Ninety-two: Hitching a Free Ride, a Free Meal, and a Prison Wagon

A free ride to prison?

Such a reason was truly unheard of, enough to make the Rain ninja stare in astonishment.

The problem was, who would be foolish enough to believe such nonsense?

None of them had ever heard of a prisoner willingly turning himself in, let alone to a notorious place like Hozuki Castle.

Unless he was sick of living and had a death wish.

"Move. Take this suspicious man down!"

With that thought, the leader of the Rain ninja barked an order at his companions.

When Kisame heard this, he shook his head and sighed.

"Why does no one ever believe me? Am I, Kisame Hoshigaki, really such a convincing liar?"

As soon as the words left his mouth, he reluctantly struck first in self-defense.

Three minutes later.

The familiar scene played out once again.

Just like the Hidden Mist operatives who had once escorted Kisame, these Rain ninja were all beaten down by him and left writhing and howling on the ground.

Kisame had not used too much force. After all, he still needed these people to get him to prison.

But he had left the imprint of an explosive seal on each of them, and had given them a live demonstration of the art of detonation.

Boom!

A huge blue-gray boulder taller than a man was blasted skyward by Kisame and shattered into countless fragments.

This sight sent cold sweat pouring down the backs of the Rain ninja and crushed any thought of resistance.

Under their fearful gazes, Kisame strode straight to the prison cart and opened it.

"Thank you, this..."

The scar-faced man inside the cart broke into ecstatic joy and was just about to thank Kisame for saving his life when the latter shoved him into the corner.

"Brother, make some room."

Kisame pushed him aside and climbed in, his massive frame instantly filling more than half the cart.

Faced with Kisame's brazen seizure of the space, the scar-faced man could only huddle in the corner, his face pressed against the bars, barely able to turn his head.

He was almost out of breath.

"What are you standing there for?"

Kisame waved at the dumbfounded Rain ninja and urged them on.

"Hurry up and get moving. It won't do to delay the trip."

The few of them exchanged glances and had no choice but to accept the situation.

Under Kisame's threat, they could only obey and escort him together to Hozuki Castle.

The convoy set off once more.

Yet after they had gone only a short distance, someone else stepped out to block their path.

It was Jiraiya.

He revealed his identity and politely asked the Rain ninja a few questions, such as whether they had seen any suspicious persons near the Grass Village.

As one of the famed Three Ninjas of the Leaf, Jiraiya's face still carried weight.

At his words, the Rain ninja all looked toward Kisame in the cart.

Oh?

Following their gazes, Jiraiya looked over as well. When he made out the prisoner's face, he frowned slightly, feeling oddly familiar with him.

"You're... Kisame Hoshigaki of the Hidden Mist? First place in the last Chunin Exam?"

He looked astonished as the memory finally returned.

"Lord Jiraiya." Kisame nodded in greeting.

"What is going on here?" Jiraiya asked, perplexed. Why would a Hidden Mist ninja be escorted by Rain ninja?

Kisame repeated his story once more and offered his explanation.

Though Jiraiya found it strange, he had no time to waste, and matters of other hidden villages were not his concern. So he quickly took his leave.

He headed straight for the Grass Village.

Kisame watched Jiraiya's retreating figure.

He realized that Jiraiya had probably been tracking him all along, only to fail to recognize his identity and pass by the very "Leaf invader" he was seeking.

Kisame withdrew his gaze and told the Rain ninja to continue onward.

His current strength had already reached the Kage level, enough to rank among the elite of the shinobi world. But for Kisame, that was still far from enough.

Over the past few days, he had encountered several Leaf shinobi in succession: Kushina's Adamantine Sealing Chains, Minato Namikaze's Flying Thunder God Technique, and Jiraiya's Mount Myoboku Sage Arts.

Each one was stronger than the last.

Each one made Kisame wary.

Thus, he yearned fiercely to become even stronger, ideally to devour the Box of Bliss before the flames of the Third Great Ninja War swept across the nations.

Only then would he truly possess the power to defy fate itself.

By that time, whether his opponent was a tailed-beast jinchuriki or one of the Leaf's Three Ninjas, Kisame would be able to overwhelm them with ease.

Thinking of this, Kisame looked ahead.

Hozuki Castle, I am coming.

Two days later.

Jiraiya had made a long circuit outside, only to return to the Leaf empty-handed.

He walked into the Hokage's office and reported to Hiruzen Sarutobi, only to find, to his surprise, that Tsunade and Orochimaru were there as well.

Half an hour later.

The Three Ninjas of the Leaf left the Hokage Tower together and went to the tavern they frequented most often.

Over drinks, Jiraiya suddenly asked, "By the way, do you still remember the first-place winner from the last Chunin Exam, more than three months ago?"

He had recalled the man he had seen in the prison cart that day.

"You mean Kisame Hoshigaki from the Hidden Mist Village?" Orochimaru looked at Jiraiya in surprise, not understanding why he had brought it up so abruptly.

