In Naruto: Reborn With Talent

by Little Merger

A soul was transmigrated into Narutoverse but was refused to be given any sort of insta-OP power, instead, he could choose from three talents. Follow him and his loved ones on their journey to become strong as they pave their own path through the battle-filled world of Naruto. Will they be villains? For some, surely. Will they be heroes? For others, maybe. But anything they do is d

6. 161

In Naruto: Reborn With Talent #Chapter 161 - Ch161. Negotiation? - Read In Naruto: Reborn With Talent Chapter 161 - Ch161. Negotiation? Online - All Page - NOVEL NEXT

Chapter 161 - Ch161. Negotiation?

Sosetsu stared at Mikado, completely startled out of his wits. He knew the snow bastard would ask this exact question but never would he expect he would be so blunt and rude about it. It was finally driven home for Sosetsu just how arrogant Mikado was.

'This is the man leading a village that is supposed to protect my country from the shadows? I really screwed up with Yukigakure, didn't I?'

His eyes then trailed to the figure of his brother, Doto, hiding a measure of surprise. 'What the hell is he doing here?' Sosetsu's mind went into overdrive, trying to think up a good reason for him to be present. He liked his brother and still wanted to refuse he would actually have a part in this scheme but him being in the presence of the Yukikage was a deep blow to that trust. 'So... in the end, everything in these doc.u.ments was really true.' Sosetsu mentally slumped in defeat while outwardly maintaining a picture of courtesy.

"I am willing to give you some level of independence for certain concessions on your part but autonomy is impossible. What do you say?"

Mikado looked at Sosetsu funnily as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. He didn't even try to hide his disbelief and let it show on his face, maybe even a bit exaggerating it on purpose.

"Are you sure you want to be like this?" Mikado airily asked, giving a glance at Doto, "Look, we are both leaders. We both want the best for our people-"

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Rei almost snorted when he heard that. He made sure to investigate the Yukikage a bit before coming here and Mikado Suzufumi was a picture-perfect example of a selfish money-grubber. The only thing he ever invested in at his own expense was the chakra armors and even that was because the guy was for some reason somehow obsessed with them, spending millions of Ryo on their development. Honestly, Rei was baffled by it. The bulky junk wasn't even that good.

Sure it could protect a person against ninjutsu and give him an overall boost to his abilities through a mechanical chakra circulation system to key points of the armor. On top of that, albeit slightly, the armor still helped with chakra control, making jutsu more powerful and less demanding on the user. This made even a genin have capabilities of a jonin after a few months of practice which was awesome but the thing had to be built mostly with light-weight chakra metal, hence expensive as heck.

On paper, it was perfect war gear. In reality? The main problem outside of the cost was that the wearers could only reach jonin rank with it. Meaning the second they encountered S-rank ninja or above, they would be 'melted' almost instantly. After all, it still had many weak spots and openings that could be poked, let's say with a kunai.

Then the users of the chakra armor often got too used to using it and stopped developing their own capabilities, relying on the armor instead. That meant the quality of the Yukigakure ninjas actually lowered since the armor started to be manufactured.

"Think hard about what is best for this country, Sosetsu." Mikado continued with a pressing tone, "I don't think a civil war is something you would like to have on your conscience. I am actually giving you a way out here, you see? I am trying to help you! By giving Yukigakure full autonomy, we will still help the Land of Snow. Naturally. We are living in it, after all. It's just that the price will be a bit hig-"

"Utterly ridiculous," Sosetsu finished for him in a cold and a bit angry tone. "That's what you want to say, right?"

Sosetsu knew Mikado cared mostly about Yukigakure's power which translated to chakra armors which meant they needed more money. What Mikado tried to do here was to get autonomy so he could actually start taking a 'protection fee' from the Land of Snow and be able to approve more... human-oriented experimentation when it came to the armors by himself, not needing the permission of the Daimyo.

"In the end, you want money and power over the state. Don't hide it, be clear! Don't you have any pride!?" Sosetsu barely held himself back from shouting.

Hearing him, Mikado frowned, his eyes hardening. This was not a result he imagined. Not in the slightest. He always took Sosetsu for a weakling who could only butter up to the masses. The sheer thought of such a person trying to oppose him was an utterly ridiculous notion for him.

"I think," He started in a measured manner, making sure to put weight in every word, "that you should look more into the long-term gains rather than the short-term losses. Once Yukigakure develops better armors and starts mass-producing them, we will be the strongest ninja village!" Even the emotionless and depressed Kakashi lifted an eyebrow at that while Rei only facepalmed at Mikado revealing such a thing while knowing there was a ninja from a different village present. The man probably didn't count on Kakashi surviving today. "The Land of Snow will become the most impo-"

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"No. Do you really believe some piece of metal can make you the strongest? Once you have strong chakra armor in great numbers then what? You will need wearers, more ninjas. You will start mass recruiting from the common populace. You will eventually start a war! A war I doubt we would be able to win no matter on how high pedestal these chakra armors are in your head! Absolutely not! I refuse!" Sosetsu turned towards Doto, "Don't you see it, brother? His goals are insane! Why are you...?"

Sosetsu however quieted down before he could finish that sentence as a very controlled killing intent of Rei landed on his shoulders, making him choke the words back, showing a conflicted expression. In the end, he just deflated with a sigh.

Rei already told Sosetsu what Doto's plans were. To ask him why he wanted to create a coup right now would screw quite a bit of Rei's plans so he simply had to stop Sosetsu from being an idiot and blurting out he knew about their plans and preparations.

Doto simply shook his head at his brother, inwardly highly amused at his antics while Mikado was simply exasperated. 'Here I go out of my way and try to persuade the fool and he just won't budge! Ugh, how frustrating! Fine! Let's go with this.'

"Lord Kazahana, I see you are unreasonable simply for the sake of being unreasonable instead of trying to be constructive here. I am going to give you one last chance so listen very carefully. If the happiness and safety of your people is not such a big deal for you, then I wonder if your daughter is important enough?" Mikado said and the entire room became completely still.

'Damn, that was quite a straightforward threat.' Rei thought, awkwardly grimacing at how it was said.

Sosetsu felt chills creep up his spine as nervousness started filling him, making him fidget. Under the table, he gave Kakashi a hand-gesture, ordering him to go to Koyuki. Kakashi only very reluctantly listened and sneakily but hastily left the room, not even leaving a clone behind.

'I guess experience is something he would have to build up some more.' Rei hummed, looking at the intense staredown between Mikado with threatening narrowed eyes and fidgeting Sosetsu who, while looking like a scared chipmunk, didn't break off the eye contact.

Normally, now would be the time to quietly wait and glare at each other until Koyuki either appears captured or a message of her safety reaches Sosetsu. The negotiation would not go either way unless Mikado decided to straight-up kill Sosetsu but that would create more problems for him than solutions.

'And that's where Doto comes in.' Rei's lips stretched into a smile as he prepared to defend Sosetsu when he saw Nadare and Doto glancing at each other from behind the unsuspecting Mikado.

To his misfortune, Mikado didn't have the best reflexes as he was too used to eating and shrugging off hits when wearing the armor. His only reaction to having a sword run through his heart from behind was to look at the blade sticking out of his chest with wide disbelieving eyes as a trail of blood slowly flowed from the corner of his lips down his chin. He was dead before he could even comprehend how.

As Nadare pulled the sword out of Mikado, letting his corpse fall down, Sosetsu only despondently watched Doto going for a kunai, lunging at him with a ferocious expression. It really drove the point that his brother wanted to kill him home.

As for Rei... 'Here we go!'

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Chapter 162 - Ch162. The battle for the Land of Snow 1

Doto's kunai quickly pushed its way towards the apprehensive Sosetsu while Doto's face showed a mad glee. He could already see himself sitting in the Daimyo's seat, controlling this rich country as he wished. The only problem was...

Rei's hand grabbed Doto's wrist, stopping his hand in its tracks just when the tip of the kunai was only a few inches away from Sosetsu's chest. Doto blinked uncomprehendingly, his brain momentarily refusing to process he was interrupted when he was so close to finishing his plans.

"Mah~, sorry but this dude is under my protection." Rei said jovially, enjoying the bafflement on Doto's face and the frozen smug smirk on Nadare's.

Their surprise didn't last that long, however. Nadare quickly sprang forward, going for an attack on Rei whom he judged to be the bigger threat than Sosetsu while Doto's eyes focused on his brother, showing a murderous enraged glint. He clearly wanted to take advantage of Nadare slowing Rei down and finish Sosetsu off. Not that Rei would allow that.

As Nadare's sword came dangerously close to the leisure Rei, he only deflected it with the back of his hand, sending the blade forcefully to the right, causing it to pull Nadare's arm alongside it while leaving his front wide open.

He was wearing the newest product of Ringo on his hands. Silvery tight-fitting gloves weaved from very thin strands of chakra metal. In the end, they were still metal but the sheer flexibility, lightness, and most importantly, toughness... these boys were supposed to be able to block a swing from one of the Seven Swords of Kiri and still be in a serviceable shape. Ringo simply refused to stop forging, reforging them and getting help from the Uzumaki clan to create her first-ever masterpiece. Only when the gloves withstood ten brutal slashes from Samehada in her own hands did she reluctantly agree she was somewhat satisfied with their performance.

The best part? Unlike the Seven Swords, the gloves could be mass-produced and modified. Yugito even asked for retractable claws in hers... which was a bit problematic since the gloves looked like silvery butler-style gloves from Rei's previous world. Ringo was an assassin and it showed in her forging too. She wanted the gloves to be easily concealed otherwise she would simply make tougher, stronger, sharper gauntlets instead of gloves that didn't have the capacity for that much material or seals on them.

Rei quickly gave her the design to the butler gloves and Ringo fell in love with them almost instantly. The sole problem was, they would stand out in the crowd as there was no equivalent in the world and once their future ninjas got famous for using them, they would be easily recognizable.

That's where Tsunade came in and had the Biri-Biri company mass-produce similar gloves from cotton and started selling them, creating a new trend, at first in the world of nobility and from there it spread to the merchants, and later to the normal people. She earned piles of Ryo, made the company more famous for releasing such a fashion trend... and most importantly, made sure the gloves Ringo made would be nothing to bat an eyelid on even in the crowd of normal people.

As for Nadare's sword... that pitiful excuse of a sword could only get duller the more it clashed with them. The single deflection already chipped the blade. Rei estimated that the sword could handle no more than five clashes before it broke in front of Nadare's eyes.

Rei also didn't take the chance to use the created opening in Nadare's defense. He only used the momentary surprise of Nadare and stepped to the side, closer towards Sosetsu while sending the approaching Doto flying back with a light kick to his gut. Rei then stepped back, pushing Sosetsu closer to the wall. He was now in front of the Snow Daimyo. If either Nadare or Doto wanted to get to Sosetsu, they first had to go through him.

The first to attack was Nadare. He once again slashed the sword at Rei who simply caught the blade in his gloved hand, slightly grimacing, 'So this is the strength produced by the chakra armor?'

Seeing his grimace, Nadare grinned. Despite his sword being caught, his mood actually improved as he let go of it, fluidly drawing a kunai from a pouch on his belt and slashed at Rei again. By that time, Doto was already on his feet, rushing towards Rei's other side, also having a kunai in his hands. Apparently, he decided to first end Rei and only after that focus on Sosetsu.

Rei who was holding the sword in his right hand found himself in a disadvantageous position as Nadare's kunai was approaching him from the right side and Doto's from the left while he only had his left hand free. Or at least, that was what Nadare and Doto thought.

Rei simply snapped his left hand towards the right, bitchslapping Nadare away, sending his body spinning through the air until the wall stopped him. Instantly, Rei used his left foot to snap-kick Doto's ship, causing him to lean more towards Rei's left side which bought time for Rei to snap his left hand from the right towards the left and slap Doto towards the ground as his grimace turned into a pitying frown.

"Man~! I know it is just an early version but these armors are shit." He whinily drawled as he mentally noted Doto was just a genin-level ninja if taken into consideration his actual strength without the armor while Nadare was chunin at best. "To think it would only increase your physique this much..." Rei shook his head. 'If I had to compare the effect... It simply made them from cheap and small fishing boats into battlesh.i.p.s with cannons. Still... as surprising the huge boost in their power it provides, it is a bit underwhelming for its actual cost.'

Rei could see why Kakashi could have a problem dealing with the guys and even understood where their confidence in taking on the world came from. They could probably take on smaller ninja villages with just a few teams of chunin.

'I will have to take a few armors and let Ringo and Mei study them to find out how exactly they work. They might create a gear working on similar principles but waaaaay cheaper. As it is now, the armors are just a costly shit. Wearing clothes made of diamonds would be cheaper than one of these suits. If I was in my old world, I bet I could afford a nuke for one of those.' Rei inwardly chuckled, getting out of his pondering only when he heard Sosetsu's voice.

"Why, Doto?" Sosetsu whispered towards the groaning mess on the floor. Somehow, the man actually managed to stay awake after Rei bitch-slapped him with the chakra metal gloves.

'Eh, should have hit stronger, shouldn't I? That guy's skull must be quite thick!' Rei blinked at the sight, half-expecting Doto's neck to be already broken.

"I-It's always yo-you!" Doto wheezed through the pain. Jonin would be completely fine eating such a hit and chunin could also shrug it off after some time but Doto was barely a genin-level and as such, it was not advisable to meet chakra metal with his cheek head-on. It was prone to cracking.

"What?" Sosetsu awkwardly furrowed his brows, not understanding what his brother meant. What was it that Doto lacked? Luxury, money... and as shameful as it was for Sosetsu to admit it, even women. Doto had everything he ever wished for. From birth, both of them were given only the best and Sosetsu was actually glad that the work and burden of being the Daimyo fell from him. It was a very tough job from time to time. There was no need to burden his brother with it. So then... why would his brother want to kill him? Didn't he have as comfortable a life as possible?

"I-I should have been the Daimyo! I sho-should have the weapon that you are building in my hands! The crystal...ugh!" Doto started to get progressively louder and Rei didn't like it so he kicked the nuisance in his ribs, shutting him up.

"Crystal?" Sosetsu's eyes widened. 'So he was after the Spring Generator? But... what weapon? It is just a device to bring spring into this country.' Sosetsu stood there, gazing at his brother in utter bafflement.

"I should rule... I am the better one of the two of us... I..." Doto continued madly mumbling through the pain.

It was then Rei took Nadare's sword by its handle and ruthlessly slashed Doto's throat, making the man look at him with wide fearful eyes as he gurgled while blood poured out of him like a waterfall.

Rei turned towards Sosetsu who watched in horror as his brother's blood flowed on the floor and Doto slowly died, "Sorry. He would die anyway and the longer it would take, the more awkward it would probably become for you." He shruggingly said, showing he was not sorry in the least, while looking towards Nadare, noting he had his neck broken.

Sosetsu could only wryly smile at such logic.

'And killing my brother in cold blood in front of me is not awkward for you at all?'

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Chapter 163 - Ch163. The battle for the Land of Snow 2

"Well, then... it's time to go, I guess." Rei said after a while of letting Sosetsu stare at the lifeless corpse of his brother. He could at least give the man a bit of time to mourn the guy. Common courtesy or whatever they call it.

Sosetsu awkwardly grimaced but gave a short nod to Rei. On one hand, he was glad and grateful for Rei protecting him and making sure his daughter is fine. No matter his goal, without him, Doto knew he would most likely die today and Koyuki's life would be either turned upside down... if she survived, that is. On the other hand, though, Rei just killed his brother in front of him.

Hatred... no. Sosetsu didn't feel hatred.

Revenge? After seeing Rei's capabilities and knowing of his identity, that would be just a suicide. Honestly, slightly hoped Rei would show himself to the Yukikage who would recognize him and back off. Sosetsu knew this was just his wishful thinking.

Rei of Yozora had no available description at all so even if he stepped forward and introduced himself, the Yukikage would either get a bit wary or laugh him off on the spot. He would nevertheless think he is an impostor either way though. There were just so many rumors about his supposed look and Rei didn't fit even one of them. He was not a bulky three meters tall giant capable of crushing skulls with his hands nor was he an old unassuming expert with a sharp cold gaze... in short, the number of his rumored appearances was off the charts. As such, the number of impostors also grew. There were only a handful of people knowing how Rei really looked and most of these had his Secrecy Seal on them anyway.

Sosetsu was actually surprised he felt only a slight apprehension towards Rei. Two days, that's how long it took Rei to persuade Sosetsu that handing over his country is actually a very good deal for him and the people of the Land of Snow. The number of benefits Rei could provide...

'And yet, he killed my brother. So why am I not resenting him for it? Is it because Doto tried to kill me? Was I always such a cold person?'

"Oi, Sosetsu!" Rei called out again, snapping Sosetsu out of his thoughts.

"Huh?"

"I said let's go. I still have work to do, ya know? I promised to keep you safe, after all." Rei rolled his eyes at the slowpoke.

"What do you mean... work to do? The people who wanted me dead are finished, no?" Sosetsu asked in a confused tone, making Rei laugh as his amused gaze landed on the bewildered older man.

"Do you really think they would smugly march here, attempt to assassinate the Daimyo, and take over the country with just the three of them?" Rei's eyes sparkled in an 'are you an idiot' kind of light. "I mean, sure, they were pretty stupid but... nah, they were not THAT braindead. Of that, I can assure you."

As if to prove his words, numerous huge explosions rattled the capital city of the Land of Snow, sending the entire city into chaos. Sosetsu's eyes widened in horror as he quickly jumped towards the closest window, looking outside of it. The capital... was on fire.

"What they came here to do is to overthrow you." Rei's leisure voice resounded from behind Sosetsu who was getting more and more worried about the people of the city.

"What is going on!?" He hurriedly turned towards Rei with a desperate expression, demanding answers... and Rei, happily obliged.

"This was not some pitiful assassination attempt where you are finished by getting rid of the assassin. Yukikage himself would not make his way here just to assassinate you. That kind of thinking is just silly, isn't it? No, this…" Rei smiled widely, "is the start of a bonafide civil war!"

...

Chizuru Kaguya swiped the sharpened bone that was previously her forearm through the neck of her unsuspecting victim, quietly laying his body onto the floor while making sure to keep a hand on his lips until he stopped trashing.

"This is so tedious!"

She heard a quiet whine from next to her as her partner, Kurumi Uzumaki, also laid the dead body of her target onto the ground before they continued on their way through the dark halls.

"And look! A few droplets of blood fell onto my kimono! That's just awful, don't you think, Chi-chan!?" Kurumi whisper-screamed.

'How did this woman manage to get into the Stealth Corps again?' Chizuru mentally lamented her misfortune of being partnered with the unceasing chatterbox with a mile-wide temper for this mission. Chizuru's expression soured, 'Oh, yeah... I took her in because of her superior concealment seals, silly me.'

The duo sneakily continued through the hallway, using shadows and mostly sticking to the ceiling to get past the patrols before ambushing them from behind and taking them out without setting off any alarms. Just like that, they were making a steady advance deeper into this base. It was not only them either. Ten teams of two were currently sweeping through the base.

The Stealth Corps was Chizuru's pride. When Rei started making the basic structure of his future village, she offered to lead a kind of ANBU-like organization but what she had in mind was a bit different. It took a whole lot of proving herself capable before Rei gave her the position too. There was no way she would not be proud of it and develop it the best she could.

The Stealth Corps was for ninjas who didn't put much value on flashy Jutsu. It was a place where skill with weapons and mastery at stealth was the most appreciated. That didn't mean they didn't have any flashy Jutsu of mass-destruction under their belt. On the contrary, firepower considered, each of them was required to be able to obliterate a small building. But the members of the Stealth Corps trained a lot differently than what the ninja villages generally offered their troops. This was all in order to be able to finish whatever mission in the stealthiest manner possible. After all, they were ninjas, and staying quiet was quite a valuable skill.

"Chi-chan! I found the main room!"

Chizuru almost flinched at the volume of her partner's whisper. She really had no idea how they managed to stay undiscovered with Kurumi being so loud all the time. 'It must be some kind of weird seal, I am sure of it.' She helplessly sighed.

Not many Uzumaki entered the Stealth Corps. In fact, so far, she had only two Uzumaki working under her. This was primarily because the Uzumaki clan created their own division... Chizuru called bullshit. 'They are just so damn loud there is no way for them to get into the Stealth Corps and they clearly know it so they don't even try!'

"Come on, Chi!"

'Or at least, most of them do...' Chizuru deadpanned at Kurumi who was urging her to order action. Frankly, Chizuru knew she was a bit too harsh on Kurumi. The woman was the best she had. If Kurumi didn't want to be found, nobody in the Stealth Corps would be able to notice her even if she was in plain sight. Considering the Stealth Corps were the best trackers Uzushio currently had...

And that was without Kurumi using her special concealment seals. Her hiding skills were just that absurd. Growing up as a thief on the streets in the capital city of the Land of Wind certainly had given the girl the necessary skills.

"Fine... Let's take them out." Chizuru quietly said, noticing Kurumi's eyes glint as a very thin metal wire guided by chakra started to sneakily drag itself from her sleeves. It sn.a.k.e.d an inch above the walls, reaching the ceiling where it continued its way above the unsuspecting Yuki ninjas who were currently in the middle of coordinating the communication.

Since she was a close-range combatant, the first to attack was Chizuru. She sent five bone bullets from the tips of her fingers at the Yuki ninjas in the room, instantly killing two while three managed to lean away on sheer reflex, already swiping a kunai in preparation for a fight... and die right after that as Kurumi's razor-sharp wire came down from the ceiling and quickly enwrapped around their necks, pulling them up, separating their heads from their bodies before both parts fell onto the floor with an audible thud.

"Ahaha, aren't these Yuki ninjas a bit too easy? There was not even one jonin guarding them!" Kurumi loudly exclaimed, no longer worried about whispering which only made Chizuru groan at her as they both walked into the room and shut down all communication channels of the Yuki ninjas.

"Well, they are a small village. Their jonins are most likely fighting in the city. Also..." Chizuru looked at the corpses and her lips twitched, "Why do they wear full-body heavy armor made from metal if they leave their necks and faces mostly exposed?" She mumbled to herself before a man appeared in the middle of the door.

"Lady Chizuru" He slightly bowed, "the building is cleared. The Communication Headquarters of the Yukigakure forces is no more. We have one injured and no casualties."

Chizuru only smiled and nodded as she activated the communication seal, starting to speak the second it connected, "We are done here. Their communication is down, you can go in." She turned the scroll off, turning towards Kurumi who gave her a winning pose while happily looting the corpses. Chizuru blankly blinked before chuckling at the scene.

'Thief indeed.' She shook her head and turned towards the man.

"I guess, this is it for us. Let's go home. Give the order to retreat."

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Chapter 164 - Ch164. The battle for the Land of Snow 3

The main defensive force assigned to the protection of the capital of the Land of Snow was the Uzumaki clan. The second the Yukikage walked into the Daimyo's palace, ten members of the Uzumaki special division, the Sealing Monks, activated massive seals on ten various spots around the capital city, enveloping it in a massive complex sealing barrier called Homeland Protection of the Ten, which would prevent anyone living in the city for more than five years from getting hurt for the next ten hours.

As for why five years... it was a necessity. The ninjas of the Yukigakure are expected to live in the village. It is a rule there, meaning this way no ninja of the Yukigakure would be affected and protected by the barrier. Even the infiltrators spend at most a year away from the village.

