The First Tsuchikage led his Iwagakure shinobi away from the negotiation site.
Next he still had to find a way to negotiate with Kumogakure, to make the Cloud present a satisfactory compensation plan so Akatsuki Village would withdraw and cease hostilities.
Uchiha Makoto also chose not to linger. He smiled, his lips moving, his expression full of a victor's mockery, casting a covert glance at Senju Tobirama's still-dark face.
Tobirama instantly read Makoto's lip-speech: "Senju Tobirama, you big idiot."
Brief, direct, straight from the chest.
His face went from black to red, then red to purple—like a Sichuan opera mask change—but in front of a crowd like this, what could he do?
Tobirama could do nothing.
"Everyone, it's hot. Remove armor."
"Yes!"
"Let's head back together."
After savoring his triumph, Makoto stopped tangling with Tobirama and issued orders to the Akatsuki, the Uzumaki, and the Konoha shinobi.
Tobirama felt his authority challenged yet again. But it really was hot, and when Makoto told them to strip armor, they actually did.
The next day.
Thanks to Akatsuki Village's habit of buying headlines across the shinobi world, they were long-time VIPs of the press.
Akatsuki had always been hot news, and they'd just stirred a string of major events. Every paper not only took a stipend from Akatsuki but saw strong sales from Akatsuki stories. So in the Land of Fire, the Land of Earth, the Land of Lightning, the Land of Wind, the Land of Water—indeed across the entire shinobi world—the front pages, without Makoto even paying this time, all covered the news that Uchiha Makoto had been attacked by a Kumogakure assassin during negotiations.
Once the story broke,
It became the shinobi world's focus within a day.
The carefully prepared photo of Makoto raising his arm and shouting "Fight" also spread everywhere.
The shinobi world's discourse erupted.
No surprise.
Opinion was nearly unanimous in condemning the Cloud more fiercely, and even ordinary people beyond the shinobi world noticed.
You could say
Makoto's attempted assassination cast a shadow over the entire shinobi world.
Its nature was extremely vile.
This wasn't merely about Makoto's life; it would decide the shinobi world's future direction.
The First Hokage's achievement was not only ending the Warring States wars.
He advanced the system, evolving ninja from family workshops into the village era—an organizational form more efficient and with far greater mobilization.
On the surface that seemed fine—great news for shinobi weary of war.
But the Akatsuki–Cloud war made everyone realize something terrifying. In just four months, the dead on both sides had already exceeded four digits.
Such a scale of war.
Such a number of fallen shinobi.
Unthinkable in the Warring States.
It must be admitted.
The village system was far more advanced than the old clan structure. It had bigger budgets, stronger mobilization, more shinobi. The effect was like stacking industrial-era buffs onto war—killing efficiency soared.
The clans' mêlées had already been a generation's nightmare. Now the village meat grinder showed its fangs. Any ordinary person or shinobi who saw that monster would be chilled. If the scale expanded again… unimaginable.
And because the Cloud sent an assassin, the situation really began to slip out of control.
"We'll fight as long as they fight—until complete victory."
"The war won't stop—let the shinobi world burn."
Akatsuki's public statements were severe, a posture of carrying the war to the end. Their ally Konoha could not sit this out, and Iwagakure looked ready to enter.
The one-country-one-village system brought a lull, but after just three years, the war between villages threatened to become harsher than the old clan wars.
An escalation?
A grand mêlée among the great villages?
Not only the shinobi powers worried for the future; even the daimyo were alarmed.
Honestly,
The daimyo didn't like ninja free-for-alls either. War inevitably brought chaos. Who doesn't prefer peace and clear rivers?
They had suffered in the closing Warring States turmoil and had only just recovered some vitality. If marauding ninja again looted across the lands and refugees flooded the roads, their governance costs would spike.
They indeed saw the commoners as leeks to be harvested, but the leeks had to grow first. War's damage to economy and livelihood hit their purses. Still, for certain unspeakable reasons, they sometimes had to stir up shinobi against shinobi.
At first, the daimyo watched Akatsuki versus the Cloud for sport. New-era village tensions were in their interest, and they even opened betting books. In the Land of Fire and beyond, bold nobles reached Makoto through intermediaries, asking if he'd co-manipulate markets.
Damn.
Makoto only hustled for his own village. Akatsuki shinobi were his base. If this ever leaked, his tenure as Shadow would be finished.
Though the deal fell through without burning bridges, he was furious. Such dirty business, taken to him while he bled on the front? Impressive, truly impressive. When the chance comes, he'd have them strap on explosive tags and meet his Susanoo for some green-onion seasoning.
The daimyō of Fire and Lightning viewed the war as investment. After all, villages were the core force safeguarding their rule.
They'd poured funds in; they wanted returns.
Testing villages' combat through war was direct.
