The Border Festival!!

" The Border Festival!! " ( 国境の祭り!! , Kokkyō no Matsuri!! ) is chapter 4 of the Konoha Shinden manga.

## Summary [ ]

Even if her assignment is not as dangerous as she originally believed, Mirai is nevertheless intent on doing a good job: she watches Kakashi and Guy eat dinner from a nearby tree, ignoring how hungry and cold she is so that she can attend to them. She wonders why Kakashi doesn't seem to notice that Guy is stealing his food, once again making her question Kakashi's supposed legendary skills, when Kakashi suddenly appears at her side. He expresses concern about how seriously she's taking this mission, believing she's putting too much pressure on herself; he remarks that her father was the same way at her age until he learned to loosen up. When he confides that the Seventh Hokage shares these concerns, hence why she was assigned to this mission, Mirai is relieved, as it means that the Seventh still has faith in her abilities.

Mirai promises to start enjoying what little time remains of their mission. Kakashi corrects her, as the mission she evidently thinks is to last two days will actually last twenty. While Mirai processes this mistake, Kakashi also notes that, although they are approaching this as a chance to have a vacation, their mission to inspect the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Hot Water is real. They spend the next day doing just that, and then stop for the evening at a town that lies exactly on the border of the two countries. They notice many people in town are wearing either cat or dog masks, and that arguments over cats and dogs seem to be fairly common. Mirai is confused, but Kakashi and Guy recognise this as the Quarrel Festival .

Legend has it that the town's two hot springs were discovered with the help of a cat deity and a dog deity, but the town is bitterly divided over which hot spring was discovered first. This disagreement has since grown into an annual celebration/competition between cat lovers and dog lovers. As they walk through town they spot Tamaki and Kiba Inuzuka , who are arguing which hot spring they should visit first. Kakashi sides with Kiba in recommending the dog hot spring, and Guy sides with Tamaki in recommending the cat hot spring, purely so that he can oppose Kakashi. They turn to Mirai to be the tie-breaker, who tries to pick both. Kiba and Tamaki make pleas for siding with them, but before she's forced to choose they are drawn to a commotion in the center of town.