In the cave, the leader of the bandits was currently receiving a report from his scouts who had just returned from their trip.
"Konoha's ninjas are protecting another caravan this week?" Daiki the leader thought about his next course of action, he naturally knew that as bandits they were strong to the weak and weak to the strong. Picking a fight against Konoha would be suicide, not to mention the bad feeling he had this morning, so he made a decision almost immediately.
"Toru, gather our supplies and weapons we will move out in a few minutes." Daiki stated with a serious expression, as he looked at his subordinate.
"…What about the others?" Toru said softly as he already knew the answer to his question.
Daiki sighed and replied, "Tell them that we are going to scout for a new hideout."
Toru glanced at the woman who was assigned to service Daiki and then glanced back to Daiki.
Daiki quietly walked behind her and just before he could silence her a massive explosion echoed from outside the cave.
"What's going on?!" Daiki quickly turned to Toru who seemed to be just as shook as himself.
Screams echoed through the hideout just as a hand shot out from beneath Daiki and grabbed onto his knees pulling him into the earth and leaving just his head exposed on the surface.
Inumaki popped out from the earth with Yoshimaru on his head.
Toru instinctively reached for a weapon, but before he could draw it Inumaki threw a shuriken at Toru that landed directly on his neck causing him clutch his neck in agony as he bled out, he then turned his attention to the woman who had almost been beheaded and knocked her out with a light hit to the neck.
He turned back to Daiki who was stuck in the ground and noticed the extreme fear in the man's eyes, "Please let me go, I will come clean just don't kill me."
Inumaki kicked his head like a ball, knocking out a few teeth and knocking him out. Though the mission asked to either capture or bring the body of the leader, he decided not kill him yet.
On the other side of the hideout Shinra and Hyori were cutting through enemies in a one-sided manner, Shinra drove his sword to the heart of one bandit before immediately pulling it out and slashing the head of another one. Hyori was calmly using her gentle fist to hit the enemy's weak points to kill them.
Seeing Inumaki and Yoshimaru come out from deep within the cave, Shinra and Hyori picked up the pace, since the leader was subdued they needed to finish their part of the fight.
Unfortunately Shinra couldn't use his explosive tags to finish the raid quickly since it might cause the cave to collapse on them.
The earlier explosion hadn't been set off within the cave, but was used to as a signal to distract the bandits and begin the raid by directly taking out the leader.
Seeing an enemy emerge from the boss's room the rest of the bandits tried to escape out of the cave, this caused them to be easy pickings for the team and in less than a minute dozens of bandits were killed.
Only three bandits managed to make it out of the hideout and just they ran up the stairs to the entrance of the cave, someone was waiting for them there.
'…How come this brat is here?' One of the bandits thought as the kid who had butchered most of the group had seemingly teleported right in front of them.
'Thankfully I am standing at the back, if he gets occupied by these two I can use the forest to hide and escape.' The bandit thought as the determination to survive burned heavily in his eyes.
Unfortunately for him, Shinra made a couple of hand seals in less than a second and pulled a kunai coated in lightning, he threw the kunai at the bandits who were rushing up, the lightning-coated kunai pierced through the first bandit's chest before continuing into the second. The third tried to dodge, but he wasn't fast enough and a part of his right torso was pierced.
Shinra's clone who was positioned at the entrance to prevent any bandits from escaping sighed and leaned towards the cave's entrance awaiting any other survivors.
Back inside the cave Shinra, Hyori and Inumaki surrounded Daiki who was planted in the ground. "Why do you think we were asked to bring him alive if we can or if he's dead we should bring his corpse back?" Hyori asked as she looked at the knocked out Daiki.
"Maybe he possess intel that is of the value to the village." Shinra replied as he dug the man out of the ground and tightened a rope around his body.
"Him?" Hyori couldn't possibly imagine what sort of valuable intel a bandit could possibly possess.
Daiki regained his consciousness to find himself tied and laid on the ground, he knew that trying to escape is highly unlikely so he had to make them let him willingly.
"How much was it?" Daiki said hoarsely.
The trio looked at the man who is missing most of his front teeth and remained silent.
"I asked how much are you getting paid for this mission? If you let me go I will double— no triple your mission reward." Daiki attempted to bribe them, he looked at to each of their eyes only to see that they weren't moved by his offer except for a single pair of blue eyes that gained a little more light.
The faint glimmer in Shinra's eyes immediately disappeared and a smile found its way to his face.
"Triple?" he repeated.
Daiki nodded his head frantically causing it to collide with the ground multiple times.
"Yes. Triple. More if necessary. Just please let me go."
Shinra crouched down in front of him.
"You seem to misunderstand something."
Hope appeared on Daiki's face.
"Then—"
"You're already captured."
Shinra pointed to the rest of the cave around them.
"Your men are dead."
Then he pointed toward the unconscious woman in the corner.
"Your hideout is gone."
Finally he pointed toward Daiki himself.
"And whatever money you planned to use to bribe us is probably somewhere in the vicinity."
Shinra naturally searched the entire cave for money and supplies but found nothing, since they can't feed thirty people without having a stash of supplies or cash hidden somewhere he concluded that only the leader would know of the location.
Daiki froze.
"…What?"
Shinra smiled again.
"So why should I accept triple the reward when I can collect the mission reward and your money?"
Silence filled the cave.
Hyori slowly turned her head toward Shinra. Inumaki stared at him for a few seconds, even Yoshimaru looked mildly disturbed.
Shinra didn't mind the looks and brought a kunai to Daiki's eyes, "So, are you going to tell me the location of the stash before or after I carve off your eyes?"
Daiki's eyes widened in fear so much that he didn't notice the liquid leaking out of his pants. Inumaki and Hyori created some distance between themselves and Daiki, Shinra looked down and noticed the wet ground around Daiki and chuckled. "Did you seriously wet yourself as a grown man? Don't worry I won't kill you I am not cold hearted after all."
Daiki's fear subsided a little, but Shinra's next words elevated them to an even higher level.
"*Sigh* these boots were very expensive to buy, only for you to ruin them by pissing on them… How do you feel about becoming a eunuch?"
Daiki squirmed on the ground and shouted, "NO, NO! the stash is hidden two kilometers west of here, there is a tree trunk which has the shape of a human face, beneath it is all the cash that I have gathered. Just please get away from me."
Shinra's entire demeanour shifted back to normal as he went to the entrance of the cave and asked his clone to locate and collect the stash hidden in the forest.
Inumaki glanced at Daiki and said, "Hyori carry the unconscious lady, I will carry him and we will meet back with Yogi-sensei."
Hyori nodded her head and carried the woman on her shoulder.
Inumaki moved around Daiki and dragged him out of the wet ground and carried him by his collar to avoid being touched by the wet spots.
On the other side of the forest Shinra's clone stood in front of a dug hole with wide eyes and smiled, "I didn't expect bandits to have so much money."