Taking the kunai in his hands, Kazuo felt his heartbeat race.

'Ah, thank god my efforts paid off.' Kazuo thought as he gave a ninety-degree bow to Minato.

"Thank you so much sir, I'll treasure it with my life," Kazuo said before straightening himself up.

Minato looked at him for a moment before patting his shoulder.

"If you're ever in danger of losing your life just throw this kunai and send some chakra to the handle and I'll try my best to come as fast as possible and save you," Minato said with a smile before leaving the tent.

As he went, Kazuo's thoughts immediately took a turn.

The last words Minato had said to him.

'Why the hell would he offer something like that to me? Suspicious, suspicious as fuck' Kazuo thought before taking the three-pronged kunai and tying it to his ninja bag.

Turning toward the commander, Kazuo nodded before walking to his chair and sitting down.

Hours passed with Shikaru doing nothing besides completing papers and looking at a map.

In the afternoon, six shinobi came inside the tent.

Just from the air around them alone, Kazuo could guess that they were in a high position, most likely the captains of the different shinobi divisions.

"Come here, I'll be explaining our attack plan for tomorrow," Shikaru said as he pointed at a map, causing all six shinobi to nod and head closer.

Kazuo curiously stood up as well and went ahead to stand next to the commander.

'If im being used by you then it's only right that I do the same isn't it' Kazuo thought as he took his position.

By standing next to the commander, he was increasing his already good standing in the camp after the last battle even higher, though the danger would of course increase in proportion as well.

If before Kazuo hadn't have been a target for the cloud ninjas then now he would most likely be, after all, he had been turned into a hero of the camp, someone who brought the camp's morale up.

Shikaru gave him a glance before returning his sight to the map, the edges of his lips slightly raised.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

"We are here as you all know," The commander said as he pointed at a small clearing in the map, it was surrounded by forest, and further northeast stood a mountain range with a small clearing in the middle that allowed passage, on the other side of the clearing Kazuo could see what was marked as the Cloud ninjas base.

"Tomorrow will be a full-blown war right in the middle of this passage from what I could predict, and so 90% of the camp combat forces will be going over there to fight, what I want is for one squadron to team up with the Anbu and set up explosives on the other side of this canyon-like passage," Shikaru said as he pointed at the entrance of the passage from the side of the cloud.

If we manage to do this and detonate them successfully then I predict a loss of about thirty percent of the cloud ninja forces." Shikaru said before pointing at a location next to the passage.

"That however will only be the start, the entire force will be hidden here at this spot and will wait for the explosions, as soon as the cloud ninjas retreat back then we will attack however that is not all. I will send our best anbu squad to directly attack their camp and eradicate any medical ninja they do have, lowering their chances of survival even further." Shikaru said as a smile overtook his expression.

'Crazy bastard' Kazuo thought before a smile took over his expression as well, matching Shikarus.

'I like it. Actually can't I use this to increase my standing even further?' Kazuo thought for a moment as a plan started forming in my head.

'On the first turn, I'll see how the tides turn, if we win the battle overwhelmingly then I can simply let it pass however if we take any damages because of miscalculations then I could simply kill myself and make it seem as if I thought of the possibility that the specific danger could exist, thus increasing my standing in the camp if what I said was correct. I don't need to be as smart as you Shikaru, I'll simply smash my way through to victory, no matter how many turns it takes.' Kazuo thought inwardly, however despite his joy he didn't change how he acted outwardly, appearing as though he was a calm lake, simply there to observe and to learn from his commander.

"All right Shikaru, we'll follow your orders, you have never failed us after all" A man with white eyes and long black hair wearing a black headband that he had tied to his forehead said.

Kazuo turned to face the man, quickly identifying him.

'A hyuga of the branch family most likely since he is covering his forehead.'

Next a boisterous laugh erupted from the next captain.

It was a woman with short spiky brown hair and two red fangs painted on her cheeks, her irises and pupils were thin almost looking like a cat instead of those a human would have.

'Inuzuka.'

The other four shinobi nodded their heads, they didn't have any discernable traits that Kazuo could match with the famous clans of the hidden leaf village.

'They're either civilian birth ninja or they're from some small unknown clan.' Kazuo thought turning his head to face Shikaru once more who nodded at the Captains and dismissed them.

Shikaru turned to Kazuo and motioned with his hand, clearly dismissing him as well.

"There's nothing else to learn today, you can go back."

Kazuo nodded his head politely and turned around, leaving the commander's tent and heading straight to the training grounds once more.

He had to increase his level of tree walking and quickly at that, it would be very useful in a place like a canyon and not being able to have full precision and mastery over it in such a place would be a massive decrease in potential combat power.

_____________________________________________________________________________