And while this meant that not all of the citizens of the capital would be protected, the bigger chunk of them had their safety guaranteed even if an explosion tag went off on their position so the Uzushio forces could fight freely without worrying much about the original inhabitants.

The members of the Sealing Monks were all Grandmasters in the Sealing Arts. That was one of the entry requirements. They were also all Uzumaki clan members so that meant they had to be Grandmasters by the Uzumaki standards. In recent years many of the Uzumaki reached this stage thanks to personal tutoring from Rei's clones, which only earned him even more respect among the Uzumaki clan.

Honestly, Rei thought it would be a damn shame if he disregarded this aspect of the Uzumaki clan. They simply could not stop themselves from studying sealing. Even someone who never ever saw a seal was drawn to it and naturally curious about its working. Even if an Uzumaki was lazy, dumb, or hyperactive, they would still dutifully study sealing for hours on end. Rei just used this trait of their clan to make sure his future village had an ample number of Sealing Grandmasters and many more who strived to reach that stage. For now, there were only thirty-four of them but even that number was ridiculous considering other villages would be happy to have even one in their employ.

As for the cringe-worthy name of the division... Mei thought it would fit but her suggestion was quickly rejected by almost all Uzumaki. In the end, Mei sullenly rejected any other name, making the name-choosing process to be delayed. At this time, Mei persuaded most of the Uzumaki kids that were around ten that the name Sealing Monks was incredible.

It wasn't even that hard. Some sweets and a few books on elementary sealing and voila, the kids were bothering their parents to no end, trying to push for the name Sealing Monks. The frustrated parents tried to push for the name also if only to stop their children from constantly annoying them which created pressure on the leaders of the Uzumaki clan, and in the end, Kaya Uzumaki, the newest leader of the Uzumaki clan, was forced to name the division the Sealing Monks, giving the smug Mei a glare with a sour expression.

...

Pakura, who was crouching on a rooftop of a building next to Ringo, raised her eyes towards the shimmering sky with a bit of an excited grin, ignoring the numerous explosions going off in the close vicinity.

"Okay, guys! The Yukigakure started their attack, our Sealing Monks have done their part in making sure not one of them can get away or injure anyone of importance, and the Stealth Corps cut off enemy communication! It's time for us to join the fray!" Pakura ordered, making the air turn serious around her entire force of a hundred jonin-ranked ninjas who started running towards their first target.

This was the Strike Force composed of a hundred jonins formerly from Kiri that fought under Rei's command on the Nagori Isles. The ones that were sent there to be sacrificed. When the war ended, not even a hundred and fifty were left of the original two hundred.

So when the time came and Rei found himself in need of some high-level ninjas, he quickly remembered those outcasts that didn't quite fit in the political climate of Kirigakure. Needless to say, it didn't take much enticement for more than one hundred and thirty of those still alive to join him. All it took was to promise them to take in their families as well and Kirigakure gained over a hundred new rogue ninjas overnight.

And what shitstorm that was!

Pakura was a bit nervous. She was supposed to be the future jonin commander and that was why she was leading this mission while Ringo was here only to make sure not one of her ninjas lost their life during the mission. Something every single member of the Strike Force was grateful for.

Normally, having to face over a thousand Yuki ninjas, who were around chunin rank with some jonins mixed in, with a force of only a hundred jonin would be called a suicide but with communications disabled, and the Yuki ninjas currently split up into multiple groups of twenty all over the capital city... Pakura's job was to simply go from group to group, annihilating them in an orderly manner while they could not relay any messages. This was not a 'thousand-plus versus a hundred' kind of battle. This was over fifty times a hundred versus twenty.

Shortly, the Strike force reached its first target, twenty Yuki ninjas clad in the cheaper, older type of chakra armor. Before the distressed Yuki ninjas even spotted something was wrong, a hail of kunai descended on their position, making five of them into a pincushion while the other fifteen were skilled enough to mostly dodge the initial shot.

"Who are you!?" One of them shouted but received only silence in return as the hundred jonin of the Strike Force jumped towards them. The battle itself was a quick affair. Yuki ninjas were chunin-level and vastly outnumbered by the excited Strike Force.

Simply, it was a slaughter for the Yuki ninjas. The ninjas of the Strike Force were war veterans used to fight together, used to face much stronger people, and used to use tactics to overcome greater odds. In comparison, this was not hard. The more the Strike Force fought, the more its members realized...

'There is no excitement in this! This was supposed to be my first mission in almost a year but... why is it so boring!?' They internally screamed as they ganged up on the poor Yuki ninjas who wanted to do nothing more than to scream at these cheaters.

"Okay. Let's move on." Pakura said as she finished off the last of the group while wryly sighing. She was a bit peeved she could not use her scorch release and show her real might but her kunai would have to do for now. Really, this was supposed to be the very first mission for these ninjas and Pakura was sure all of them wanted to show off. They just had no idea Konan's plan would make it so easy but tedious for them. "We still have a few tens of these groups left until the work is done!"

The entire group could think only one thing.

'Why the hell did I volunteer for this? Oh, yes, I wanted a bit of excitement, dammit!'

...

At the end of the day, what was supposed to be a civil war, ended in overwhelming favor of the Daimyo of the Land of Snow and Rei. Only a very few of the Yukigakure ninjas survived, and even then, they were all captured.

Now... It was time to march into the Yukigakure itself.

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Chapter 165 - Ch165. Yukigakure 1

Mei stood on a dune of snow, in the mountain range on the north of the Land of Snow where the Yukigakure was supposed to be located.

"This is really a well-hidden location." Mei frowned, seeing exactly nothing through the freezing snow hail that was ongoing through the entire year in these mountains. Her mouth then suddenly widened into a gleeful grin, "I can see why I was sent here!"

Mei's hands started going through various hand seals at breakneck speeds as her chakra was poured outside of her body. The temperature quickly rose and the piles of snow started melting at a visible rate under the influence of lava-natured chakra. It was not even the effect of the Jutsu yet, merely the chakra Mei was sending from herself through the snow around to deep underground.

As the chakra gathered in one spot, the ground suddenly pulsed and the world grew silent for a brief moment before a loud eruption of lava shook the whole area. The huge stream of orange superheated liquid reached high into the sky before its deadly searing droplets started raining back onto the snow-covered area, changing it into a massive pit of sizzling and hissing hot mist. The only thing safe from the excruciating heat was Mei alone.

The ninjas in Yukigakure watched with bated breath as the land in front of their village was rained upon by droplets lava. Every single one of them was certain this was not a natural occurrence. Which meant... they were under attack. Despite that, deep in their hearts, neither of them wanted to face the person capable of using such a powerful Jutsu.

Alas, desire or not, they were ninjas of Yukigakure and since a threat appeared so close to their village, not even an hour later, around thousand highest-ranked ninjas who were not participating in the battle for the capital of the Land of Snow, found themselves passing the gates of their village, heading towards the still sizzling area in front of it. Most were honestly hoping whoever threw that Jutsu into the wind would be already gone but everyone knew the chances of that was effectively nil.

The Yuki ninjas ran all the way towards their destination, taking extra care to not be ambushed. It took them ten minutes to reach the location where the Jutsu originated and look and behold, right in the middle of the now muddy plain that looked as if a war was fought on it, stood a woman clad in black ANBU clothes and blank white mask with kanji for ROOT on its forehead, impatiently waiting for them with her arms crossed on her chest.

Before their leader could even start questioning the mysterious woman, she spoke with an impatient tone. "Finally! You took your sweet time getting here!"

"Who a-"

"That's not important. What is important is that you have something the Roots of Konoha covets. I came to tell you to hand it over."

"Wha-"

"No, no, no, don't even think to disagree! You saw what I can do. Imagine what a war with Konoha would look like. Hand it over!"

The leader of the Yuki ninjas was really having a profound headache at the demands of the crazy masked redhead. Honestly, he had no idea what Konoha could want from them but judging by the chakra levels and the pressure the woman was continuously blasting them with, he had no plans to clash with her anytime soon.

"I-, I have no idea what you want from us. Is it the chakra armor? If so I am sure when the Yukikage returns, he will certainly talk about trad-"

"Chakra armors!? You mean the useless crap your entire force is wearing? Nah, you can keep that. I came for something else! Hand it over!" She stomped her feet onto the ground, creating cracks all around the place where she stood.

'At least tell me what the f.u.c.k do you want!' The leader of the Yuki ninjas wanted to cry.

...

Yukigakure was positioned in the snowy mountain range. Many would think there was only one path in and that was the plain in front of the village where Mei was currently trying and succeeding being annoying while stalling for time.

Konan on the other hand was using the universal entry path to any settlement above the ground, the sky. As Mei attracted the attention of the village, Konan flew inside through the very scarcely protected back of the village that faced a mountain. Nobody would expect such an attack but Konan was a ninja, something the Yukigakure defense designers forget to account for.

Konan had her clothes change into the attire of Yuki ninja. Her own Paper Transformation Jutsu was far superior to its genin equivalent. Then again, it was A-rank Jutsu since she first had to change her body into paper and then mold the paper to a new appearance. Now, however, she was using only the clothes variant and since her clothes were always made of paper, it didn't take even half of the reserves a normal Henge would.

Konan proceeded to create hundred paper clones in an alley that was out of the hand and with those, she started doing her job. Going around the half-empty village while putting tags with spying seals into the walls of important buildings, the Yukikage office, and even on the streets.

Rei decided to let Yukigakure off the hook. Part of the reason for his decision was the fact he didn't have enough ninjas. Uzushio currently had around three hundred of them but even with their superior seals and skills, Rei had no confidence in taking over Yukigakure without losing even one of them.

Well, he and his girls probably could do that with some massive ninjutsu, wiping huge parts of the village out of existence, but the only reason why the main combatants in the defense of the capital of the Land of Snow were ninjas currently staying in Uzushio and not Rei himself was to get his forces some experience and see how well they can work together. He did that because he was certain no one from Uzushio would be hurt, much less killed.

But attacking Yukigakure was a different matter. Konan knew Rei wanted to use Uzushio as cover. People that mattered knew of Yukigakure's existence and its dominance in the Land of Snow. Rei simply wanted this belief to stay alive. Hence, the village would survive in order to cast a shadow on the creation of Rei's new village.

After all, nobody would expect there would be two hidden villages in one nation. Yukigakure would certainly not allow that, right? Well, Yukigakure would have an existential crisis soon enough with most of their jonins and Kage killed. Not like they would find out about a new village rising in the Land of Snow anytime soon.

As such, Konan's clones were now making sure they had proper eyes in Yukigakure while the original was traversing the deep underground tunnels. These tunnels were the only thing the man captured a week prior didn't know about. The poor sod was simply a too low rank. Well, at least he knew they were there.

In short, if the group wanted to know what is deep down here, they had to send somebody to explore. And since Konan had a mission in Yukigakure anyway, she decided to take a little stroll.

Konan knew the strongest and highest-rankers of those who stayed in the village are right now being messed with by Mei. It was not like Mei could not troll her way through the Yuki ninjas for a few hours. Her chakra pressure was too big to not make these generic chunin chaps shitting their pants.

As such, Konan walked through the underground tunnels with an excited skip in her step, looking around searching for a treasure.

"Now then, let's see what do I find here..."

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Chapter 166 - Ch166. Yukigakure 2

Pa treon - 38 chapters ahead.

If you want to support me or read ahead:

pa /kasicair

--

The deeper into the underground tunnels Konan went, the dimmer the light became. It would be actually spooky if, 'Wow, the one who designed this really had to have a big flair for dramatics. A pity I have the night-vision seal on me.'

Konan saw her surroundings as if it was a bright day with a clear sky. After ten minutes, she finally arrived at the door. Briefly glancing behind herself, Konan smirked at the sight of the tunnel littered by kunais, senbon, shurikens, many of them no doubt lethally poisoned.

'Looks like my little stroll set off every trap in here.' Konan shrugged. She was honestly too deep in her thoughts to notice that anything was trying to harm her. Suddenly, Konan's face lit up, 'This might be the very first potential flaw of Mei's Steam Cloak! I have to tell her about this when I return.'

Konan was using her own Wind Release version of the defensive Steam Release Jutsu Mei used to play with Minato. It was a bit iffy to use against strong high-level piercing attacks or something extremely destructive on a wider scale but kunai? Those had no chance of penetrating it. All in all, it was a good passive defense since the Jutsu was not hard to maintain. Naturally, this wouldn't reach the defensive power of what Mei used against Minato but anything classified below B-rank would be stopped which potentially rendered any sort of trap useless unless.

Konan carefully opened the door, making sure to prevent them from letting out any sound that could alarm anyone on the other side. This appeared to be a wasted effort however because the second she took a peek at what is on the other side, it was just an empty spacious room, resembling a laboratory. On the right side was unfinished chakra armor of unknown type, a new prototype, most likely, and on the left side was a singular cell where a woman of thirty was sitting on the floor and leaning on the wall. She had white unkempt hair, similar to those of the Kaguya bloodline but lacked their other tells. The biggest difference from them, however, were their icy-blue pupil-less clear eyes and complexion as pale as snow. One could even mistake her for a sick person. Her feet and wrists shackled with chains connecting her to what seemed like a box with cores for the chakra armor.

Konan quickly put it all together and understood that the woman she saw was essential to the production of the chakra armors because her chakra somehow activates the cores. 'I wonder how that works...' She blinked as she noticed the exhausted barely alive woman directly staring at her with a pleading gaze that just washed over her with almost no effect. 'Hmm, let's ask somebody who was present for the entire process, then.'

Konan simply walked towards the cell, crouching there be on the eye-level of the chained woman. "Hello," She smiled, plans forming in her head, "Let's make a deal, shall we?"

The chained woman opened her mouth but no sound came from her throat, telling Konan that it was a damn long time since she drank something. It was only then that Konan noted the transfusions in the corner next to the cell. 'Oho~, so she is not fed nor watered? Only receives nutritious transfusion? Heh, this will be easier than I thought, won't it?'

"Don't strain yourself. What about this?" Konan used her chakra to create a ball of water and levitated it into the cell where the chained woman almost pounced onto it while Konan analyzed her further.

'No signs of violence... well, if she was so important in the creation of the cores for the chakra armor, then I guess they would not want her damaged. Sunken cheeks and malnutrition...' Konan took another peek on the transfusion, 'that means whatever they are injecting into her veins is mostly spent on the production of chakra necessary for the cores, only leaving enough for her body to barely survive. Fortunately, I put quite a lot of nature energy and medical chakra into the water ball.'

The next second, Konan was stunned, however. She expected the woman to be slightly healed since her medical chakra was frankly crap but contrary to her expectations, the second the ball of water, a small amount of nature energy, and medical chakra was completely drunk, the woman underwent a mind-boggling change.

First to change was her complexion. It brightened up. While it was still snowy-white, it no longer looked sickly, instead, taking frosty shade. Her eyes acquired a spark of life in them and the black circles under them disappeared while an almost invisible snowflake-like pupil appeared in her eyes. It was so small, one would miss it without having a proper look. The woman's body noticeably filled up but the chakra was apparently not enough so she still looked somewhat malnourished.

What really shocked Konan was not the recovery though. As miraculous as that was, it had nothing on what exactly caused the recovery, 'She used Nature energy alongside her chakra! This... natural Sage Mode!? How the heck did a third-rate village such as Yukigakure catch somebody capable of the Sage Mode?' Konan couldn't comprehend what she was seeing.

What she could comprehend though, was that the crap that was supposedly the chakra armor actually ran on Senjutsu chakra... somehow. And that was huge! The morons of Yukigakure who invented this must have had no idea what this meant!

Konan suddenly froze, 'Wait... didn't Rei tell me there is some kind of a reactor to change this snowy shithole into a spring-filled fantasy-land? Oh... that son of a-' And that was when Konan understood that Rei knew the value of the technology invented in the Land of Snow all along. 'Of course,' She facepalmed, causing the still chained woman to look at her weirdly, 'there is no way Rei would come here only because it is the northernmost country, hence way out of the hand of anyone who could ever get curious.'

Despite them never becoming hostile with each other, the state-owned company of the Land of Snow was the only technology-oriented competitor of their Biri-Biri company. That meant their technology had to be spectacular but Konan never imagined it would be powered by nature energy! The scientist in the Land of Snow probably had no idea they created self-replenishing batteries capable of being powered by the Senjutsu chakra or nature energy. If they did, they wouldn't do an idiotic thing like make a power-suit out of it...

Konan's gaze snapped back to the woman behind the bars, now holding a bit of a predatory glint, causing the poor woman to scoot a bit back at the level of interest Konan was showing her. It was certainly reminding her of the crazy scientists who liked to experiment on her.

A clone suddenly popped up behind Konan and started to gather every research paper and equipment into a storage scroll. Konan certainly had every intention to completely clean the room, not leaving even a single paper behind.

The chained woman looked blandly as the equipment of the room was vanishing into storage scrolls, now sure the bluenette in front of her is certainly not a part of Yukigakure. The spark of hope renewed in her mind so she steeled herself and unsurely spoke, "Er, hello, I am Yukimi Yuriko, yo-you mentioned some kind of deal?"

Konan just widely smiled at the clearly desperate woman and chuckled to herself. "I changed my mind. You are coming with me no matter if you want to or not."

And with that, the distraught and bewildered Yuriko could only watch as her fate was decided for her. She only hoped she would be treated better than what she experienced in Yukigakure as the excited gleam in Konan's eyes didn't fill her with many expectations towards her future.

As for Konan... 'As if I would leave somebody like this roam free. Just imagine what we could do if instead of the girl, we used Rei's dimension as the power-source for the batteries. Hehe...'

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Chapter 167 - Ch167. The reason why the 'Land of Snow'

"We are back and bringing gifts!" Konan jovially said as she opened the portal to the mansion in Uzushio where they currently stayed and stepped inside, right into the living room.

Mei was somewhat sullen on the way back from Yukigakure, muttering something about snow-brained dunderheads but Konan didn't pay much attention to her. Now that they were back, Konan barely finished her first sentence when Mei rudely whizzed past her, flopping down onto an empty seat next to Ringo who was polishing her swords, and released a fed-up sigh.

That only prompted Pakura and her apprentice, Maki, to shoot her amused glances, momentarily breaking their excited but quiet chattering which was becoming a more and more common sight these days. Especially since Pakura tried to stick to Rei like glue since he saved her and Maki tried to stick with Pakura.

Nowadays, seeing Rei in a room without these two when they were at home was almost an impossibility and it took some weeks for Mei and a bit less for other girls to get used to it. Even the corners of Tsunade's eyes seemed to twitch a lot these days whenever Pakura was nearby. Only Konna thought it was cute how the strict and no-nonsense S-rank kunoichi got all fl.u.s.tered whenever she was alone with Rei.

As for Rei... he decided to simply take it in strides and mostly tune them out. Most of the time, there was Maki right behind Pakura and that meant they could entertain themselves by chatting while he worked on seals anyway.

"Gifts?" Rei asked, stopping his game of cards with a very disgruntled and obviously losing Tsunade who eyed the pile of papers promising free favors she lost in the last hour. He looked towards Konan who excitedly walked in and then he tilted his head at the sight of an unknown white-haired woman wearing Konan's cloak over her quite tattered and already useless clothes.

Konan just gestured at the woman, "This is Yukimi Yuriko and you wouldn't believe where I found her and what she can do..." Konan promptly walked towards Rei and sat on his lap before starting to explain what she found deep in the underground tunnels of Yukigakure just as Yuriko took the closest seat to the door in the room.

Needless to say, Rei was flabbergasted at the fact the chakra armor cores had to be jump-started by Senjutsu chakra of Yuriko. His mind quickly started to go through theories upon theories of how is that possible and his eyes almost shone when he realized the potential of such a discovery, especially since he owned a dimension filled with the most potent, never-ending free nature energy.

Rei gave Yuriko a not-so-discreet once-over and made her nervously fidget which made Tsunade a bit sorry for her. Once upon a time, Yuriko must have been a strong and proud kunoichi. Especially if she knows how to use Senjutsu. That was not something some common chump could learn. The only one she knew with that ability was her grandfather so it was an incredible achievement and prompted a question of how exactly did she get caught by a third-rate village such as Yukigakure. Alas, now... Yuriko was nervous, afraid of her own shadow, and flinching at every sudden movement. Simply, the woman was a mess.

'Ten years of imprisonment and used as a lab rat. It would be useless to talk about her reaching her full potential in such a state. She would need a whole lot of mental therapy if she is going to get anywhere close to where she was before that experience. As for exceeding it...' Tsunade sighed and shook her head, joining Ringo, and Mei in not caring about the situation. With that, the conversation ended for her. Whatever scientific crap they were going to talk about was not her problem. She was a doctor and that's where she drew her line.

"Looks like the Land of Snow is an incredible treasure trove." Rei leaned back into the couch with a gentle and satisfied smile, enjoying Konan straddling him while their eyes refused to part.

"Aha! I knew you had an ulterior motive in coming here the second I discovered Yuriko!" Konan poked Rei's chest with her pointing finger, narrowing her eyes at him in a cat-like manner. "Spill. What is the really important thing you acquired here? I doubt it is the country or a place for a village. We could as easily make one in other lands or heck, even underwater, if we wanted. There must be more to 'why here'."

Rei could only give her a wry grin, 'As expected of Konan. She knows me too well to not realize it.'

Shrugging, he started speaking, "Yeah. The biggest reason was the 'Spring Generator' as they call it." All of the people present knew what he was talking about. After all, Rei did tell them about its existence even before he even went to the Land of Snow. It was just that neither of them knew of its real importance. "The thing is... what the Spring Generator does is basically, in simple terms, persuading nature energy to switch its attribute. The nature energy might be the same everywhere but in snowy lands it has a bit of a different aspect than let's say in forests. The generator does not change the nature energy itself, it just tricks it into changing the aspect which affects the land." Rei's face twitched at such an idiotic description but honestly, this was the simplest way for all to understand.

Tsunade, as the only Senjutsu user present apart from Rei, actually snorted, causing Rei to chuckle at her before humming in agreement.

"Nature energy is everywhere and it is shaping the world around us. Its predominant trait that every Sage could tell you is that it can NOT be changed at will. Even when a Sage mixes it with his chakra to create Senjutsu Chakra, it is not like the nature energy ceased to be nature energy. That is the whole reason why using it is dangerous. That is the reason why this entire thing is just so ridiculous. These scientists did something even people like Hashirama were unable to. As for explaining the theory behind it... that would take ages so I will just say the important stuff," Rei shrugged. He could feel all pairs of eyes in the room having their utmost attention on him.

"What the scientist of the Land of Snow managed was basically create something that could revolutionize the world. A way to use devices to affect the environment through nature energy which is the main element forming it. Just imagine instead of changing the environment to spring, changing it to a lava-filled place. It would be an instant bye-bye to an entire country. A forbidden Jutsus would lose their 'forbidden' meaning if this fact came out." Yes, Rei was really surprised when he found out the scientist in this backward world created something more powerful than an actual nuke by a sheer fluke. And while setting it up would be hard and require time and utmost secrecy... it was still not an impossible task and that is where the problems lay. "There is no way I could leave something like this in the wind. Nope, I naturally already secured all blueprints and plans for the generator. Fortunately, no single person knows how to create the whole thing."

