CH_11.1 (404)

Takuma, like most people, had highs and lows in his life, but it had been so long since he had experienced a high period since starting his second life that he had come to cherish the "flatline" moments of normalcy.

The past few months had been the best flatline periods of his second life.

He walked to the front of the room and placed his notes on the podium before turning to face two dozen ANBU operatives with just as many staff intermixed in the room. Addressing fifty or so people in a room was always nerve-wracking. He had given college presentations to larger classes, but in those situations, he felt that only the professor mattered, and most of the students weren't listening, and none asked questions afterwards. Here, every single person in the room was locked in on him.

Of course, it didn't help that there were two captains in the audience.

He glanced at Uchiha Itachi, a.k.a. Weasel, sitting in the front, and Hatake Kakashi, a.k.a. Fox, sitting in the middle of the group, both waiting for him to begin. Itachi had taken charge of the anti-ROOT initiative and had roped in Kakashi as the secondary captain required for a joint multi-unit operation. It wasn't surprising that they had decided to work together because Itachi had started under Kakashi after joining ANBU.

"In the past four months, we have used the information extracted from the agents in our custody. We have discovered bases, safehouses, and other infrastructure. We have arrested parties we believe to be their external partners... some of whom were also partnered with ANBU."

The people in the room shook their heads and sighed. Relatively speaking, ANBU was a small department. Not only was half of the department comprised of staff, but they also lacked the necessary numbers to keep the domestic and foreign powers in check. They needed the Leaf Intelligence Division to collect information for them. They used the Torture and Interrogation Department's facilities and often hired their interrogators. Many of the ANBU facilities, including the headquarters, were guarded by shinobi from the regular forces.

Just like they had contacts within Hidden Leaf, they also had contacts outside. Many of them were former Leaf shinobi, others not—all of them useful in their own right.

"We have cleared out those we have identified and launched an internal investigation for any potential overlap." Takuma continued, "Moving on. Last week, our team managed to find another ROOT agent—"

He saw irritated and envious looks in the room because he and his team had done more than anyone else.

"Stop bragging!"

Takuma ignored the comment with a smirk and continued,

"—and just last week, we managed to get something out from him that we passed to the Foreign Department because it was their jurisdiction, but we're hoping for a positive result. Our focus has been domestic, and if the other guys managed to get something, it'd be a breakthrough to finding out what they're doing outside."

Itachi had kept his initiative restricted to the Domestic Branch because smoothing out any kinks was much easier when things were kept in-house. The Foreign Branch was bound to get involved sooner or later, and their eventual involvement was important because, from the chatter they had been hearing, the now-independent ROOT was quickly establishing itself in the foreign market.

Before Danzo created ROOT, he had continued Tobirama Senju's ambitions and shaped the Hidden Leaf's ANBU into what it was today. There was nobody better than him to run a highly effective shinobi mercenary force. Some even thought that ROOT was an enhanced and improved version of ANBU, and that kind of reputation could be monetised to the moon and back. Shimura Danzo was a seasoned warlord who knew how to play his cards right to maximise the benefits of war, information, and violence.

The ANBU had to move quickly because, even if Danzo knew their playbook, they still had the advantage of greater resources and a stable foundation, something ROOT currently lacked. However, with the passage of time, that advantage slowly closed.

"And that's it from me for this meeting." Takuma quickly concluded his progress and returned to his seat in the back while someone else continued their report.

Ever since the initiative had started, they had held bi-monthly meetings. It wasn't mandatory attendance, but when two captains were scheduled to show up at one, people—especially those who weren't from the units under the captains—showed up to make a good impression.

The meeting ended, and the agents began to mingle, talk and exchange information.

"How are you doing this?" asked another ANBU operative.

"Luck, great support, and hard work," Takuma replied with a tired sigh.

"More like, no personal life," said a voice from beside him.

Even though the words were those of accusation, they lacked any tone of criticism.