The mobilization shown, the number engaged, the number dead shocked them. That alone did not make their eyes pop.
In one sense, the more ninja dead, the happier they were. But for the balance of power, they had to look further ahead.
For whatever reason,
Kumogakure had underperformed. With matters ballooning, Akatsuki planned to drag Konoha and the Uzumaki into a gang fight. A world war was a hair's breadth away.
The Land of Fire's advantage was too great.
If Iwa and Kumo both lost, Kirigakure couldn't intervene on the continent, and Sunagakure was too poor to project force. The smaller villages were even less relevant. Perhaps, propelled by historical inertia, the shinobi world would drift toward unification.
The daimyo and nobles, versed in power's game, did not want that.
If shinobi united into a single rope… next they'd need an enemy.
In this broad world, who qualified as the shinobi's enemy? Without doubt, the daimyo and nobles who held power.
The Fire Daimyo's PTSD flared.
Whenever Konoha came up, the "Hashirama threat theory" lodged in his throat.
If that harmless-looking Hashirama was a deep schemer intending to use Akatsuki to eliminate one or two great villages, what he might do next, the Fire Daimyo dared not imagine.
The daimyo of big and small nations quickly contacted each other, planning to jointly halt an expansion of the war.
"Ha, balance of power again."
"British-style orthodoxy is everywhere."
"So this is the daimyo's golden decree?"
Makoto had not yet fully healed and still lay in his private medical tent, holding a stack of letters.
One was an urgent missive from the Fire Daimyo.
The language was very tactful. Makoto's public relations had been flawless: moral paragon and victim. Even the Fire Daimyo spoke gently.
Makoto, I beg you… withdraw.
For the peace of the shinobi world.
To guard against Hashirama.
As for compensation, the Fire Daimyo said he had contacted the Lightning Daimyo, who would pressure the Cloud to present a reasonable plan.
There was also a letter from Hashirama.
Its contents were similar.
Cookie-cutter.
He hoped Makoto would restrain his anger.
Even as a victim, Hashirama believed Makoto was an idealist willing to sacrifice for peace, who would avoid expanding the war. But this time Hashirama did not mention unconditional ceasefire. He knew that decision had wronged Makoto.
In any case, Makoto and Akatsuki should be compensated.
Other letters came from minor daimyo and mobilized magnates—without exception urging calm.
In short, Makoto felt pressure from all sides.
The Fire Daimyo's golden order, Hashirama's kind persuasion, daimyo of various lands, magnates squeezing. Oh—and Senju Tobirama.
That heavyweight bastard.
Tobirama had holed up in his tent. For certain reasons Makoto had been blocked and could not enter. He didn't know what Tobirama was tinkering with, but from Uzumaki Shinsi's occasional intel, Tobirama was researching some strange, incomprehensible but undoubtedly powerful forbidden technique. Akatsuki's explosive tag barrages had inspired him.
Barring surprises,
Makoto figured Tobirama's project was meant for him.
Faced with colleagues who either wanted to talk him into ending the war or physically erase him to end it permanently, Makoto now somewhat understood the General's hardships on a northern expedition. Why were there opponents everywhere around him?
Thankfully this was all within expectation. From the moment Iwagakure intervened, he'd seen the war nearing its end.
Akatsuki's two strategic goals were basically achieved this time. It was about enough to haul in the benefits. Even if Konoha joined to help beat Iwa and Kumo, the postwar layout for Akatsuki would not be better than with a ceasefire now. The more legacy Hashirama left Tobirama, the harder it would be for Makoto to deal with Tobirama later.
Makoto himself carried a bit of that British-style orthodoxy. Given the current situation—viewing the whole board, surveying past and present, considering departmental averages, analyzing and summarizing—one might conclude, to be blunt even if unpleasant, that if the war continued, Akatsuki's prospects would become delicate.
His hardline posture in the papers—a vow to fight to the end—was merely to wrest more in compensation.
Even the Lightning Daimyo would have to pay a cut.
Thus,
Under multi-front mediation,
Makoto, seeing the Cloud willing to compensate and sincerely repent, once more chose sacrifice for peace—agreeing to resume ceasefire talks. The Akatsuki–Cloud war finally neared its end.
At this result,
The Fire Daimyo was satisfied.
The other daimyo exhaled.
Hashirama again affirmed Makoto's resolve to protect peace.
Tobirama remained unhappy.
And the actual fighters of Akatsuki and the Cloud knew perfectly well: the ceasefire was only temporary. What looked like the end of one war was the start of another.
Akatsuki still felt the job half-done, planning to find a chance to finish off that mad dog of a Cloud. The Cloud held its breath: the First Raikage dead, the first and second lines smashed in a night, and the blood-debt of thousands of dead shinobi.
Until the grudge is extinguished, the war will not stop.
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