When Madara saw Takasugi return with a shamisen, he didn't pay it much mind.
After all, the Land of Grass wasn't too far from the Land of Music, the homeland of instruments, so it wasn't unusual for such things to spread there.
(The Land of Music: Where Orochimaru founded the Hidden Sound Village.)
Tobi, however, was different.
The moment he saw Takasugi bring back something new, he rushed over excitedly, asking questions with curiosity.
Ignoring Tobi's inquiries, Takasugi sat directly on the stone bed, lowered his head, closed his eyes, tuned the instrument, and then began to pluck the strings slowly.
The moment the prelude began, Madara—who had been resting with his eyes closed—allowed the faintest hint of a smile to tug at the corner of his lips.
Tobi, too, quietly sat cross-legged, propping his chin in his hands as he listened intently.
The shamisen's melody—sometimes fierce, sometimes slow, sometimes soaring, sometimes somber—stirred memories of the past in Madara...
When the song ended, Takasugi placed the shamisen against the wall and coldly warned Zetsu and Tobi.
"Don't touch it."
Tobi, who had just been considering doing exactly that, hung his head heavily in disappointment.
Opening the fridge—the only modern appliance in this underground cavern—Takasugi frowned at the sight of the empty refrigerator compartment before turning his gaze to Tobi.
Only this guy would be curious enough to steal his Yakult.
"Takasugi, this time I didn't—"
Before Tobi could finish, he suddenly felt something terrifyingly ominous staring at him from behind!
Realizing he had to take the blame or risk his life, Tobi quickly changed his tune.
"Alright, alright! I'll go find one of those weird machines in the wild! Geez!"
From that day on, the Yakult in the fridge disappeared at an alarming rate—especially when Takasugi was away on missions.
Strangely enough, during this period when Tobi frequently stole the Yakult, Madara's body noticeably became bloated and weaker.
.....
In the year Gintoki turned thirteen, the long-standing war continued.
But to everyone's surprise, the seemingly allied Hidden Rock and Hidden Cloud suddenly turned on each other!
No one knew who had betrayed whom—only that the final outcome was the Third Raikage, covering his subordinates' retreat, facing ten thousand Rock-nin alone!
After three days and nights of relentless battle, he fell from sheer exhaustion!
No one knew how many of the ten thousand Rock-nin survived—only that the number was definitely less than or equal to ten thousand, never more!
Normally, that would have been the end of it. But then something happened that sent chills down the spines of the Hidden Rock and every other village.
The several thousand Rock-nin who had survived that battle...
Were later slaughtered by an unknown force, their bodies left forever in the Land of Grass!
Not a single survivor made it out alive!
At this moment, Iwagakure was truly shocked—not a single one of the ten thousand shinobi had survived.
These ten thousand shinobi had already accounted for the majority of Iwagakure's forces!
Iwagakure dispatched investigation teams, but the results were the same—none could survive to relay any information.
The same went for other shinobi villages; anyone who entered the Land of Grass would vanish without a trace!
The Grass shinobi were ecstatic about this, convinced that their village must have a hidden powerhouse!
Any shinobi who entered the Land of Grass would be mercilessly slaughtered by this unseen force!
They were getting carried away!
The Grass shinobi had truly lost their minds—so much so that they forgot their own names, strutting around arrogantly and flaunting their power.
They would casually venture out and if they couldn't win, they'd retreat back to the Land of Grass, seeking the protection of that unknown, faceless entity.
Thus, not long after, the Grass Village was completely annihilated—no shinobi was spared, except for a few ordinary civilians.
Among the survivors were a few families who had fled from other villages due to war.
However, somewhat unexpectedly to Takasugi, these people did not resent him for it.
On the contrary, they were deeply grateful to him.
...
The Land of Grass had recently become a forbidden zone—almost no shinobi who entered could ever leave!
All shinobi villages were closely monitoring this small country due to such bizarre events.
Some villages, undeterred by the danger, believed that sending too few people at once was the reason for these incidents and dispatched thousands at a time!
But... still, not a single soul returned.
The Land of Grass concealed a formidable power!
And it was angry!
This was the conclusion all shinobi villages had drawn.
As a result, the Land of Grass became the first country to withdraw from the Third Shinobi World War and restore peace—though from that moment on, the country also closed its borders.
Of course, this "closed borders" policy needed quotation marks because, in reality, almost no one dared to provoke them.
Entering meant death!
...
With the Land of Grass no longer a viable route for troop movements and the terrain of the Land of Rivers being unsuitable for marching, Iwagakure had no choice but to focus its efforts on the Land of Rain, hoping to crush Konoha and Sunagakure through that battlefield.
But times had changed.
Konoha, no longer needing to divert forces to the Land of Grass, also began reinforcing the Land of Rain, resisting Iwagakure and Sunagakure with full strength.
The three factions fought fiercely in the Land of Rain—simply put, everyone was an enemy to everyone else.
Aside from their own side, all others were foes!
The remaining battlefields were now limited to the three-way conflict in the Land of Rain, as well as Konoha's battles against Kumogakure in the Lands of Rice, Hot Water, and Frost.
Kirigakure had remained relatively inactive, so Konoha wasn't overly concerned, merely dispatching a small squad to monitor their movements.
But then... their home was sneak attacked.
While Konoha was locked in fierce battles with the other three great nations, Kirigakure launched a covert assault.
Konoha, stretched thin with no troops to spare, was left with only a handful of low-ranking shinobi and nearly allowed Kirigakure—the ultimate opportunist—to claim victory!
Fortunately, there was Might Dai, who single-handedly crushed Kirigakure's elite Seven Swordsmen.
Terrified, Kirigakure disbanded the Seven Swordsmen and with internal instability and factional power struggles among its leaders, they withdrew from the war.
Soon after, Sunagakure and Iwagakure also nearly simultaneously ceased hostilities with Konoha.
This time, Sunagakure failed to trigger the Battle of Kikyoyama and was instead decisively defeated by Konoha in the Land of Rain!
The surrender of Sunagakure was glorified by both Konoha and Sunagakure as the formation of an alliance.
As for Iwagakure, having suffered heavy losses in the Land of Grass, they initially attempted to secretly send troops through the Land of Grass to attack Konoha after losing ten thousand men.
However, both their thousand-man and two-thousand-man units were completely wiped out in the Land of Grass—they never even made it out!
Realizing they had utterly lost the Land of Grass as both a crucial battlefield and a strategic route, Iwagakure ultimately chose to accept Konoha's invitation to negotiate the terms of a ceasefire.
But before that, there were those who did not want the war to end…
Danzo secretly contacted Ōnoki, but failed to sway his resolve for peace.
Instead, he began stirring up trouble in Amegakure, hoping to prolong the war.
....
Meanwhile, in the gradually recovering Land of Grass, an unknown man revered by the locals as the "Guardian Deity of the Land of Grass" stood before Madara, listening to his final instructions.
Madara had no fear that Takasugi would betray him.
After years of companionship, he knew Takasugi was the same kind of person as himself—someone who despised war yet would stop at nothing to achieve their goals.
He would not change.
"This is my will. I have poured my will into it…"
Snap!
Just as Madara infused Black Zetsu into White Zetsu, turning him into a black-and-white hybrid, Takasugi suddenly moved, locking Black Zetsu's throat in an instant.
Madara frowned.
"What's the meaning of this, Takasugi?"
"Who the hell are you?" Takasugi glared at Black Zetsu, his left eye's black pupil slowly morphing into a Sharingan, eventually forming a symmetrical, butterfly-like pattern.