This revelation shocked some and scared the other people in the room. Just imagining such a power...

As for the problems with setting it up, this was a world with ninjas in it. Secret operations were something that happened on a daily basis here but they usually didn't have much of an impact.

"Anyway, we should probably return to the original theme." Rei said, pulling the girls out of their thoughts as they looked at him with confused gazes so he turned his head in the direction of the newest addition and reminded them, "Yuriko."

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Chapter 168 - Ch168. Yuriko Yukimi

"Where to start?" Yuriko gazed at her hands while looking a bit lost.

"What about starting on how did you actually get yourself into the position of a prisoner?" Rei quipped, trying to help Yuriko find some good point to start her life-story while also making it easier for her to start talking now that she had certain guidelines and something different than her past torturous years to focus her attention on.

"Right..." Anger flashed through Yuriko's eyes as she remembered what happened to her but this anger quickly disappeared as she bit her lower lip before forcing her body to completely relax. Her eyes gained a determined glint, knowing she had to get it off her chest if she was to come to terms with those feelings.

Taking a deep breath, Yuriko slowly started, "I was a part of the now-almost-extinct Yukimi clan, the founders of Yukigakure. It was actually my grandfather who founded the village." Yuriko said a bit self-mockingly while her voice shook at the memory of her childhood.

The second Tsunade heard her, she halted for a moment and her attention almost doubled. She could not believe how similar the circ.u.mstances between them were. Looking again at the woman with slumped shoulders who was projecting a dejected aura all around herself, Tsunade could only wryly smile. She briefly wondered if she also became such a sorry sight if she didn't meet Rei.

"Since young, I lived in luxury and the only thing expected from me was to better my ninja arts. Especially my bloodline which seemed to be extraordinarily strong. Grandfather often used to say that according to the records of our clan, I am the first in two centuries to have such strong blood." Yuriko said in a sad nostalgic tone, not even knowing how many memories this evoked in Tsunade. When Rei naturally noticed it but he could only gently put his hand around Tsunade's shoulder and cuddle her closer to himself in order to give her a bit of consolation.

"Things like cooking, cleaning, and so on were not important. All I had to do was focus on developing my bloodline Jutsu, the Snow Release which is capable of absorbing the chakra of the enemy and replenishing our chakra with it among other things."

"And I guess you got curious how it works on a deeper level. That's how you learned elemental Sage Mode, isn't it?" Rei nodded. It was a possibility. After all, Hashirama's situation was not much different. If the bloodline was capable of transferring the chakra of one person and remaking it to fit another before replenishing his reserves... there simply had to be nature energy involved in that.

Tsunade's research showed that there are many bloodlines that unknowingly use nature energy in their Jutsu without even the caster noticing. For example, the Kaguya clan. Their body is very sturdy and that is because of natural reserves of nature energy it takes in. These reserves are very small and it can't really be called Sage Mode as there is no mixing with chakra involved but instead, these reserves are needed for the 'body manipulation' with which the Kaguya clan members make holes for their bones to stick out from their bodies and then seal them shut. If somebody attempted to coat their underskin with bone armor as Kaguya could, it would be a very painful experience to live with. It is only thanks to these natural reserves of nature energy that the members of the Kaguya clan do not scream in pain every time they use their bloodline and are able to use it so efficiently.

Honestly, Rei had to admit that chakra was a wondrous but also a very unknown thing in this era. No Uchiha would tell you they use and need mostly Yin Chakra for their Sharingan. Why? Because they do not know about it! They never bothered to study it that deeply. As a ninja clan, they are focusing on the development of Jutsu and do not try to understand how exactly it works. Their explanation is... It's our bloodline, duh... And that's it.

Tsunade spent a lot of time working this out with the pair of Sharingan eyes Rei bought on the black market for a literal fortune. With the Third War being barely over, one would not believe the things that he could get in the black market. Anyway, it was proof that there is more to the bloodlines than it appears at the first glance. Some bloodlines, such as Kurama, Hyuuga, not to even mention, Akimichi giant-shift bullshit, simply have to work with something stronger than the chakra of an individual. There is simply no way for a singular Akimichi to have enough chakra to be enlarged by a factor of a hundred, no matter how fat he is.

"Yes... after prodding and probing, I learned to manipulate the non-chakra energy in the air... er, Nature energy, as you called it." Yuriko gave Rei a meaningful look. For her and her clan, this energy was something new. As for Sages... she never heard of them.

"But... back to the topic." The atmosphere in the room suddenly grew downtrodden as Yuriko slumped her shoulders even more before continuing, "Since I was busy learning the ninja arts, I had no time to do menial tasks. I was given an attendant... a slave if you will." The air around Yuriko grew heavy as her killing intent involuntarily poured out of her, earning her a few raised eye-brows. Even Maki, the newest member of the group had already experienced far heavier killing intent from Yugito or Mei when they spared so this was frankly nothing but amusing. Nevertheless, they quickly understood this 'attendant' will play a crucial role in this story. Yuriko gritted her teeth before she barely restrained her anger to get the next sentence out of her. "His name... Mikado Suzufumi."

"Oh boy, I think I know where this is going..." The corner of Rei's lips twitched. "Mah~, you will be delighted to know he died by being literally backstabbed by his right-hand man and had enough time to realize what happened to suffer through the betrayal. Not the most painful of deaths but a very pathetic and enraging one indeed."

That remark created a small satisfied smile on Yuriko's lips but her face still showed a slight discontent at being unable to kill the man herself.

"I was good to him, you know?" Yuriko started in a low tone, "I never treated him like a slave. There were other slaves but he had so much freedom and his life was simply better because of me. I even allowed him to practice ninjutsu from scrolls belonging to my clan! And then... twelve years ago when our clan was not in the best shape because of the Second Ninja War, I turned my back on him after a long and exhausting fight and with a slight dull ache on the back of my head, the world suddenly grew dark." Yuriko's eyes showed exactly how helpless and bewildered she felt at this betrayal.

It was almost poetic. The man who stabbed her in her back died by being stabbed in the back by a man he trusted. Rei only barely held himself from chuckling, mostly to not seem like laughing at the distraught woman. Mei, Ringo, and Tsunade didn't have such a problem. They all chuckled, grinned, and snorted respectively which earned them a disapproving glare from Konan and Pakura.

"After that, I found myself in the underground cell we used as a prison for important people. Now, I was a prisoner in the village belonging to our clan and I had no idea how or why..." Yuriko sighed, "But Mikado came a few hours after I woke up to gloat. He actually managed to pull off a revolt. The slaves of our clan apparently didn't like that in times when people of the Land of Snow mostly starved and froze to death on a daily basis, they had a safe place, a warm bed, enough food for a minimal amount of work. Our clan, or at least most of it, never mistreated their servants as it was counterproductive but... maybe that was a mistake." Yuriko quietly said, looking conflicted and confused. It was obvious she had no idea why exactly did their servants betray them.

"Mikado said the reason why many of the Yukimi clan died during the Second War was the drugs our servants were putting into our food." Yuriko lowered her head to hide the tears that started streaming down her cheeks with her hair before she wiped them away. "Most of my family died in the war. The clan was so weakened that Mikado, who was one of the most skilled people in the ninjutsu in the village after the heavy losses the Yukimi clan incurred, was capable of killing almost everyone who could give him at least a bit of resistance. He killed them in their sleep... I should not have let him get stronger." Yuriko lamented, growing silent for a moment as her gaze grew distant.

"See? That's why you have to use Seals to put safeguards on people!" Rei burst out, nodding in agreement to himself, highly satisfied at being proven right. Only after getting a few disapproving looks from his girls did he add in a small voice, "I mean... if you want to enslave somebody, you gotta make it foolproof, no? Not that I would ever put such a failsafe on you... Hehe."

Rei... didn't realize his girls silently agreed with him and only glared at him because of how inappropriate that remark was at the moment.

Yuriko, whose mood slightly improved watching Rei getting glared at for his remark, decided to continue. On one hand, she was on the verge of breaking down, on the other, she knew it was important to not bottle it up. "It was hell for any captured member of my clan, especially women and children. Mikado especially liked me watching how he and his subordinates torture my clansmen in various ways while showing me how superior he apparently is to me." Yuriko shuddered, her thighs clamped together and her arms hugged her body as she tried to make herself seem small. "The first five years, it was pure torture and I was the last of my clan alive, living only to satisfy Mikado's vanity. It was only later he thought about creating chakra armor after a lot of experiments..."

Yuriko was now openly sobbing in between the words and Tsunade decided to cut this short. She pulled herself away from Rei and stood up before walking towards Yuriko and hugged her while whispering 'All is fine, you are no longer there.' until the woman finally calmed down.

"Yeah..." Rei slowly started when he saw Yuriko finally calm enough to listen, "I think we can wrap this up. Tsunade... would you mind showing her her room and tucking her into the bed?"

Before Tsunade could react, Yuriko almost desperately asked, "What will happen to me now?" She simply had to know what to expect as surviving being a test subject once more... she would rather kill herself.

"What do you mean?" Rei snorted in a ridiculing manner, "Do you think we will use you to create these cores? Bah, if you can do it with your bloodline, we can definitely learn it with our bloodlines or different methods. Using you is simply inefficient and insufficient! You can simply stay here until you fully recover and teach us how to do that little nifty trick of yours. After that... do whatever you want. You can leave and roam the world or join my new village. It will be up to you." Rei nonchalantly shrugged. He had no intention of holding Yuriko against her will after he learned how to create batteries working on nature energy from her. The Silence Seal was on her the second she stepped through the portal so Rei was not afraid of her talking about Uzushio or his group.

After all, as Yuriko's life-story proved right, safety measures were EXTREMELY important.

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Chapter 169 - Ch169. Location of the new village

Days passed and the whole fiasco with the failed coup, for better or worse, sent waves through the world. The minor ninja villages started, or at least tried, to be extremely friendly with their Daimyo while the said Daimyo decided to be a bit more cautious of their supposed protectors.

Helping a member of the royal clan to become the Daimyo was fine... at the end of the day, the title would still belong to someone belonging to the said clan, but this was the first case of the open rebellion of a ninja village where its leader tried to usurp the power for himself. And that subtly shifted the entire political situation between Daimyo and ninja villages in the whole world.

As for Yukigakure... they were disgruntled. Those who knew about the rebellion were flabbergasted the strongest ninjas from the villages lost and on top of that, never came back. Those who didn't know about it, those of low rank and strength, were on the contrary bewildered the village higher-ups tried to do such a thing.

But both groups had one thing in common. They both were utterly happy that the Daimyo of the Land of Snow was generous enough to not give the order to execute them or at least, the order to disband the village.

Just like that, Yukigakure, while weakened beyond belief, continued to exist.

...

In the days after the rebellion, while the ninjas of Yukigakure were too afraid to leave their village, Rei finally found a good spot to set up his village. While Yukigakure was situated in the northern part of the country with its back tightly protected by an impassable and dangerous mountain range, Rei decided to establish his village on the other side of these mountains.

The reasons for this were simple. The mountain range was the literal edge of the world... well, not really since Rei knew the world was not flat but as far as the inhabitants of this world were concerned, the mountains were the end. They were so far north, nobody ever found a good reason to try and cross them. After all, the Land of Snow was the northernmost island of the elemental nations and beyond that... nobody has a clue what is there.

The mountains were also incredibly dangerous. While the Land of Snow, or as it was nowadays being renamed after Sosetsu used the Generator, the Land of Spring, changed its climate, the mountains were not included. In front of Yukigakure, the plains that were previously covered in a monumental amount of snow were now covered in colorful flowers and fresh grass but the mountains behind the village are still covered in snow. The reason for this... the scientists simply refused to step into these mountains to set up the device needed for the generator's influence to reach there.

And this worked just fine for Rei.

The mountain range was very treacherous. Massive avalanches, sharp and steep cliffs with a deceptive blanket of snow on them, and their sides frozen enough for sticking exercise to not work, and if that was not enough, because of the harsh environment, the animals inhabiting the place were also a lot stronger than usual. Chakra made sure of that. While it was just a passive strengthening and the size of the animals was only slightly bigger than normal, facing a pack of snow dire wolves enhanced by chakra was no joke even for ninjas.

These mountains were the best natural shield Rei could ever hope for. Nobody would have any valid reasons to even suspect the village is anywhere near them, even if they somehow found out it was located in the Land of Sn-, Spring. After all, only a total madman would have guts to go into these mountains, much less set up an entire village there, no?

That left people with only one way to accidentally reach the village without crossing the mountains. The sea.

Frankly, Rei was not worried about that. In this world, adventure-seeking explorers were rare. Everybody was too busy trying to survive and get stronger or richer in this war and conflict-infested world. The closest thing to 'explorer' was merchants who sailed on the sea to sell their goods in a different country and even they would never get off their normal course in fear of sinking in unknown waters.

Plus, this place was so far up north that nobody had any valid reason to even go here. On top of that, the Land of Snow was too big for merchants to take detours around it. The climate was freezing, the winds were slow... it would take at least half-year to sail around the island. It was simply not worth the time. And that was without taking into account the various dangerous creatures living in these waters... yeah, Rei was fairly positive the village's location would stay hidden unless he outright said where it was. No accidental stumbling upon it was happening anytime soon.

"It's beautiful, don't you think?"

Rei's shoulders suddenly felt added weight as Konan embraced him from behind, pressing herself to his back and leaning her chin on his right shoulder while her arms took a tight but loving hold of his chest.

Rei involuntarily smiled, enjoying the sudden warmth of his lover as he took yet another look at the surroundings around the hill he was standing on. High snowy mountains, blue glittering sea, whitish forests... yeah, the surrounding land was indeed a sight to behold.

"Yes... but the weather leaves a lot to be desired," Rei let his body shudder a bit.

"Mhmm," She distractedly hummed as she started to rub her hands on Rei's chest in an attempt to make him warmer. "It will take a lot of work to make this place habitable." The corner of Konan's lips twitched upwards, "Tough."

Rei could only helplessly groan. In a way, he brought it upon himself. The second his girls saw the climate and felt the cold, they promptly turned around while shivering and left through the portal, back into the warmth and coziness of their mansion in Uzushio where they stayed for the next week under warm blankets before the shiver went away. Only Konan and Tsunade stayed, and even that was to give Rei a smug yet encouraging smile that obviously meant, 'I told you so!'.

"Even with the current amount of clones, it will take at least a year to cover the entire place with a huge sealing matrix that would make the place pleasant and warm without affecting the surrounding lands." Rei half-grumbled. He could not afford to spend more clones on this. His clones were already spread thin with researching new seals, building the new village up, taking care of Uzushio development, setting up the Uzushio Trading Company, and much more.

'Saving Pakura was one of the best things I could ever do. Without her, I would have to take care of my current shinobi forces. Thankfully, she is competent enough to basically act as the Kage in my absence...' Rei fondly thought about how big of a help Pakura was before his cheek twitched, 'now if only she was not so clingy.'

"But that's fine, I would loathe forcing my people to live here if it was not a pleasant and a good place to live in. I never realized that..." Rei apologetically shook his head. He always knew he would have to spend a lot of time making this piece of inhabitable land a cozy and warm home for his village. He just didn't realize it was quite as bad as this.

Rei, as somebody whose body was enhanced by nature energy on a daily basis for the last twenty-plus years, felt only a slight chill but Mei, Ringo, and Pakura apparently almost keeled over the second they stepped through the portal.

"I know," Konan quietly said, enjoying the moment. It was not often she got to spend time with Rei alone. She knew Rei would give her as much alone time as she desired if only she asked for it but that would be simply selfish so these moments were very rare and cherished by her. "I can feel it too. It is cold but... nowhere near the minus forty Celsius degrees, the thermometer is showing. Since you showed me how to enhance my body with nature energy, I never slacked. At least, this will show Mei to be a bit more diligent with the exercises she deems useless."

Rei put his hand on Konan's, squeezing it slightly. "A pity, really. If she did practice the exercise diligently every day, I could slave... ahem, use her to help me out with the village." He said in a very regretful tone, causing Konan to chuckle.

"Yeah... a pity Tsunade has a company to direct. Otherwise, you could make cheap labor out of her too." Konan quipped.

Tsunade was a Senju and Sage. She was somewhat resistant to cold thanks to her Senju physique that started adapting to the environment straight away but the second she activated Sage Mode, she felt no discomfort due to the cold whatsoever. Standing in Konoha forests and standing in this freezing land was no different for her.

"Speaking of which... you-" Rei teasingly started but Konan quickly cut him short.

"Tu, tu, tu..." She playfully poked his cheek with her pointing finger, "I am far too busy with setting up the routes for the Uzushio Trading Company to play builder with you," She said in a sincere tone but her eyes gleamed with unveiled amus.e.m.e.nt at the situation.

Rei could only sniff in distaste, "In the end, I was abandoned!"

A peaceful silence spread between the two as they watched the hive of clones tirelessly work. It was only ten minutes later, Rei decided to break the silence as he remembered,

"Speaking about Tsunade and Mei, how is that plan going along?"

A slight vicious light flashed through Konan's eyes but it was gone as quickly as it appeared, leaving only a pleasant smile on her face, "Ah... Tsunade is really invested in that. Unfortunately for her, as much as she would want it, she can't go and do the talks with Hokage. If not her appearance, manner of speech, voice, habits, her gestures could reveal her..." Konan let out an annoyed sigh, "So we decided it would be me who will go negotiate with Konoha. It shouldn't be hard, the air in there is currently quite explosive."

"Ouch..." Rei chuckled, now knowing the poor saps fell for their plan. "In the end, the trust between them was only so much..." He shrugged and without a warning, spun on his heel while lifting the body of Konan, who yelped from surprise, and putting her on his shoulder before creating a portal to his room in his dimension, "Since you will be away in Konoha for a bit, I think a few days spent together are in order!"

Nobody saw Rei nor Konan for the following week.

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Chapter 170 - Ch170. Trouble brewing

"What did you do?" Hiruzen asked, puffing on his pipe while half-glaring at Danzo who stoically stood in front of his desk.

"I have no idea what you are talking about, Hiruzen." Danzo answered, his eyes showing confusion while his expression was as if set in stone.

Partially, he was telling the truth. Danzo simply did so many things that he really had no idea what exactly Hiruzen meant. 'How the heck did he even discover anything suspicious?' Danzo thought while internally frowning. He spent the majority of his time covering the tracks so this entire meeting was highly unusual and a very surprising thing to happen.

"What am I talking about?" Hiruzen almost quietly asked, his rage flashing through his eyes. This was something Danzo got to see only very rarely. The expression full of anger filled with the promise of pain...

'Uh, oh...' He thought warily but he really had no idea what Hiruzen meant. "Yes. Tell me... please." He added to show some measure of respect. An enraged monkey was very hard to deal with, after all.

Hiruzen's expression twisted but he barely kept calm, just throwing a letter at Danzo who caught it with almost practiced ease.

"Read!"

Danzo furrowed his brows at the pissed tone of his long-time 'friend' and started reading the letter. The more he read, the more his always-expressionless poker face came closer to breaking from the sheer shock he was feeling.

But before Danzo could voice out any of his doubts, Hiruzen started speaking, "How about explaining why ROOT is still in function? I remember very well that years ago I gave the order to disband it, Danzo!"

Silence descended on the office as the air between Danzo and Hiruzen turned chilly, both staring at the other with unflinching determination in a powerful show of wills. What was really surprising though... was the result.

Hiruzen slightly lowered his head, not enough for it to be taken as defeat or, Sage forbids, submission... only enough to show how tired he was at having to wipe Danzo's ass.

"I am not angry because ROOT is still operating." Hiruzen wearily sighed as he started talking in an old and tired tone, "That was given the second you tried to assassinate me after the death of Fourth Hokage on my way to the Fire Daimyo to reintroduce myself as the new temporary Hokage."

"I never did that. You must be mista-" Danzo started but Hiruzen just dismissively waved him off with his free hand, not even bothering to acknowledge the excuse.

"No, Danzo. What I am really angry at you for is the blatant stupidity showcased here." Hiruzen's voice started to slowly but surely get stronger, "If you want to lead a freaking SECRET organization with no ties to Konoha, DO NOT teach your emotionless drones to introduce themselves as 'Roots of Konoha' during their supposedly secret missions, for f.u.c.ks sake!" By the end, Hiruzen was standing on his feet, clasping on his chest while breathing hard from yelling at Danzo.

Danzo however just simply grimaced knowing the cat was out of the bag. Not because of the letter. Not because the Hokage knew. But because this situation did not give any sense whatsoever for Danzo and the old monkey was his best bet to make at least some sense out of it. Oh, he didn't want to... how he didn't want to speak with Hiruzen openly about ROOT. Danzo was not an idiot and knew this probably would be used by Hiruzen later down the line to majestically screw him over but Konoha now faced a serious threat so the cards had to be put on the table.

"ROOT didn't do it." Danzo said impassively, letting his face relax into a wide scowl.

It was an open secret among the members of Hiruzen's genin team that while Danzo had an impressive poker face that simply could not be seen through, the second the man relaxed his facial muscles, his act was utterly incapable of masking what he really thought. This was a big part of the reason why Danzo always wore his grim look. Which was why Hiruzen believed every word coming out of Danzo's mouth the second he saw his confused and enraged scowl.

"I have no memory of allowing such a mission."

Danzo was the head of ROOT. That simply meant he was the one who handed out missions to his ninjas and he knew one thing for sure. He did not send even one of his ninjas to the Land of Snow in decades. Hence...

"The report is bullshit, you want to say?" Hiruzen flopped back down into his chair, not knowing what to think anymore.

First, a few days ago he received a report that there was an attempt at revolt in the Land of Snow. This didn't mean much at the first glance but since then, he always had some pretentious noble from the capitol 'visiting' Konoha in the guise of the treaties between the village and the Daimyo slightly changing in the favor of the Daimyo. Honestly, Hiruzen was too old and tired to care about these small things.

Who cared if ninjas were not allowed to step into the Daimyo palace without an escort from the Daimyo's ninja guards? Who cared if they had to report their presence in the capital to a special secret Samurai guardsmen? Konoha was not revolting anytime soon, plus missions in the capital were almost as rare as SS-rank ninjas so these 'restrictions' had basically no effect on the village at all. Still... it was very time-consuming and tiring to have talks with nobles, even if they were about unimportant things that would simply reassure Daimyo about their loyalty.

Hiruzen thought that was the end of the Land of Snow fiasco but he was clearly wrong.

After the Daimyo of the Land of Snow won against the rebels, which didn't take even a day, an impressive feat in Hiruzen's opinion... Yukigakure simply gave up two days later. Well, nobody could blame them, really. The really important people of the village were killed in the revolt and what was left was not strong enough to even be called a village. They should be happy the Daimyo didn't outright disband the village for how weak it was.

And therein laid the current problem. The letter, which was still tightly clutched in Danzo's angry grip just as he started speaking.

"Yes! I have never sent my ninjas so far north and nobody trained by me would act like an idiot! Announcing where they come from? That-"

"That. Doesn't. Matter!" Hiruzen gritted out. Danzo was pushed too far too suddenly and Hiruzen couldn't believe this made his friend blind to the real matter at hand! "The most important thing is that ROOTs existence was revealed! This is an official complaint letter from the Daimyo of the Land of Snow on behalf of Yukigakure for the actions of Konoha's 'secret' ROOT division!"

