, while his body was becoming monstrous, his mind was regaining its humanity gradually.

He found in himself a level of empathy that he certainly didn't have in the past. He was still developing, sure, but the progress he had made already spoke for itself.

He now had friends, family, and people he cherished... But despite all of that, he was still more of a monster than a human.

In his past life, it was quite the opposite.

He was human, skilled, but human. He couldn't fly, he couldn't grow scales or regrow arms. He was a mere human.

But his mind had turned into that of a monster as he fully let go of any morals he may have had to pursue his 'passion'.

He cared for no one, had no relations with anyone, and even looked down on others for forming such connections.

It was odd how both of his lives seemed to unfold in such a similar, yet fundamentally different fashion.

In the end, the Blind Monster could only really go with the flow. He would continue to explore his own progress as he led the children towards not what was right, but what he considered right.

His views could change one day, and when they did he would look into changing the mindsets of the children as well.

But for now, he had no reason to worry about any of them being too misguided anyway.

The new recruits were still adjusting to their new lives, and they had barely even started training. And the old recruits were all mostly in their teens by now.

Those that weren't still progressed quite a lot mentally, maturing a lot faster due to their environment and past.

Their development was important to Ken, which was why he planned to do something he wouldn't have considered in the past...

A joint examination of sorts.

He had already contacted his allies regarding it as well.

The Chunin Exams.

They were, for regular shinobi, an examination that allowed Genin to go ahead into the next rank.

The Exams were swiftly approaching, and plenty of genin from all age groups were looking to join them.

The Shinobi part of the Three Corners Alliance already planned to hold their Chunin Exams together, so it wasn't all that difficult for the Dark Brotherhood to join in.

He was prompted to select three teams of three that he'd be willing to send over to participate.

It was tough to pick and choose which teams would get to participate... So Ken decided to allow the children themselves to choose.

That was the best and least discriminatory way to go about things.

In the end, after quite a lot of back and forth.

The children came up with three teams, all having one figurehead.

One team was led by Tatsukio, who was the obvious winner of the Chinin Exams already in Ken's lack of eyes.

The other team was led by Morita, a strong contender as well, and his teammates were also plenty skilled.

Yue was also the leader of a team, although Ken was slightly worried about her going over and killing too many people and souring relations.

But Ume was also in her team, and she was a lot kinder, so Ken was sure things would somehow balance themselves out.

The Brotherhood's internal tournament was going to have to wait for now. But Ken was already looking forward to the performance of the children.

He decided to also give out some rewards for the participants, all based on performance, of course.

But Ken did 'let it slip' that the top spots would receive special attention from him, and that the number 1 contender was going to receive one of the 7 Swords that had formerly belonged to the Mist.

The Chunin exams were only a month or two away, but the teams were already preparing for thier departure, aiming to train on the way there.

Ken was of course not going to go with them. He was set to meet them there when the time was right.

He trusted them enough to allow them to travel alone through the surrounding Lands.

They all donned coats above their usual black training clothes. They put on white masks as was customary, and they also decided to wear some straw hats.

Ken chuckled a bit as he realized that the children looked a lot like Saburo's clones now, just smaller.

He did go to the gates of the compound to 'see' them off with a smile on his face.

"Take care of yourselves, remember to stay hydrated..." Ken said as he slowly studied each child with his enhanced senses.

"Yeah yeah, we know~" Yue slowly stretched as she spoke in a bored tone, her voice slightly altered by her mask.

Tatsukio gave her a dirty look, before turning his head towards Ken and smiling warmly underneath his mask.

"We appreciate the concern, sir... Thank you for trusting us enough to let us go al-"

"No need to thank me. If I managed to trust you to fight in a large-scale war, then I can trust you with this much." Ken crossed his arms and chuckled a bit as he waved towards them.

Morita didn't speak much, he merely sighed and bowed towards Ken, silently thanking him for the opportunity as well.

"Father, how much should we hold back again?" Ume, the littlest of the group, raised her hand as if she was in a classroom.

"As much as you want to really. Just don't kill anyone."

"Lame~" Yue seemed the only one disappointed by Ken's orders.

"Deal with it." But the Blind Monster wasn't going to just bend the rules for her.

Yue humphed for a second and seemed to want to talk a bit more, but Tatsukio hopped over to her and gave her a karate chop across the head.

"I'm sure she'll behave, sir. Please make sure our new siblings feel welcome in the meantime!"

"Of course I will... Now then, off you go." Ken waved them off one last time before they all nodded and turned to leave.

The one-legged assassin slowly started hopping away with the rest of the group as well, ignoring the frustrated profanities of Yue, who was behaving in a very unladylike manner.

Ken sighed as he felt them leave, their morale as high as could be.

'I wonder when they realize... That the Exams began the moment they stepped out of the compound..'