He knew that Harichimo and Karumo had both had trouble with the gang in the past and had fulfilled their task under the supervision of the man called Guanyin Nanashi, a name that had come up surprisingly often when he had started digging around in the past. Fukai was yet to meet the guy but he would be sure to find out as much as he could about him if he ever was to. A man with as much prominence as him would surely prove a problem if he was to end up on the wrong side of the fence. Fukai had no idea where the man was or where he could possibly find him, the main things that he had been able to uncover were that he was the captain of the medical division and had stood in as an interim kage until another one was found. Yes, he was quite obviously someone who had an interesting history and someone like him would be worth knowing. Once he had started setting the foundations for his future ventures, he had come to the quick realisation that contacts and allies were invaluable. He would do well to keep vidulent when it came to networking. At the moment he could count his trustworthy friends on one hand but he hoped that when the time came when he needed them, they would be there to help.

It was about this time that he started to miss Karumo and Harichimo. They had been his friends for quite a while now and they were definitely the type of people that he could rely on. Their presence was one thing that he had missed while he was travelling. But they were still away on their mission in Suna, and he was back here, coping as best he could. Oh well, that was the way it was. He had no other choice than to keep pushing forward without them. A smile sprang to his lips when he thought about how they would react when they saw how much he had grown so far. Then that smile disappeared as soon as it appeared. It was a funny thing, he had been on his own for so long when he was grown up, he thought he would be used to being alone. But with all this action and meeting and interacting with someone new every day, he had quickly become adapted to the social scene and the adventures that it brought with it.

Fukai was walking up to the administration building to receive his mission. This would be his first field mission as a chuunin, yesterday he had taught that group of academy students about what real combat tasted like, but a bunch of kids could not be called a real mission. By the sound of this though, the resurgence of the Infinity gang would require a heavy handed approach. This was something that Fukai had confidence that he could deliver. Yesterday afternoon when he was turning in his previous mission, he had been given a little chat on his work today. It was the first time that he had been to the third level of the admin building. The higher floors were associated with the higher ranks and it showed that he was a chuunin that he was required to scale the great stone staircase that he had graduated from hid geninship. Fukai winked at the woman that used to deliver him his missions as a genin. She smiled at his as he passed and then turned back to the group of kids that now jostled for her attention. The purple eyed young man did not miss the pen that he had been placed in as a genin, often it was a rank that was made of people still in their teens. A large and quite obviously older man such as himself stood out in the group. But both he and his supervisors knew that he had surpassed his rank well before he had been promoted. This was shown with his successes in the chuunin exams. Only after then was he given any attention as to a promotion.

The meeting with his elders only took a few minutes and he walked out with all the information that was needed. Apparently the new leader was a younger cousin or something. Whoever it was, was asking for it. The Infinity gang was a tough and hardy group each time it rose up, Iwagakure struck it down with pure, overwhelming strength. Yet they kept coming back. Like some sort of rash, there seemed to be no shortage of members, the social problems in the land of stone gave more than enough when it came to a source for broken people to be swallowed by a criminal organisation. Fukai had thought about this, if things were really bad enough that people had to continually resort to an occupation that had a very low life expectancy then maybe they should be treating the root causes instead of the outcomes.

He set out on his way to the Wild West. He had been to the area countless times before and had no trouble navigating it. Today's destination was well off the beaten path, but that was to be expected when it came to hideouts. Iwagakure's scouting division was top notch when they dealt with these lands. They had more or less pinpointed the area of interest. It took a solid two hours of forced march jogging to get to a rocky outcrop just to the east of their camp. Fukai took note of how large it was. The gang's pulling power had not waned much at all. But he doubted the quality of their recruits. They would not have had much time to train but there was strength in numbers. He mused over his entry point it would not do to just walk up, especially when they had it well guarded. Then a cunning plan came to mind. There was a ring of guards that were circling the area in steady intervals. If he could assume that position then there would be little disturbance and he had the chance to enter unannounced.

Fukai waited for the guard that was closest to him to come near the outcrop and then he jumped him and locked his arms and neck. He then cut the circulation in his neck and dragged him back into the shadows without so much as a yelp. The gang uniform was not much more than a brown cloak it seemed. Not a particularly good quality, but then that was not much of a surprise. He donned the cloak and then jumped into line. He traced around the outside of the camp like the others, peeking into the camp given the opportunity. After half an hour, the guards returned to the camp. Fukai funneled into the tent that housed the changing room for the guards. He looked from side to side to see young men and women getting dressed and ready for their shifts and others getting ready for time off. This seemed like a good place to start as any, the inhabitants of the tent were preoccupied with their duties. Fukai drew his staff and walked slowly over to the nearest man. He whipped out his staff and lunged towards his neck. The staff sizzled with raiton as it grew a chakra tip and bit deep. The man howled for half a second before he collapsed, dead. The sudden shock alerted everyone in the room, their faces perked up to take in the danger. In that instance, Fukai exploded into action, stepping and pivoting to turn into a whirling slash attack to assault multiple foes at once. His bladed scarf burst through the cloak and struck out like pouncing snakes at targets, cutting through vital spots and killing those too slow to react. It did not take him too long to drop everyone except a few that had escaped. His superiority in strength, speed and skill as well as the surprise advantage meant that he was able to assault them without much of a fight.

He quickly ducked his head outside to continue with the mission at hand, but when he slipped through the canvas ten door, he was met by a large hulking mass. Apparently gigantism ran in the family because he was even bigger than Fukai, and his large bladed weapon pointed at him menacingly. The chuunin barely had enough time to step outside before the first swing came at him. Fukai barely managed to throw himself sideways to avoid the well placed attack. There were some young men running up to support their leader by charging Fukai but the scarf lashed out at them and managed to dissuade them so that Fukai could gather himself. He looked up at the sound of whooshing to see a glowing halberd bearing down on him. Since he was low to the ground already, Fukai attempted to block the attack. He reinforced his staff with chakra to strengthen it and then charged it with his excorsim jutsu so that when the weapons met, Fukai's chakra spread into the halberd just as it burst into flames. The flames immediately withered and died and the kinetic energy of the attack was absorbed. The giant leader looked confused that his attack had failed for a second and that is where the chuunin struck. He pushed his halberd to the side and sent the scarf blades into his neck. He tried to withdraw his weapon but Fukai pushed it off balance with his own. The gang members watched on as their leader dropped dead to the ground. They were stunned for a few seconds and then started carefully backing away while the others further back ran for it. Fukai would let them go.

1638 /1500
mission complete
~exit~