The weather grew ever hotter.
Uchiha Makoto's heart was as restless as the sun. He and the daimyō were auditing the profits from the tulip plan.
Dozens of accountants stood before them, calculating nonstop. After half a day, they finally produced the final figure.
"How much?"
"Roughly ninety billion ryō."
"In total?"
"No, Your Highness, that is your share."
Listening at the side, Uchiha Makoto sprang up from his chair, grinning from ear to ear, humming under his breath. This score was insanely good.
About ninety billion ryō.
It far exceeded what Makoto had expected at the start. After all, there wasn't only one mastermind. As more people piled in, nobles from nations great and small across the shinobi world joined the game. With a pot this big, there was no way the Land of Fire's daimyō and Uchiha Makoto alone could control it.
All sorts had mixed into the crowd. Did they really think there were no heroes left in the world?
So the daimyō kept roping in the great lords close to him to co-manage the play, and many other heavyweights outside the plan, spread across the shinobi world, pushed things along from behind the scenes. These were the aristocrats at the very top of the pyramid. Some knew each other, some did not, yet they moved in step, tacitly advancing the plan together.
The higher you are on the pyramid, the clearer you see that this was a rare opportunity, a deliberate and organized harvest aimed at nobles high, middle, and low across the shinobi world.
A bigger pot means more people eating meat.
Simple as that.
Makoto was easy to satisfy. The daimyō's seed funding for Akatsuki Village had only been one billion ryō at the very beginning. Now the musket had been swapped for artillery. It was overnight wealth.
With this pile of money, many of the plans that existed only in his imagination could begin at once.
Recruiting shinobi clans could proceed smoothly.
Akatsuki Village was indeed much slower than Konoha at absorbing clans. Senju Hashirama's title God of Shinobi was the real deal, unlike Sarutobi Hiruzen's hyped label of Strongest Hokage.
Not to mention that Konoha also had Uchiha Madara.
A great name casts a long shadow. Those two were Konoha's golden signboard, letting it draw powerful clans from the Land of Fire and the surrounding regions at exceptional speed.
According to intelligence the daimyō had gathered, the Hyuga, the Ino–Shika–Chō trio Akimichi, Nara, and Yamanaka, and other large and small clans had already agreed in principle to join Konoha, and their relocations had begun.
But the shinobi world is vast.
Besides Konoha, the other Four Great Ninja Villages were still being formed, to say nothing of the small ones. He could poach from all of them. Even those who had already joined Konoha, Makoto planned to try prying loose. Even if he had to smash them with money, he could still build a formidable Akatsuki Village.
The Land of Fire's daimyō could not hide his excitement. He ran over to Makoto and high-fived him. Even for the daimyō, ninety billion ryō was a colossal fortune.
What made Makoto feel best of all was that the scapegoat had stepped out on its own.
Rumors were spreading across the shinobi world that Konoha could supply tulips without limit. No one knew if Konoha was foolish enough to announce it themselves or if someone was deliberately smearing them with falsehoods. Makoto believed it was true, because Senju Hashirama possessed Wood Release. With his ability, he could mass-produce tulips for the entire shinobi world.
But if you don't come when the meat is on the table and only a little broth remains, then Konoha leans in and drinks that broth in one gulp, how do you think those nobles, already on the verge of exploding with resentment, will take it?
"This situation is really not optimistic."
Senju Tobirama sat in his office chair, face clouded. Over the past few days, Konoha had received a flood of mission cancellations. For shinobi, taking and completing missions is practically their only source of income.
This struck at the village's very foundation.
With his keen nose, Tobirama immediately traced the cancellations back to their cause.
Damn it, tulips again.
"Those despicable profiteers will stop at nothing for money."
"And now Konoha is carrying the whole blame."
To recover the lost five hundred million ryō, Tobirama had Hashirama catalyze a massive batch of tulips, then placed them for sale in tulip markets across the Land of Fire.
Considering the need for publicity and the bleak market outlook, the spot goods had to be offloaded quickly.
So the merchants released news that large quantities of tulips could be supplied. A flood of spot tulips did appear in the market. As the story spread, it somehow mutated into unlimited supply. Maybe short-sellers wanted to hammer the price, or maybe someone planted the rumor on purpose.
The original source was impossible to verify.
In any case, that was the message that got out.
Then something worse happened.
To test whether the claim was true, tulip market operators placed enormous purchase orders with Konoha. Tobirama, thrilled, stayed up all night, convinced a huge profit was coming, and cheerfully agreed. Konoha really could supply tulips without limit.
A chain reaction followed.
By then, tulip prices were running on faith. Once that faith cracked, prices plunged in a headlong slide that nothing could stop.
It happened too fast to react.
Nobles who had been shorn turned their anger toward Konoha. Rumors spread that Konoha had orchestrated the price all along, and this move was just to take another bite of a blood-soaked bun. Every kind of accusation appeared.
Once the mud is on your pants, it looks like filth no matter what.
Given Konoha's military strength, the nobles had no way to take coercive measures. But when it came to boycotts that would make Konoha miserable, they had as many tricks as they needed.
The mass cancellation of Konoha missions was merely the appetizer, and even that was almost more than Tobirama could stand.
This disaster had erupted on Senju Hashirama's watch. If the Uchiha clan got a handle on it, things would go bad.
"Tobirama, what should we do now?"
Hashirama, unusually, came to the office. Even he sensed the urgency. Konoha had absorbed so many clans. If they couldn't get missions, they really might choose to withdraw.
Even the title God of Shinobi could not solve that. Clans have to eat.
"We go and seek an audience with the daimyō."
Tobirama looked despondent.
He had already locked down the news inside Konoha, but that could not hold for long. The best course now was to secure direct support for Konoha Village from the daimyō of the Land of Fire.
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