The cart trundled along the dusty, winding road. The wheels, barely holding themselves together from the long journey, through mountain passes, grasslands and the deep forest that now surrounded them, rolled along. As he guided the horse along, he looked back to the cart, to once again check on the valuable cargo.
His wife of many years and his children, asleep in the cart atop whatever meager possessions they could scrape together in time to avoid the destruction that awaited them at what used to be their home. They were exhausted from the long journey and, truth be told, he probably should have been asleep with them.
But not yet, not until they reached their destination, where they would be truly safe.
As the sun rose he shielded his eyes, the bright light painful to his bloodshot gaze. As the sun's intensity waned, he moved his hand from his gaze, and what welcomed him gave the man a great smile.
The sight of a large village, perched in front of a great mountain, the carvings of three truly exceptional leaders placed upon it.
Konohagakure no Sato, the Village Hidden in the Leaves. A place of refuge for those disposed, like his family. He quickly roused his family from their slumber, anxious to let them see the beginnings of their new life.
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"I doubt they can even fathom their fortune."
The Sandaime Hokage, in a particularly wistful mood, looked out the window of his tower, watching as new bands of refugees were arriving in his city.
War was a terrible thing, and the Third Great Shinobi War would be no exception to that, it seemed. The greatest conflict between the ninja villages to date saw an almost immeasurable amount of damage done the continent over, spanning a great many villages, cities and towns the entire way. The war between the villages ravaged a great deal of the land, as more and more powerful ninja, with great jutsu, were being brought to the fold, a struggle for dominance between the elemental countries tearing the world apart.
Konoha had not seen direct damage from the war and, although Sarutobi would be eternally thankful that his own home and family had been spared the destruction that did not mean that he was not fully aware of the cost this war was having. The mortality reports from the various battles were one such reminder.
Another was watching people ride into the village, their livelihoods, their fortunes, so much they had ever known, destroyed. It started with the outer-rim of the Fire Country's borders, with several farmers and villagers from the outlaying territories flooding to Konoha for safety. Only to learn, once Konoha had managed to push back the assaults, that their lands, homes that had been in some of their families for generations, had been destroyed by the conflict. That Konoha would have to act as their new home.
Then there were those who were not so fortunate as to leave the sites of battles early, assured by their leaders that their country's ninja would be able to keep them safe and keep enemy movements at bay. Imagine the shock and horror they must have gone through when the lines were broken, and suddenly their own homes were the sites of great battles between the warring states.
All the villages were seeing floods of refugees like this, but Konoha's safety, having been untouched by the greater conflict, drew a greater number than the other villages.
Sarutobi was glad to have these people here for the duration of the war. Konoha could more than afford to hold these people for the time being, and it would, until these people would be able to return home.
Sighing to himself, Sarutobi set aside his hat and ran a hand through his greying hair. The refugee presence in the village wouldn't be the only thing to end once the war drew to a close either. Sarutobi looked forward to retirement, after such a long and tiring run as the Third Hokage.
He could see the end on the horizon, and it looked brilliant.
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Everything was just gone.
His home, his land, his brothers, his wife… his children.
It had come, a monster that rivaled the worst of natural disasters. It had trampled over everything, its many tales flailing and crashing into the ground. He had just been barely able to avoid the coming of the demon fox.
Nothing he held precious had, though.
If it wasn't enough that everything he had known was gone, the fox's evil energy had tainted the very land his home and farm once stood upon, corrupting it. Defiling it.
Now he walked along the dirt path, well-trodden by now and widened to allow for greater traffic, to the only place he knew was absolutely safe. To his sides were many others whom the past night had seen lose everything, or damn near. They were all going to the one place they knew they were going to be able to survive. No bandits, no demons and utterly untouched by both the war and by the fox.
Konohagakure. Perhaps there, he could get back on his feet, and find a way to go back home.
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"It was supposed to end with the war."
Sarutobi, the re-instated Sandaime Hokage, muttered this. The words carried far more meanings than one, as he watched from the window of what was once again his tower. Watched as yet more refugees poured into Konoha.
Watched as his retirement ended in the most horrible manner it possibly could have.
Sarutobi picked up his nearby pipe and took a long drag on it, attempting to settle his nerves. The end of the war seemed like such a short time ago. Everyone was preparing for peace-time. The refugees were looking forward to returning to their homes.
The first hurdle came when a lot of refugees simply couldn't return to where they had come from. Newly changed borders either put their homes in other countries where they had no right to the land they had once owned, or their land had otherwise been destroyed, completely, and needed years and years to be properly rebuilt, or in the case of farmers having lost their fields, made fertile again.