Danzo suddenly grew pale... "Meaning the dignitaries of other countries will have free access to it." He muttered almost wordlessly, causing Hiruzen to stiffly nod.

ROOT was an incredible concept but it only worked if they were totally secret even from the higher-ups of Konoha. Over the years, the organization did various things and caused mayhem in too many places. The only saving grace was nobody knew they belonged to Konoha. Oh, people suspected but that was it. Suspicion was at the end of the day just... suspicion.

The second evidence starts coming about ROOT being Konoha's division though... all the families of the victims of assassinations... Danzo could almost see the map of the Elemental Nations getting painted in the colors of Konoha enemies. After all, every eyewitness that caught even a glance of the blank white mask with the words 'ROOT' on it, now knew to blame Konoha for it.

"Kidnapping a member of the Yukimi clan from the village and having over a hundred eye-witnesses to the said red-haired female agent's introduction as somebody belonging to ROOT..." Hiruzen continued, "It honestly would not matter and we could just dismiss it as lies. The Daimyo of the Land of Snow would have no leverage... if only the Biri-Biri company didn't join the fray and confirm his claims to be truthful. The same Biri-Biri company that holds incredibly high relations with many Daimyo's, important nobles, and wealthy merchants. The same Biri-Biri company that is one of the richest in the world. The same Biri-Biri company... that was totally impartial and has the best reputation there is."

"The same Biri-Biri company we desperately need if we want to recover after the Kyuubi attack in a reasonable time-frame." Danzo finished it for Hiruzen.

This was the main problem. The Daimyo of the Land of Snow somehow managed to convince the Biri-Biri company to support his claims. Frankly, Hiruzen didn't think this was hard. It was a well-known fact that Biri-Biri and Snow Corporation never clashed and their relationship was very cordial.

The men stared at each other silently before Hiruzen decided to act like a Hokage for a moment, "I want you to disband ROOT. This time for real, Danzo." He started in a commanding tone, "I let it go on for far too long. Its presence became detrimental for the village. A week later, an emissary of the Biri-Biri company will arrive in Konoha in order to negotiate the reparations for the acts of ROOT in their lands. We both know it doesn't matter if it was your ninja or not or even if the accusation is actually real. There is simply too much political power being thrown around and too little time to prove ourselves innocent." Hiruzen sadly shook his head, ending his speech. Konoha needed the goods of the Biri-Biri company... and the Fire Daimyo was far too friendly to their representative in the capital of the Land of Fire to ignore the company. The best Hiruzen could do was to go head-first into this already lost negotiation with their emissary and try to reduce any sort of payment they would ask for while keeping their relationship on a good basis.

Hearing Hiruzen's order, Danzo just turned on his heel and silently left the office, silently swearing to find out who played him for a fool. Without the support of so many Daimyo, Konoha could just throw around its weight and past achievement but now... 'Damn it all to hell! So many years of my effort wasted in a blink of an eye!'

The second Danzo closed the door behind himself, a man appeared from the shadow of Hokage's chair, "Will he really do it? Disband the ROOT?"

Hiruzen could only exasperatedly yet tiredly shake his head.

"If only, Raido-kun... if only."

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Chapter 171 - Ch171. Visit to Konoha

"Welcome in Konoha, Miss Kona." Hiruzen greeted the representative of Biri-Biri, a pale-skinned woman with shoulder-long blue hair, clad in an azure kimono as her discerning and sharp amber eyes glanced right and left from person to person, measuring them. Hiruzen's stomach sank at the sight. He never expected the 'negotiator' would be the previous president of the Biri-Biri company!

Konan, or as she was known by her alias, Na Kona, came to Konoha to negotiate the reimburs.e.m.e.nt Yukigakure would receive for the attempt to kidnap a member of the Yukimi clan, the founding clan of Yukigakure, and a blatant attack on the village, which was actually a breach of the peace treaty signed after the third ninja war between all the ninja villages.

Most villages in one form or another broke the treaty but the important thing was to keep it all hush-hush. If it came to the light and was important enough... a situation like this could easily happen. Konan couldn't help but grit her teeth hard in order to prevent herself from mockingly grinning like a loon and she was still unable to wipe the smile from her face completely. The most she managed was to keep her lips set in a small gentle smile.

Normally, an accusation such as this would mean shit and would be completely ignored. Normally, Konan would be laughed off with some crap-like excuse from the Hokage and that would be it but...

'Rei really had a good idea with making Biri-Biri the picture of neutrality and making connections with every important Daimyo family there is. One word from us and suddenly, this became the talk of the year... better yet, nobody can accuse us of siding with Yukigakure, much less being the one who orchestrated all of this. I mean… what could possibly be our reason to do so, right?' Konan mirthfully thought while exchanging pleasantries with Hokage and his council. The Biri-Biri company was simply too important to ignore and so this entire thing was blown out of proportion so fast, Konoha had no time to counter-attack.

A mere dispute between Konoha and Yukigakure became something every country closely watched. This... was the closest the countries got to the start of the fourth ninja war since the third ended. Konoha was weakened beyond belief after the Kyuubi attack and only the peace treaty and Hiruzen's swift orders to strengthen the borders prevented the war from breaking out again right after that incident. God knows Kumo certainly wanted to jump at Konoha at the earliest opportunity.

And now… who would have thought Konoha would have the guts to blatantly break the peace treaty when that piece of paper was half the reason why Kumo and Iwa sat tight in their villages instead of marching to Konoha and razing it to the ground out of sheer spite.

The reason why Konan found this situation so hilarious was that she knew Konoha was completely innocent in the matter. After all, it was her who took Yuriko away from Yukigakure and Yuriko was in no way a happy citizen as it was portrayed in the complaint. The supposed ROOT ninja was just Mei in disguise and yet... Konoha was unable to say anything in their defense because of the division in the village. Heck, most jonin doesn't even know that ROOT existed.

Danzo can say his ROOT didn't do it all he wanted but Hiruzen has no idea what ROOT actually does. He knows nothing about their missions and Danzo's assurances were, quite literally, worthless in this situation. Even if Danzo let the ANBU search through ROOT headquarters and gave all doc.u.mentation to Hokage, which he would never do, it would not help because a simple 'you must be hiding the doc.u.ments' or 'you already destroyed them' would suffice to completely shut him up. There was simply no proof ROOT didn't do it and at this point, it didn't even matter if ROOT actually was responsible. Konoha had to grit their teeth and pay up to prevent a war they were in no shape to fight.

"I must say, I am very grateful to the Biri-Biri company for stepping in and preventing a war from breaking out because of this incident, Miss Kona." Hiruzen amiably said, gesturing at a pre-prepared chair for Konan.

Konna chuckled, unable to keep it in. The man was actually thanking HER.

"No, no... war would simply postpone too many of our projects so we decided to step in and use our influence to resolve this dispute between Konoha and Yukigakure." Konan answered while shaking her head as she sat down on the luxurious chair.

Any Konoha ninja would know Konan was somebody important the second he got to know she received a chair in front of the council. In order to show their importance, anyone answering to the council was left standing in front of them.

"Well, then, gentlemen..." Konan took the lead in the discussion. She crossed her legs and put her hands on her knees while leaning her body slightly forward as her amber eyes gleamed in excitement. "Shall we begin the negotiation?"

...

Konan naturally didn't come to Konoha alone. She was supposed to be an important person and that meant a bunch of bodyguards and attendants. These people were currently housed at the best hotel in the village, finally resting after a long trip. It was already evening when they arrived in Konoha and they knew they would probably stay a few days in the village until the negotiations were over. Moreover, tomorrow, Konan will most likely assign them some kind of work so they wanted to enjoy their free time to the fullest while they could.

Only one of Konan's tag-alongs did not share this mindset.

Ringo sneaked out of her room, clad in black clothes heading to fulfill her own mission while Konan provided a distraction by requesting the council to gather despite it being practically already a night.

'Heh, everybody is so focused on these negotiations, even the patrols are lighter than what they normally should be.' Ringo thought as she slipped past two chunins hidden on a rooftop, watching the still-busy street. She basically stood only a few meters away from them but Ringo was not one of the best Kiri assassins for nothing. The chunins had no idea she was ever there. 'Hmm, correction. Konoha is just incompetent.'

Continuing through the empty back alleys and occasionally using rooftops to get to her target, Ringo finally landed in a crouch on the rooftop next to the orphanage. Staying hidden for an entire hour as she observed the surroundings.

Done with observation, her eyes darted to the right, towards an old house opposite the orphanage, while narrowing, 'The first set of guards...' She spotted the ninjas occasionally taking a peek through the window. Ringo clicked her tongue as she looked to the left where a restaurant was located. 'Two watching from there.' These two were actually very well hidden and only their unnatural interest in the orphanage gave them away.

"And if my chakra sensing is true, three more are hidden inside the orphanage. Daaamn~, this is pain." Ringo quietly complained to herself as her body started to move again.

While she was observing the situation, a clone of hers disguised herself with make-up and found a spot close-by the two observers in the restaurant. Getting a signal from the original, it quickly used an invisible chakra string to trip a nearby waitress, causing her to spill the contents of her tray right onto the disguised ninjas. Needless to say, both of the observers quickly stopped paying attention to the orphanage when their hair was full of sticky noodles.

The two in the restaurant solved, only the two in the house opposite the orphanage became a problem. Well, not really. They only looked out of the window occasionally unlike the two in the restaurant who stared at the building almost religiously. Ringo simply sneaked inside the orphanage right after the ninja behind the window turned around.

'And I only have to avoid the three nuisances inside.' She thought as she silently walked through the dark hall. By now, it was way past curfew and the children were already asleep while the workers could be heard talking in the kitchen, the only lit room in the whole building. Ringo simply silently ran like a shadow around the open door to the kitchen, heading towards the room with the younger kids.

Finally getting to the door behind which her target slept, she could feel three a.d.u.l.t presences inside. Suddenly, Ringo's smile widened into a predatory grin when one of them felt somehow emotionless. 'Heh... let's see how this will work!'

Crane, a member of Konoha ANBU, was watching the young two-year-old Jinchuuriki sleeping after yet another day of being rejected by the kids and caretakers alike. It was a bit of a bother to stay silently put in the corner and observe the kid. Really, for two years nobody even came close to threaten his life, and yet, he and Bear had to watch him.

'Maybe it's time to finally resign from ANBU?' Crane contemplated, knowing well he took this mission upon himself because he was as lazy as any Nara. After all, two years of peace in ANBU? He basically exploited the situation to make his career skyrocket! And...

Suddenly his eyes were attracted to a closet inside the room where a small amount of lightning crackled. Crane's eyes widened as he realized, 'Shit! We are not alone!'

Before he could even attempt to sign his companion, Bear, to be silent, a man wearing a mask with ROOT on the forehead ran out of the closet and in one move jumped outside through the window.

The two Konoha ANBU watched dumbfounded for a second before their brains rebooted and both promptly gave chase...

Ringo stepped into the room through the door, amusedly watching both guards running after the ROOT operative. Honestly, she thought one would stay behind to watch the kid but she was apparently wrong.

"Well, an easier job for me, I guess." She shrugged and approached the sleeping blond kid.

Putting her pointing finger on his forehead, Ringo flared her chakra into her hand, activating the seal put there by Rei before she left Uzushio. She watched as the Kanji from the seal slithered down her hand onto the kid's forehead where they set themselves in a circle before promptly disappearing under his skin.

"Rei said he has no idea what to expect from this, kid," Ringo whispered to the sleeping boy, "but I hope, for your own sake, you won't end up like me. Brainwashed and willing to sacrifice yourself for ungrateful ingrates who couldn't be bothered to throw you away on the first opportunity after you lose your usefulness. I guess... only time will tell."

Ringo turned around and silently left. The rest... was not her problem.

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Chapter 172 - Ch172. Afternoon with Pakura

Rei and Pakura were having a picnic on a grassy hill near the Uzushio village, both somewhat awkwardly pondering how to start a light-hearted conversation.

"Damn," Rei chuckled, "this is harder than I thought. I think this is actually the first time we are truly alone."

Pakura worked as Rei's Jonin Commander which currently, while the village was not yet built, meant she temporarily took the role of his secretary. The problem between them became quickly apparent. Despite Pakura's obvious affection towards Rei, they were both used to being professional towards each other so now that they were alone, it was hard to have a casual talk.

It was actually Konan who was responsible for the current situation. Pakura got surprisingly along well with the resident bluenette who was also of the strict and no-nonsense type during work. Their similar personality and approach towards work made the two girls close considering they both worked together on many projects.

And since Konan was the best at psychology out of Rei's girls, she quickly noticed Pakura's feelings. Well, at least, she did so sooner than others. Noticing it didn't require any psycho-analytical skills, really. Pakura sucked at hiding her feelings in every meeting that didn't pertain to her job so once she started spending some time with Rei and his girls during her free time, the cat was out of the bag pretty fast.

It was only a half-year later after Pakura's arrival when Konan noted Rei started to notice Pakura more. At first, it was just a few additional glances but the two were clearly being drawn to each other. And yet... Rei refused to make any advances despite all four of his girls giving him their blessing. After all, even now, he was run ragged by his projects whether in sealing or in the village creation, and on top of that, he had to find time for all four of his girls.

Well, Rei was not complaining. Work could go stuff itself. For Rei, his girls were his priority but still... time was precious, and getting involved with yet another woman? Rei didn't really think he had time for that.

As such, two days before she left for Konoha, Konan took the situation into her own hands, and somehow, here they were... Rei and Pakura were ordered to go on a picnic date with a no-nonsense 'I-dare-you-to-disobey' kind of tone.

' 'If it works it works, if not, at least you know where you stand with each other!' ... She said' Rei thought as he side-glanced at the fidgeting woman sitting next to him. 'Ei, whatever.'

"How is training Maki going?" Rei started. He really had no idea what else than their work to talk about with Pakura. With his girls, it was just so easy as they always had a common topic but now...

Pakura furrowed her brows, not expecting such a question, and her mind slightly panicked as she hurried to create a coherent answer, "It... is fine?" She said unsurely, making Rei chuckle which only made Pakura fidget nervously even more.

Seeing her state, Rei decided to help her out a bit. He knew Pakura had no time to spend on interaction with males and he had more experience from dates with his girls so...

Rei put his hand on hers, squeezing it slightly in the reassuring matter and when Pakura's face snapped in his direction adorning a stunned expression, Rei just gently smiled at her. It was not an easy feat since he was quite nervous but he was a ninja and acting was a fundamental skill of his profession.

Thankfully, Pakura considerably relaxed after seeing Rei's calm smile and shuffled a bit closer to Rei. The duo started to snack on the sandwiches while looking at the sunset painting the Uzushio orange in pleasant silence, their hands still connecting.

"So..." This time it was Pakura who started speaking, "Er," She sheepishly avoided Rei's eyes, "this is actually the first time I am on a date with anybody."

Silence again descended on the duo, making the time awkwardly drag on until Rei decided to... "Neh, Pakura?" He hummed, getting her attention, "Let's just... act like usual, okay?"

"Fine." Pakura chuckled and amusedly shook her head, "To think Konan would forbid us from discussing anything work-related."

"Yeah, I don't think that will work for us."

"Right... It's actually my fault." She sighed but her eyes stared into the distance in a nostalgic way, "I have nothing but Maki and my work. From an early age, I was led to work hard for my village. Pakura, get stronger... Pakura, our village needs you... Pakura, you have to support the village… Pakura, your Kekkei Genkai..." Her lips twisted into a distasteful mocking smile, "I had never time to have a normal life. Even Maki was literally thrown into my arms with orders to train her to the best of my ability because she showed a promise. It wasn't even my own decision to take her in as my apprentice." She sadly muttered.

"And now... work is the only thing you know and love Maki as if she was your own." Rei amusedly hummed in acknowledgment while putting his arm around her shoulder and pulling her closer to him, "We all found it a bit strange that you don't have even one hobby or interest. You just spend all your time on your duties as my Jonin Commander."

"I am actually very happy about getting the position, you know? It consumes just enough time that between training Maki and focusing on my duties, I don't have time to think about the betrayal of Sunagakure."

"You know... at some point, it will come out that you are alive. You will have to face it one day." Rei gently reminded her but to his surprise, Pakura just took a refreshing breath and brightly smiled in a way as if a burden fell from her chest.

"That will not be a problem!" She assuredly stated. "As long as I have Konan backing me up, nothing is impossible. I am sure she would be able to persuade the Sunagakure higher-ups I am dead even if I stood in front of the council itself. All she would need was their doc.u.mentation of my apparent death." She snickered. After seeing Konan's mind at work in political manipulations, Pakura really pitied any village trying to make problems for Rei's lands through diplomacy.

"Cheers to that," Rei smirked and reached into the basket, pulling out two bottles of water before handing one to Pakura. "Honestly, just as Tsunade is scary good at the economy, Konan's niche is politics. That's actually why she was sent to Konoha for the negotiation instead of Tsunade going herself... among other reasons."

"Speaking of which," Pakura's eyes gleamed in interest made of schadenfreude as she excitedly turned her body towards Rei, "I heard you got news from her yesterday. How does the negotiation with Konoha go?"

The second it was decided the emissary will be Konan, it was an established fact that Konoha is f.u.c.k.i.e.d. What remained to be seen, however, was what mood Konan will be in during the negotiations. Mei and Tsunade even bet on how much Konan would make Konoha suffer.

Needless to say... "Tsunade lost the bet. Her guess was too small." Rei quipped. "The negotiations are almost wrapped up after these two weeks. They only discuss some minor unimportant things now so Konan will be returning quite soon. According to Konan, it was quite dramatic. In the end, she only managed to secure a reparation payment of 1 000 000 000 Ryo." He nonchalantly said with a shrug.

Hearing the sum, Pakura actually spat out the water she recently drank and started coughing while hitting her chest to calm down from the shock Rei gave her. "Can you repeat that!?" She asked almost hysterically after she finally found herself in a condition good enough to talk again.

"You heard me correctly." Rei smugly smirked. "We both know that Konan is a miracle worker, alright!"

"But... How!? 1... Such a sum is no small matter for a village! That kind of..." Pakura couldn't help but feel flabbergasted.

"Konan promised to give Konoha a fifty percent discount on the products of the Biri-Biri company for the duration of their debt. Considering they were given ten years to pay the reparations..."

"I see," Pakura grimaced, now understanding why Konoha was fine with accepting such an exorbitant price, "It wouldn't be impossible to actually profit if they took advantage of it. Buy in bulk and then resell."

Rei simply snorted, "Do you really think Konan of all people would let Konoha screw with her? Oh, I am sure the Konoha council and Hokage think they are smart but... I know Konan. She already sent a proposal to ration the goods sent to Konoha with her report. This discount given to them doesn't work for Konoha, instead, it is only for goods sold on Konoha's territory, meaning if Konoha decided to buy elsewhere, they will have to pay full price."

"So Konan wants Tsunade to cut the number of goods sent to the Konoha territory by... 50%?" Pakura inquired. It seemed logical to her. This way, there won't be any loss, only an abundant profit but Rei quickly put that notion to a sudden stop when he amusedly shook his head.

"She will cut the supply by three-quarters." Rei gleefully stated and Pakura shuddered when she realized the implications.

"Oh... Konoha is so f.u.c.k.i.e.d. They will actually have to buy from elsewhere for full price at this rate!"

"They sure are. They thought they would be able to wave the contract in front of our company and demand goods at a dirt-cheap price and Konan is using exactly that arrogance. Sure, the contract does state we will have to sell our goods at half the price on Konoha's territory but there is nowhere written we are obliged to deliver as many goods as Konoha desires."

"And without being able to resell our goods, Konoha won't be able to make the money to pay for the reparations, hence they will have to use what they have safely deposited in their coffers. That is actually a very insidious scheme. Damn, Konan is ruthless. Using only a single hole in the contract to make Konoha pay almost two times their annual income." Pakura leaned closer to Rei, her eyes sparkling in glee.

Rei blinked and his eyes slightly widened. It was only now he realized they somehow got too close during their heated talk about the negotiations. Pakura's face was basically just a few inches away from his and her body was pressing itself into his side. Rei, seeing their position, made his mind.

'Here we go. Let's make it count.'

Leaning forward, he kissed the startled girl. Needless to say, the remainder of their date was spent in silence as the two enjoyed each other's lips, their conversation about work long forgotten.

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Chapter 173 - Ch173. Consequences of the negotiation

Days slowly passed and Konan returned, almost glowing with happiness. The monetary payment was but one single thing among many she managed to negotiate and honestly, Konan thought this was the performance of her career.

To name a few results...

Konoha's ninjas were forbidden to enter the Land of Snow. If even one ninja belonging to Konoha was found within the territory of the Land of Snow, it would instantly become a matter between Daimyos of Snow and Fire and the Biri-Biri company would take the side of the Daimyo of Snow. And with it, the other countries.

The Hokage would disband the ROOT organization for good. Well... Rei didn't put much faith in Hiruzen of all people as he was almost sure Danzo would just screw with him anyway and keep ROOT active out of the sight but officially ROOT was supposed to not exist anymore.

The best part, however, was that all villages and countries now knew ROOT is 'disbanded' which basically meant that if even a single ROOT agent was caught and confirmed to belong to that organization from hence on, Konoha would be shit out of luck with their own Daimyo due to the diplomatic shitstorm it would cause. Sometimes, diplomatic pressure can be much more devastating than brute force.

At least, Danzo would have to be more discreet and careful in his operations from now on and as such, nothing would go as smoothly or quickly for him as it was up till now.

And since the massively overpriced payment was mainly compensation to the Land of Snow and the Yukimi clan, Konoha naturally had to compensate Yukigakure too since they were the 'main' victim whose founding clan was 'kidnapped'. Konan complained for days about how much nitpicking went into it. She knew exactly which techniques she had to ask for and by the end of the negotiation, copies of at least a hundred D and C ranked techniques were handed out into her hands to be given to Yukigakure. Within those, there were even some high-ranking ones such as Shadow Clones.

Sure, Tsunade brought the technique with her when she moved the Senju library into the mansion in Rei's dimension but now that Konoha 'handed' it over to Yukigakure, Rei can simply 'buy' the technique from Yukigakure and nobody can say he stole it from Konoha when the ninjas of his future village use it. After all, Shadow Clones was a strictly regulated and safeguarded technique of Konoha so having a foreign ninja using it would create some friction if there was no 'justifiable' reason for 'how' exactly it was possible.

As for the low-ranked techniques... of course, they would get to Yukigakure only after Konan made copies. Needless to say, these were all techniques whose presence lacked in the Senju library. They would surely be useful for someone after being put in the library of the new village.

Honestly, tricking Konoha with the discount for the Biri-Biri goods was just icing on the cake. Not a week passed after Konan returned when she received a missive from Hokage, requesting a bigger supply of goods in the Biri-Biri shops located in Konoha.

Reading it, Konan... simply blew a raspberry and with joyous laughter cut the supply by an additional ten percent.

Even after the Kyuubi incident, losing a lot of lives and having a part of the village completely demolished, Konoha was still considered the strongest and while there were attempts to usurp this place, they failed. Nobody could have guessed it would be a simple reimburs.e.m.e.nt and greed that would actually make Konoha fall from their grace.

