Chapter Six: Signs of War

Naruto, Mito and the Senju kids strolled through the business hub of Uzu no Kuni while the warm sun beat down on them gently. The group of six were being closely followed by a few civilians and shinobi. The civilians followed because it wasn't everyday that the island had Senju visits, and the shinobi because they were in charge of watching over the kids.

Naruto and the others did not pay them any attention though, instead choosing to focus on the small conversation that had popped up between them, "…no way! You fought, and killed, five tigers at once?"

Mito's incredulity could be felt in her tone as she stared at Hashirama. The oldest out of all of the present children held a sheepish look on his face as he scratched the back of his head.

"Yeah, I also find that a bit hard to believe." Naruto said, turning his head in order to look at the Senju children walking behind him. He currently led the small rag-tag group of kids through the Whirling City. He would stop and point at a particular store and explain what that store had, and then they would move on.

Judging by the reactions that they had towards certain stores Naruto put together a bit of a profile for each of the children.

Hashirama was an excitable individual.

Tobirama was someone that kept quiet a lot. He barely let any sort of emotion slip through throughout the impromptu tour. He only spoke up whenever he was directly asked a question by either Naruto or Mito. The other Senju kids just seemed to treat this as a normal behaviour, so Naruto assumed that it was such. The only time he spoke was when he was reprimanding the other Senju kids sans Tōka, who just kept quiet just as much as Tobirama did.

Itama was a bit harder to figure out, because while he was talkative, it only happened whenever he saw something that he thought was worth mentioning. Anything beyond that was considered nothing worth talking about.

Naruto found the Senju brothers to be a perfect blend of each other. One spoke a lot, while the other barely spoke, and the third was a bit of an amalgamation of both. His hair denoting that fact.

"Hey guys," the youngest Senju said, drawing the attention of all of the other kids to him, "I hear that Uzu has some of the most exotic, uh, animals in this world-"

"-Yeah, that's true." Mito interrupted excitedly, "You want to see them?"

Before Itama could answer, Hashirama beat him to the punch, "Heck yeah. That actually sounds cool. Plus, I can get a feel of the Uzu forestry."

Naruto turned a critical eye onto the oldest Senju in the group. Why would he want to get a feel of the forestry of his nation? Looking at Tobirama, and his reaction to Hashirama's outburst, it would seem that there was more to what Hashirama said than one would initially think.

The slightly scathing look shot in Hashirama's general direction after his comment made, which made the older boy shrivel a little under his brother's gaze, was a dead give away.

Quickly schooling his features, Naruto pretended to not notice a single thing out of place with Hashirama's statement and just said, "If you wanna see what we have, then follow my lead."

Quicker than most of the civilians could follow, Naruto jumped onto a nearby rooftop, with Mito following suit. Hashirama, Tobirama, Itama and Tōka also followed soon after, looking to see where the blonde Uzumaki would take them.

Uzumaki Clan Main House – Same time

The tension between the leaders of the two distantly-related clans was so palpable that it could be cut by an actual bladed weapon. If there was any other person, aside from the three powerful figures that were currently there in the room, they would have been sweating a lot.

Fortunately, the men that currently took part in these talks were experienced shinobi. Two of them were clan heads, a job description that came with the biggest headaches imaginable, while the other was a former clan head. Tension was nothing new to any of them.

"So, what can we do for you, Butsuma-dono?" Jin began the discussion in its new location, cool as a cucumber. All of the pleasantries went the way of the dinosaur as soon as the three men entered the study that the meeting was taking place in. That did not mean that he had to show his true colours, yet.

"You sound like someone that doesn't really want to talk." Butsuma stated, small smile placed on his slightly wrinkled face.

Of course Jin didn't want to talk to the man. He would have preferred if he never saw or spoke to the man ever again. Any amount of time spent away from Senju Butsuma was good for you in Jin's book. He knew that his father agreed with him, but he would never really say so. Alas, things rarely work in your favour, even as the head of a powerful clan.

