That night, Nobunaga stayed in the Anbu archives all night long.
He was now an Anbu Jonin. Rasa had personally promoted him.
Nominally, it was a normal promotion, but in reality, Rasa needed someone in the Anbu to help him keep an eye on certain things.
Things that couldn't be seen on the surface, the truth behind the numbers.
The light in the archives was very dim.
An oil lamp, a pile of scrolls, and a person sitting in the corner. Outside the window, the desert night wind howled.
Nobunaga flipped through them one by one.
The Hidden Sand Village's financial reports over the years, mission completion rates, Ninja casualty statistics, the frequency of border skirmishes, records of the Daimyo's funding, and the number of mission requests.
Numbers don't lie. He looked at those numbers.
Military spending was decreasing year by year; this year was only sixty percent of what it was five years ago.
Mission completion rates were dropping every year, not because the Ninjas were getting weaker, but because the missions were too difficult and the rewards were too low.
Casualties were increasing every year, border skirmishes were becoming more frequent, and every time, people died. Those who died were the youngest group.
He put down the last scroll and leaned back into his chair.
The flame of the oil lamp flickered, the wind blew outside, and sand hit the glass with a fine, rustling sound.
He thought of the Sandaime he had seen during the day. The exhaustion in those eyes. That straight-backed figure.
The Sandaime was strong, truly strong, but one strong person couldn't save a Village. This Village had long been backed into a corner.
Nobunaga closed his eyes.
He recalled the history he had read before transmigrating.
The Third Ninja World War. The Hidden Sand Village took the initiative to attack Konoha. The Battle of Kikyo Pass. A crushing defeat.
Many people didn't understand why Sunagakure did that. Knowing they couldn't beat Konoha, why did they still fight? Wasn't that just seeking death?
But at this moment, looking at these numbers, he suddenly understood.
The situation of the Hidden Sand Village was like a person whose house was on fire.
The house is burning, the children are crying, and the wife is shouting for help.
At this time, a strong man is standing outside the door; you know you can't beat him, but you must rush out.
Because if you don't rush out, you will be burned alive.
They weren't being hot-headed and wanting to challenge Konoha alone. They were forced into a corner where they had no choice but to fight.
Trouble within the ranks, and the top combat power had mysteriously disappeared.
The Third Kazekage was assassinated, leaving the Village leaderless.
To make matters worse, powerful enemies outside were taking advantage of the situation; the Hidden Cloud Village immediately launched a massive invasion after learning of the internal strife.
Pressure forced it, and military funding continued to shrink.
The Daimyo had been cutting the budget for years. If they didn't go to war, the Village wouldn't even be able to eat.
This wasn't a war. This was a gamble. A desperate gamble.
The bet wasn't "can we win," but "if we don't fight, we might be finished immediately."
Unfortunately, the results proved that they lost this gamble.
The Hidden Sand Village almost fell to the status of a vassal of Konoha.
Nobunaga opened his eyes and looked at the moonlight outside the window.
In the distance, the stone pillars on the training ground, carved with deep marks by Wind Release, stood quietly like a row of silent tombstones.
He thought of those three children. Temari. Kankuro. Gaara. They would go to the battlefield in this war.
They would face Konoha Ninjas. They would be injured, they would bleed, and they would watch people around them die. They might even die themselves.
"I must do something, something I can do."
A name surfaced in Nobunaga's mind.
Sasori of the Red Sand.
On the surface, he was the Village's rising star. A genius Puppet Master, capable of making puppets more exquisite than those of most Jonin at the age of eighteen.
Chiyo's grandson, the Sandaime's direct disciple. All everyone said was that this child would surely become a pillar of Sunagakure in the future.
But Nobunaga knew what he would do.
So, in the following days, he began to investigate.
His Anbu authority gave him a lot of convenience. He could access all of Sasori's files:
Birth records, training records, mission records, puppet-making records. The files were perfect. So perfect they didn't seem real.
But Nobunaga knew where the stains were. He began to tail him.
The first time he followed him, he discovered Sasori going in and out of an abandoned mining area north of the Village. No one went there anymore; the ore had been depleted, leaving only abandoned tunnels and caves.
What was Sasori doing there? Nobunaga followed him in. Deep in the cave, he saw those puppets. They weren't ordinary puppets. They were puppets made of human bones.
There were complete skeletons, assembled joints, and polished skulls. Those puppets moved flexibly and were much stronger than ordinary puppets. But the material wasn't wood or metal; it was humans.
Nobunaga didn't move. He just took note of it.
Chiyo's influence in the Hidden Sand Village was no less than that of the Kazekage, and Sasori was her only descendant. Furthermore, Sasori carried the highest expectations for the future of Sunagakure's Puppet Masters.
With just a few civilians, there was no way to touch Sasori.
Moving against him would be like alerting the snake, making an enemy of Chiyo's family.
When that time came, let alone stopping him, whether he could even stay alive would be a problem.
He needed more evidence and a foolproof opportunity.
The second time he followed him, he found Sasori collecting Preservative agents. That kind of medicine had a very strong smell and was brewed using a special method to prevent corpses from rotting.
Purchasing this agent required registration and an explanation of its use. Sasori used an alias, purchased it from different sources, and only bought a little bit each month.
But Nobunaga followed the clues and found that the Preservative agents Sasori had purchased in the past year were enough to process dozens of corpses.
Yet on the missing persons reports, there were fewer than ten people.
Nobunaga knew what this meant.
Who were those extra ones?
He didn't move. He was waiting.
The third time he followed him, he saw the names.
That night, Nobunaga sneaked into Sasori's residence. In a hidden compartment, he found a scroll. The moment he unfurled it, his hand paused.
On it were names packed closely together. Arranged by time and categorized by status.
At first, they were ordinary people, then wandering Ninjas, then Genin, then Chunin, then Jonin.
Those names had all appeared on the missing persons list later.
But the last three names had not appeared yet.
Temari. Kankuro. Gaara.
Three names, written together.
Nobunaga stared at those three names for a long time, the pair of Mangekyo in his pupils spinning silently.
In the next second.
Nobunaga closed his eyes; his Mangekyo Sharingan had always been hidden and never used.
Because every time he used it, the risk of exposure increased.
The Uchiha Clan was in Konoha, and the Sharingan was their symbol.
Once exposed, it would be hard for him to explain.
But now... he opened his eyes; it was time to use it.
Tomorrow night, he would go to the mining area to secretly deal with the trouble that was Sasori.
Then he would frame Konoha for it.
Nobunaga put away the scroll and walked out of Sasori's residence.
He walked on the way back to his residence, his mind already calculating tomorrow's operation. How to approach, how to act, and how to handle the aftermath.
When he walked past the Anbu office building, he saw that the lights were still on inside.
Someone was working overtime.
Nobunaga's footsteps paused; he hesitated for a moment, then pushed the door and walked in.
Tomorrow's operation would require Anbu authority and some equipment. It was better to prepare everything now.