Chakra Thirst

Once Takara allowed the couple to "sort out" their differences, he deprived them of consciousness and kept both of them guarding the Greed Pot with Kurama sealed inside.

Minato didn't even have the strength of a genin and he applied a spatial seal on his neck as a precautionary measure. Moreover, Kushina's chakra could reinforce the seal, so he wouldn't allow their souls to return to the Pure Land.

Even less so when someone else could revive them and extract information about their activities.

Wrapping up the most important matter, Takara took two days to complete the village's mission, and before returning, he transplanted Hinata's Byakugan into himself. Thanks to his extensive preparations, his body didn't reject the eyes and he could use them completely naturally within a few days.

"The chakra consumption when activating them is a bit higher than estimated at first," he felt when he tried to use them for the first time and practiced to familiarize himself with them. "Probably due to the lack of Hyuga lineage, but that won't be a big problem."

Thanks to the seals on his mask, not even another Hyuga could know he had the transplanted Byakugan, and the benefits the eyes provided were worth the cost. Now he just needed to find the entrance to the Moon to catch Toneri off guard and investigate how to obtain the Tenseigan.

Does he really think his puppets can protect him from his own?

Although he had to admit he would study those moon works with interest.

Furthermore, thanks to having Kurama and access to its chakra, the noxins could start searching for his rebirth egg.

Meanwhile, he would take advantage of the opportunity to go catch another biju: Isobu!

It took him three days to find and reach the mist-covered lake where the three-tailed beast reappeared. He didn't have Yagura's son with him to attract it with his chakra, but he didn't need it.

He immediately started sending a large number of noxins to surround the area not only to monitor but also to help him create a temporal barrier seal, to be able to extract Isobu from his personal dimension and block his return to it.

In a day, it would be full moon, and it happened that he had a puppet that could only be used during this exact lunar phase, not a single day off. It was also one of his first experiments where he tried using other materials like ceramics, fabric, etc.

But in the end, he had to repeat it more than forty times to have a functional puppet.

Or maybe he just wasn't meeting some condition he didn't know, in any case, to date, he hadn't been able to make a second one, and its use in the past wasn't possible due to the huge amount of chakra it requires to use it once to launch a single technique.

But the resurrected from the Edo Tensei turned out to be excellent batteries of inexhaustible chakra that could power the puppet, he just needed to be cautious and not let Isobu realize what was happening around it until nightfall.

It so happened that a group of merchants camped a few hundred meters from the barrier he set up, and that irritated him. He couldn't allow rumors to arise that would betray the reappearance of the three-tailed beast or that someone else captured it.

Akatsuki could get nervous if they found out he had a competitor for the biju.

Nor could he remain silent and wait for them to leave, as the way they set up camp seemed like they wanted to rest for a couple of days before leaving, and he couldn't wait for the next lunar phase without the village suspecting that something was wrong with him.

Not that it mattered to him, but his identity as a Suna chunin was useful as cover, as a "weak" child like him couldn't be too relevant in the eyes of the higher-ups elsewhere.

"I guess I'll need more sacrifices for the Edo Tensei," Takara reflected.

He still had some Konoha genin trapped, but he didn't have sacrifices of the caliber for when they were resurrected, the chakra output they were extracting would be enough.

Minato made that point clear when he used Teuchi as a medium, both a precaution and an experiment in Takara's eyes, making sure the Yellow Flash didn't have the ability to make unexpected moves.

And there were probably at least one genin squad escorting these merchants, because traveling through this area without protection would only leave them vulnerable to bandits, the desperate, or the starving.

Not to mention if they had the misfortune of encountering deserting ninjas.

As for the possible leader of the squad...

It was annoying because he could be there or not, and his strength would be variable.

Konoha can afford to put jonin as leaders to improve training and increase the survival of the genin under their command, but that wasn't the general rule. Even Konoha only adopts this role in the most potential ones.

Some villages accepted chunin leaders to train them in leadership or due to lack of personnel, while in the five great ninja villages there was also something called the Genin Corps, which was a fancy way of calling those who managed to become ninjas but rarely had enough potential to go further.

They took missions when they needed money and could execute them alone or form a team, although they rarely left the village without taking the last option even if it meant dividing the money, as it was much safer.

It gave them freedom of action, but it also meant that no one actively taught them, and they had no backup if they got into a dangerous situation.

So Takara needed to know which village they were from and from there, he could take measures, but for now, he would consider and act as if there was at least one jonin present.

For the time being, he was already monitoring the camp, and thanks to his noxins not being living beings, he doubted anyone could "feel" the gaze of a machine.

If someone found them... well, they would only hasten their death.

Moreover, he could force the civilians to use Chiyo's technique on the puppets.

Maybe they would barely have chakra, but chakra is a medium that he can forcefully inject into their bodies at the time of using the technique, what he was interested in as a resource from civilians, was the life force they had and needed to transfer.

Patiently, Takara waited for the moon to rise in the sky, and when he felt it was time, he pulled out a scarecrow...