"Nothing like that, Butsuma-dono." Jin lied through his teeth, even though he knew that Butsuma knew that it was the total opposite. He did not care, "I'm just curious as to what it is that you want to discuss with us, especially after making us wait for three whole months before we could find out."

As soon as he finished speaking, Jin saw something he never thought he would ever see on Butsuma's face. Something akin to worry.

Ginrei picked up on this too, but chose to say nothing, just like his son. He was merely present in order to give his two cents whenever the two clan heads needed it. Outside of that, however, he was merely a spectator.

Butsuma seemed to be battling with something inside him, if the slight fluctuation of his facial muscles were anything to go by. These were not pronounced fluctuations, just small, nondescript ones. Fluctuations that only shinobi of a high calibre could pick up.

"What I wanted to discuss with you three months ago is different from what I want to discuss right now." Butsuma said, pausing to gather his thoughts while he stared into the previous and current leaders of his sister clan.

Jin wanted to ask the man to speed things up. He did not want to sit in his father's study all day. Unfortunately for him, doing so would make him seem like someone that was impatient, and that was most certainly not him.

"Four months ago, my eldest, Hashirama, developed… something. I don't want to call it a kekkei genkai, because that would be presumptuous, but it bares all of the tell tale signs of one." Butsuma's statement caused the two Uzumaki men to raise their eyebrows slightly.

It wasn't common knowledge that the father-son due rarely saw eye to eye, to the point where people would sometimes question if they were related by blood or not. Seeing the mannerism that they had just shared shed those thoughts out of Butsuma's mind. He was one of the few that were privy to know that the father and son that sat before him rarely saw eye to eye.

For Ginrei and his son, their thoughts were aligned with the implications of what Butsuma had just said. The Senju were the most powerful clan in the world, no one (except the Uchiha) would dispute that claim. For them to develop a kekkei genkai… well that was something else entirely. These people were a group of kekkei genkai-less shinobi that made it their life's work to stomp out every single clan out there, including the clan that possessed the (theoretically) most powerful kekkei genkai.

"What type of power did your son develop?" Ginrei asked, feeling the need to forgo his role as the guy that would only throw in a comment here-and-there and just straight up be involved with the conversation, "Is it a Dōjutsu, is it elemental or is it something else entirely?"

"Elemental." Butsuma answered the old man that was usually quiet during these proceedings, "The element itself is very strange. Nothing like the ice or the lava that we all know of. It's something… weaker really."

The slight disappointment could be heard in Butsuma's tone. The man was a war-monger and a power hungry dog. Despite the fact that his clan could be on the cusp of discovering an elemental bloodline that's never been seen or heard of before, judging by his earlier words of how even he could not identify it, due to the fact that it was not as destructive as the Yuki clan's Hyoton or the Yonton that was scattered throughout the various clans of Tsuchi no Kuni and Kaminari no Kuni, it was potentially worthless in his eyes.

"How so?" Jin asked.

"It lacks any destructive capabilities." disappointment evident in Butsuma's voice, "It's good for one thing though."

"And that is?" Jin asked, wishing the man would get to the point already.

Butsuma was quiet for a few moments, before he said, "He can create trees. How useful do you think that an ability like that would be in the battlefield?"

Jin and his father just looked at the man as he concluded his answer. His son had a kekkei genkai that could, if trained enough, at least alter the terrain. While not a straightforward attack heavy kekkei genkai, it was at least good for support.

And the man thought it was useless.

"I see." Jin said, rubbing the stubble that he had on his face, "Well, if that's the case, then why is it important? I mean I fail to see why you would want to discuss it here."

"I need your expansive library to do some research on his kekkei genkai. Either Hashirama's not achieving its full potential, or this is truly the extent of it all. Either way the Senju could be seeing the birth of a new kekkei genkai and it wouldn't hurt to know if there was something on it." Butsuma's answer basically told the last two men to hold the title of clan head for the Uzumaki all they needed to know.

