Carico walks slowly until he reaches a house in the centre of the base, he raises his hand to knock on the door, however, before he can do so, the door opens.
The one who opens it is a girl with a gentle appearance, a face with some healing wounds and a slight tremor.
This is the girl that the boss has captured last week, the girl has a rather particular long red hair and a beautiful face, her gentle appearance could make many men want to protect her.
'Tayuya, I've come to see the boss,' Carico says bluntly, a moment later Tayuya raises her head and nods before stepping back giving way for Carico to enter.
Inside the house sitting in a chair and looking at a book with some curiosity is the boss of the Paper and Ink bandits, his face is not visible due to his strange mask and his body appears to be that of a man in his twenties.
'The head of an Anbu of Iwa, you are very skilled as the report said,' the boss mutters in his gruff voice before standing up and walking over to Carico, he reaches out his hand to grab the cut off head by the hair as he looks at Carico through his mask.
'You are skilled, a good man, you deserve to be part of the Paper and Ink bandits, so...' the boss pauses, with an uncanny ability, the boss touches the head and it disappears in an instant.
The boss smiles under the mask before quickly raising his right hand in a fist towards Carico's face.
Carico is not surprised, he quickly raises his right hand as well to stop the boss's fist.
*Collide*.
Both hands collide generating a small shockwave, the boss smiles under his mask to see that his attack was blocked.
"Soon we will be leaving for a special mission in the heart of Iwagakure, we leave in three days, rest for the moment and prepare yourself, it will be a difficult mission..." the boss says with a slightly mocking tone before returning to his chair.
Carico was about to bow in respect and withdraw when the boss opened his mouth again, "By the way, your reward for this mission is that girl, from now on she's yours to do with as you please..." the boss says without taking his eyes off the book in his hands.
Carico's eyes focus for a moment on the girl in the corner not far away, Tayuya, she only arrived here a week ago, her little visible skin shows how aggressive the boss can be with girls.
Tayuya lifts her trembling face to see Carico's tired face and her mind can't help but think of various scenarios, she swallows saliva as she takes a few steps back before as she begins to breathe rapidly.
"My lord... I..." Tayuya was about to say something, but one look from the boss was enough for her to shut her mouth.
"Go now, Carico..." the boss mutters to her, Carico bows to the boss before walking back to the door, he waves for Tayuya to follow him.
...
Tayuya looks at the man she was gifted to as if he were an object, her heart can't calm down, her eyes are shining and tears begin to roll down her cheeks.
What is going to happen?
Tayuya doesn't know, she's scared, she's scared, the man, Carico, seems like a shady guy, she saw him kill several people without even blinking, so What would a guy like that do to her?
Tayuya was thinking of various scenarios with gritted teeth until Carico simply told her that she could live in any room before entering a room and not coming out.
Tayuya was anxious at first, but as the hours passed and she realised that Carico didn't come out of his room her heart began to calm down, her body calmed down, and the several days of absolute stress she experienced kicked in.
Tayuya, with heavy eyes, walked to a room with some dust in the house and lay down on a bed to sleep.
...
The next day Tayuya wakes up to a faint sound of something cooking not far away, a pleasant aroma reaches her nose and she can't help but swallow saliva as she feels her stomach is completely empty.
Tayuya sits on her bed as she blinks, that was the first time she was able to sleep after several days of constant torture due to the boss.
Tayuya squints, she is about to get up and look for Carico to ask him what she should do when Carico himself walks through the door of her room.
"Eat and then leave..." Carico mutters with a tired face and muffled voice, he doesn't even look her in the eye, he just said those words before retreating.
Leave?
Tayuya doesn't understand, she squints her eyes, clenches her fists and stares at the door, She has to leave and go back to where?
For a moment Tayuya just sits on the bed, her eyes focused on the door before she got up and went to breakfast.
She has no reason to stay, in fact, escaping from this hellish place is a great relief to her, even if she has nowhere to go back to, even starving in the forest is better than staying here.
...
Carico observes the outside from his window, from time to time he eats a few bites of the rice ball in his hand, at this moment Carico thinks about Minato's face, his words, and....
"Did he keep the book?", Carico sighs lightly, that book has taken him at least half a year of effort and hard work, but, Carico simply shakes his head before downplaying it.
Carico watches out of the corner of his eye as Tayuya leaves her room for breakfast, he watches her eat with delight and drink a lot of water before she walks out the door.
Outside, Tayuya shakily walks away from the Paper and Ink bandits' base.
None of the other bandits did anything to stop her, because it is known that Tayuya was gifted to be Carico's property, and from that point on she was Carico's responsibility.
"Hmph..." Carico mutters something difficult to understand before returning to rest.
The days go by normally, and the day arrives, the boss of the bandits Paper and Ink has summoned everyone for a small meeting and a joint mission.
Carico has prepared himself, he has several supplies with him and on his back is his trusty old sword.
As he leaves his house he can see several Bandits with a serious look on their faces heading towards the boss's house.
No one says a word, they all simply walk in silence to the boss's house.
Carico notices that the rain is a little heavier today, and his perception tells him that there are several ninjas watching from a few places not too far away.
Carico enters the boss's house, inside, besides the boss he can see another person standing next to him, that is a middle-aged man, with clothes covering much of his face and short black hair.
"Hi, you guys are here, hehehe,' the boss looks at the various bandits with a smile, We have a special mission, I mean, come on, let's go take care of some undesirable people in Iwagakure," the boss gives a slight introduction before waving his hands at the man next to him to continue.
'The mission is to deal with Akatsuki, a newly founded evil organisation that is trying to overthrow Hanzo of the salamander, in this mission you will be under my command, for the moment my name is irrelevant", the man with his face covered with bandages says with a strong attitude.
A moment later, several of the bandits in the room look at each other, many of them with frowns and solemn looks, it is easy to tell, they are bandits who are in the Paper and Ink group only for the money, and they are not loyal to the boss at all.
The bandage-covered man notices this quickly and smiles.
"If all goes well, at the end of the mission each of you will be rewarded 1 million Ryo..." the bandage-covered man says before pulling some stamps out of his clothes.
Then a pile of open boxes filled with 10mil Ryo notes appear on the floor impressing everyone present.
"It's... it's money..." one of the bandits gulps as he mutters with his eyes wide open.
"One Million Ryo, that's, fucking great!!!", another bandit smiles happily before attempting to approach the money.
However, before that bandit can do anything, the man covered in bandages moves his hands making the boxes full of banknotes disappear.
"My code name will be Mariposa, so, since everything is ready, can we talk about the mission," the bandage-covered man smiles deliberately.
Several bandits look at Mariposa with thoughtful eyes, inside they really want to just kill the man and get the money, however, after looking at their boss, they quickly understand that this is not possible.
The bandits analyse the situation, only the boss present is enough to subdue them all, and since the boss seems to have no intention of attacking Mariposa, they all stare at Mariposa before nodding their heads.
Carico acts like the other bandits, however, instead of being excited about the money, Carico keeps his focus on Mariposa.