Tsunade's brow tightened as well. With a sharp thud, she set down the cup in her hand and said unhappily, "Why bring up that guy? Bad luck."

Clearly, Tsunade was very displeased.

After all, that shameless bastard Kisame Hoshigaki had pinned the death of Fuji Gongzi on her, and it had taken her a great deal of effort to settle the matter and prove her innocence.

Naturally, she ground her teeth at the mere mention of him.

"I ran into him in the Grass Village. Kisame Hoshigaki had been sent to Hozuki Castle as a prisoner, supposedly for the deliberate murder of his employer. It seems... it was the same incident that happened in the film crew you were with before?" Jiraiya explained, then looked at Tsunade with curiosity.

"That happened?" Tsunade blinked in surprise, then burst out laughing, unable to contain her delight. "So that guy finally got what was coming to him. What a relief!"

Under Jiraiya and Orochimaru's astonished gazes, she picked up the bottle on the table and drank greedily, gulps rolling down her throat.

The wicked will surely bring destruction upon themselves.

Kisame Hoshigaki had done so many vile things; at last, he had gotten his due.

The more Tsunade thought about it, the happier she became, her face bright with drunken pleasure.

"What a pity," Orochimaru said softly with a long sigh.

He had heard that Hozuki Castle was a place from which no one ever returned, a forgotten corner of the shinobi world.

He was not sorry for Kisame himself, but for the ancestral Sword of the Kusanagi belonging to the Hoshigaki clan.

Ever since that late-night encounter with Kisame in the alley, Orochimaru had not stopped thinking about the Sword of Kusanagi.

Of course, he had also wondered whether Kisame had been deceiving him, whether the information he had given about the sword was false.

A complete lie.

Yet what puzzled Orochimaru was this: how would Kisame have known of the sword's existence in the first place, and why would he bother deceiving him about it?

In short, in Orochimaru's eyes, Kisame Hoshigaki was by no means an ordinary Hidden Mist chunin, but a man wrapped in riddles, impossible to see through.

Still, he would probably never see Kisame again in this lifetime, since the man had gone into that prison.

Thinking this, Orochimaru merely shook his head and let the matter go.

Inside the Land of Grass.

On a vast inland sea, the wind and waves were fierce. A small boat drifted with the current, struggling to press onward.

Several Rain ninja were sprawled across the boat, gripping the gunwales tightly, afraid that one slip would send them into the water.

Their gazes were fixed in resentment on Kisame Hoshigaki's back at the bow. He stood with his hands behind him, rooted in place as though his feet had taken hold of the deck, showing no fear whatever of the wind and waves.

The Rain ninja were angry, but dared not speak.

Over the past two days, after Kisame had joined the escort, he had begun eating and drinking at their expense without restraint, and he ate particularly heavily, consuming the rations of five men by himself.

Much of the Rain ninja's provisions had been "borrowed" by Kisame, leaving each of them hungry.

Even more outrageous was this:

Every day, Kisame would lounge inside the prison cart as though he were some grand old lord being carried in a sedan chair, and every few hours he would order everyone to stop.

He said he needed to get out of the cart, stretch his limbs, take a walk, and even have a hot bath.

Was this coming to prison, or going on a trip?

The original prisoner, the scar-faced man, had also been driven out of the cart by Kisame. Wearing shackles on his hands and feet, he now followed on foot behind the convoy.

Still, the destination was almost reached. For the Rain ninja, a little more endurance would see them through.

Once they arrived there, Kisame would be the one crying.

Two hours later.

Far out on the sea, an island rose high from the water, forming steep and magnificent cliffs. On the cliffs stood a sprawling complex of towering buildings.

That was Hozuki Castle.

"Be careful!" The Rain ninja gripped the gunwales even tighter.

That was because many enormous jagged stones rose from the sea around the island, creating invisible whirlpools nearby.

If one fell into the water by accident, even a ninja could be swept away by the undercurrents and lose his life.

No wonder they said Hozuki Castle was a natural prison.

At last, after much struggle, they made it ashore.

The escort party walked along a muddy road straight toward Hozuki Castle.

Both sides of the road were lined with vast fields of cape gooseberry plants, their red fruit and green leaves swaying in the wind.

These were Hozuki berries.

The sea winds would blow these berries into the prison from time to time. The ordinary red berries were harmless, but if one ate the white variety, the body would become numb all over, and the effects would only fade a day later.

Thus the prisoners on the island would do everything they could to get hold of the white Hozuki berries, eat them, and slip into the medical ward to enjoy the air conditioning and hot water there.

"My stomach isn't feeling too well. Wait for me here for a moment."

Kisame found an excuse, jumped out of the prison cart, and walked behind a tree by the roadside.

He gathered some of the white berries, stored them in a sealing scroll, and then swallowed the scroll into his stomach.

Once inside Hozuki Castle, these white Hozuki berries would be hard currency in the prison.