Butsuma wanted to find a way to mass produce his son's own kekkei genkai.

"Well..." Ginrei began, stroking his beard, "our library is yours to use as you see fit. Of course, the Fūinjutsu section is a no-go zone."

"I understand," Butsuma tipped his head low as a means of thanking his sort-of cousins for their assistance, "Fūinjutsu is your trade secret after all."

Silence reigned through the room for a few moments as the trio of men looked between each other with nothing to say. At least that was the case for the father-son duo. For Butsuma however, he had something else that he wanted to say, but was unsure of how to word it. His distant relatives had refused to help him on multiple occasions before.

As soon as Ginrei saw Butsuma's pondering, he smiled at the man in a kindly manner, as if he were smiling at Naruto or his own granddaughter whenever they had something to say but couldn't. Butsuma thought that the look was despicable and very condescending, especially when used on a shinobi of his calibre, but he did not say anything. He had to be on his best behaviour if he wanted things to go his way again.

"You look like you have something plaguing your mind, Butsuma-dono?" Ginrei said.

"Indeed I do." Butsuma shifted slightly so as to sit in a much more comfortable position.

"Anything we can do to help?" Jin asked.

"Well that depends." Butsuma replied.

"On what?" Jin, now curious, asked.

"Your reaction to what I have to say next." Butsuma looked at both men and said, "It has come to my attention that the Uchiha are in talks with the Hyūga."

"The Hyūga?" Ginrei was shocked by what Butsuma said, for various reasons, "I thought they hated each other."

"Oh, they do…" Butsuma said, "but they hate the Senju even more."

"Hate the Senju?" Jin asked a question that he knew his father had running through his own mind, "Since when do the Hyūga hate the Senju. I thought that you were very tolerant of each other."

"We were." Butsuma began, "Until a failed mission."

"What type of mission would lead to a fall out between two clans?" Jin asked, as this seemed to confuse him the more Butsuma spoke.

Instead of it being Butsuma that answered, it was instead Ginrei, "A mission that involved the assassination of a high profile member of one of the clans by the other. Am I wrong."

Butsuma cracked a wry smile and simply answered with, "Your nickname is a well-earned one. I'm glad we're not enemies."

Which was Butsuma-talk for you're so useful that I would hate to kill you.

"If that's true, then who is at fault?" Jin asked this question already knowing what the likely answer was going to be.

"We are." Butsuma admitted without a shred of shame for getting caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

"I sent out a mission request to work alongside the Hyūga for an ambush on a recently discovered Uchiha hideout." the man explained, before questions could be thrown at him, "Of course, this was a lie I cultivated to get a handful of Hyūga to come out of their hiding holes and far away from their clan for us to actually try and-"

"-take their eyes." Jin said, disgust evident in his tone. Senju Butsuma may have been a splendid shinobi, but as he sat right there in front of him explaining his treacherous mission in front of his so-called cousins, he made Jin want to stand up and kick his face in.

"Yes. That was the idea." Butsuma could feel the levels of disgust being directed at him by the two men he was conversing with, but he honestly did not care. He was a shinobi through and through. If he saw an opportunity to further the cause of his clan, he would take it, morality be damned.

"So the Hyūga discovered what you were up to and…" Ginrei ended his words in an expectant manner, wishing for Butsuma to fill in the blanks.

"They escaped our trap. We underestimated them and they were able to run away, making sure that their eyes did not end up in our possession. The two stragglers we managed to apprehend damaged their own eyes so we couldn't use them. So we ended up killing them."

"And now the Hyūga are so pissed off that they decided to band together with the enemy. Classic 'enemy of my enemy' at work here." Jin said, feeling exhausted already. He could guess what Butsuma wanted, but he wanted the man to come out and say it.

"Except, Jin-dono," Butsuma said, "that's not where it ends."

"There's more to this?" Jin asked rhetorically, feigning ignorance. Of course there would be more to this. When Senju Butsuma was involved nothing is ever cut and dry.