Takuma resisted the urge to look towards the voice and continued his conversation with the fellow operatives. If nothing else, the meetings were a great way to socialise. He didn't get to do that very often while he was busy at work. It was essential to know people, and since he had been part of Itachi's anti-ROOT initiative, he had met numerous new individuals, with whom he had exchanged information and favours.

He saw Itachi walking towards him and gave a nod to the people he was talking to and stepped away.

"Good work, Ratel," said Itachi with an approving nod. "I must say, I'm doubting my father's decision to let you go. Would you like to re-discuss that offer with me this time?"

Before Takuma could respond, the voice chimed in again.

"You're so scared of him." Takuma watched as Grey walked into his view and looked Itachi up and down with a blasé expression. "Sure, he's a jōnin and an ANBU Captain—at my age, at that. Impressive to say the least, but with what portion of your memories I can access, he seems a perfectly logical and smart person. Why are you such a pussy?"

Takuma's face twitched, but he managed to hold it together and replied to Itachi. "I would be willing to do that, but of course, it'll depend on what you can offer. The me back then and the one now are two very different people. For one, I'm an ANBU-nin now."

"Of course, let's discuss this in private," said Itachi.

After his talk with Momoe, he didn't think he would join a clan at the moment, but he wasn't going to shut down any conversations because of it. He was going to see if he could get something out of their interest.

"I take that back. Sorry about calling you a pussy," Grey said with a disgruntled look like he was disappointed in himself. "It's your fault that I'm using foul language. Your personality is bleeding into me."

It was roughly a month after Takuma met Grey that the latter began to be able to manifest as a hallucination just for Takuma.

———

 .

Takuma rubbed his eyes from exhaustion as he put down the papers in his hand on his office table. The chair creaked as he leaned into his chair and stretched his hand while staring at the ceiling.

Things hadn't been going well since the ROOT arrests.

Being part of Itachi's anti-ROOT initiative meant sharing information and resources, and because Itachi wanted to attract talent from all over the Domestic Branch, he sought to offer them something that would motivate them to devote real time to ROOT, rather than their existing cases.

He wanted to split up the eight ROOT agents in the custody of the inquisitor unit and let the others have a crack at them.

Takuma didn't want to agree because losing those agents would mean narrowing his chances of getting new intel, which would affect what he could find about ROOT in the future. However, he also knew that if ANBU wanted a higher chance of progress against ROOT, they needed more people from various backgrounds to review high-potential sources of information, such as agents.

Alas, that choice ultimately wasn't his. While he had agreed to be part of Itachi's initiative, he was only an ANBU operative at the bottom of the hierarchy, only above genin operatives and most of the staff. Regardless of what he wanted, it was his captain who was ultimately going to make a decision. And, in the end, Aburame Seinpachi agreed to split up the agents, and no one asked for his opinion. To be fair, he didn't think his captain had much of a choice because so many agents in the custody of one squad was a waste. The ANBU Commander was definitely involved in making that choice.

Itachi, however, did let him keep two agents of his choice while everyone else received one agent per team. He let Amami, who had agreed to join, have the pick of the agent she thought had actionable information and a higher chance of getting it out.

She hadn't been able to find anything on them yet, so things were looking flat.

Takuma got up and walked to find the bathroom to splash water on his face, so he could work through the end of his working hours and review more documents. While he had lost seven ROOT agents, he had gained tons of confidential information about ROOT that Itachi had initially promised him.

"Can't you go somewhere interesting?"

Takuma, who was at the sink, looked up in the mirror in surprise because he hadn't heard anyone walk behind him, only to get startled to see Grey standing behind him. He turned around and whipped a punch at his greyscale clone, only for it to go through him like he was immaterial.

'Genjutsu?' he thought and instantly tried to disrupt his chakra, only for it to do nothing. He moved back to give himself time and space for the genjutsu to fade as it always did, while he could assess for more sources of danger—but it didn't fade, and no one came to attack him.

"Relax," said Grey, leaning against the wall with his hand raised.