So, many refugees ended up becoming permanent residents of Konoha. This was… problematic, but it was still salvageable. The city was packed tight, and some areas of the forest were cut down so that former farmers could pick up their craft outside the village. It wasn't a lot of land lost, and while things were tight in Konoha proper, the people would manage until such a time when the refugees could, in fact, leave.
And now this.
Now the Land of Fire itself had been greatly disturbed. Many places within the country were destroyed, and furthermore, tainted by the demon fox's chakra which had poisoned the very earth the demon fox trod upon, and even in areas far flung from the fox's initial areas of appearance.
But, once again, not Konoha.
At the last moment before Konoha would have become just another ruin left by the Nine-Tailed Fox, Sarutobi's successor and predecessor, the Fourth Hokage, had stopped it dead in its tracks. Sealed it inside of a baby boy, insuring the safety of the village.
Insuring that Konoha would once again be a hub for refugee activity.
Not too long after the attack had ended, Sarutobi had been re-instated as Hokage. Knowing that two major issues, that of Naruto, the boy the demon fox was sealed inside of and the refugees, had to be dealt with immediately, he called for a meeting of the village leaders, clan heads and prominent ninjas. These matters needed to be decided upon.
Surprisingly, Naruto actually ended up being the less contentious issue between the two. The boy's status, such as it was, was quickly decided once 'kill him so that the fox never escapes' was firmly taken off the table. He'd be honored as a hero like the Fourth wanted him to be, regardless of the others feelings on him. He doubted that'd be the end of it though. He just knew something else would have to be done.
But then there was the issue of the refugees. Now, there some open fighting had actually broken out during the debate.
It was a tough issue to be certain. Konoha was already full to bursting, and the in-flow of anymore refugees would mean outward expansion of the village, destroying the forest that kept the village so safe. Plus, the ninja clans and others were beginning to be tired of having these non-ninjas within Konoha's walls, feeling that their honored place so close to the Hokage Mountains was being reduced to nothing.
However, several other ninja clans were quick to point out that, because of the war and the Nine-Tailed Fox, their position was basically already reduced to nothing… and sentiment Sarutobi agreed with.
The casualties from the war had been bad. Roughly a quarter of Konoha's ninja forces had been either killed or maimed over the course of the war, which was actually the least amount of damage done when compared to other countries (Wind's ninja force was absolutely decimated by comparison). Still, the situation then was at least manageable. At least there some folks could be gleamed from the refugees (a very small amount), while the established ninja families could make up the rest of the difference.
The Nine-Tailed Fox was a disaster in that regard. Roughly two-thirds of Konoha's ninja community had been slain trying to buy time for the Fourth Hokage to arrive. It was a massacre the likes of which the village had not seen for some time.
Which brought everyone to the rather obvious point: Konoha, within the next several years, was not going to be able to recover based upon its already existent ninja families. Or, it would, but it was take at least a decade, time Konoha didn't truly have to spare if it wished to be secure, or to continue to push out a vision of strength amongst the other ninja villages. Konoha's victory in the Third Ninja War would mean nothing if it didn't have the ninja to support itself.
Which lead to a rather obvious, if highly contested, solution: let all the would-be refugees stay. Most might not become ninjas, sure, but with the opportunity to advance that came with the career in Konoha, surely a good portion of them would. They'd be able to help expedite Konoha's recovery. Who knows, maybe this could even bring in entire families into the ninja forces, replacing some of the lost ninja families from the war and fox.
Still the established clans and families, the Uchiha and Hyuga chief among them, didn't care for the refugees being within Konoha's walls. They recognized that Konoha would need the refugees to recover, but they would not continue to share space with non-ninjas.
Thus, a compromise would have to be made.
Konoha would be split into two districts: the 'Inner District', the area of Konoha within the walls, would be almost exclusively left to the ninja families and those operating within Konoha's ninja forces. The refugees that would not join Konoha's ninja forces would have to spread out past the limits of the wall into the 'Outer District', where they could build homes, businesses and farms.
Sarutobi took another long-drag on his pipe as he saw several trees outside of Konoha's walls were felled, meant to be made into new buildings to house the new residents of Konoha. The announcements of Sarutobi's return, Naruto's heroism and the status of non-ninja refugees had gone out just earlier in the day, and already the refugees, most hard-working peoples before their lives were destroyed, were already rebuilding. It was admirable.
Still, despite Sarutobi's hopes for Konoha's safety and strength from this compromise, he couldn't help but feel anxious. He hoped that the honor and, dare he say, greed of the ninja families would not come back to bite them, as yet more of Konoha's protective forest was removed.