"Unfortunately." Butsuma had a genuine frown of displeasure at this point. His age was beginning to show, "The reason why it took me three moths to get here is because during this period, I've been trying to mend the fences with our other allies."

"They found out?"

"Yes. A few have abandoned ship. Choosing to go back to being neutral over the war with the Uchiha or actually join up with them."

"Just how many clans have you lost over this, Butsuma-dono?" Ginrei felt compelled to ask.

"Five. The Sarutobi and Nara went back to being neutral while the Akimichi, Yamanaka and Hyūga all joined up with the Uchiha. The Yamanaka, despite my best assurances that the Senju would never betray them, simply chose to ignore me and side with the Uchiha. The Akimichi had already been spoiling for a reason to leave us, believing that the way our alliance worked was unfair, but that was not true. This was just all the motivation that they needed to leave us." Butsuma said all of this calmly.

"So the only allied clan that you have that's based in Hi no Kuni is the Shimura clan." Ginrei deduced.

"Yes."

"You can see how this leaves us in a very precarious position." Butsuma said, to which the two other men nodded in understanding, "The scales have been tipped to the Uchiha's favour. They are now the most powerful clan in Hi no Kuni. And because of this, they have become…what's the saying? What's the mechanism that is used to launch arrows from a crossbow?"

"A trigger." Ginrei answered.

"Yes, that. They have become trigger happy." Butsuma concluded.

Jin and Ginrei looked at each other for a split second, already guessing where this was headed. Butsuma was here to ask for manpower.

"The Uchiha have been taking more and more of our clientel away, with people choosing to work with them instead of us. We're loosing territory that was once ours in Hi no Kuni. I'm sure two men such as yourselves know what I'm here for." The time for sugar coating was done. It was time to go for the kill.

"You're here to ask us to lend you our strength in order to get back your strength." Jin said.

"Yes, I am." Butsuma said.

"We have not been involved in a war in a very long time, Butsuma." Ginrei said, with the other two noticing how he chose to drop the honorific he had been using to address Butsuma all along, "Don't drag us back into one. Especially one that does not concern us."

There was complete silence in the room for the briefest of moments, before Butsuma started chuckling. It started off quietly, but within three seconds it had become full blown laughter, "Hehehehe…hahahahahahahaha! Does not concern you?" Butsuma had a look that was a cross between angry and crazy, "Are you crazy, old man? Of course it concerns you! Your clan has not seen war for a very long time because of us! The Senju! It was our generosity that allowed you to stay out of harms way for so long! We've been shouldering the burden of fighting not only our enemies, but yours as well!"

Butsuma stood up quicker than most people would ever be able to in that situation, "Now, when we need your help you reject us like every other time that we do it? Nuh-ah, not this time! You will not reject us because this is not a request that can be ignored! Just think! Think for a second! Think about what will happen to your clan if we're gone! We're your biggest Fūinjutsu customers! We are the ones that buy most of your exports and sell them on the mainland. We! The Senju! Once we're gone, you won't have a buffer to protect yourselves from the outside world beyond the pitiful whirlpools that surround your island! And we know that they won't hold up a candle to a clan with flying animal summons! So get off your blasted high horses Uzumaki, and start pulling your own damn weight in this world!"

Then he went deathly quiet, "Because if you don't…oh dear cousins, if you don't, then you will burn to the ground. You and this beautiful island of yours."

By the time he finished, Butsuma was hyperventilating. He had never spoken so many words in one go in such a long time. Only women, as far as he was concerned, spoke as many words as that in one go. His father had raised a man, a true warrior of the Senju. He didn't raise a weakling.

Ginrei and Jin were surprised by the amount of passion and energy that Ginrei had put in that tirade. They had never ever seen the man speak with such passion ever before. From the way he spoke, they guessed that this had been something that had been weighing on his mind for a very long time. With most of the Senju's requests over the years being met by a series of no's, there was obviously going to be a breaking point. It would seem that this was it.

