.....
"Don't worry, I promise I won't do that again from now on. The Seven-Tails jinchūriki is still waiting over there, probably getting impatient. We should head over first."
After much coaxing, Furina finally managed to calm Shion down. She quickly shifted the topic to the Seven-Tails not far away, unwilling to dwell on that not-so-pleasant memory from just now.
She called over Hikari, who still had a trace of resentment on her face, and Shion, whose eyes were still a bit red at the corners, and led them to the Seven-Tails. No—at this point, the Seven-Tails had already released its tailed beast transformation and returned to its jinchūriki form.
Furina vaguely remembered the other's name seemed to be something like "Fū"?
Seeing her saviors approaching, Fū, who had been sitting on the ground resting, immediately jumped up. In just a few steps she ran in front of Furina and gave a deep bow.
"Thank you so much for saving me just now. If it weren't for you all, I definitely would have been captured by that bad guy with black gas coming off him. Really, thank you so much."
"Heh, aren't you afraid that my goal might be the same as that guy's just now? Maybe next I'll be the one trying to capture you."
Looking at the overly familiar girl in front of her, Furina's eyes took on a playful glint. The thing she had just suppressed flared up again like dead ashes reigniting.
"How could that be? I trust you all very much. After all, even that guy just now was defeated by you. If you really wanted to capture me, I wouldn't be able to fight back anyway."
After saying that, Fū let out a somewhat helpless sigh. But soon her face was full of smiles again. She stared intently at Furina and continued,
"Besides, you're so good-looking—you're simply the most beautiful person I've ever seen in my life. So I believe you definitely aren't bad people."
"Cough cough." Seeing Fū's eyes practically sparkling with stars, Furina quickly coughed twice to interrupt her, putting an end to the matter for now. Although it was praise directed at her, she felt it was better to talk about serious things right now.
"Thank you for your trust. I'm a ninja from Konoha, disciple of the Fifth Hokage Tsunade. As you said, of course I won't make a move against you. Right now, the Akatsuki organization that's capturing tailed beasts all over the ninja world is our common enemy."
"Mm-hmm, I knew it! You're so pretty—you look like the kind of person who'd become my friend. How could you possibly capture me? Nice to meet you, my name is Fū. I'm a ninja from the Hidden Waterfall Village."
After a simple round of introductions, just as she had said, Fū immediately unilaterally declared Furina and the other two as her friends.
Faced with someone so overly familiar, neither Uchiha Hikari nor Shion was very good at handling it. They could only quickly nod in agreement and silently pray that the other would not continue to "bother" them.
In the following conversation, Furina also learned the cause and effect of why Fū had fought Mōryō here. Not long ago, Mōryō had suddenly led a group of ninja to attack the Hidden Waterfall Village.
Although he did not say it outright, the Akatsuki organization's goal had already become common knowledge throughout the ninja world after their recent prominence. Once they recognized Mōryō from his Akatsuki cloak, the higher-ups of the Hidden Waterfall Village immediately understood the attackers' purpose.
Understanding was one thing, but there was simply no ninja in the Hidden Waterfall Village who could match Mōryō. Fū did have the ability to fight him, but the village leader had forbidden her from joining the battle and arranged for the village's jōnin to cover her retreat.