"What the fuck is this?!" Takuma yelled with a kunai in his hand.

"I don't know," Grey shrugged like he was resigned to it. "When you started poking around and I pulled you in, something changed. Our... connection is stronger than before," he didn't sound happy about it.

"How?!"

"I don't know!"

Takuma wanted to scream and yell, but held it inside. He didn't know what was going to happen, but he didn't think it was going to be pleasant.

————

 .

The two weeks that followed were utterly stressful because Grey continued to show up a few times a week, voicing his thoughts about what Takuma was doing or what he was doing himself. It was irritating to say the least, but he had been so stressed that when Grey showed up, he was constantly on the edge of crashing out, everyone around him.

At first, he thought that because he couldn't dismiss Grey by interrupting his chakra or when he didn't fade as genjutsu did with him, that his presence was not a genjutsu, which was depressing because it ended up as a total unknown. If it were genjutsu, at least, he could've felt comfortable because he knew plenty about the top.

However, he eventually discovered that hallucinations were indeed genjutsu. And that didn't make things any better. Disrupting his chakra didn't work because the genjutsu was using his own chakra, which caused him a panic attack, because if Grey could use his chakra, he could kill him in his sleep. Fortunately, that horrifying possibility was disregarded when Grey volunteered the information that he could only control the naturally mixed chakra constantly flowing through his body.

The body was always passively mixing chakra to support the body. A person didn't need to be a shinobi to have chakra in their body. However, that amount of chakra wasn't enough to cast jutsu—even the weakest D-rank jutsu—which was why shinobi needed to mix chakra when they wanted to cast a ninjutsu actively. The only reason Grey could use that chakra to cast a genjutsu was because he was literally inside his mind, past any defences other shinobi would have to bypass to cast a genjutsu on Takuma.

"But I must say, you've accomplished so much since we started. Do you have a secret unit working for you somewhere?" asked Itachi.

Takuma still couldn't get used to Itachi joking because of the image he had of him in his head.

"It's just honest, hard work," said Takuma. "I couldn't have done any of this without the information you shared." When Itachi had taken away agents in his custody, he had released a lot of intel that the ANBU had on ROOT.

"He's not wrong," Grey commented again. Perhaps he had been lonely inside his mind, but the mental hallucination was particularly chatty whenever he showed up. "You do have a big, personal squad of your copies working a lot of hours for you."

Takuma called the last few months the best flatline months of his life. If Grey's hallucinatory presence was a negative, then his progress with the Shadow Clone Jutsu was the positive that balanced it out. He had gone from being able to create one viable clone for four hours a day to two viable clones for five hours a day each, giving him a total of ten hours a day of extra man-hours.

It was a huge step forward because it provided proof that Inenpachi's method was working. By manually controlling and delaying the flow of information riding on spiritual energy as it returned to the body, allowing the brain time to process the information at a pace that didn't overwhelm it.

Shadow clones, combined with water clones, had given him an absurd number of man-hours for one person, which he divided between work and training.

"If only you could dedicate one of them to doing something not boring. Have a life, buddy," said Grey before disappearing.

Whatever had changed, it had pulled them "closer." Grey now directly received the input from all five senses and thus experienced what he did. Before, he was happy to sit in the darkness behind the wall, but now, when the outside was thrust at him during every walking moment, he cared more about what was happening. Takuma had grown tired of telling him to fuck off. After finding that the new circumstances had no clear dangers to him, he just accepted that this was going to be another thing he would need to tolerate.

"That information went to some others as well. I don't see them producing similar results. Accept the credit and continue doing the excellent work," Itachi said before adding. "Look forward to your preferred choice of bonuses."

Takuma wasn't surprised that Itachi knew that B-rank jutsu were part of his compensation package.

"Another thing. I was wondering if you'd look into something for me," Itachi said.

"ROOT?"

Itachi shook his head. "I'll send over a file. Review it and see if you're interested in taking it on."

----------------------------------------

Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón []. Link here and in signature.

Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.