After finishing this, Kisame returned to the cart.

It was called a prison cart, but during the sea crossing its wheels had already been removed, leaving only an iron cage.

The Rain ninja had no choice but to stand around the cage and hoist the more than two-hundred-pound Kisame, carrying him step by step toward Hozuki Castle.

Soon, their shoulders hurt so badly they could hardly bear it, and their backs were bent with exhaustion.

"Lord Kisame, would you perhaps... like to get down and walk for a bit?" the leader of the Rain ninja finally could not hold back after walking some distance and asked.

"No. I am a hardened criminal guilty of grave offenses, very dangerous. Someone like me must be kept inside the prison cart."

Kisame flatly rejected the offer, sitting cross-legged with his arms folded, looking utterly righteous and forceful.

At his words, the Rain ninja could only grit their teeth and keep carrying him.

At last, the party reached the gates of Hozuki Castle and saw up close this cold and deadly iron prison.

Both prisoners.

The scar-faced man had turned ashen-faced, his eyes filled with despair and fear, his whole body trembling.

By contrast, Kisame wore a smile born from the heart, his gaze full of hope and expectation, as though he had finally come home.

Creak.

The towering gates several meters high slowly opened.

In the open space at the prison entrance, several wardens were counting the prisoners who had arrived that day.

Around them stood more than a dozen guards with matchlock guns in hand, their eyes sharp as falcons as they watched the prisoners. If anyone acted out, they would open fire at once.

With the arrival of the scar-faced man and Kisame, today's batch of prisoners was finally complete.

Bang.

After the Rain ninja unloaded the iron cage and completed the handoff with the prison staff, they passed by Kisame one after another with mocking smiles and hurried away.

Though they wanted to see Kisame receive a brutal beating, no one wished to linger in such a gloomy, haunted place.

Behind the prisoners, the great gate slowly closed.

"Lord Muu will now speak. Everyone, keep your ears open and listen carefully."

A warden stepped forward and barked at the prisoners.

Then a man with long black hair and a resolute face walked out from behind the wardens. He wore a splendid cloak and looked no older than thirty, yet he was already the lord of Hozuki Castle.

"I am the one in charge of this prison, Muu."

Muu's cold, emotionless gaze swept over the crowd as he said in a chilling voice, "Being sent here means your village no longer trusts you. In other words, you are worthless trash..."

Before he could finish—

"No, I refuse to die in a place like this!"

A Cloud ninja suddenly screamed in hysteria. He turned and charged at the gate, knocking down two guards in his way and forming hand signs to use a ninjutsu and destroy the gate to escape.

He was making a desperate gamble.

Muu frowned and walked over unhurriedly, saying coldly, "We Grass ninja have been entrusted by the nations. We will never allow prisoners to escape."

Whoosh.

He suddenly rushed toward the Cloud ninja at blinding speed, striking the man's chest with a palm and sending him flying.

Bang!

The Cloud ninja crashed into the prison gate with a dull impact, then fell to the ground.

"What is this?" He frantically lifted his shirt and saw intricate red patterns appearing across his upper body, like chains of burning fire.

He still wanted to resist, but as soon as he finished forming his hand signs, dizziness overwhelmed him and his body seemed utterly drained.

Two guards rushed in and beat him with their rifle butts, quickly knocking him unconscious.

"Take him away and confine him to the solitary room."

Muu issued the order without expression, then turned back to the remaining prisoners and continued, "The technique I just used is called Fire Release: Heavenly Prison. It is a restraining art inherited in my family. It is precisely because of this technique that I was able to take control of Hozuki Castle and become the warden of this prison.

"Let me emphasize once more: there are only two ways for you to leave this place. Either your village sends an official request, or... you die here."

His voice was cold and merciless.

From the very beginning, Kisame had been studying Muu.

Fire Release: Heavenly Prison was an extremely powerful sealing technique, and compared with the Adamantine Sealing Chains of the Uzumaki clan, it was even superior in some respects.

In the original story, Naruto had learned Sage Mode and had just defeated the Six Paths of Pain who invaded the Leaf, yet when caught off guard he was still subdued by Muu in a single move.

Fire Release: Heavenly Prison restricted a prisoner's ability to gather chakra, preventing him from using any ninjutsu and reducing him completely to a cripple.

When one could rely only on physical strength and pure taijutsu, most ninja were not much stronger than ordinary people. Faced with the matchlock guns in the hands of the prison guards, they had no means of resistance.

What was more, once a prisoner tried to escape, the sealing technique would become chains of fire and burn him alive.

But as the saying goes, every technique has a weakness, and Fire Release: Heavenly Prison was no exception.

And Kisame happened to be someone who did not fear Muu's sealing art at all...

On the road here, he had long since thought things through and drawn up a strategy in his mind.

Thus, Kisame took the initiative and stepped forward, bowing slightly.

"Lord Muu, hello."