Paying double their annual income in ten years timeframe... the budget for Konoha grew even tighter than it was before and many of the rebuilding projects slowed to crawl. The richest village was officially having financial problems and for the first time since its creation, the Fire Daimyo had to send monetary support to Konoha apart from the standard funding.

The higher-ups of Konoha became the laughing stock of the decade while the name of Na Kona became the equivalent of a devil who dethroned Konoha from its position of strongest via giving them a discount. Konan's alias sent shudders through the leaders of various countries and hidden villages even more than Madara's name.

After all, no matter how scary the legend Madara left behind was, Konan could make their life very unpleasant for a very long time very fast with a bright innocent smile.

After Konan's return, she was especially glad that Pakura and Rei became a lot closer even though it made her disgruntled that the thing that bonded them was their work in the village. Here she put so much effort into making them not talk or even think about work and they dared to completely ignore her!

The worst part... she could not even call Rei a workaholic because he just made sure to spend most of his time with her or her 'sisters' despite his heavy workload. It was as infuriating as it was flattering, really.

Tsunade, on the other hand, complained about Konan's negotiation in Konoha because the Fire Daimyo was writing one complaint after another.

At first, the guy was full of giddiness when he heard about the discount Konoha would be receiving. After all, the Biri-Biri didn't just deal with seals for ninjas. They had various luxury goods, electrical appliances, gadgets that made life easier... nobles and Daimyos simply loved having them and the Fire Daimyo most likely already saw himself with his new and cheaply-acquired goods.

But then, the supply to Konoha was cut and one very happy Daimyo became a very angry and unhappy camper. He literally camped his own desk in his office and spent his time writing letters to Tsunade who was the current head of the Biri-Biri company under her alias.

Needless to say, Tsunade was flabbergasted and exasperated, not knowing what to do. The Senju clan always had good relations with the royal family of the Land of Fire. There was a lot going on behind the scenes between the two and it had a lot of importance but on the other hand, the Fire Daimyo had no idea that the head of the Biri-Biri was a Senju. Plus weakening Konoha, as distasteful as it sounded in her mind, was a good step for keeping the world balanced. Somehow, the second Konoha lost its place as the 'strongest' hidden village, the other villages didn't descend into a frenzy and try to attack them.

No... the other Kages actually seemed content with the situation and just sat tight on their asses, focusing on developing the economy of their own villages. Heck, nobody was even arming up as the purchases of weapons dropped by five whole percent despite them being ninja villages.

In the end, the Fire Daimyo had to just suck it up and because Tsunade refused to budge.

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Chapter 174 - Ch174. The village hidden...

Months slowly passed and soon it was two years after the incident written into the history of the Elemental Nations as the biggest f.u.c.k-up of Konoha. Exactly as Rei predicted, Konoha's sudden drop in momentum and their loss of the title of the strongest slowly started yet another subtle power-struggle among the Kumo and Iwa, the only villages strong enough to claim such a title. It was nothing concerning and far from a conflict capable of escalating but thanks to it, Rei finally launched Project UTC.

Uzushio Trading Company appeared in the world and climbed to the heights of top-class companies of elemental nations in less than a month after it started to supply various never-before-seen goods on the market completely unobstructed since all who could and would make it harder for them were supremely busy with their own problems.

The two most likely countries to block them, Earth and Lightning, were locked in a silent childish flexing contest. Konoha and the Land of Fire had a lot of problems with hashing out their economical situation to meddle and could only silently gape like fish when they heard about the re-emergence of their long-thought-to-be-extinct ally. Kazekage was currently too busy with a ridiculous glaring match with the Daimyo of Wind and was quite spectacularly losing. The Land of Water was... quiet. Too quiet and Rei knew what that meant. In the past year, things started to look quite bad for the bloodline users. It was still in the state of quiet before the storm but from the current tension, Rei was sure the initial massacres will begin soon enough.

But... that was completely fine now. That was the whole point of pushing his other unimportant projects to the side and finishing the village! Now that the UTC and ever-loyal Uzumaki clan were up and around on their own independent feet and his village was finished, the only thing that remained was to wait for the shitstorm to start and reap the rewards. After all, why bother putting in the effort and years to train ninjas from scratch when the Kirigakure would so sincerely push their own bloodline clans away? The only way the situation could be better would be if they actually really gift-wrapped them but other than that, it was damn perfect.

There was very little the desperate clans with the threat of extinction looming over their heads wouldn't do to survive.

...

Rei laid on the sofa in his new mansion on the hill overlooking his newly-built village, the same hill from which he and Konan observed his clones at work just a few years prior.

Building the village was honestly a major pain in the ass he will certainly avoid doing in the future. It couldn't be done in phases as what Rei had in mind required him to imbue seals into the land before the building process even started, then also imbue seals into the buildings as they were being built, and at the end, cover the walls of the buildings when they were finished. Only after all of that could Rei add the finishing touches... something he did only yesterday... and add a wide-scale sensory barrier around the whole village.

Honestly, even with the overwhelming force of the free 'cloned' menial labor, there were simply so many details in the process that it took literally ages to finish.

On the brighter side, now that the seals were set up, Rei's control over the village was incredible. He was especially proud of its warmth and cozy atmosphere despite being in the northernmost part of the 'known' world. With the seals, Rei could effectively control the weather around the village on his whim.

That also helped with setting up numerous training grounds with various different environments that were graded on the difficulty of surviving in them. But no matter how Rei tried, the harshest place was still the one where the natural environment was preserved. It was just so frigging cold not even jonins would dare to do a survival test there.

Suddenly, a soft groan resounded through the room and Rei looked at the waking mop of green hair on his chest with a fond smile. He and Pakura really bonded over their common efforts for establishing the village in the past two years. Well, figures two people would find a way towards each other when spending most of their time together.

"Wha'z up?" Pakura sleepily drawled, still half-asleep rubbing her face on Rei's shirt.

"You fell asleep when we were going through the finishing touches on the sensory sealing barrier." Rei informed the woman while subconsciously stroking her hair which almost caused her to purr.

It took a few head-pats and a cup of coffee to get Pakura's brain up and running again and soon, the two people found themselves cuddling on the comfortable sofa while staring at the village through a massive one-way seals-made window in the study of Rei's mansion.

"We created an amazing place..." Pakura said, awe seeping into her tone as she watched the numerous tall towers almost mockingly reaching the heavens, surrounded by houses.

"That we did." Rei's lips widened into a mysterious smile that always made Pakura pout, knowing he was not telling her everything. Good thing she was focused on the village as she leaned her back on his chest so she didn't see it.

They might have worked together for years, he might have to admit he was fond of his green-haired 'secretary', and his girls definitely liked Pakura but there was no way Rei would tell her all of his secrets until she was bonded to him.

Honestly, there was nothing 'hidden' about having tall towers in his new hidden village and Rei knew Pakura had more than one complaint about them but he never listened, always just shrugging her off with a knowing and infuriating smile.

Rei needed these towers and he figured if anybody was capable of firstly, venturing into these inhospitable cold parts on the edge of the world, and secondly, seeing through the illusionary sealing barrier covering the whole village, then towers or not, there was not really much that would hide the village from such a person.

Well, he could have built his village in the spacious system of the underground cavern located in the nearby mountains but Rei didn't want his people living in caves of all places. No matter how majestic of a city he would be able to carve in there.

The purpose of the towers was simple. They, alongside the houses and the streets, were a part of a massive sealing formation that focused on converting nature energy into electricity, making the whole village have an inexhaustible source of energy all year long without the need for power plants. The best part... unless one was better than the Uzumaki Seal Grandmasters, there was no way to sabotage the sealing formation.

It was not like the formation could only produce electricity either. It literally powered up the seals all over the village, whether they were the weather control seals, sensory barrier seals, anti-spying seals based on intentions, gravity seals put over certain training grounds... simply, the whole village was an amalgamation of seals and they needed a power source so why not use something like nature energy that is ever-present in the world?

For that, the placement of every house, street, and tower in the center of the village was carefully thought of and seals were placed in the foundation of these buildings, making various pathways through the whole village, in order to make the sealing formation with the sole purpose of energy production and management. Without it, Rei was afraid the place would most likely already be a smoldering piece of lava-filled crater considering the tens of thousands of seals working at once. There was simply something bound to go wrong, blowing the entire village up.

Good thing too, that Rei knew enough about seals to prevent such an amateurish mistake as overcharging the seals from reducing his future village to a pile of rubble. If you can't manage something... simply make it automatic.

"Speaking of which... you never told me how are you going to name the village." Pakura quipped in an inquisitive tone but Rei simply chuckled. He honestly never thought about it.

"Let's go with something simple, shall we? ... Considering we are on the opposite side of the mountain range than Yukigakure and we will certainly want our name to be known but we also do not want people figuring our whereabouts from it..." Rei hummed thoughtfully before a mischievous glint passed through his eyes and his lips stretched into a grin as he stared at his village through the window, "We shall be known as the Village Hidden on The Other Side."

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Chapter 175 - Ch175. First Council Meeting

"I hereby announce the beginning of the very first council meeting of our 'Other' village." Rei quipped, finding humor in making it sound so unimportant it was almost casual. Not that it would be anything but since this supposed first council meeting was happening in the kitchen of Rei's mansion while his group ate breakfast. It just so happened, he had every important person present so... why not?

On Rei's right side sat Konan clad in light-blue kimono, sleepily munching on a sandwich. She, during these last two years, shed every responsibility of hers to the Biri-Biri firm and hand-picked plus trained people to take care of them. Right now, she was completely free and so one nice sunny day a few days ago, she kicked Pakura from her post of Rei's secretary and delegated herself to the position. There was really nothing anybody could do about it, really. Even Rei could only whistle and look away.

Konan also acted as the head of the Intelligence department with all the spying paper clones she had all over the Elemental Nations in the offices of important people. When the village became more populated, Konan was expected to pick some apprentices and teach them some of her self-made Jutsu good for spycraft.

On Rei's left side sat still a bit sullen Pakura, eating her own breakfast. After Konan took over her duties as Rei's secretary, it meant Pakura didn't spend that much time with Rei because of her work. That was a very enlightening experience for Pakura as she found herself searching for various reasons to spend time with Rei. It was then Pakura really understood she loved Rei since any excuse of the type 'we work together, it's only natural we have a good relationship' became a moot point. Since then, Pakura decided to move into Rei's mansion.

Yet another thing Rei had no say in. Not that he didn't welcome Pakura with open arms though.

Pakura was the Jonin Commander of the village and now that she lost her duties as Rei's secretary and held only this position, she found herself with quite a lot of free time and as such, she decided to spend it with Rei. Just like that, because Pakura had no idea how to spend time with somebody other than work and training, Pakura's training to become stronger began.

Next to Konan was Kaya Uzumaki who with droopy eyes supported her cheek with her hand, trying to fully wake up. Kaya was the Head of the Uzumaki clan and the Sealing Corps. It was meant to be a temporary thing until they found an Uzumaki with royal blood but Rei knew better. It was not like anybody protested her being the clan head either. Since Rei delegated her to the position, the members of the Uzumaki clan respected the decision of the man who saved them. Alas, in the past years, Kaya showed her competence and ability to lead the clan, becoming very popular among her clansmen. The second it became apparent Kaya's daughter Karin held one of the Uzumaki bloodline Jutsu's, the deal was sealed and Kaya suddenly found herself stuck in the position even if she didn't really want it that much. Yesterday, she came to talk with Rei about sales of a new seal and it was very late when they finished so she spent the night in the mansion.

Rei could only sigh in exasperation and hope she would get married soon. After all, Kaya's home might be countries away but for them, it was only a single portal away so he clearly understood the meaning of her stay... not that he would take her up on her quiet invitation. He had enough problems with four horny girls who demanded his attention and Pakura who was slowly also starting to become one of them thanks to Konan's oh-so-helpful guidance.

On Pakura's other side, sat Chizuru Kaguya, the head of the Kaguya clan and also the Commander of the Stealth Forces which was basically the ANBU of the village. What was she doing in Rei's mansion though? Well... Rei would also like to know. The Kaguya clan had an entire compound in the village, after all!

Unlike what Rei imagined, Chizuru became Tsunade's training partner and they liked to think of uses for Shikotsumyaku which more often than not made them forget the time so Chizuru was prone to spend the night in one of the guest rooms.

Next to Kaya was Mei slowly munching on cereals, completely disinterested with whatever was going to be discussed. Fortunately for her, she was just an odd wheel in this meeting since she refused any position. Not like Rei would give the brat one unless she persuaded him she could be responsible. Honestly, he really had no idea how her canon counterpart could be the Mizukage. She was just so childish at times...

Next to Chizuru, Tsunade was reading reports from the Biri-Biri company. She was the head of the company as well as the head of the Medic Corps of the village.

Next to Mei was Ringo who refused any position despite being the first pick for the head of the Stealth Corps. She instead focused on her forging and Rei had to admit, his village would be so over-geared it was funny. Every village had some kind of special weapons but the supply was really low. That meant only up to ten ninjas could be geared with those at any given time. But thanks to Ringo's new hobby, Rei could already see that his new village would have no such problem. Ringo was creating one amazing weapon after another, weaving seals into them with the help of the Sealing Corps. So far, the weapons she made that were only slightly worse than the Seven Swords of Kirigakure already numbered in hundreds. Rei had no desire to force a position on her when she was basically making his new village overpowered just by focusing on her hobby. He only made it clear he expected her to train a few apprentices in her tracking and assassination techniques. After all, she still was the best tracker possibly in the whole world.

On the other side of the table, Yugito and Maki were giggling while gossiping together, not paying any attention to the old folks. Usually, Mei was with them but the girls already knew to leave Mei alone when she is upset. Yesterday, Mei planned to sneak into Rei's room but the talks with Kaya took so long she fell asleep so today she was supremely pissed despite showing neutral expression. No way was Maki nor Yugito going to talk to Mei before she approached them. They didn't want to end as Mei's stress-relieving punching bags in the name of training. No, thank you…

'Wait…' Rei discreetly narrowed his eyes. 'I will have to get some allies of male gender into the leading positions. Being the sole male in council full of women...' He shuddered, just realizing it as he gazed at the full gathering of his council members, feeling really outnumbered. Sadly for Rei, he already knew that with Konan being his secretary, the leading positions could be given only to people she approved of being worthy of his trust. It was just… 'I really lack male friends, don't I?' Depressing thoughts struck Rei.

The council meeting continued as everyone tried to wake up as they ate their breakfast. It was nothing grand. At best, they discussed the budget which was really smooth since nobody had to argue. The village was packed with money due to the Biri-Biri company and the Uzushio Trading Company acting as cash-cows for it. No way was Rei going to be dependent on the Daimyo for funds. That was simply a recipe for a disaster later down the line.

Another topic was promising kids from both the Uzumaki and Kaguya clan and Pakura also mentioned that some of the kids of the hundred-plus Kiri jonin, who fought under Ringo on the Nagori Isles, were already old enough to start their ninja training. For now, these matters were in their hands but Rei already told Pakura to make a department under her that would take care of the new blood. No way was Rei, as the leader, going to take care of such things as putting together teams. As if he was going to waste the time of his jonins with teaching brats only to produce their sub-par clones skill-wise. No... Rei already had a better system in mind but sadly, it would be feasible only when the number of ninjas in his village increases.

The meeting was finally ending a half-hour after it started. Frankly, it could be over in ten but they still ate during it and nobody really hurried. When Rei finally announced the council meeting is over, Mei spoke,

"I have a question."

The second Rei heard her tone, his lips twitched, realizing her mood and what was most likely the reason for it. This was not the first time she failed to sneak into his room. Normally, she actually manages it but is kicked out by either irritate Tsunade or Konan since these two could be damn scary after a stressful day.

Unfortunately for Mei, she was one of those who found it embarrassing to ask for a date or spending a night together. She preferred to appear uninvited and while more often than not that resulted in a threesome when Rei already had promised to spend time with another girl, sometimes Mei was simply shit out of luck, and the next day she would have this cold poker face...

"Go on..." Rei nodded, wondering what inane thing she came up with this time. Honestly, he really loved her for bringing laughter into his usually busy life.

"I would like to ask... now that we already have the village going, can't we go deal with the hideout of the Madara guy?" Mei dropped the bomb, causing all to stop what they were doing and look at her in bewilderment, neither knowing where that came from. Seeing their expressions, Mei hurriedly continued, "I mean after we got the sample of the Sanbi's chakra, I know that Konan created a clone to follow that Obito guy before we left. I thought it would be stupid to fight a man who was once praised as one of the strongest two ninjas of the strongest generation but now he would most likely already dropped the bucket, no? Konan said he has thousands of these wooden human-like things growing there so... shouldn't we go and take care of that? Nobody makes an army without intention to use it, after all."

'Aha... here we go. Her usual bullshit.' Rei brightly smiled. When she mentioned Madara, Rei had no idea what she wanted but the second she spoke of those wooden things, he got it. Considering Mei was pissed and irritated... she probably just wanted to melt something and thousands of Zetsu's most likely seemed like an appropriate target.

"No... it's not like we didn't go and kill Madara because I didn't have enough confidence to do it. He was old and his body was frankly useless at that stage. The only real threat would be his eyes if he had them in his eye-sockets." Rei rolled his eyes, remembering Madara's eyes were with Nagato. Speaking of which... he should probably account for Nagato in his plan... "But Madara's plan is really beneficial for us so sorry Mei, I can't let you relieve your frustration with his army. After all, we need him to declare war on all villages for my plan to succeed."

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Chapter 176 - Ch176. Plans delayed

"That's a good reform, just make sure to contain any protests. If you proceed with it exactly how we discussed, it should work spectacularly." Third Mizukage told Yagura Karatachi, the new Fourth Mizukage of the Village Hidden in the Mist. Yagura was quite young but Third Mizukage figured there was not much his apprentice could f.u.c.k up with him as his supervisor. Mist desperately needed a new leader as he didn't win any favor with the clan heads for ignoring the rumors about how horrible their clans are. It was either give the hat to Yagura and work hard to help the clans or watch as they revolt... yeah, that was not happening anytime soon if the Third had any say in it.

Thankfully, Yagura was smart and they started to make reforms that would help the clans and cleanse the false rumors among the common populace and... the new civilian-born ninjas. Yes, the whole situation became somewhat convoluted to a degree it simply could not be ignored. At first, the Third let it continue to curb-stomp the overinflated pride of the clans but it grew so rapidly, he found himself in so much shite, it forced him to abdicate.

His advisory duty done, the Third excused himself and stepped outside of Yagura's office. Everything was going just fine. Sure, losing his position might have been a bit melancholic for him but... he could admit he was getting too old. Being an advisor to the new Mizukage was a lot more peaceful profession for his old age anyway.

Humming, the Third put his hands into his pockets and suddenly froze as he found a folded paper in one of them. Stopping he took it out of his pocket and unfolded it, cursing under his nose. "Expenses report for the new barracks. Shit... this is actually important." He muttered and resignedly turned around, heading back to the office of the new Mizukage.

Stopping in front of the door to the office, he was about to knock when his hand halted just an inch away from the wood of the door and a frown appeared on his face when he heard an unknown voice coming from inside. The Third Mizukage furrowed his brows and decided to listen for a second.

"... more ninjas... reforms can provide... money... follow the plan... fight against..." He didn't hear every word since even without silencing seals activated, the door was made of a special wood that dampened the sound so any unwelcome listener would most likely not understand what was discussed even if he was pressing his ear to the door as if his life depended on him. It was only his incredible sense of hearing that allowed the Third to hear as much as he did. "Sharingan Genjuts..."

'Oh, shit!' All hairs on his body abruptly stood when he realized what was going on inside of the office.

Not even thinking, the Third Mizukage kicked the thick wooden door, snapping them out of their hinges and sending them flying into the office where they landed with a loud crash that alerted every ANBU around the building.

'Not even that loud crash woke him up? That must be some mighty strong genjutsu.' The Third frowned, looking at the assailant and instantly noticing the red-eye behind the mask. 'Uchiha, huh? ... Wait!' He scrunched his face before gaping in astonishment. "Yo-, you... how?"

In front of the Third Mizukage stood the exact copy of the scapegoat Rei described as the attacker of the capital of the Land of Water. Black coat with red clouds, orange swirly mask with only one opening for an eye behind which was a Sharingan, short black hair...

'How is this possible? The description is spot-on! But... this man was supposed to be fictional!' Thoughts flashed through the head of the Third Mizukage. He knew it was Rei who was responsible for the incident in the capital city. The man in front of him was no imitator of the description either. He left out a lot of features described by Rei such as the Sharingan eye but the ninja in front of him was an exact replica of what Rei described. A realization suddenly dawned on him, 'Rei... that shithead actually described a real person!'

The Third quickly snapped out of his bewilderment and Obito was forced to duck lest his upper body got riddled by a multitude of lethally poisoned senbons. He was still somewhat surprised that somebody actually walked in on him casting genjutsu at the new Mizukage. Because his Mangekyo was not a Genjutsu enhancing type, he had to reform and strengthen it periodically otherwise Yagura would break free from it. It was simply lucky that Mangekyo strengthened his illusions enough that even a jinchuuriki could be influenced.

"I have no idea what you were trying to do to Yagura but you are not walking out of here alive!" The Third Mizukage shouted and leaped at Obito, engaging him in a taijutsu bout. Obito blocked, evaded, and parried a few blows before a good opportunity appeared.

The Third Mizukage was inwardly frowning while throwing punches at the intruder. 'He is quite good in taijutsu... to match a Kage.' His eyes gleamed as they noticed an opening in the center of his opponent's c.h.e.s.t. He quickly struck... but before getting the hit in, from his sleeve, a kunai suddenly appeared and flew into his hand. The steely tip entered the body of his foe on his way towards the heart and the Third Mizukage involuntarily grinned but his eyes quickly widened in disbelief and shock as his hand started phasing through his enemy.

Obito quickly let his whole body phase through the Third Mizukage and pivoted on his heel, about to stab a kunai into the Third's back.

'I won!' He thought but...

Three Kiri ANBU appeared around him in shunshin, mid-slash with their tanto blades, and Obito was forced to again activate his intangibility, letting the three swords phase through him while his own kunai and hand harmlessly entered the back of the Third Mizukage.

'This is bad...' Both Obito thought.

He didn't like his prospects now that the entire village was alerted. He might have fought against Minato but he knew he was almost killed because he was arrogant enough to think he could match his teacher in one on one. If Minato used kunai instead of Rasengan and struck something vital during the fight, Obito would be dead right now. It just so happened that blunt force was negated a lot by the Zetsu-like flesh that merged with his body, allowing him to come unscathed from his a.s.s being rasenganed. Not that it didn't take him two months to recuperate that particular hit.

But even if he could become intangible, fighting an entire village? He didn't have enough skill for that yet. 'Gotta run, then...' Obito decided while frowning as his eyes strayed towards Yagura, 'It will be hard to get close enough to cast the genjutsu again. The jinchuuriki will be a lot better guarded this time around.'

As he realized his revenge was at the very least delayed, a murderous glint passed Obito's eyes, and one of the poor ANBU who he was fighting against, got the brunt of his anger as Obito's kunai found itself too close to his neck. Blood splattered on the floor from the slit throat of the ANBU as Obito kicked another ANBU away, breaking a few bones, while twisting his body mid-air and punching away the third one.

