When the news spread that the Land of Water had fallen—that the Water Daimyō had been captured, would be publicly tried, and then sent to the guillotine—every other country, big or small, was hit with the same stunned, disbelieving "holy shit" shock. For a moment, no one could even process what they were supposed to do next.
Because they couldn't win a war. If they surrendered and tried to become a vassal state, the other side wouldn't even accept them. So wasn't there only one option left—wait to die?
In theory, yes: wait to die. But even the biggest losers don't just lie down that easily.
Even if you're about to crush an ant, the ant will still struggle and run, right? And these weren't ants—they were entire nations.
Of course… their struggle was about as meaningful as an ant's, too.
And yes, you shouldn't kill ants just because you're bored. An ant's life is still a life.
But killing lords and daimyō? That's fine.
Because those people have it coming.
Of course, we're civilized, righteous people here. Killing is allowed—but not torture. It has to be legal: trial first, then justice carried out.
That was the idea.
The four remaining great nations tried to form a coalition army and block the Shinobi Republic's forces; it meant nothing. Every attempt at resistance was erased almost instantly.
As for the smaller countries? Even easier. They were blown apart in minutes.
Some idiots decided: If we can't win head-on, we'll fight dirty.
Ambushes like bandits. Sabotage while hiding among civilians. Fake surrender, then stab them in the back the moment their guard drops…
A lot of fools believed they only lost before because they were "too honorable."
They thought: If we ditch morals and rules, if we stop being bound by limits, we'll become invincible.
But that wasn't how it worked. Those rules had been protecting them too.
Because the moment you throw away the rules, you also give everyone else permission to do the same.
In a world without rules, the people who used to be sheltered—arrogant, self-important types—are the first to taste real pain and helplessness. They finally learn the world isn't the naive fairytale they imagined.
So the "Four Great Nations" coalition—well, four now—faced the next-generation military and lost.
They were routed, butchered, and stripped of any possibility of recovery. They collapsed in a messy, irreversible chain of defeats and then—inevitably—ceased to exist.
There was no heroic last stand. No "final samurai." No "greatest soldier of the Warring States" legend.
Even if someone like that existed, they were still just trash in front of the Shinobi Republic's absolute power.
Maybe tens of thousands of years later, in some far-off era, when people finally couldn't endure the Republic's rule anymore and tried to overthrow it, they would invent stirring legends—using the past as propaganda for the present.
But for now, the Shinobi Republic stood for justice, victory, and strength.
Every word used to describe a top-tier imperial superpower could be projected onto the Shinobi Republic.
And it was even stronger, more competent, and more terrifying than anyone had imagined.
When the Republic unified the shinobi world the global evaluation was positive, positive, and overwhelmingly positive.
Even the aristocrats and lords it wiped out—no matter what they said out loud—had to admit privately:
"Impressive."
Maybe they hoped they could pivot into court-jester mode and earn a meal ticket.
Too bad.
This time Uchiha Yōrin's war was thorough. He didn't want to leave any hidden dangers behind, so he killed them all.
And so the shinobi world was unified.
Unified beneath the Shinobi Republic's "Five-Elements" banner.
If a 21st-century person saw the Republic's flag, they'd probably blurt out, "Wait, isn't that the Olympics?"
To bind the five biggest hidden villages together—and to reflect chakra's elemental transformations—Yōrin designed the flag with yin-yang tones framing five interlinked "element" symbols. At a glance, yeah, it looked a bit like the Olympic rings.
But that didn't matter. Nobody in this world recognized that reference anyway.
Letting that "five-ring flag" fly over every corner of the shinobi world was just one more private joke from Yōrin.
A world unified beneath five rings, a unified republic—honestly, it was kind of delightful.
Of course, after that, plenty of people came to "advise" him:
Before, sure, he hadn't unified the world yet—being a dictator was fine.
But now he'd united everything, become the world's ruler. So upgrading from dictator to emperor should be easy, right?
Yōrin refused again.
If you're going to push the world forward, don't do it halfway.
With Yōrin's power, he didn't need the title "emperor" to get emperor-level authority and privilege.
Titles weren't the point. The real point was power and control.
This wasn't some rule-based "female-lead logic world" where labels mattered more than force.
At first people didn't believe him. They assumed it was just the classic three-refusals performance, so they kept "urging" him.
He still refused, firmly.
Only then did they accept: he wasn't acting.
He genuinely didn't want to be emperor.
That sparked confusion—and even anger.
Confusion: Why would he do that?
Anger: because he was blocking everyone else's path.
Like the saying goes: "If you won't take it, how can I take it? If I won't take it, how can Director Smith take it? How are we supposed to 'advance'?"
If Yōrin wasn't going to be emperor, then people who dreamed of being princes, dukes, feudal lords—there were plenty of them.
He'd cut off their ladder. Of course they were annoyed.
But what could they do?
Yōrin did what he wanted.
After unifying the world, his power surged again—so far beyond the old Sage of Six Paths that it wasn't even comparable.
Even if people were unhappy, nobody dared to rebel.
After a brief wave of grumbling and instability, life went on.
Even if someone did rebel, Yōrin wasn't afraid.
A new generation of shinobi was rising—more numerous, more loyal, stronger, trained in a modern system with modern doctrine and modern combat methods.
If the old guard ever tried to revolt, that would be perfect: crush them and replace them with the new era's people.
The unified era—the prosperous era—the era of building, equality, and "everyone can become a dragon"—no longer had room for feudal sludge to crawl back out of the mud.
And to Yōrin's relief, while some of his subordinates were still confused about priorities, his harem was remarkably cooperative.
None of them threw tantrums about wanting to be "queen" or "imperial consort."
Whether that was because Yōrin had trained them well, or because they were simply good girls—either way, as long as he cared for them and spent time with them, they were happy to back his decisions.
And honestly… most of Yōrin's decisions were correct. Supporting him was basically choosing victory on easy mode.
So yes—everyone in the shinobi world lived happily ever after. Everyone lived peacefully, joyfully, under lasting peace.
Congratulations. Congratulations…
No.
That wasn't the real ending.
If Yōrin could choose, he'd love a simple fairytale happy ending too.
But he couldn't.
Because this world had the Ōtsutsuki—a species like cosmic locusts.
They'd had their eyes on the shinobi world for a long time. Sooner or later, they would invade again.
If they succeeded, everything would be annihilated.
Even though Yōrin had grown stronger—far beyond "Six Paths," into the so-called "elite" tier—his power had still risen again after unifying the world.
But how strong, exactly?
He asked Black Zetsu, and even Zetsu didn't know. Zetsu was, at best, a deformed premature byproduct—he didn't actually have deep Ōtsutsuki intelligence.
If someone like Zetsu returned to the Ōtsutsuki, he'd be eaten like a snack. That's how cold they were.
…
And even if Yōrin exceeded Ōtsutsuki "elites," that still didn't mean he was invincible.
The legendary Ōtsutsuki God had supposedly broken through dimensions into a higher plane.
Even ignoring that being—how many monsters did the Ōtsutsuki still have in reserve?
Yōrin had no idea.
So, planning for worst-case scenarios, he still needed at least one Ōtsutsuki as an ally.
Kaguya might be a lousy fighter—basically a stationary artillery piece with zero skill—but even a stationary artillery piece was a valuable ally.
Yes, Yōrin had already made progress on synthesizing Ōtsutsuki genetics.
But he was still far from full success.
And he didn't even want to copy their grotesque "devour each other" biology perfectly—so he'd have to keep refining it anyway.
In that situation…
Kaguya was the best option.
~~~
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