"Brother, under no circumstances can Konoha escalate this. We must call on both Akatsuki Village and Kumogakure to exercise restraint, then dispatch a Konoha force to the front to mediate and arbitrate, preventing further expansion.
"But since Akatsuki is our ally, inside Konoha we'll announce we're forming a force to aid them—aid in name, mediation in fact."
Senju Tobirama had decided to protect Konoha in his own way.
He quietly tossed out the first plan that popped into his head; he knew full well his brother would never agree to it.
So he would take the middle road.
Let big brother play the good man,
smooth things over.
For Konoha.
This time Tobirama would simply let him have it.
As for the "mediation plan" he was now proposing, you could call it utter nonsense.
Only his brother could be naïve enough to believe mediation would work.
Akatsuki had won big on the battlefield; their momentum was surging—how could they possibly back off now? And Kumogakure had lost over a thousand ninja in one night—how could they swallow that?
Akatsuki had only won by surprise tactics. They had indeed shown great strength, but Cloud was still the great village that dominated the Land of Lightning, not a clay idol.
Once they recovered, they would unleash the wildest revenge on Akatsuki.
The war had only begun.
Both sides would beat each other's brains out.
Akatsuki was marching under the banner of "avenging our fallen Chunin," and as their ally Konoha should, in principle, stand unconditionally with Akatsuki.
However—
Akatsuki's current strength had surpassed Tobirama's expectations. He believed he had to find a way to suppress their growth.
This war was the best chance: let Akatsuki and Cloud fight to the bitter end, boil the frog in warm water, and bleed each other's living strength.
Konoha's job was to delay.
Forming a force requires personnel allocation, talks with each clan, procurement of supplies, building a logistics line… so many tasks, all of which take time.
Aid to Akatsuki wasn't "no aid," but the right kind of aid: have well-off clans provide it; targeted aid, scientific aid, efficient aid, strategic aid; put powerful ninja on it; let administratively gifted clans like the Senju lead it… and always keep "special circumstances" for flexibility.
In short, there were endless pretexts for delay.
Give Tobirama a minute and he could list a handful.
Only one thing worried him: village opinion.
He feared the public sentiment he had just pushed down would rise again. Uchiha Makoto and the Uchiha's schemes came in ones, then twos, then threes. If they tasted success meddling with opinion this time, what would stop them next time from interfering in Konoha's internal governance—and after that?
Would they try to meddle in the selection of the next Hokage?
The thought unsettled him.
How could that be allowed?
He had already earmarked himself as Second Hokage.
"Shadow Hokage," "Konoha's Nine-Thousand-Year-Old"—those weren't empty titles.
He had founded the Anbu, designed the academy…
Who burned the midnight oil in the Hokage's office?
His brother? Uchiha Madara? Some other Uchiha?
Every clan could see it.
The ten-billion-ryō purse from the Fire Daimyō wasn't nothing, either.
Crude as it sounded, it was true in Akatsuki, in Konoha, in the whole ninja world: control the purse, and your voice carries.
Those who stood with Konoha's Nine-Thousand-Year-Old,
who pledged loyalty to him,
would be first in line for Konoha's fiscal support.
Tobirama's political sense was keen. He knew how to use power and how to win clans over.
Give them enough,
and even if they weren't his people at first, they would become his.
Many clans in the village were already willing to back him. The Senju went without saying; the Sarutobi and Shimura were die-hard supporters.
When Hiruzen Sarutobi and Danzō Shimura caused a catastrophe, it was Tobirama who begged his brother to clean it up; afterward he'd even been mocked to his face by that born-evil Uchiha brat, Uchiha Makoto. A favor that big could never be repaid.
To bind those two clans completely, Tobirama had even gritted his teeth and taken Hiruzen and Danzō as disciples.
Of course, it helped that both were promising. To atone, they trained day and night, ran missions, and scraped together money to pay him back, wishing for two days in one.
Tobirama saw their effort.
The young err—often gravely—
but there's no greater good than knowing fault and mending it.
If they kept at it, those two would amount to something.
Beyond them,
the Ino–Shika–Chō triad had core heirs who wanted to study under him,
as did the Aburame,
the Inuzuka…
and a host of lesser clans—his potential base.
Konoha could have only one voice and one will—the Hokage's voice and the Hokage's will. Since his brother would not govern, the Shadow Hokage—the Nine-Thousand-Year-Old—would rule in full.
He would never allow stray noise to disrupt Konoha's operations, derail his plans, or cloud its future. As for those base-level ninja bewitched by Uchiha Makoto, and those ignorant villagers—normally Tobirama cherished his plumage and let things slide.
But now he resolved that a few feathers could be shed.
Because this was to save Konoha's future.
At the crucial moment,
if villagers and rank-and-file ninja would not follow Konoha's will, they were no longer ordinary villagers and ninja.
Tobirama would not be soft.
For such people, he would strike with a heavy hand.
All for Konoha.
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