Obito then tried to use the momentary shock of the Third Mizukage due to the death of his comrade and use his Mangekyo to swirl away but the Third Mizukage proved his life-long experience by not standing like an idiot and watching him get away. He threw a senbon right in the middle of the swirl, forcing Obito to cancel his technique and lean out of the way of the senbon.

"I said you are going to die here." The Third sneered while glancing at the dead body with the corner of his eye. 'That said, this man is really dangerous. Best wait for reinforcements. His intangibility is a real problem but it must have some form of weakness... Not once did he attack with things inside of his body so he probably can't become tangible while something is in the location where his body is supposed to be.'

"Haaaa~, I really didn't want to waste this." Obito released a tired sigh before his personality did a back-flip. "Tobi is just a good boy on an errand! He has no time for dying so... See ya, old man!" Loads of explosion tags suddenly flew out from under Tobi's coat, making the Third Mizukage's eyes go wide as he jumped to the still glazed-eyed Yagura and quickly weaved hand-seals for water ninjutsu to redirect the force of the explosion away from them.

A huge explosion rattled the center of Kirigakure as the Mizukage Tower gained a new opening right through the wall of the Mizukage's office.

Letting the water shield down, the Third Mizukage clicked his tongue when he saw the burnt corpses of the two ANBU who helped him but he realized it was inevitable. Even he survived only thanks to his experience and instincts. Honestly, the water shield jutsu he used... he didn't even register he was performing it before it was already shielding him. The explosion simply happened too fast.

"So he escaped, huh?" He voiced out, displeased. A second later, a squad of ANBU landed on one knee in front of him but before they could even utter a single sound, the Third spoke, "Put the village under a lockdown. We have an intruder here." Turning around, the Third Mizukage went to see if he was able to break Yagura out of the genjutsu.

He had no idea that Obito was already far away from the village, planning how to kill any nuisance to his plan like the Third Mizukage to enact his vengeance for Rin's death.

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Chapter 177 - Ch177. Jiraiya in Uzushio 1

"Welcome to Uzushio, Jiraiya-sama."

"Thank you! Eh. beautiful..." Jiraya beckoned the woman responsible for reviewing doc.u.ments at the gate to the village. "Could you tell me... where can I find the hot springs?" He asked, his grin turning loop-sided, only for the woman to look at the old creeper in obvious but polite disgust.

"I... It's three streets away that way." She answered with a broken smile, fully intending to alert the proper authorities the second he left.

Clueless Jiraiya simply nodded before briefly pondering about inviting the juicy redhead wonder in front of him for a date but decided to bite his tongue. After all, he was a ninja on a mission! ... and the woman looked really repulsed by him. 'Sigh... what did I do now? Such disrespect for super perverts!' He thought despondently while shaking his head in clear amus.e.m.e.nt.

Contrary to the popular belief of anyone familiar with Jiraiya, the very first thing the Sannin did was walk around the Uzushio, creating a mental map of the village... or at least, the allowed parts of it. Jiraiya could only narrow his eyes as he noted how many areas were inaccessible by travelers despite the village not being 'officially' one of the hidden villages.

'Trading town, they call it. And yet, barely forty percent of the village could be toured. This is fishier than Sensei's relationship with Danzo. Well, no fear. First the hotel and then...' Jiraiya's face suddenly loosened, 'RESEARCH!'

Needless to say, the people of Uzushio were very startled by the weird, loud, and creepy white-haired old man running through the streets of their village as if his life depended on it while looking for a hotel, having a perpetual perverted grin on his face.

...

"I finally understand why Sarutobi-sensei always said Uzumaki are to be feared. No wonder even the Second Hokage was utterly terrified by them! These demons actually created anti-peeking seals!" Waterfalls of tears streamed down Jiraiya's cheeks as he complained at the injustice he encountered, "How dare they... criminals!"

Unfortunately for Jiraiya, his research was interrupted due to his complete inability to peek in the hot springs. That was when he was forced to take his hat off and pay respect to the Uzumaki sealmasters. Poor guy was forced to do the only other way of researching he knew... going to a brothel.

Fortunately for Jiraiya... in the past two years, Uzushio became one of the main trading hubs in the world due to the incredibly high living standards of its inhabitants and the unusual goods usually using seals to work.

This success naturally attracted all sorts of people. Thugs... the Uzushio police force could handle. These usually found themselves outside of the village with so many bruises and broken bones they would never dare coming closer than a kilometer away from the village. But as the number of visiting merchants increased, the Uzumaki clan who all but ruled the village had to make a few concessions and allow a few brothels to form.

'Ah~, the Redhead Heaven... I think I shall report to Sensei that the mission got delayed and I will be spending a few months on this heavenly ground! They certainly know how to use the reputation of Uzumaki to attract customers!' Jiraiya giggled before sighing in content as a frown set in on his face, 'Just a pity no real Uzumaki was among those redheads...' His eyes narrowed in suspicion while his lips expression twisted sourly. Jiraiya still remembered Kushina and from her, he knew the most likely features of an Uzumaki woman. Needless to say, it was easy to spot none of the girls there were actually from the Uzumaki clan if one knew what to look for.

'But... Uzushio is using brothels to gather intelligence in their own village. That's... not really good. This is one of the main trading hubs, meaning there are many people with even more secrets passing through. Who knows when some important noble idiot from the Land of Fire gets his tongue undone by a pretty big-b.r.e.a.s.ted redhead just because he was foolish enough to drink that incredibly strong sake they serve.'

Naturally, Jiraiya was very experienced in this field, especially when it pertained to courtesans and their job. He dedicated a big part of his life to the small nuances of information gathering in this field, with him owning a massive chain of brothels all over the Land of Fire and even other countries under various aliases using scapegoats as his public image. He knew exactly what subtle manipulations are used to make the clients more agreeable to disclose their secrets. Jiraiya was actually quite surprised he didn't find any subtle genjutsu-inducing seal inside the establishment with this being the territory of the Uzumaki clan. He certainly used those in his establishments.

Not that he was actually persuaded there was none of those. It just meant they were competent enough to hide them even from his trained eyes.

"This is such a drag!" Jiraiya w.h.i.n.ed as his perverted grin appeared on his face again in full. "Now I just have to go there again to totally ascertain there is no ulterior motive at work and stea-, … er, unveil all their methods of getting the information! Yeah, our ninjas will benefit greatly from knowing what to expect from the place! I will gladly sacrifice myself for the Greater Good of Konoha's male population!" He nodded in complete conviction and righteous tears moistening his eyes.

Jiraiya was far from the first Konoha ninja visiting Uzushio. Many merchants traveled there and that meant a lot of foreign ninjas from all over the Elemental Nations came with them as their escort. Obviously, only an idiot would believe there was no specially selected ninja supposed to act as a spy and find out as much about the village as possible. There were naturally tons of covert spies in these 'escort' parties and yet...

'From what Sarutobi-sensei said, not one of our previous spies managed to find out what is in the restricted section of the village. I would bet my completely worthless ninja pay Uzushio is secretly training ninjas and waiting to get stronger before declaring themselves a bona-fide hidden village.' Jiraiya's thoughts again became serious. 'The plan is sound though. Like this, they will... no,' He frowned, 'Correction, they already have a lot of support from foreign Daimyos who are completely in love with their products. There is no way for any Hidden Village to openly attack them and not cause a major diplomatic incident. Looks like their previous destruction indeed taught these redheads something. They have as much time as they need to get to the level of the major five but nobody can really antagonize them. After all, they are just merchant villages, right? Why would ninja villages bother with them, no? You dare to spy, or god forbid, attack the suppliers of my favorite product? Look how I will cut the funding for your village to negative numbers, you sc.u.m!' Jiraiya mockingly imitated an enraged Daimyo in his head as he snorted. Yeah, Uzushio became nigh untouchable… officially, that is.

Jiraiya found it almost poetic. The people behind the newfound rise of the Uzumaki clan must be really knowledgeable in the way how the world worked. Uzushio didn't rise to monumental heights in two short years because of overwhelming power but because of politics and using an exact moment where all major powers were either dealing with their own problems or with each other.

In an ideal world, Uzushio would be razed to the ground the second it became public knowledge the Uzumaki clan is trying to re-establish it. They would be destroyed just because they were a threat in the past and honestly, that was completely enough for Iwa and Kumo to act. 'But we don't live in an ideal world...' Jiraiya snorted. 'Power is nice and all but politics is what really matters unless you are on the level of Madara or Hashirama.'

The only way to 'attack' Uzushio was covert one, outside of the official records. Not one spy who was sent to Uzushio was actually there on an 'official' mission to spy on Uzushio. If they died, or worse were discovered, during it, they would simply be written off as rogue ninjas working on their own. Their fates would then become not Konoha's problem anymore.

And that was what really drove Konoha's higher-ups sparse... 'Every single spy we sent was discovered AND discreetly returned to us with a mocking description of how utterly useless they were.' Jiraiya would laugh if it were only people trained by Danzo but some of these spies were trained personally by him and that made it personal. 'Worst of all, not one of them actually remembers how they were discovered. They simply blacked out and the next thing they remember is being outside of the village with a message directed to Hokage and bruised black and blue. Who knows what kind of information was pulled out of them while they were out of it!'

And that... was in nutshell the reason why the best spymaster of Konoha was currently on a vacation from chasing whor-, ahem, Orochimaru. He would find out what nefarious things were going on in this village full of gingers! Who knows what other atrocities other than anti-peeking seals were brewing up under the visage of a peaceful town. No longer was it just a job for his village. Now it was his pride as a super pervert that was beckoning him to find out for sure.

And then... Jiraiya was suddenly pulled out of his righteous contemplations as a knock resounded through his room, causing him to furrow his brows as he knew he didn't expect anybody to visit.

...

In an office in one of the Manors in the Uzumaki village, Kaya's mother, Kara Uzumaki was relaxing with a smoking pipe in her mouth and her feet resting on her desk while her husband contently massaged her shoulders and hummed a relaxing tune. Oh... Kara had no illusions how they would spend the night. Even if her selfless husband did so much only to make her feel better without expecting anything in return, it would be only fair to reward him, no?

"You say one of the girls in the Redhead Haven reported Jiraiya of the Sannin trying to pull information out of her during the act?" Kara asked, completely amused while enjoying the hands of her husband kneading the muscles around her neck.

Her secretary, a tall red-headed man, nodded. "Yes, Kara-sama, how do you wish to proceed?"

"Ah... leave it and give the girl a raise." Kara shrugged, "My daughter is certainly already aware of our new visitor with his not-so-discreet attempt at peeking in the hot springs and he would no doubt receive his warning soon. I just really hope he will be arrogant enough to ignore it... Hehe." Kara's eyes glinted.

After all, shaming one of the Sannin? Wasn't that the best way to gain a reputation for Uzushio? How come it became so easy to become famous in the ninja circles? The opportunities could be said to be throwing at them, no?

--

Author Note:

Okay, I am completely sure there will be people complaining about topics such as whores and brothels breached in this chapter but... dudes! We are talking about Jirayia here. Not to mention those would be blasphemy! Where ELSE than a brothel would the guy go if he couldn't access hot spring.

So... nope, not going to bother with people complaining about it.

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Chapter 178 - Ch178. Jirayia in Uzushio 2

Jiraiya lazily stood up from his bed and went to open the door. His right hand was cautiously preparing to grasp the hidden knife in his sleeve while his left hand was opening the door. Naturally, he didn't let himself be wide open, and instead, most of his body was obstructed by the door.

"Jiraiya of the Sannin?" Asked the masked green-haired slim woman with orange bangs who stood in front of his door.

"Yes." Jiraiya nodded, now knowing what to expect. He was quite famous these days so he would half expect a warm welcome such as a visit from resident ANBU if he stepped into a hidden village. The problem was... Uzushio was supposed to be just a normal trading city.

'To think they wouldn't even try to hide the fact there are ninjas in the city...' Jiraiya stared, half in disbelief that Uzushio had the gall to send the ANBU, he judged the woman's identity by the mask, they were not even supposed to have to give him a greeting. 'The leader of Uzushio must have considerable balls to do this. That's one man I wouldn't want to compare the s.e.x.u.a.l prowess with!' He grudgingly admitted with new-found respect, totally clueless about the leader being a woman.

"I was sent by Kaya-sama," Jirayia's eyes slightly widened at that admission, causing him to instantly reconsider his willingness of prowess comparison, "to give you a very simple warning. We know you are Konoha's spymaster so... don't spy. You won't like the consequences." The woman dryly stated, not amused at all at the raised brow her statement earned her. Jiraiya clearly didn't take her seriously and if his expression was any indication, he found the entire situation extremely hilarious.

"Eh, don't worry, cutie. I came here to enjoy my vacation!" Jiraiya jovially stated, "So... what's your name? If you want to keep me from spying, it would be best to keep an eye on me, no? I don't mind being watched over by someone of your... proportions." He said as he started to discreetly ogle her curves.

Jiraiya honestly could not help himself. He might not be able to see the woman's face but her body... he could tell she was an extremely dangerous and totally gorgeous individual. Frankly, he was hooked. His addiction to these kinds of women probably stemmed from his infatuation with Tsunade. It mostly resulted in him being beaten but he simply couldn't resist.

Jiraiya's merry mood brought up by the juicy female in front of him quickly came to a screeching halt as his danger senses suddenly flared to high heavens and the hair all over his body suddenly stood up. His eyes connected to the narrowed brown orbs as sweat started appearing on his brows from the sudden shot of temperature in the room. Jiraiya was honestly unable to react to such a subtle yet potent killing intent he was currently bathed in. His body cramped up, prepared to strike as his instincts warned him but his mind told him: Not yet. Still safe.

This contrast made Jiraiya into the miserable sweating mess of nerves he was now. His instincts wanted to attack but his body commanded by his confused mind didn't... couldn't move. He was not paralyzed nor frightened. He was simply confused by all the signals his senses were receiving and his mind was unable to tell his body what to do with them. There was killing intent at full blast aimed at him and yet, it had no d.e.s.i.r.e to do harm. There was danger staring right at him yet it felt so peaceful his mind couldn't figure out how to react.

Naturally, Jiraiya didn't have a clue what his body and mind felt. He was simply... confused as his instincts and reflexive reaction to danger honed through life-threatening battles completely failed him in the face of this ANBU. He felt as if he was staring at a dangerous snake baring its fangs at him and yet, the woman in front of him was simply calmly staring at him.

Time slowly passed as the two motionlessly stood opposite each other when Jiraiya suddenly widened his eyes into saucers as his mind was ruthlessly yanked from its thoughts when the curtains and sheets caught on fire.

'Shit! How come I didn't notice this heat!' Jiraiya hurriedly thought, feeling his throat dry and parched as if he didn't drink anything for a week when his senses finally caught up with what was happening around him. Honestly, he doubted he would be able to do anything but croak out some unintelligible sound if he was to talk.

Jiraiya could feel his skin blister, sending a jolt of hot pain through the surface of his body. Water was evaporating straight from his body that screamed at him in boiling agony while his brain was shutting out from the sheer heat he was under. His dry lips desperately yearned for a bit of wetness while his eyes started to sting, causing him to blink due to discomfort as he gritted his teeth at how agonizing it was to do something as simple as breathing.

The room was bathed in scorching warmth embracing everything it engulfed. Jiraiya's rampant instincts screamed at him to get away, to stop whatever was trying to mummify him alive, to do something! He was about to attempt using a jutsu when...

"I am called Sun, Jiraiya-sama."

Everything suddenly stopped to a halt at the soothing voice of the woman who still calmly stood in front of him as if the world wasn't a smoldering hell just a second ago.

A frightening chill ran through Jiraiya's body as he realized there was no heat. No life-threatening scorch. No blisters on his skin. Nothing. He was fine as if everything he felt was just one elaborate illusion.

A rattled breath involuntarily left Jiraiya's lips at the realization and his brows furrowed in desperate confusion, 'What the hell was that!? A killing intent? Genjutsu?' His eyes glanced at the blackened remains of the curtains and the burnt spots on the sheets, causing him to gulp. 'No... that was no genjutsu and it was obviously much more than a simple killing intent. But... She didn't use any chakra! How in Rikudo's name was she able to...' Jiraiya cautiously eyed Sun, his hands jumpy as if he expected her to attack him any moment now.

"As for the date," Sun started speaking again, causing Jiraiya to jump a little, "I am not that desperate. Just remember the warning."

With that, the woman shunshined away, leaving Jiraiya dumbly stare at the place from where she disappeared. Thoughts were flashing through his head too fast for him to comprehend and it was only now that he noticed how erratic his heartbeat was. Slowly, his mind started to get out of its numb state, sharpening and Jiraiya found out he was... trembling. His body was shaking and a small sting made itself known, causing him to look at his hands with an incomprehensible look full of confusion only to find himself clutching kunai with no idea when he drew it. His grip was so strong, his nails dug deep enough into his palm to draw blood.

For a moment, Jiraiya stared at his hand with kunai, his expression turning difficult as conflict flashed through his eyes before he finally found enough strength to take a deep breath before slowly closing the door.

"That was... scary." Jiraiya let his coiled muscles calm down, trying to forcefully relax his nerves while he shakily walked towards his bed. "I didn't feel such dread since Tsunade found me peeking at her." He muttered in a haunted tone before it became grumbling, "What was she anyway? Tsunade's apprentice?"

Poor Jiraiya would never know his thoughts couldn't be truer.

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Chapter 179 - Ch179. Jirayia in Uzushio 3

It took a whole week for Jiraiya to finally calm down his jumpiness after the sudden scorching welcome by the so-called Sun. A week he fruitfully spent marking every useful information about the accessible part of Uzushio he could get his hands on. He was Konoha's spymaster, after all! Even the creepiest and hottest scare of his life wouldn't be able to prevent his peeking tendencies from resurfacing.

Now, Jiraiya was sneaking through the dark back alleys of Uzushio, on his way to the closed-off parts of the village. He was perfectly aware of being monitored this past week. That's why he left a shadow clone with enough chakra to last for two days in his hotel room. Jiraiya had no illusions his shadow clone would stay there either. He knew it would not be even an hour later his shadow clone would go and try to find a pretty girl to flirt with. That too was exactly according to his plan, no matter he had no control over that marvelous quirk of his clones. This way, the annoying observers would see exactly what he wanted them. Him, flirting with somebody. Perfect alibi.

'All I have to do now is to sneak in, get as much intel as possible, and sneak out without being discovered and nobody can pin anything on me, hehe.' Jiraiya thought while sidestepping yet another of the hidden alarm seals that littered the back alleys close to the restricted areas.

He was already in the section in-between the restricted and the accessible areas, nimbly traversing the shadowed parts of the alley while using chakra to hide. Unfortunately for Jiraiya... that was where his little infiltration quest ended, for the Uzumaki clan was not foolish enough to leave easy-to-spot alarm seals all over the alleys without any reason.

Jiraiya's sight blurred as his body suddenly felt weaker, causing him to support himself with his hand on the nearby wall. His world spun before he was driven to his knees at the feeling of weakness. At first, Jiraiya thought it to be a genjutsu and tried to flare his chakra only to find out... he couldn't access it. His eyes briefly widened in panic before rolling back as the man's body powerlessly fell forward, unconscious.

Not even a second after his body hit the ground, two figures stepped out of the nearby shadows. One of them was the green-haired Sun while the other was Kaya Uzumaki who prodded Jiraiya with her foot a bit.

"This never gets old. They always spot all visible alarm seals and get c.o.c.ky." Kaya chuckled. The thing that defeated the mighty Sannin was actually one massive chakra suppression seal placed in-between the accessible and the restricted area. Anyone who was entered, civilian or otherwise, would drop down unconscious because their bodies and minds would register them being near chakra exhaustion despite them having their reserves full. Actually, Kaya had no idea about its in-depth workings. All she knew that anyone who was not keyed into it would be incapacitated, hence no spy ever reached the restricted section. Well, there still was the threat of flying but considering the entire restricted section was under the same chakra suppression…

"You know that he would not spot this trap no matter how long he looks around. The seals are in the walls and deep in the ground. It's not really a matter of skill at sealing anymore." Sun, or more commonly known as Pakura, said as she took off her mask. She decided to come to Uzushio herself the second it was confirmed Jiraiya was skulking around... which was almost a month ago. Clearly, after this month, she held some resentment for the man because his presence kept her away from Rei.

"Yeah, you got a point... Still, it doesn't make it less hilarious how everybody so valiantly steps into the chakra suppression field only to keel over a second later. If they waited a bit on the edge, they would get out of it easily after recognizing something was wrong but they all just hurry and by the time they realize their chakra is acting weird, they have no time to escape." Kaya seemed almost wistful as she said that. "Uzushio is frankly impenetrable due to this seal. If only it could be made portable. We would win every single fight because our enemies would just drop unconscious."

Pakura snorted as she crouched near Jiraiya and started to look through his pockets, "You know that's impossible. Rei had twenty clones drawing seals for half a year in order to set up the chakra suppression field all over the restricted section of Uzushio. The thing requires far too many seals and far too much precision to make this portable... Oh, here it is!"

Pakura smiled at the small scroll she found and unrolled it, quickly reading the contents while Kaya busied herself with trying to discern the location of her ANBU guards. She was something like acting Kage of Uzushio so she knew they were somewhere around her but these ninjas trained by Ringo... honestly, even though Kaya prided herself in being chunin level ability-wise, she had not even smidge of an inkling of where exactly her guard detail was located.

'Maybe they ditched me? I would most definitely not even notice...' Kaya frowned only to be pulled out of her thoughts as her hand instinctively sprang, catching the scroll Pakura threw at her. Kaya's eyebrows furrowed, giving Pakura an inquisitive look but only got a 'go on' gesture in return.

Kaya swept the contents of the scroll with her eyes only to derisively snort after she was done. "There is nothing of importance. He found out exactly nothing in the last week of visiting brothels day and night." She rolled her eyes. Yeah, Kaya might have felt a bit of contempt for this so-called best spymaster of Konoha. Especially after seeing him 'at work'.

Pakura, however, had a different opinion, "You know I took you with me to give you a bit of a lesson." She sighed, her eyes gazing at Kaya in an admonishing way, "He did not find 'nothing'. He found out a lot actually. Sure, the information in that scroll is easily accessible to any spy who could be bothered spending some time snooping around the unrestricted areas. But with all the information he found out and categorized, Konoha ninjas will have an easier time acclimatizing in this village, giving him a bit of an edge over ninjas from other hidden villages. He mapped out everything from the best shops and their location to the quickest escape routes." Pakura lectured as a smirk appeared on her face, "And look! He even included all the brothels and his personal ratings. Isn't it just a delight to know your mother's Red Heaven is his personal favorite?" Pakura mentioned, knowing Kaya's opinion on the topic, and giggled at the peeved expression of the redhead.

"Don't expect me to be proud of that." Kaya huffed and angrily stomped her foot into the ground. She was not happy with this part of her mother's holdings. Far from it. No matter how good of an information network it provided.

"Alright, alright," Pakura shook her head in amus.e.m.e.nt as she put the scroll back into Jiraiya's clothes. "Don't get so angry with me. It was just a simple joke, jeez." She said as her eyes landed back onto Jiraiya's body, and her slight gentle smile slowly turned into an irritated sneer while her eyes narrowed in anger.

'Oh, boy…' Kaya somehow started pitying the white-haired man.