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It was set to be a terrible day from the beginning, it seemed.
It had been several years since the demon fox had re-introduced a flood of refugees into Konoha. Many years since the ninja families and clan heads decided, as a compromise, that the refugees would be allowed to live in Konoha: but only the ninjas would live within the walls. Those who would choose to not have family be a part of the ninja force would have to build for themselves new homes outside of Konoha's walls.
The village had expanded greatly because of that. Over half a decade later, the 'Outer District', as it had been called, was for the most part, complete. The refugee community had multiplied the size of the city by one-half in their expansion, drawing out the limits and shrinking the forest around Konoha. Their businesses and shops were creating new opportunities in Konoha.
Speaking of which, it seemed that Konoha would be expanding again soon. The day prior, several families approached the Council in order to ask to be allowed to join the village. Some were to submit their children as members of Konoha's ninja force, which got them readily accepted. The others had different reasons.
They weren't refugees either, looking for refuge in Konoha due to some disaster. No. These people wanted to become citizens of Konoha because they saw opportunity. They wanted to join the 'Outer District'.
The initial rattle and ramble, Sarutobi had thought, would insure that Konoha wouldn't be accepting non-refugees into the population. If Konoha began to accept just common immigration as a reason to be allowed into the city, then there was no telling how much further Konoha would expand beyond its already precarious borders.
The meeting this morning was supposed to seal that. However, when the meeting began, he noticed that several of the clan and family heads whom had been anxious to see immigration banned from the Hidden Village were… muted. Their calls for none more to enter the village than had already been accepted due to prior disasters replaced instead by the idea that more people would mean that, down the line, more children could be convinced to join up as ninjas.
When the meeting ended, the other families were accepted into the village.
When, later that afternoon, Sarutobi learned of several of the families' intentions to expand their holdings within the walled-in section of Konoha at the expense of the more minor ninja families, he came to realize what had happened.
The 'lesser' Outer District, hungry for more labor and potential business, had managed to usurp the will of the Inner District by purchasing their opinion. Sarutobi had realized that members of the Outer District were beginning to amass quite the sum of wealth between them, acting as actors of trade between the outside world and the Inner District, but he didn't imagine it would come to this.
But, even Sarutobi would admit, all this on-balance was also very good for the ninja in Konoha. Although the recovery of Chunin and Jonin last to the war and to the Demon Fox had yet to begin, Konoha was absolutely flushed with new recruits readying to enter the pool as Genin. Many of the students at the Academy and the Genin themselves showed the same will and resolve as their refugee parents, a fact that had made them hard studiers and even hardier ninja once they left the Academy.
Plus, Konoha had never been so flush with revenue before. Security projects, projects of renewal within the Inner District and even the construction of new training yards were easy to pay for with the money pumping out of the Outer District.
Even with all this money flowing around, crime was at a minimum, and Sarutobi knew exactly who to thank for that.
The Konoha Military Police Force, or as it was becoming colloquially known these days, the Uchiha Police Force.
The Uchiha Clan, already taking very seriously their position as heads of Konoha's Police Force, had taken that responsibility up another peg as the Outer District really began to expand. Although the Uchiha still rose up to positions in the ANBU, and, as Sarutobi knew, still had their eyes on the position of Hokage, the Uchiha had taken the Police Force as their great role in Konoha, insisting that only the Uchiha Clan, with their great bloodline and their great ninja, were capable of bringing justice to both civilian and ninja crime.
The honor that the clan staked on the Police Force made the Uchiha members damn-near incorruptible.
Their skill made them effective, deadly and near omnipresent.
Their very presence left the crime in the Outer District, whereas in other such cities in villages it would be in a state of growth along with the district, deflated.
Many civilians in the Outer District would complain about the military attitude of the Uchiha in this regard, but for most in the Inner District, even Sarutobi, he viewed this as natural, considering the ninja were given the same treatment.
The Police Force offered Konoha the opportunity to reap so many of the benefits of the Outer District with few of the fall backs. Certainly the exposure of Konoha to the outside world through trade and the destruction of the forests were a very hard pill to swallow for some, but the potential size of the new ninja populace, the new revenue and just the amazing synergy of the two districts left Sarutobi… optimistic. Well and truly optimistic.
While still unsure about the outcome of the morning's meeting, and what it meant for the village, Sarutobi couldn't help but shake the feeling that better things were in Konoha's future.
At the time, Sarutobi had no idea how, later that same day; he would be proven so terribly, terribly wrong.
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It was a mess.
That was truly the only way to describe it.
