"Here it is, Madara-sama!"
Hi-kun came jogging over, carrying the dust-covered crimson armor.
As it walked, it kept wiping the armor with its arm. By the time it finished, one of its pale white hands was coated in gray dust.
Madara's heart stirred.
His armor had actually gathered dust?
It was only to be expected.
When he left the village, he had taken nearly all of the ninja tools he had ever used from the Uchiha Clan compound.
His armor, his war scythe, his chained sickle, the Uchiha Gunbai, several Three-Tomoe Sharingan...
...and a number of precious scrolls.
Perhaps, deep down, Madara had never truly believed he was guaranteed to defeat Hashirama.
Maybe he had expected the battle to end in a stalemate, too close to call.
If he had to leave Konohagakure afterward, he'd still need somewhere to stay—
A place to regroup and resupply before continuing the fight.
Madara stared at the dust covering the armor, his emotions growing complicated.
Back then, he probably never imagined that he would end up hiding inside a cave for so many years without making a single move...
Nearly meditating himself straight into death.
"Take this armor... and send it to Hiruzen," Madara instructed after a brief pause.
"Huh?"
Hi-kun froze.
For once, it couldn't simply agree with whatever Madara said.
"Madara-sama, you just fought the Hokage. How am I supposed to deliver it? Wouldn't that be practically confessing everything?"
"Hi-kun, in the shinobi world, strength comes first—but wisdom is just as important." Madara tapped his temple.
"Only those who know how to use their brains can remain undefeated."
Hi-kun blinked.
"I'm not telling you to place my armor on Hiruzen's desk."
"The Uchiha Clan's auxiliary storage house is filled with sealed-away scrolls. Just leave it there. Before and after every war, someone from the clan always checks those inventories."
"The Uchiha will naturally discover it then," Madara patiently explained.
This White Zetsu had developed a fair amount of humanity.
Among them, it was one of the few he genuinely liked dealing with.
"Once the Uchiha discover the armor, if they don't hand it over, then when someone else eventually finds out, it'll become a small but troublesome scandal—enough to crack the trust between Konohagakure and the Uchiha."
"It's nothing more than an idle move."
Hi-kun nodded vigorously, indicating that it had once again been awestruck by Madara-sama's wisdom.
But in reality...
That wasn't what it was thinking at all.
Why do I get the feeling...
Madara-sama just wants to see the Hokage wearing his armor?
He's upset because the Hokage wore Hashirama's armor instead!
Naturally, Hi-kun didn't dare say any of that aloud.
If the awkward Madara-sama flew into a rage out of embarrassment, that definitely wouldn't end well...
It was a smart White Zetsu!
As for why Hi-kun was so clever...
Part of it came from the enhancement provided by the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path, along with all the books it had read.
But another reason was that, before it had made a name for itself, it had spent a long time lurking around Hiruko's home, secretly monitoring the words and actions of this Konoha council member...
Without realizing it, it had picked up some of his habits.
"Hi-kun, from now on, you'll be responsible for cleaning my ninja tools."
Madara continued issuing orders.
Seeing his equipment covered in dust left him faintly irritated...
Besides, circumstances had changed now.
Overall, he still needed to prevent his identity from being exposed, but if something unexpected happened, he might have to don his armor and make some adjustments to the plan.
After absorbing the chakra inside Nagato that had been passively transformed by the Rinnegan, Madara's body had grown noticeably younger.
He was now about as fit as a robust old man.
His raw strength was sufficient.
His stamina, however, was another matter.
"Understood, Madara-sama..."
Hi-kun nodded obediently.
It had never seen Hiruko's research journals.
Those were strictly confidential, only accessible inside the laboratory or through scrolls sealed with Fūinjutsu that could only be opened and closed under controlled conditions.
But Hiruzen's quotations and Hiruko's handwritten notes beside them...
Those it had read with great enthusiasm.
One line, in particular, had left a deep impression on it:
'Any job that lets you work with the Hokage is a good job...'
Applied to itself...
That meant anything done in service of Madara-sama was a good job!
"Good. Black Zetsu!"
Madara gave Hi-kun a satisfied glance.
After spending more than half a year monitoring Nagato, Black Zetsu had finally returned to the side of the reincarnation of Indra it served so faithfully.
"Here's a list. Take the White Zetsu with you and search the entire shinobi world for the corpses of these shinobi."
"That beast, the Nine-Tails, has gotten smarter after spending so much time in Konoha..."
"We're strategically scaling back our presence in Konohagakure. Just leave a handful of elite squads in Kirigakure and the Uchiha Clan compound."
Madara issued his orders to Black Zetsu.
The White Zetsu's intelligence-gathering capabilities inside Konohagakure had been growing weaker and weaker.
It wasn't because their Transformation Technique was being exposed.
Rather, with their intelligence, it was becoming increasingly difficult for them to grasp the fundamentals of concealing themselves while moving, making it easier for others to notice something suspicious.
Not to mention...