Frankly, Rei told Pakura to let it go and leave Uzushio to sort this situation with Jiraiya out. She... didn't listen. She simply could not. As someone raised on stories of the Sannin, someone who knew about Jiraiya's prowess in espionage... she could not calm down knowing he was currently in Uzushio. So... she personally went to sort the situation out.

The worst mistake of her month.

Jiraiya, to be perfectly honest, was an incredible spy. Three whole weeks, he preserved in probing and prodding the defenses of Uzushio from every possible angle, trying to find a way how to secretly enter the village. The first week? It was funny, hilarious even. The second? It started to become irksome. The third, however, Pakura had had enough of seeing his hundredth attempt without him getting the hint it simply won't work.

Thankfully, just as Pakura was about to decide to go and make eunuch from Jiraiya, the man finally realized he is not as good with seals as he apparently thought himself to be and stopped making an idiot out of himself by trying to deactivate the disgusting amount of detection seals around the village, placed there by the best Uzumaki seal-grandmasters in Uzushio.

Pakura's judgment might have been a bit screwed though. Jiraiya rightfully deserved to be called Seal Master as he didn't trigger even one detection seal in the three weeks he tried to get past them. Pilfering some knowledge from Minato who was taught by Kushina or not, Jiraiya was simply too inexperienced and didn't know the right techniques to do anything with Uzumaki seals. If one simply looked at his skill level and compared it with other non-Uzumaki seal users... then yes, Jiraiya was one of the best.

Alas, this was Uzushio he was trying to get into...

So... with Jiraiya unable to get in secretly, he opted for going in boldly. He walked inside through the main gate. Jiraiya actually briefly thought about disguising himself first but if the security seals around the village were any indication, he quickly determined it would not work, and being discovered would make everything worse for himself.

For that, Pakura respected his ability as an infiltrator and the sheer guts he showed by tackling this in such a straightforward manner. If this was any other village, he would probably succeed too since it took some time even for Pakura to notice the swap of the man with his shadow clone. Only a tracking seal she snuck into his pocket during her brief visit alerted her that the white-haired bastard in front of her was not the original and led her to the location of the real Jiraiya before he was knocked unconscious.

"Now... how to punish the man in the most humiliating way that would make Rei praise me." Pakura's eyes darkened and glinted in a peculiar way that made Kaya take a step back when Pakura turned towards her with a mischievous smile, "Hey Kaya... You said the brother of the Earth Daimyo, one of the five grand nobles of the Land of Earth is currently visiting the village, right?" Pakura's eyes started to hover over Jiraiya's unconscious form, narrowed in a catlike way with a bit of glee in them. "I wonder..."

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Chapter 180 - Ch180. Jirayia in Uzushio 4

'So comfortable...'

Jiraiya woke up to feeling a euphoric sensation as his body sank into the soft mattress, unwilling to open his eyes and lose the sluggish enjoyment of being on the edge of the dreamland. He didn't feel this good for months and was quite reluctant to let it go. Slowly getting a feel to his hand, Jiraiya's lips stretched into a lazy smile as he recognized what he was touching through experience alone.

A warm and tender body of a woman. The most pleasant thing he ever got to know.

Taking a deep breath, Jiraiya's nose was instantly assaulted by the air filled with the smell of s.e.x, reassuring him that yes, yesterday he scored. If it was possible, Jiraiya's lips would stretch even into a bigger smile as his still half-asleep mind slowly gathered the facts.

His hand slowly crept up, dragging itself on the skin of the woman... the more it explored, the more Jiraiya's smile started changing into a frown and his brows started furrowing.

'What is this? Squishy?' Jiraiya's mind slowly woke up, making the spymaster's brain work as his fingers sank into...

Jiraiya abruptly opened his eyes, freezing at the sight in front of him.

Horror crept through Jiraiya's body as he saw the pile of pure fat lying next to him, taking up three-quarters of the whole bed. She was at the very least a head taller than him and thrice as wide, causing Jiraiya's eyes to almost pop out of their sockets. His body shivered as he realized what he thought to be b.r.e.a.s.ts was actually her double chin causing him to retract his hand at a speed even Raikage would praise.

Just as Jiraiya's mind was close to finally rebooting, a loud farting noise resounded through the room, causing Jiraiya to scrunch his nose and realize that... the smell of s.e.x, was only in his head and dreams. What he really smelt was more... putrid than anything else.

Needless to say, Jiraiya's horror only increased. He would have nightmares of this morning for months to come, he was sure of it.

So scary was his waking experience that he completely forgot to think about how he got into this situation and what he was doing yesterday. These things were not at the forefront of his thoughts when he had such a disastrous situation at hand. After all, waking up next to a pretty lady was quite common in his life of debauchery. Waking up next to... whatever it was that laid next to him... now that was something he never wanted to experience again.

'I couldn't be drunk enough to do... this, could I?' Jiraiya yet again shivered as he carefully stood up from the bed, looking for his clothes, as quietly as possible in order to not wake up the whale on the bed

As Jiraiya was half-way to putting his pants back on, the door suddenly opened, "So you are finally awake." A gruff old voice said, not sounding very pleased with the situation but also having a bit of resignation in its tone.

Jiraiya... didn't expect to be discovered. Hearing the voice was a big surprise for him, causing him to trip on the pants that were around his knees, sending him face-first into the stomach of the whale of a woman, abruptly waking her up and hugging him in reflex as if he was an overstuffed teddy bear.

The woman blinked off the sleep before sweeping her brown hair from her blue eyes with her stubby hand. It took her a few seconds to realize where she was, causing her to flush while Jiraiya's hands desperately flailed around, trying to get him away from her because of the acute lack of oxygen his face deep in her fat folds was currently experiencing.

"Oh, papa?" The woman yet again blinked.

"Good morning, Tsuname." The man who opened the door greeted, "I see you slept well." He added, a smirk creeping up his lips at the suffocating Jiraiya.

"Huh?" Tsuname tilted her head before she finally realized she was embracing somebody. The second her eyes fell on Jiraiya, they lit up like stars in the night sky, full of happiness. "Yes! Meet my hubby, papa!"

Jiraiya at long last managed to get hold of some of his strength and push himself away from what he now feared as the fatball of suffocating doom. Coughing, half due to his earlier predicament and a half because of what he just heard, he exclaimed, "Hubby!? What? I didn't agree! No way! I swore to be single for life! Yeah!" He desperately shook his head and tried to pull away from Tsuname. "You can't force me to... ah?"

Jiraiya suddenly stilled as his eyes finally landed on the face of the man in the door and his complexion turned paler than Orochimaru.

'Ah, shit.' He thought, recognizing the man who was frowning at him. Jiraiya's face then robotically turned towards the massive woman who called that exact man papa and Jiraiya felt despair embrace him as he realized the situation. 'Ah, double shit.' His eyes then strayed down, onto the sheets where a small patch of dry blood was located and Jiraiya's mind almost stilled to halt. 'Ah, triple SHIT! This time I really did it!'

"I see you finally realize what you did yesterday and its consequences, Jiraiya of the Sannin..." The man, Kazuhiro Iwako, stated. He was the brother of the Daimyo of the Land of Earth and one of the three most important nobles of his country. His tone then changed to utter discontent as he added, "My new son-in-law."

Jiraiya could only faint in horror.

...

"Was it necessary?" Kaya asked the smirking Pakura who sipped on her tea. "It was simply down-right cruel."

"Ah, Kaya, it was the most beneficial choice for us. Killing Jiraiya is simply dumb since Konoha knew he went here to investigate. But Konoha also knows what a horndog he is, you see." Pakura snickered. "You know that each country has its own customs and it just so happens that one of the five greatest nobles of the Land of Earth where taking the v.i.r.g.i.n.i.t.y of a willing daughter of a noble is as good as marriage was visiting Uzushio. The fact his ugly daughter couldn't get engaged to anyone no matter how good of a deal he offered is just making the entire thing better!" She smugly explained, "The poor old perv had no chance from the start."

Kaya facepalmed, "And it just so happens this whole thing will either make Konoha and Iwagakure who hate each other's guts a bit closer, preventing any possible spark of war." Kaya was a bit unwilling to admit it but the plan was well thought out. "With Suna being preoccupied with the feud between the Kazekage and the Daimyo, Kirigakure being on the brink of the civil war, and Kumogakure being the sole threatening existence... yeah, if Iwagakure and Konoha show the common front, no matter how frail and false it would be, Kumogakure would not dare start anything big."

"Or..." Pakura uncaringly shrugged, "Jiraiya will act like a dumbass and run which would actually start a war between Konoha and Iwagakure, weakening them even further which in turn would probably make Kumogakure join. In the end, the Biri-Biri company would make more profit for the time being. I don't see any loss here. Both options mean the focus on Uzushio will significantly reduce which would decrease your workload by a lot."

Kaya couldn't believe what she was hearing. Yes, she knew this was a do-or-die kind of deal. Either Jiraiya is smart, stops his life of debauchery, and suffers a marriage with the oh-so-noble oversized girl, or he runs... starting a war.

Honestly, in no way was Konoha able to afford a war at the moment. It was weakened due to Kyuubi and then even its economy suffered because of the debacle with Yukigakure. As much as the Third Hokage likes Jiraiya, this was a mess he could not clear up for his pupil. One man's happiness simply wasn't worth the continued existence of the entire village.

In short, Jiraiya damn well knew what the answer would be if he asked Konoha for help.

Kaya shuddered at the cruelty of Pakura's revenge for wasting her time. Damned if do, damned if don't. 'But to think Pakura thought about how her actions would benefit Uzushio before doing something that would change the entire political climate of the Elemental Nations... I see, this is why she is Rei's Jonin Commander, huh?'

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Chapter 181 - Ch181. Vengeance 1

'Clang'

Rei parried yet another slash from Yugito who was swinging Samehada at him. It was years since he held a sword and his wrists made this fact clearly obvious to him as they painfully protested every time Rei's and Yugito's swords clashed.

In the past years, Rei was far too preoccupied to train so he mostly depended on his shadow clones. That, however, had its bright and dark spots. In things like Sealing, Ninjutsu, and generally, anything to do with knowledge and energy manipulation, he got infinitely better than he was before. The physical aspect, though, suffered.

It was not that he lost his muscles. They were nourished by nature energy and could not shrink or diminish. It was his muscle memory that became a problem. Funny thing... shadow clones could train muscle memory and to some effect, even transfer it to the user but Rei found out it was not reliable because the muscles of his clones were, in the end, not his and therefore his own muscles didn't learn anything.

Ergo the situation with his wrists and some other joints...

When Rei previously blocked with his sword, he always minisculely turned his wrist which would ease the power behind the clash. He did these things instinctively. Now, however... Rei had a really painful time after the first half-hour of the spar when he realized he forgot to do this and his wrists were screaming at him in pain for it. Jinchuuriki-powered Samehada was no joke to block, after all.

It was then Rei noticed his entire body moved somewhat off. It all laid in small details. His h.i.p.s didn't lean to the appropriate side while he was slashing. His ankles didn't ease up to be more flexible and prepared to jump to either side. His abdominal muscles were a bit more tightened than necessary. His form was simply a mess.

'Well, not that anyone other than probably Tsunade and Konan noticed.' Rei thought as he deflected a downward cleave from the massive Samehada without even moving a half-step. The force behind Rei's deflection caused Yugito's body to fly back a few feet before she landed and slid on the ground to a halt, making her end up on one of her knees as she panted, trying to regain her breath.

Fortunately for Rei, Ringo was far too engrossed in her new forging project so nobody bothered to inform her there will be a sword fight. Something Rei was sure she would throw a fit at a later date. As long as she didn't see his atrocious form though, it was a win-win for him. He knew he would never hear the end of it.

"Being a bit less straightforward would help you a lot, Yugito." Rei said, causing Yugito to groan as the exact same words Ringo tells her when she trains her came out of his mouth. Rei, not really caring about her outburst, continued, "Samehada might be a bit too big and it surely prevents you from utilizing your max speed and numbness but that's just because you are too focused on a fighting style based on the type of your weapon. Yes, you have a two-handed cleaver in your grasp but you are Nibi Jinchuuriki with the natural grace, nimbleness, and speed of a cat. Use it. Samehada doesn't need more than a touch to injure anyway."

Yugito's eyes lit up. Ringo never explained what exactly she meant with those words so when Rei elaborated, Yugito was very grateful. She stood up, still somewhat shakily, and channeled her chakra into her body to prepare for another clash as a new plan formed in her mind.

Yugito dashed at Rei, hurling Samehada through the air towards Rei's right side. Obviously, her strike was easily deflected. Despite the massive size of Samehada, Rei could simply overpower her strike before she could get anywhere close to his body. Considering he didn't use chakra on his blade because of knowing Samehada would just eat it... yeah, Yugito was very resigned since be it Ringo, Rei, or whoever from Yozora, they had their own way of completely negating the biggest advantage of Samehada.

This time, however, Yugito gambled and her gamble clearly paid off. She used the force of Rei's deflection to spin her body in the air alongside Samehada, sending a kick at Rei's head, making him duck, and slightly disrupting his balance. The force carried her body and Samehada, making it spin and suddenly the blade that came at Rei from the right side was rushing at him from left with a momentum Yugito would never be able to create alone.

Rei's eyes widened at Yugito's plan as he realized he used too much power to deflect the strike. Depending on the power of the opponent's deflection to set up a follow-up attack was foolish because experienced swordsmen could simply alter the force behind their deflection, disrupting these plans. That most often than not ended with the idiot who tried impaled through his c.h.e.s.t or head. But...

'The girl has the natural balance of a cat!' Rei cursed. Even if he realized her plan and countered it, Yugito would simply use her cat-like balance and nimbleness to find a foothold. Rei had to admit the girl really came up with something ingenious this time.

For the first time during the spar, Rei was forced to step back from his starting spot as he impaled the tip of his sword into the earth, barely blocking Samehada. His entire sword trembled from the power behind the slash, passing the impact to his arm which also slightly shook.

Rei noticed Yugito's body was still in the air but before he could counter-attack, she channeled her chakra into Samehada, making the shark-skin blade enlargen. Samehada shocked Rei by twisting its tip with the mouth around the blade of his sword, clearly aiming to take a juicy bite out of his side.

'Yeah... I guess this time she deserves it.' Rei chuckled and nodded, "You win. I guess, you passed my requirement," He said and before Yugito knew it, Rei's sword that was next to her sailed through the air into Rei's hand via almost invisible chakra string. After all, letting go of his sword was one thing, having no way to retrieve it another. "But... there is still Ringo's requirement." Rei sternly reminded the delighted girl, causing her to pout.

"Quite rusty, eh?" Konan's voice resounded from behind Rei and before he could react, he felt her lean on his back as her arms tightly embraced him. "I think we are due some... exercises, don't we?" She whispered into Rei's ear, causing his body to stiffen...

'Wham' Tsunade's hand light-heartedly slapped Konan's shoulder, breaking the intimate atmosphere between Rei and Konan.

"Rei... I, on the other hand, think we should talk about the unnecessary strain you put your body through during the fight." Tsunade slowly said, her tone low. Needless to say...

"I think I am going to visit Ringo, hehe..." Yugito quickly realized she didn't want to be present for this and left even before finishing the sentence, not leaving Tsunade a chance to stop her and berate her for hurting her body during the fight. Yugito could feel her h.i.p.s hurting from the last twist in the air she did and she had no illusions that Tsunade didn't notice. Thankfully, as a jinchuuriki, she didn't need a healer for such trivial injuries.

Just like that, Rei was left alone, gaping at being so easily abandoned in the clutches of...

"You are NOT going to fight with a sword against opponents of Yugito's caliber before you regain your muscle-memory, am I clear?" Tsunade firmly spoke as her hands gently grasped Rei's cheeks, and locked his head in place so he could not avert his eyes.

Rei could only smile at the concern Tsunade was showing for him as he enjoyed her warm hands on his cheeks. All three of them knew she was exaggerating and overreacting but... that was simply Tsunade. For her, Rei, Konan, Mei, Ringo, and Pakura were family and so she took care of them the best she could. And they loved her for that.

"Yes. I won't put my body through strain that even chunin can handle." Rei said in an amused tone, causing Tsunade to click her tongue at him.

"Smartass." She leaned forward, affectionately kissing him on the lips. "I know Konan wants to talk about some reports with you so I will be with my apprentices if you will need me. See you tonight, Rei." She one last time c.a.r.e.s.sed Rei's cheek with her thumb before turning around and leaving with a skip in her step.

"You are in for some healing and s.e.x tonight, I see." Konan chuckled, letting go of Rei before stepping back.

"I am honestly surprised she didn't order me to lay down so she can heal me." Rei shrugged. "But... what report?" He changed the topic.

Rolling her eyes, Konan took out a few doc.u.ments. "The date for signing the peace treaty between Kumo and Konoha was set." She smirked at him knowingly, "Is that why you let Yugito win? You said you won't let her go and have her revenge before she makes you move in sword-fight and pass Ringo's stealth training... and here we are."

"And here we are," Rei repeated in a light-hearted tone. "Honestly, she was strong enough a year ago but..."

"But you wanted to be certain nothing could go wrong." Konan nodded in understanding. Yugito grew on them during the years. In Konan's perspective, she was... well, not-really a daughter but a bit more than a pet. Officially, Konan would refer to her as Ringo's apprentice or Mei's friend though.

"Doesn't hurt that the situation is extremely favorable. If we play our cards right, we might even get some cash for her enacting her own revenge." Rei hummed before his eyes landed on one particular report which made him halt.

Konan naturally noticed the sudden shift in his posture and tilted her head before noticing what he was reading.

"So the Third Mizukage was assassinated, huh?" Rei finally said with a detached tone. He had a lot of memories of bickering with the man and while they didn't exactly like each other, it was still a nostalgic feeling to remember those times. "Guess the swirly bastard wasn't much impressed with his plans to manipulate Yagura getting delayed because of the Third."

"Not that you were impressed either. I distinctly remember you destroying half of your personal training ground with fire that day." Konan quipped.

"Eh... can't fault me for that. My plans got delayed by years, ya know?" Rei shrugged, "It still isn't best. By now, the civil war should have been starting but because of that single intervention, it will take years for us to be able to collect some desperate bloodline clans from the Land of Water."

"The reports say he was run through with a blade from behind without him even noticing. Ironic, really. An assassin was assassinated." Konan mocked in her deadpan tone.

In a way, she was right but Rei knew Obito had a cheat-like bull for his Mangekyo Sharingan and the Third Mizukage was a marvelous schemer, assassin, and strategist but a head-on fighter he was not. At least not in the leagues of the Kages of his generation. Yet another reason why Rei stacked seal after seal on his territory to prevent nuisances like Zetsu or Obito from entering. Honestly, any space-time ability would not work on the territory of his Other-sided Village without being keyed into the sealing barrier... or ten.

"On a happier note... up for a shower and lunch?" Konan asked while l.i.c.k.i.n.g her lips as her eyes wandered on Rei's body.

Raising his eyebrow, Rei's lips twitched, "Now that is an offer I simply can't refuse, can I?" He chuckled, giving the doc.u.ments back to her before he grasped her hand, his mind trailing towards the enticing girl in front of him.

'Now that she mentioned it... I can take a break for a shower. Few hours won't kill anybody, right?'

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Chapter 182 - Ch182. Jiraiya married!

Jiraiya wanted to die.

It was three days since he got 'married' according to the customs of the nobles from the Land of Earth and so far it was an utter nightmare.

Imagine his horror when his father-in-law, Kazuhiro Iwako, a man in his mid-forties started to lecture him, the best member of the legendary Sannin, the spymaster of Konoha, the most stunning man in the Land of Fire, the Super Pervert in his early fifties himself, about all the rules and regulations of being married to a noble 'lady'!

'More like a noble whale! Do you have any idea how hard is it to sleep when the girl in the bed clinging to you feels as if the entire mountain has been dropped on your back!? If I wasn't such a strong shinobi, I would be squashed!' Jiraiya shuddered and mentally g.r.o.a.n.e.d, blinking his haunted eyes tiredly as he realized his father-in-law was still making his shovel speech to him. 'Man~, is he still going on? This reminds me of the times when I was scolded by Sensei for peeking in hot springs as a kid. Jeez.' He almost rolled his eyes.

"...And that, Jiraiya-kun is the rule number 269 of our household. Do you understand?" Kazuhiro sternly said. Jiraiya, however, couldn't really take the situation seriously. Not when Kazuhiro's bald head was in such a good angle that it basically shone when light from the window landed on it.

In the end, Jiraiya could only dumbly nod in agreement. He didn't even know how to feel. Finding amus.e.m.e.nt in the shine of a bald man... he knew how childish it was of him but can you blame him? After being told that, no, his 'research' is forbidden from now on? That he can no longer visit any fine establishments and has to stay completely faithful to his new wi-, wife? That there are more rules he will have to live by than in the goddamn shinobi rulebook?

"Now, this morning my daughter conveyed her wish to go shopping." Kazuhito started, attracting Jiraiya's attention, causing him to stare dumbly at his father-in-law in a way that obviously said 'and what does that have to do with me?'. Kazuhito, however, just smiled at the man who taught the Yellow Butcher. "Don't worry, I volunteered you to accompany her and be the gentleman who compliments her looks and carries her bags. Just a bit of advice though. My daughter never stops her shopping spree before an entire carriage is filled. Good for you that you are such a strong ninja and will be able to carry her stuff around, no?" Kazuhiro's eyes gleamed in amus.e.m.e.nt at the abject horror that appeared on Jiraiya's face.

Yes... Jiraiya really wanted to die. He only hoped Sarutobi-sensei would know how to get him free from this torture.

...

Hiruzen stared at the missive in front of him, his mind refusing to comprehend what it was saying. Now, Sarutobi was an old man who lived through many wars and saw many things. Many things that others would believe to be an utter fantasy and write them off as impossible. Things such as Danzo actually disbanding his ROOT or massive fox devastating his village. Inconceivable things.

But this... this had even him, the wise Professor, in a bind.

"Jiraiya... married? Earth Noble?" Hiruzen muttered, his right hand slowly creeping closer to his c.h.e.s.t as if to grab his weak heart and trying to prevent it from having a heart attack while his mind swirled, trying to make any sense of what he just read.

Oh, Hiruzen was an old political monster and he could clearly see the diplomatic shitstorm his apprentice caused. It didn't matter if Jiraiya tried to... omit... mentioning them in his letter. What Hiruzen couldn't seem to accept was the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.

Here he tries his all to protect the weakened Konoha. To make good ties with other countries. To please the angry Daimyo who is still a bit resentful he had to fork out so much money because of the ROOT f.u.c.k-up. To balance the issues between the civilian council trying to demilitarize his military village and the shinobi council trying to grab as much influence for themselves. Everything from placating the angry Uchihas for being relocated to the outskirts of the village to verbally kicking the smug Hyuugas down a few pegs was in his job description. Honestly, Hiruzen was just happy that Naras were so lazy, Akimichi too busy stuffing their cheeks to care about politics, and Yamanaka too small to matter. It really made his job, which was basically a wholesale nightmare in the current situation, a lot easier.

Now imagine his surprise when his apprentice, Jiraiya, suddenly undo years of hard work with his sleeping habits. This was Konoha and naturally, as a village hated by all of the Land of Earth, Hiruzen focused on allying with people who had similar opinions towards the rocky country. Being in a situation where his options were either allying with the Earth Country or going to war with them?

