"The tailed beasts currently under the control of the Five Great Hidden Villages are: the Nine-Tails in Konoha; the Eight-Tails and Two-Tails in Kumo; the One-Tail in Suna; the Three-Tails in Kiri… though that one's already GG'd. We just have to wait for it to respawn… hey, how long does it take a tailed beast to revive?"
At that point, Yorin turned his head and looked at his adviser, Black Zetsu.
Face twisted like he'd just eaten something foul, Black Zetsu still answered Uchiha Yorin's question—while feeling secretly, wildly excited.
Heaven and earth knew what he'd been living through lately.
That damned Uchiha Yorin was finally willing to mobilize his power to collect the tailed beasts and save Mother.
He had no idea why Yorin suddenly got so proactive.
Wasn't this guy scared?
Before this, Yorin had clearly stated: unless he reached Sage of Six Paths–level power, he absolutely would not release Mother.
But now he was starting to collect the tailed beasts again…
Could it be his strength had already jumped up to the Six Paths tier?
Come on. Since when is Six Paths–level as common as cabbage? You don't just "boom, now I'm Six Paths".
His Yin–Yang Release hadn't advanced that far. He didn't have any Truth-Seeking Orbs floating behind him, either.
But that perfect Sage Mode did make Black Zetsu take him more seriously. And yeah, Hashirama deserved credit for that too.
People who only looked at the surface thought Hashirama was broken because of Wood Release… but anyone who actually knew things understood: it was Hashirama himself who was broken.
Even among Asura's reincarnations, Senju Hashirama was absurd. Black Zetsu honestly believed that even Asura himself, fighting Hashirama, would get smacked so hard by one Sage Art: True Several Thousand Hands – Top Transformed Buddha that his own mother wouldn't recognize him.
Black Zetsu even harbored a borderline-heretical thought: on paper, Mother's stats looked better—but if it came down to a real fight, she might actually lose to Hashirama.
When he evaluated Uchiha Yorin's strength, he used Hashirama as the reference point. After all, Yorin had restored a perfect Sage Mode and could flawlessly draw on the world's natural energy.
The sky's, the ocean's, the earth's.
And his ultimate technique was a giant, like True Several Thousand Hands—but not a wood giant. It was a Primordial Titan, created by fusing sky, land, and sea natural energy.
If you used Hashirama's naming conventions, you could call it:
Sage Art: True Uchiha of Many Hands – Primordial Titan.
As for what element it counted as, everyone had their own take.
Iwa-nin insisted it was a fusion of Earth and Lightning Release—obviously a form of Steel Release.
Kumo-nin claimed it was a fusion of Lightning and Water—clearly the legendary Storm Release.
Konoha, meanwhile, declared it Water and Earth fusion—Wood Release reborn, naturally.
Everyone had their own justification. Uchiha Yorin couldn't be bothered.
What affinity it was didn't matter. As far as he was concerned, as long as it was strong enough, anything was fine.
…
"About a year or two," Black Zetsu answered.
Yorin fell into thought.
"A year or two, huh… that's enough time."
He nodded and started calculating.
"In Iwa, we only have Han, the Five-Tails Jinchūriki…
So that's five beasts held by the great villages, plus one waiting on its respawn timer. Then there are the rogue jinchūriki: Utakata and Rōshi, and Fū in Taki…
Wait a sec, the timing on her age doesn't quite line up.
Then again, this timeline's age logic is already broken for more than just one person, so whatever."
Thinking of how he spent every day happily snuggling up with Kurotsuchi and Temari, and eagerly waiting for Hanabi to hurry up and grow up, Yorin decided one more jinchūriki with a weird age curve was really not a big deal.
…
"All right then. First we take out the two rogue jinchūriki and grab the Four-Tails and Six-Tails.
Then we hit Takigakure.
A dinky little village holding onto a tailed beast—a bona fide weapon of mass destruction—is really getting ahead of itself. Gotta deal with that. We have to deal with that."
Small hidden villages and rogue jinchūriki were easy. Big villages were not. If he tried pulling beasts out of those while the current alliance was still this loose, it was guaranteed to provoke refusal and hostility from the big five—and might even light the fuse for a Fifth Great Ninja War.
Then he'd be fighting the Ōtsutsuki on one side and putting down rebellions on the other. There wouldn't be enough of him to go around.
"So before extracting tailed beasts," Yorin thought, "we unify the world first."
Once he confirmed those two points, he turned back to Black Zetsu.
"Then tell me where Rōshi and Utakata are. I'll take them down and seal their beasts first."
"I'm not your subordinate, you bastard."