Butsuma sat down and looked at the father and son duo as they seemed to be thinking about something. Whatever it was, for their sakes, Butsuma hoped that it was a yes, because he would hate to have to turn on the only clan outside of his own that he actually liked.

Uzu no Kuni Forest – Day

"Alright guys, hurry up." Naruto's voice rang out through the forest that the children currently found themselves in.

They had travelled from Whirling City to the forest because Hashirama wanted to spend some time in the forest. Naruto found it to be kind of weird that Hashirama would want to do that as opposed to seeing the city. It was a great tourist attraction, since it was the only one in the world that was under direct shinobi rule.

"You know, I wanted to show you guys something really cool. Something that will become a mainstay on the mainland really soon." Naruto said, trying to hype up his father's invention. If he could get the kids of the Senju leader interested, then maybe they could get their father to buy into this as well.

While the other children paid attention to what Naruto said, Hashirama was too busy to pay any attention to the only blonde Uzumaki in existence. What was he busy with?

"Oh, yeah…that's so nice…" Hashirama cooed these words while he was busy rubbing himself against a random tree.

"Okay, that. is weird." Naruto said, getting a nod out of Mito as they looked at the young Senju as he had the look of someone that felt great pleasure, especially with the way his eyes were half-lidded.

"Oi, Hashirama," Tobirama shouted, getting Hashirama stop his tree ministrations and pay attention.

"What, Tobirama?" Hashirama's tone clearly conveyed that he was not pleased with being disturbed from his 'moment'.

"Don't make me come there and force you to pay attention, damn it!" Tobirama shot back, getting his older brother to recoil slightly and to have a dark cloud hang over him.

"Tobi-baka's no fun." Hashirama said in a deperesed tone, "Taking all of my fun away."

"Tobi-baka!?" Tobirama's was livid, "I'll show you a baka!"

Tobirama quickly ran to Hashirama, looking to clean his clock for him, but the older brother was more deceptive than he let on as his sour mood quickly vanished to be replaced by a mischievous smirk, before he disappeared at the last second, replaced by a log just as Tobirama put his hand on him.

'Whoa.' Naruto thought, 'I didn't even see him make any hand signs.'

"Last one back is a rotten egg!" Hashirama's voice rang throughout the forest, or at least the section that they were in.

"Show off." scoffed Tōka as soon as his voice died down.

Naruto and Mito were too buy looking all over the show, trying to see where he was.

"Don't bother."Itama said, getting them both to stop searching for the eldest Senju among them, "He's gone. Probably already halfway to the entrance of the forest."

"Oh." Naruto said, preparing to get going.

"The others are too." Itama disappeared as soon as he said this, and then Naruto and Mito realised that all of the Senju kids were already gone.

"Hey, no fair!" Mito bellowed as she started playing catch up. She ran for a few seconds, before she realised that Naruto was just looking at the direction that they had run to.

"C'mon, Naruto. They're getting away." Mito pleaded.

"Don't worry about it, Mito." Naruto said as he turned left and started to walk that way, "Follow me. I know a short-cut."

Stuffing his hands into his pockets, Naruto walked forward at a leisurely pace, waiting for Mito to catch up to him, and as soon as she did, he put his hand on her shoulder and said, "Hold on tight."

"You're the one doing the holding, Naruto."

"Oh, hehe. My bad."

And with that, they were gone.

To be Continued

And that, ladies and gents, is an end to the sixth chapter of this story. Honestly, this chapter was soooo hard to write. I actually re-did it three times. I know it's short, but there was nothing else to add that wouldn't ruin the flow I'm going for with the story.

Also, sorry about it being late. Blame it on Fifa and lethargy. Seriously, I'm not going to make any excuses beyond the truth of the matter. I got lazy, and this was a pretty hard chapter to write.

Anyway, I've already begun the next chapter but I don't know when it will be out, hopefully soon, because it isn't as hard as this one.

Let me know what you guys think.

This is me signing off.

I'm out.