As he saw members of the police force dash around, desperately trying to do work that was meant for a police force twice, nearly thrice, the size of the… remaining members, while also working on putting together what had happened tonight.
Sarutobi looked on at the scene, a great sadness in his heart and a terrible weight building in the back of his mind. The Uchiha Clan had been massacred to a man, if the initial reports he had received were to be believed. The great chunk of Konoha's Military Police, the best of the best at that, were now just gone. Blood stains and corpses being all that remained of one of Konoha's oldest and most esteemed clans.
Sarutobi had come to the station to try to direct the chaos, knowing that in these early hours it was going to be Hell for the remaining Police Force to keep the organization going in this new light. Crime in the Outer District still needed to be watched, and Sarutobi was still intent on getting as much information together as he could on the attack, or at least, making it seem so.
Suddenly, one of the officers ran up to the aged Kage, a wide-eyed expression on his face.
"Sir! One of the other units said they found one of the Uchiha alive at the scene! They're bringing him in as we speak!"
For a brief moment, relief flooded Sarutobi's system. A bit of good news had finally dropped into his lap since the beginning of this mess. A witness to describe the scene precisely and, potentially, one Uchiha left alive to lead the police force. One was better than none, as far as Sarutobi was concerned.
As Sarutobi arrived at the front of the station, he and the other officers with him pushing the crowd that had grown around the arriving Uchiha, that optimism died on the vine. Sat in one of the chairs in one of the holding rooms, blood caked into some of his clothes and on his face, was but a boy. A boy who Sarutobi knew for a fact was in the Academy. Who had not activated his Sharingan. Whose capacity had not yet reached the point where it could replace all that was lost tonight.
As Sarutobi's hope died, so too did that of the gathered police force, many of whom broke off to go about trying to keep business moving within the station. Sarutobi had stared at the poor child who, after some time of staring randomly into space, stared back at him.
A few moments later, Sarutobi withdrew back into the station, leaving the child alone with his thoughts.
Alone to contemplate the deep betrayal committed to him by his own brother. Alone to contemplate that his entire family, his loved ones, were now all dead, the blood of his parents now on his own clothes.
Alone to contemplate that his world was over.
"Here you go."
An old, wizened voice snapped the boy out of his trance, staring wide-eyed at the old man as Sarutobi knelt down, a blanket from inside the station clutched carefully between his old fingers. The Sandaime Hokage took one look at the young boy's frail expression and offered a sad, heartfelt expression in turn.
"It's okay, come here."
Sarutobi wrapped the blanket around the young boy, his gaze still locked onto the Hokage's as the old man withdrew his hands.
"It's okay."
Tomorrow, it wasn't going to be. Tomorrow, Sarutobi was going to have to find a way to quickly bring the Police Force back up to strength. Tomorrow, this boy, Sasuke, was going to have to deal with the loss of his entire clan, of his family.
But tonight. Tonight, Sarutobi was dead set on letting this child know his world hadn't ended.
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An entire cart of goods was being transported down the flattened stretch of road by several horses. Sat at the front of the cart was a rather interesting duality: one finely dressed man, a chain for a pocket watch dangling at his side, and one more conservatively dressed man, keeping his hands on the reigns. In the cart itself several men stood waiting, either meant to guard the goods in the cart or meant to off-load them once they arrived at their destination.
The well-dressed man pulled out his pocket watch, the metal shining a slight orange as dawn began to break over the horizon.
"Yes yes, excellent timing. We should be arriving at the city limits at any moment." The man closed his pocket watch as he turned to the driver. "Now remember my fellow, get me to the business district to off-load this merchandise before the morning rush, and a fine bonus is in it for you and your compatriots here."
The driver nodded and lashed his whip out at the lead horse, rushing them forward in order to make the time for their employer. Soon enough, the woods began to severely thin out, the tree line disappearing as they approached the crest of a hill along the road.
Upon reaching its peak, they were greeted with a far-reaching sight of their destination.
The mountains that dominated the shinobi district were quite far from the outer-reaches of the city now, as was the Hokage's Tower that stood so proudly at the 'beginning' of the city. Outstretched from that very powerful core were several roads, many buildings of wood and stone, with new ones being built within and on the outskirts of the city limits. The roads were not entirely active, owing to the time of day, but early birds were already running about, delivering news, surveying the roads or merely setting up shop.
Those men in particular the well-dressed man felt quite close to: the early birds, the entrepreneurs, the businessmen. The men willing to roll up their sleeves starting far before the rise of the sun and work until the sun had set hours before.
Only the most ambitious men were able to make it in this place, after all.
Such was the nature of the City of Konoha.