Mito had recently become obsessed with taking walks.
Aside from rarely visiting the Uchiha Clan compound, the old lady spent every day strolling around after meals with Yamato in tow and a little fox following at her side.
She could easily rack up tens of thousands of steps in a single outing...
She had practically become a walking radar!
How were the White Zetsu supposed to deal with that?
Black Zetsu's face stiffened.
It had only just returned from such a long assignment and hadn't even had time to warm its seat...
...and now it was being sent out on another mission?
To dig up the graves of those lowly shinobi?
This was nothing but dirty, exhausting work!
"Yes, Madara-sama..."
Even if it was, by status, the noble third son of the Rabbit Goddess, when living under someone else's roof, it still had no choice but to bow its head.
Black Zetsu accepted the list and examined it carefully.
The Gold and Silver Brothers...
The tragic pair—the Second Tsuchikage and the Second Mizukage...
The Second Raikage...
Uzumaki Ashina...
Six dead people in total.
Then there were three living candidates.
Sasori of Sunagakure.
The leader of the Jashin Cult from the Land of Hot Water.
Karatachi Yagura of Kirigakure.
Including Madara himself, that made ten.
Of course, this was only Madara's preliminary list.
The Six Paths puppets created with the Rinnegan were at their best in sets of six, but if one was destroyed, he could simply repair it or replace it with a new one.
The same applied to living people.
Madara still had his eyes on Seisui and Obito...
Though at the moment, his greatest target was still Hiruzen.
He intended to use facts to convince the inheritor of his younger self's will.
Black Zetsu glanced at Hi-kun before suppressing the resentment in its heart.
In the past, dirty and exhausting jobs had always been left to ordinary White Zetsu like them.
Since when had it become its turn?
Still...
As long as Madara could pull himself together and stop obsessing over that ridiculous spokesperson plan, Black Zetsu felt that enduring this hardship was worth it.
Thanks to the wealth of experience it had accumulated over a thousand years in the shinobi world, finding a few corpses wouldn't be a problem at all. Gathering information on those living candidates would be just as easy...
As long as they weren't in Konohagakure.
'Madara's finally acting like himself again. Before, he was so timid, and he still wanted to become the Ten-Tails' Jinchūriki?'
'This is what he should've been doing from the start!'
'With the power of the Demonic Statue of the Outer Path and the Rinnegan, all of these powerful shinobi can be turned into tools...'
'Meanwhile, I'll figure out a way to restore as much of his condition as possible. As long as Madara can support the Ten-Tails, all we have to do is wait for the next great shinobi war and ambush the villages' Jinchūriki.'
'If we spend another five or ten years preparing, this will be our best chance yet to rescue Mother!'
Black Zetsu had always been deeply dissatisfied with Madara's spokesperson plan.
Having orchestrated countless schemes over the centuries—most of which had ended in failure—Black Zetsu understood one fundamental truth.
Stretch any plan across twenty or thirty years, and no matter how meticulous it is, cracks will inevitably appear.
There were simply too many unpredictable variables in the shinobi world.
Some extraordinary individual was always bound to emerge out of nowhere.
Besides, in Black Zetsu's eyes, Madara's plan wasn't particularly meticulous to begin with.
It looked more like an excuse to preserve his pride.
'To truly restore Madara's youth, he needs the power that gives rise to all things...'
Black Zetsu found the problem rather troublesome.
That was something only an Ōtsutsuki possessed.
It had a little of that power within itself...
But there was no way it would give it to Madara.
That was the one-time contingency Mother had left behind for it.
Once used, it would be gone forever.
It was meant only for the direst of emergencies.
But where in the shinobi world could it possibly find another Ōtsutsuki?
As far as Black Zetsu was concerned...
That was simply impossible.
'I'll keep searching.'
'The shinobi world is a strange place. Maybe I'll stumble across someone with a unique constitution who's basically a walking super-tonic.'
'And if all else fails, I'll trick Madara into gambling everything on a temporary restoration. Let's see how easily I can play him.'
Now that hope had returned, Black Zetsu threw itself into its work with even greater enthusiasm.
What Black Zetsu didn't realize, however, was that Madara had never intended for the Six Paths puppets to charge into battle all at once...
At least, not at the beginning.
Because the very nature of the situation had quietly changed.
Now, the real test was whether Konohagakure's system could withstand the pressure and survive in the shinobi world.
That would serve as the anchor point for awakening Hiruzen's deeper reflection and ultimately lead him to embrace the Eye of the Moon Plan of his own accord.
Madara considered himself a reasonable man.
Back then, he hadn't started his career by challenging Senju Butsuma.
At most, he had fought opponents only two age groups above his own.
The pressure he placed on Konohagakure should follow the same principle.
Besides, Madara was also worried about pushing Hiruzen too far.
If Hiruzen became desperate enough to use Impure World Reincarnation to summon the Senju brothers...
And if they returned with most of the strength they had possessed in life...
That would become a serious problem.
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