He said that, but Black Zetsu still grumbled his way off at top speed to gather intel exactly as ordered.
No matter how uneasy Yorin's strength made him, he still had to work hard—for Mother's sake.
As for Utakata and Rōshi, he really didn't care. For ordinary people, jinchūriki were doomsday weapons, but for a monster like Uchiha Yorin, tailed beasts were just little scrubs to be kneaded at will.
Like Yugito last night.
…
"So who gets taken down first, the Four-Tails or the Six-Tails? If I can choose, I'd prefer the Four-Tails. Of all names, it just had to pick 'Son Gokū'…"
As a former reader, Yorin had a special feeling about that name, of course.
It was one thing for that Saiyan Kakarot to claim it. But now some four-tailed giant ape dared call itself Son Gokū too? Forget tolerating it—he wanted nothing more than to literally slap that face.
…
A few days later, Black Zetsu brought good news.
They'd found a jinchūriki's trail. Unfortunately, it was Utakata, not Rōshi.
Which actually made sense. In the original timeline, Rōshi dressed as a wandering monk and roamed constantly, while Utakata had a fixed, hidden retreat near the legendary Tsuchigumo clan, making him much easier for Black Zetsu to keep tabs on.
"Then we'll start with Utakata—and maybe clean up the Tsuchigumo clan while we're at it."
This world never ran out of ridiculous superweapons. The Tsuchigumo clan's forbidden technique, Fury, was one of them—rumored to be able to destroy a million square kilometers.
That was obviously an exaggeration. But even leveling a few dozen square kilometers would be insane.
Fury was another way of weaponizing natural energy.
Unlike Yorin's precise control, the Tsuchigumo clan lacked finesse; they just treated it like a giant bomb.
"An unregistered clan sitting on a weapon of mass destruction?" Yorin snorted. "Can't let that slide. We have to hit them hard."
…
That was the plan, at least—until a new intel report hit his desk and made Yorin decide the Tsuchigumo clan could enjoy a few more seconds of life.
"Ugh. The Sky Ninja, huh."
It was the Sky Ninja.
They'd kept their heads down all this time, but lately they'd suddenly gotten active again—secretly contacting noble houses who had enough power and enough reason to hate Uchiha Yorin.
Those nobles had one thing in common: they were all hardline anti-Yorin holdouts.
Whether or not they'd actually done anything yet, to hear them talk, they supposedly wanted to march an army on Konoha right now, butcher everyone in the village, dig up the First Hokage's grave, slice earthworms lengthwise and smash eggs flat.
Given that, the Sky Ninja figured they could profit.
You hate Konoha, we hate Konoha—clearly we're on the same side, right?
If we're on the same side, and Sky needs money and resources and especially lab gear right now, shouldn't you show some generosity?
Yes, their main goal was shaking people down.
Their leader, Shennong, had smelled the wind shift. Lately, Kazahana Dotō's fall had only deepened his unease.
Konoha's power was skyrocketing. Meanwhile, the Sky Ninja were stuck in place.
If Uchiha Yorin really did conquer the world, unify the ninja world and rebuild Shin Sect, then wouldn't Sky Ninja be a punchline?
When exactly were all their plans for revenge and Konoha's destruction supposed to happen?
Unacceptable. Totally unacceptable. They had to speed up and act now.
So the Sky Ninja sent out emissaries to various traditionally anti-Konoha nobles, hoping for backing and "friendship"—to get funding.
You support Sky today, Sky destroys Konoha tomorrow, and the good days are back for you. What's not to like?
The idea was good. The results, however, were… not.
Honestly, they'd just been shut-ins too long. Their social skills had decayed to tragic levels.
What should have been mutual benefit came off, in their delivery, almost like extortion.
And as for the claim that all these resources would go toward "avenge us against Konoha"—the nobles didn't believe a word of it.
Sky Ninja? Who?
What level do you think you're on? What level is Konoha? You think you can just decide to take revenge? Give us a break.
They'd rather spend that time finding a woman and making heirs.
One after another, the enraged nobles wrote to Konoha like snowflakes in a blizzard, begging them to send someone to deal with these supposed "Sky Ninja" thugs.
Yorin: "Okay, okay, got it. Konoha will absolutely take care of this."
After seeing emissary after emissary and then repeating the same nonsense via long-distance calls and letters, even Yorin, despite being a professional who never laughs, was struggling to keep a straight face.
This was really a case of being too clever for your own good.
Once he finally hung up, Uchiha Yorin couldn't help it anymore and let out a long, delighted laugh.
"Then it's decided."
Before collecting the tailed beasts, he'd crush the Sky Ninja first.
~~~
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