A question Hiruzen hadn't found an answer to until he stepped back into the Hokage's residence and walked straight into a surprise.
First thing he saw was Biwako, but he wasn't smiling. He could feel the chakra signature of the person who'd put him in this mood lurking inside.
Azula was playing with his son. Both of them looked genuinely happy. That's when she turned to face him.
"Lord Hokage. It seems the meeting only got more complicated after I left." She said it so innocently that anyone walking in blind would never guess she was the root cause of his current problems.
Biwako fell squarely into that camp. She was his wife, sure, but she was also firmly on Azula's side. "He's always like this. No sense of time. Left the house at the crack of dawn, and let me tell you, he won't last an hour before he's buried in paperwork again."
That was a bone she picked with him constantly. To the point where he'd stopped even trying to defend himself.
He ignored the jab and answered Azula directly. "The meeting got more complicated? Don't you know that better than I do?"
He couldn't quite keep the hostility out of his voice, something Biwako didn't miss and definitely didn't understand.
Contrary to what people assumed, being married to the Hokage and an Elite Ninja herself didn't mean she was in the loop. They rarely talked shop at home. It was a hard rule they'd set after work talk nearly torpedoed their marriage once already.
And as for Azula? Biwako actually thought rather highly of her. Most of the village did, honestly. The list of things the girl had done for Konoha was too long to count.
Even if she thought well of Azula, Biwako wasn't dumb enough to side against her own husband over some hostility she could barely get a read on.
'Probably has something to do with that rumor floating around about her becoming Hokage sooner rather than later.' That was the best she could piece together.
She let out a sigh. "I don't really know what's going on between you two, and frankly I don't want to. But I do know that whatever's driving both of you, it starts from wanting what's best for the village. I hope you can find some common ground."
Azula gave her a reassuring nod, a gesture Hiruzen found himself mirroring despite his mood. Then Biwako scooped up Enzō, their eldest, who was still whining to play more with Azula, and left the two of them alone.
Being in his own home, Hiruzen didn't need an invitation to sit.
"So," he said, cutting straight to it. "What did you want to discuss?"
Azula let out a soft laugh. "You make it sound like an interrogation. I'm pretty sure Biwako would come running to my defense if she knew you were grilling me with that kind of intimidation."
Hiruzen didn't crack a smile. If anything, he figured this was just another one of her tactics to get him to drop his guard.
Which was exactly the reaction Azula expected from a man who knew he was losing the game.
"Fine. No jokes, then." Her face shifted, all business. "This is the first time we've had a private conversation like this. Probably the last, too, no matter how things shake out. And honestly, if it were up to me, I don't really do 'talking things out.' But you're Tsunade's teacher. That earns you an exception."
She wasn't trying to put him in his place or sound like some arrogant brat. It was just a fact, a confidence backed up by the awakening of her Mangekyō and many trump cards.
But Hiruzen hadn't picked up on any of that.
"Oh, so I'm supposed to feel flattered, then? Getting special treatment from the ninja world's new god." His voice dripped with sarcasm.
Azula didn't even flinch. She just nodded, utterly shameless. "Yes. You could put it that way."
'God, if only I had the nerve to say embarrassing crap like that with a straight face.' He kept the thought locked firmly behind his eyes.
"The reason I'm here, as you've probably already guessed," she paused, making dead sure their gazes were locked, "is to ask you, nicely, to step down as Hokage. Let the future belong to the generation that actually represents it."
'She's got the nerve.' Hiruzen found himself stunned all over again by her sheer audacity. 'No. Guess that's just baked into every Uchiha's bloodline.'
He latched onto that excuse, quietly absolving himself of the fact that he simply wasn't 'brave' like her.
"You're seriously telling me, the sitting Hokage, that you want me to resign?" He let his chakra flare, a pressure he hadn't unleashed on anyone like this since the day he took the hat.
He'd never been disrespected like this.
But when it came to applying pressure? There wasn't a soul in the modern shinobi world who knew how to turn the screws better than Azula.
Her eyes, utterly devoid of concern, fixed on Hiruzen as she let a sliver of Yin chakra bleed into the room, dense enough to rival Kurama himself, yet controlled tight enough that not a 'dust' of it escaped the chamber.
"Let me make this crystal clear, Hokage-sama," she spoke, her voice soft, almost like she was teaching a lesson. "I'm not here to ask you for anything. I'm offering you a chance to do this with your dignity intact. It's important you understand the difference."
But Hiruzen's attention wasn't on her words. It wasn't even on the sweat now beading down his temples. 'Impossible. How the hell did she reach this level at her age?'
The pressure rolling off her was damn near identical to what he'd felt when Mito had confronted him before leaving for Uzushiogakure.
That same crushing weight that reminded you exactly how small you were, and had done the same to Danzō, Koharu, and Hōmura back when they'd tried to throw their authority around.
"Face reality, Hiruzen." She dropped the honorific entirely. "No matter what you scheme up, I'll be stronger than every man, woman, and child in Konoha put together. And I don't have time to waste on your political nonsense and power games. When I want something, I'm direct about it."
She ticked options off on her fingers. "I could take my clan and walk. Head to Kiri, be their Kage, and make Konoha my vassal state. I could start my own village from scratch. I could actually... no. We'd be here all day listing what I could do, and we'd never finish."
"So make your choice, here and now. Which path do you want me to take? And while you're at it, ask yourself how much of what you're doing is really for the village."
That was all she had to say. Honestly, she felt like she'd already said too much.
'By now, the clone should've already secured my nomination as Fourth Hokage from the Daimyō, right?' She was sure of it. Before she'd even stepped into this room, she'd known exactly what kind of choice Hiruzen would make.
(END OF THE CHAPTER)