...Change...
Iruka waited for the last of his students to leave before he left the classroom.
So many things had changed after the war, the land of water had fallen under the Earth's control, and while no one cared to help free the people there, everyone knew about the mines that the people were forced to work in.
He sees a group of civilians gathered around one of the wooden boards that had been put up to show the recent news.
People normally find out about things from the local newspaper or what they see on television, but those things only stay in people's minds for a short amount of time.
The news that was put on the board for some reason always seemed to stick in people's minds for far longer, he didn't know why, but it did.
He joined the crowd to see what was going on and to his surprise, he found that most of the villages had decided that they couldn't deal with all of the refugees anymore.
They had decided that they were going to send all of the refugees to the border and have the Earth deal with them.
Iruka knew that the villages didn't have any reason to explain themselves to anyone, but he was thankful that they did, after all, he had just read that they were going to send their people to the monsters that had caused this mess.
And he hated to admit it but the Kages and Daimyō's were right.
The crop failures, along with the changing climate, and the effects of the poisons and radiation that were released during the war, were the perfect mixture for not just a famine but.
Mass death.
Meaning that by the time that anyone could deal with anything, there would be so many rotting corpses that even more problems would pop up, before anyone could fix anything.
Iruka didn't want to think about what that would look like, so he didn't, instead, he turned his attention to the mountain that had the faces of the Hokages of the past and hopped that their spirits could guide him and the rest of the village in these hard times.
...Change The Lost Mountain...
"I have to say you people work fast, almost as if you already had plans for the river." he says to the leader of the Hidden Village of the Sand, who ignores his words and acts as if he didn't say anything.
"Because we did, the Land of Wind is a place where water is a precious resource, so we have to do everything that we can to keep it safe." the Kazekage says to him before he hands a scroll to one of his guards.
The only thing that he can do at the moment is watch as his old friend opens the scroll and inspects it with one of the few spells that can find jutsu and not activate it.
The Kazekage only starts talking again after his guard puts the scroll in front of him before he separates it into three parts.
One shows the map of the Land of Wind, the other is the blueprint for a waterway and the last one is a contract.
"If you agree to let us divert some of the water into a reserve that my people can use, it will benefit the two of us in the near future." the Kazekage says to him.
"You're surprisingly honest about your intentions. But how exactly does this benefit me and my people?" he asks the Kazekage.
"It's only a matter of time before the other villages start to target you and your people, the reserve will act as a buffer for both of us."
"Since you already agreed to let us use the river, we find ourselves quickly growing attached to it, and with that feeling comes the need to keep it safe."
"It has only been a few days since you allowed us to take water from it, but your actions have started to affect the pockets of the people that we once bought it from."
"The chances that someone will not only target you but will want either destroy the mountain or do whatever is necessary to pollute the river are growing by the day."
He doesn't say anything as the Kazekage reaches into his sleeve before he takes out several forehead protectors and places them on the desk in front of him.
"I will admit that you haven't gained monetary profit from our alliance at the moment, but we have already been keeping our side of the deal." the Kazekage says to him.
He looks directly into the Kazekage's eyes, most of the forehead protectors have the emblem of the Hidden Leaf on them.
A heavy silence fills the room as they look at each other.
He looks at the map of the Land of Wind and the blueprint of what the Kazkage wants to build.
It's obvious to anyone who looks at the thing that the man is planning to free himself from having to buy water from somewhere else.
"I need a good reason to allow you to do this."
"What you brought me is proof that I was right to allow you access to the river, but even I have people that I have to answer to."
"So I need a good reason to allow you to move the only reason that you and your people have to put yourselves between the other villages and us." he says to the Kazekage.
"Because they will need to target our reserves before they can target the river and even if they target your river, they will be forced to deal with both our people." the Kazekage answers him.
He didn't say anything, it wasn't like he had to agree to anything but the offer that the Kazekage made was something that he was already planning to do.
The problem was that the man in front of him had approached him with the idea first.
"I'll only agree to it under two conditions. The first is that my men will be a part of the guards and my people will be allowed to sell their goods in whatever village or market grows around it."
"The second is that my people can enter and leave your country whenever they want. Feel free to place escorts on them so that they don't do anything that they aren't supposed to."
He looked at the Kazekage who was now glaring at him, he would have smiled but doing that would ruined the mood.
"Deal." was the only thing that the Kazekage said before the two of them signed their names on the contract.
"Well that was something, I never thought that he would come here," he says to one of his guards, the moment that the Kazekage left.
"Just be happy that he didn't offer you one of his daughters to cement our alliance." his old friend says to him.
He ignores his guard's words and picks up one of the forehead protectors.
"How many does this make?" he asks his guard.
"Twenty from the leaf." his guard answers him.