'Jiraiya... just had to f.u.c.k around so much he f.u.c.k.e.d away all of my efforts, right?' Hiruzen's bulging eyes shook in the helpless realization that most of the alliances he so painstakingly formed will inevitably crumble under the weight of this new situation. 'Years of effort wasted. So much paperwork... for naught.' Hiruzen thought with a dry throat, feeling the pressure as if wanting to vomit while tears glistered his wizened cheeks. Suddenly, he simply couldn't hold it in as he felt the world crashing around him.

Half of Konoha heard the scream of impotent primal rage originating from the Hokage Tower, causing the citizens to worry if Kyuubi got free.

In his office, Hiruzen was slumped over the letter from his previously favorite student, contemplating his life choices.

'I should have focused on grooming Tsunade. Why must my two male apprentices be such failures? One is a pedophile scientist with a perversion for immortality and the second is a perverted f.u.c.k-up who is capable of putting the village in a tough spot despite not even being present in it.' Hiruzen sniffed, barely holding himself back from crying. 'At least Tsunade was competent enough to not cause an international problem for the village.' He realized, feeling completely empty. Taking in a brush, Hiruzen started to shakily pen a reply to Jiraiya.

You reap what you sow. Enjoy the marriage.

There was nothing else Hiruzen could say. He was far too angry and no matter that Jiraiya was his former favorite, this was simply too much even for him.

'Am I really the only man in this village that works for its well-being opposite to all of the idiots who do everything in their strength to get it closer towards destruction?' Hiruzen's empty eyes momentarily strayed towards the picture of his successor and predecessor at the same time, Minato, and his mind instantly remembered Naruto who was supposed to be raised by Jiraiya before the man fled. 'Even the jinchuuriki has to be taught about the Will of Fire by me personally despite there being hordes of people who were friends with Minato and Kushina. Don't tell me the supposed ninjas of this village are blind enough to not see the blatant resemblance.' He scoffed.

'Yes... at least Naruto is obedient and growing up to be loyal to the village.' Hiruzen sighed.

If only he knew the truth...

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Chapter 183 - Ch183. Vengeance 2

Finally, after a few months of relentless effort, Yugito received her pass from Ringo. It was not easy. Far from it. Many times she wanted to snarl and curse the woman when she bruised black and blue went to sleep. Pain became a constant companion and Yugito really understood that the woman she thought to be the quietest and most 'normal' out of Rei's wives was actually craziest of them all when it came to training. Yugito was only glad she had a natural grace, nimbleness, and sense of balance of a cat otherwise... she shuddered at how much harder the training would be for her.

But now that she finally passed... she could, at last, have her vengeance.

Yugito clad in her kunoichi attire stood on the top of one of Kumogakure's towers, breathing the chilly night air as she reminisced about her time in the village while looking around the clouds-covered towers in the mountains... her birthplace.

Kumogakure was a really nostalgic sight for her. As someone who grew up half on the streets, Yugito knew quite a lot about the layout of the village. But after spending so much time with Mei and her family, Yugito no longer felt that Kumogakure was her home. It took but a few lessons from Konan to understand. She was a kunoichi of Kumo. She was a jinchuuriki of Kumo. Naturally, she was indoctrinated to be loyal to Kumo.

Looking back, Yugito doubted she would follow Mei if her friend didn't surprise her in her moment of weakness. But as it was, Mei approached her when she felt especially down, and here she ended up. On the roof of a tower where one of the councilors responsible for her misery lived.

The man... wasn't going to survive tonight.

Yugito sneaked inside the tower through the window, opting to enter from the top rather than the bottom where most guards were concentrated. She nimbly and soundlessly strode through the dark halls, melding her presence into every shadow to make her small body even less spottable to others.

The first patrol was easy to bypass. She only had to use the teachings of Ringo which said... if you can't go through or around without being spotted, you have to go from above. Yugito carefully walked on the ceiling to get past the team of two ninjas who patrolled the halls. They were not anything extraordinary by any stretch. Simple chunins but still annoying to dodge in narrow hallways of the tower without being spotted.

The second patrol group was also easy if a bit riskier. Yugito hid behind a corner and waited for them to pass, ready to strike if they turned in her direction and saw her. Fortunately for them, they didn't.

It was the third time she saw guards that became a slight problem. Two guys who stood in front of the door leading towards her target. Really... there was no dodging those.

"Always be smart about proceeding forward, silence is the key, huh?" Yugito muttered the third rule of assassination Ringo taught her and her eyes shrewdly gleamed.

Using the cover of the night, Yugito used chakra sting to entwine around a leg of one guard. Chakra strings were one of the most practiced things in Ringo's training montage because of how 'easy' and dead useful they were in many practical uses. Sadly, one had to have incredible chakra control to make them almost invisible and Yugito was a jinchuuriki...

Yeah, she was extremely glad she chose nighttime for her little operation. Her control still s.u.c.k.e.d enough to make creating invisible strings impossible.

Her string prepared, she then sneaked on the ceiling to get above the guards. After she was in the position, it was entirely too easy to drop in front of them while slashing the throat of the guard who didn't have the string around his ankle while the one that did was pulled up, screaming bloody murder only for no sound to leave his throat because of a silencing seal Yugito slapped on his shoulder mid-drop. Yugito's hand caught the body of the man whose throat she slit and placed it onto the ground before finishing off the man who hanged upside down on the chakra string by his ankle.

Two corpse storage scrolls and two shadow clones that henged into the guards later, and Yugito was ready to enter the room. After all, it wouldn't do for someone to stumble into these parts of the tower and discover the door unguarded. That would ring too many unnecessary alarms.

Putting a silencing seal on the door, Yugito slowly and soundlessly opened them, sneaking inside. One very delightful part of being Nibi's jinchuuriki was her ability to naturally see at night so the darkness in the room didn't bother Yugito one bit. She frowned, however, as her s.e.n.s.i.t.i.v.e nose caught the smell of s.e.x in the room, and then she saw the man whose life she swore to end. He simply lied there under the sheets, soundly sleeping without any alert with three women dr.a.p.ed over him, also asleep.

'And this is why Rei made sure to drill into my head all those alert seals.' Yugito inwardly hummed.

The vulnerable man in front of her was one of the most skilled jonins of Kumo. Or at least,... has been. Life in luxury and attending to political matters clearly considerably dulled his instincts. The man was still fit and muscled but...

'No matter who or how powerful your target is, they are as vulnerable as any backward farmer while sleeping. Choose the moment of your strike wisely. Assassination rule number five.' Yugito remembered and couldn't help but agree.

From there, it wasn't hard to use chakra strings to move silencing tags on the walls and then some knock-out tags onto the bodies of the women while also putting chakra restraining tags onto the man himself. This clearly woke the councilor up as he started thrashing around with his arms and legs bound, trying to scream for guards. His panic was simply music for Yugito's ears.

Yugito amusedly watched as the man tried to get off his bindings only to fall down from the bed and stifle a painful groan before moving like a worm on the ground. He still didn't notice her standing in the corner which made Yugito's sadistic streak just that much more satisfied. The man had no idea what was going on and his mind was in chaos. Eh... Yugito would let him stem in it for a bit. There was no need to hurry so much anyway.

It took but five minutes for the man to finally calm down. Seeing as his restraints wouldn't fall off no matter how he thrashed, he tried a different method.

"Hello? Anyone there?" He asked with a shaky voice. As a political superpower in Kumogakure, he knew he had many enemies but this was his tower. His home. The place where he was most guarded. He could do anything inside and nobody would even notice. To think he would be attacked here... the man was now really, really scared.

Yugito slowly nodded as she stepped out of the shadows. She didn't have THAT much time. There were still four more unwilling participants to her tor-, ahem, as Tsunade would call it, hands-on anatomy classes.

"Y-You!?" The councilor shrieked, dread creeping into his gaze. Political opponents could be negotiated with. Assassins could be paid off. But the woman in front of him? He knew he did her wrong. Horribly wrong but he never even in his worst nightmares would imagine seeing the previous jinchuuriki again!

The moment he saw her cold gaze, he knew he was f.u.c.k.e.d beyond measure.

"I... N-No. I didn't want to hurt you!" The man started in panic, pleadingly staring at Yugito whose lips twitched upwards at these words. "I-"

"I don't want to hurt you either." Yugito interrupted him with an uplifting voice. Causing the panic of the man to slightly decrease. "I simply want you to suffer." She added indifferently as if she was describing the weather, causing the eyes of the councilor to shrink.

It would be only in the morning that Kumogakure would learn how bloody the previous silent night was, getting only a single message in return.

A message saying,

'Yozora is displeased.'

Chapter 184 - Ch184. Raikage's reaction

"You think the one responsible for killing five councilmen is Yugito?" Killer B asked A in an incredulous tone, his eyebrows rising almost to his hairline, even forgetting to rap.

"Yes." A grumbled. "Remember that investigation about her treatment by the village I secretly conducted after Yozora took her?" Raikage sighed in sadness, remembering how the woman he thought of like a niece was mistreated. "She would have the biggest motive to do... that." He said a bit shaken from what he read happened to the five councilmen. Honestly, death would be merciful at this point for them.

"But... Yugito? Joining Yozora by her own will?" Killer B asked, not wanting to believe Yugito would betray her village. Deep down in his heart, however, he knew that she had every right for it. He knew he could not fault her for this decision. That didn't mean he wanted to believe it though.

"Yes. It is actually a miracle," Raikage rolled his eyes but B could see how grumpy and angry he was, "that this incident happened after I signed papers for their retirement and eventual clean-up."

"Ah. The Hyuuga incident..."

"Yes... I lost my Jonin Commander because of these swines." A harrumphed. "Now I can't even give them up to Konoha for their mistakes." Raikage rubbed his temples, trying to prevent his rising headache. "Could you believe we were sent the body of Hizashi Hyuuga, the twin of Hyuuga patriarch, despite sending a letter that the demand for the body of their clan head was not official and we do not require it? The old Monkey really does everything to lower the influence of the clans."

"We were used as scapegoats, heh..." Killer B smirked.

Everybody knew that the Hyuuga clan was on the rise after Uchihas fell out of grace and were relocated to the outskirts of the village. How better to make them fall in line than subtly creating some internal conflict? Sarutobi didn't even have it that hard with Kumogakure council idiots providing every tool needed for him. The fact that the Hyuuga clan is divided into two branches was just the icing on the cake.

He could exchange a life of a single jonin from the Hyuuga clan for instability in the clan, lowering their influence and diverting their eyes to something else than 'becoming Hokage' or getting more direct power in the village, and the blame would completely be on Kumogakure. All he had to do was keep the letter saying Kumo didn't want the body of the Hyuuga clan head secret.

"I knew I should have sent the letter through the official channels, preferably our Daimyo but there was just no time for that. I thought... hoped that this mistake of these five councilors would not implicate Kumogakure but to think Sarutobi would use this situation to take the Hyuuga clan down a peg. Sigh." Raikage shook his head. Since he got the report about the failure of the mission to kidnap the Hyuuga heiress, the mission he never approved of, his headache was on the rise. After all, it meant somebody in his council was trying to screw him and the whole Kumogakure over.

Needless to say, finding out the idiots who did that wholeheartedly believed doing something that could start the next Ninja War was for the good of the village was a shocker in itself. Sure, Kumogakure came out of the previous war in the best shape but that didn't mean they could go and provoke everyone. Not when Konoha was getting chummy with Iwagakure due to Jiraiya's marriage.

"So... what did little Yugi do to the bastards?" Killer B asked, almost eagerly. He already decided to write a song about it! Now he only had to dig for the small details to incorporate into it.

Yes... Kumogakure had a reputation of kidnapping and breeding members of bloodline clans but this didn't mean it happened on a daily basis. In the years the village stood, only less than twenty such cases happened, none of them under A's administration.

A made sure to execute every f.u.c.ker who hurt Yugito but the five who were on the council and had enough leverage with the nobles of the Land of Lightning. Those, he couldn't touch so easily. He just waited for them to make a mistake and now that they authorized the kidnapping of the Hyuuga heiress, he had them by the balls only for someone from Yozora to turn them into heavily crippled piles of barely living flesh. On one hand, it was vexing he couldn't deliver his own justice to them, on another, if it really was Yugito... then he could be fine with it, he supposed. Not that anybody else could use the fire of Nibi with enough precision to inflict hours of torture on the victim.

A simply wordlessly handed the report to B, letting him learn what Yugito did to them, and watched as B winced or grimaced at times.

Yugito was brutal. First, she cooked their limbs one at a time. That alone must have been incredibly painful, leaving them begging for death. Only when the damage of a limb was so extensive they completely lost the feeling of pain, Yugito severed said limb. Brutal torture by fire. Even B was green after reading about it.

Then, Yugito took their manhoods off. She did it in a way as if she was chopping a carrot. One circlet at a time. Needless to say, even Gyuki inside of Killer B shuddered and whimpered at such cruelty.

It was only when all of that was done and the men couldn't scream anymore, Yugito took their tongues and eyes away and burned most of their skin. All five were now in the Kumogakure hospital, limbless, tongueless, eyeless, and d.i.c.kless burned piles of flesh. Killer B didn't know if he should be proud of the revenge little Yugito enacted or if he should run the f.u.c.k away from her anytime he sees her. As a ninja, he found it impressive but as a man... it was downright frightening for him.

"I now see why you think it was Yugito. Nobody would have good reason to go this far with them." Killer B nodded with a gulp as he handed back the report. "But... is it alright?"

"What do you mean?" A grunted, focusing on the paperwork in front of him.

"You hate Yozora, don't you? Is it fine that Yugito apparently joined them?" B asked, raising his arms and entering a rapping stance. "I am sure, you want a lure. You feel hate, mate. This is a chance for Yozora's bounty to go risin', are ya gonna let it go missin', brozza?"

A looked at B, totally unimpressed with the brief musical addition. "B..." He sighed and leaned on the backrest of his chair. "I do hate Rei, Konan, and Ringo Ameyuri. They killed my fiance." A's eyes frosted before showing a resigned gleam. "But I am the Raikage. I have to think of the village. Anybody who can get inside a ninja village without raising any alarm, torture five high-profile politicians for a whole night without anybody even knowing it was happening, is a threat not worth antagonizing. If I was not so sure it was Yugito? I would probably blow a gasket and secretly try to do something about it. That said, I am still going to secretly find a solution to this intruding problem of ours." A frowned, "But for now, I gotta let grudges go. Especially if Yugito actually joined Yozora."

Frankly, A was dismayed. He so wanted nothing more than to dispatch hundreds of his ninjas to hunt Rei, Konan, and Ringo down but he had no idea about their whereabouts, skills, or current strength. Yozora still did a few jobs once in a while but they faded to the background, lurking in the shadows. This current incident was actually the first major happening caused by them in the last four years.

Kumogakure let its guard down for a moment and Yozora gave them a painful reminder of why that is a bad thing to do.

A looked at the picture of a woman and sighed. He really had to let bygones be bygones. For the village, and for Yugito. After all, A knew his fiance would want him to look after her sister.

Even if the girl chose to serve somebody other than Kumogakure.

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Chapter 185 - Ch185. Final bonding

Rei watched as Pakura clad in a sandy-yellow tight-fitting kimono that highlighted her curves well, stepped through the portal into his dimension. This was the first time he ever saw any kind of make-up on her face and he had to admit, the woman was gorgeous. Her lips glistened with pink lipstick, adding a cute vibe to her usual strictness. A bit of dark green eye-shadow went incredibly well with her hair and highlighted her eyes nicely. Her hair was completely let free compared to her usual bun held by a senbon but it was obvious that Pakura spent quite a lot of time making her hair slightly wavy and appear so silky.

Rei was firstly baffled when she requested to be dressed according to Wind Country wedding customs for this day. "I am giving myself completely to you. Naturally, I want to look my best!" She said and to that, Rei had no valid argument. He was simply happy Tsunade or Ringo revealed their feelings on the matter because Rei knew that since Pakura pointed it out, they were miffed for days that their bonding was not perfect because they didn't get to wear wedding dresses.

And then Rei saw his other girls step in and his jaw dropped as he understood why they never revealed their dissatisfaction.

Here he was, clad in a totally laid-back baggy bright green shirt he wore on Sundays and comfortable black pants, looking like a crazy village bum while all of his five girls looked gorgeous beyond belief. There was obviously something he was not told!

Konan had an expensive-looking Levander kimono that blended with her blue shoulder-length hair decorated by a blue origami rose of a lighter shade, marvelously complementing her clothing and hair color. Her mischievous smile clearly betrayed whose idea this dressing up was. Somehow, Rei couldn't find it in himself to be angry at those lascivious light-blue lips she was lightly biting in invitation. Adding Konan's almost sparkling big amber eyes full of happiness... yeah, Rei never had a chance, did he?

Tsunade opted for green haori ending a bit above her knees with an intricate leaf pattern all over it and her hair was all in two blond pigtails lying on her c.h.e.s.t, reaching her lower abdomen. It was obvious the piece of clothing was dear to her heart since it didn't exactly look new but was still well-cared for. Rei quickly put two and two together and realized this was the attire in which, according to Tsunade's stories, her grandmother Mito appeared at her wedding. Rei softly smiled at his sentimental medic, getting a content grin in return.

Mei... Rei spotted she really grew up well. Instead of a kimono, she had the tailors of Uzushio create her a 'western' dress. Rei could only wryly smile. He described it one damn time and the girl became as if infatuated with the idea. There she stood, in azure light dress ending a bit below her knees, her plentiful red locks all flowing over her also almost reaching her knees. Oh, how Rei loved her silky crimson long hair... In Rei's old world, this would in no way count as something on par with what his other girls wore, at least from a symbolic point of view. Here though? It looked well and fit Mei's personality well. Simple but daring. Not that Rei would ever say that out loud.

And lastly, Ringo. His little swordsman had a black kimono dress with a flowery pattern that went very well with her red hair which was freely flowing down her back with two bangs covering the sides of her faces, reaching her c.h.e.s.t. Surprisingly, her hair was decorated with small braids and two hairpins resembling a black butterfly were preventing the bangs from coming into her face. Needless to say, this was actually the very first time he saw Ringo dressed up so beautifully and Rei made sure to carefully store this memory into his mind. After all, with her personality, it very well might be the last time.

Konan was the first one to approach, mostly because of some sense of seniority the girls decided among themselves. Konan was supposedly the 'leader' while Tsunade was her substitute whereas others were on the same level in the pecking order. Rei was just glad his girls didn't fight for something as senseless as a 'better' position and were content with how things were right now as he had no intentions of treating one of them better than others.

"I see you didn't get the news." Konan stated when she saw Rei's lazy attire. If they didn't know each other, it could come across as insulting. They spent hours to make themselves look gorgeous for him and here he stood, in his most casual baggy clothes.

Fortunately for Rei, his girls were fast to the uptake and instantly turned towards Mei who was supposed to inform Rei. Konan raised her eyebrow, Pakura slightly glared, Tsunade was amused, and Ringo... well, she didn't turn to Mei, and instead her eyes trailed over Rei while she licked her lips.

"What?" Mei crossly asked, "Don't look at me like that! Does it even matter if he knows we want to make this into a sort of a wedding night? So what if he isn't dressed up?" She pointed at Rei in a dismissive manner, "I personally love the moments when we are rolling in the sack the most... when we are completely n.a.k.e.d. I care not what he wears and I know that neither of you wouldn't really mind if he was n.a.k.e.d either so where is the problem?" She defensively stated and Rei had to fight his urge to take a step back from how weirded out he was at this opinion of hers.

'Wait...' His eyes slightly widened as he saw the other four girls turn to him, 'don't look at me like that... No, no, no. Stop with that understanding gleam of sudden realization in your eyes!' He took a step back at their hungry stares and hotly added, "Oi!"

"What? She is totally right." Tsunade uncaringly shrugged, causing the girls to snicker and giggle.

Rei could only wearily shake his head, not even realizing he was slightly smiling. After all, deep down, he had the same opinion. These dresses were nice and all but he wouldn't overly mind if they were n.a.k.e.d in front of him. But he also knew the girls wanted to dress up and show themselves to him so he kept quiet and enjoyed the sights.

"Let's just... start, okay?"

No matter how tired of the situation Rei acted, the girls spent a lot of time with him so there was no deceiving them. Especially not when he really couldn't help himself and take more than a few appreciative side-glances all over them.

Happy with themselves, the six people decided to proceed with the main event. The bonding ceremony for Pakura.

Soon enough, Pakura found herself in Rei's embrace as they stood in the middle of the sealing array while the other four girls encircled them, standing in their own designated places. Bonding six people to each other with one main bond between Rei and Pakura, and multiple secondary bonds to the girls was no joke so Rei had to spend two days re-creating the process to make it safe.

The girls started to feed their chakra into the seals, causing them to slightly light up and Rei, knowing Pakura deserved this to be a happy memory, in that precise moment where they were bonded, leaned forward, placing a gentle loving kiss onto the surprised woman, causing her to melt in his embrace.

Just like that, the bonding was finished. Outwardly not very impressive but inwardly... a lot has changed.

The group decided to take the next few days off from their work and spend them together in Rei's dimension, just lazing around, making out, and having s.e.x, completely carefree and without any work or worry. It really reminded Rei of the dream he had in his previous world. He wanted to be rich, carefree, and have a loving wife. He was always a bit lazy. And yet... here he was, putting so much effort into building his own village and getting stronger when he could just shut himself and his girls in his dimension for a few centuries, focusing on indulging in carnal d.e.s.i.r.es and basking in the warm feeling of being loved. There was nothing he needed anymore.

But he couldn't really do that, could he? Tsunade, Pakura, and even Ringo had a few people or at the very least sentiments in that world and they would be sad if they were killed or destroyed. In the end, Rei didn't want his girls sad. Hence, he decided to solve the threat of the Otsutsuki clan once and for all. 'Baby steps. One thing at the time.' Rei mentally hummed.

It was at the picnic two days after the bonding that Pakure timidly raised the important question.

"So... can I consider you my husband now?" Her nervousness was almost visible as she asked that while subconsciously fidgeting.

The whole meadow suddenly grew deadly silent as five pairs of eyes intently locked onto Rei who blankly blinked as he opened his mouth but his mind refused to supply him with an appropriate answer.

The mood of the girls soured when even after a few seconds they didn't get a positive answer. Fortunately, Rei slowly nodded and finally found words.

"I... guess?" Rei unsurely agreed, causing the girls to happily beam at him but their eyes still held some concern at how lackl.u.s.ter the answer sounded. Rei, not seeing that, continued, "I have no idea, to be honest. Well, in Uzushio and my Other-sided Village, we can consider being as good as married. I frankly always considered those bonded to me as my wives. I simply do not know if from the legal point of view we can be considered married since there was no official wedding." He explained.

Hearing that, Tsunade quickly added her opinion, "It doesn't matter."

Pakura nodded, "Only weddings between nobles, Daimyos, or important people in shinobi villages are recorded. A wedding between peasants is not and the only proof is a scrap of paper they receive that proves that yes, they are married. There is also no way to access a record of a wedding from Suna.. say, in Konoha. The countries do not share these things so as long as somebody says he is married, you can either believe him or not as there is no real proof." She said.

"Well," Rei smiled. He never really paid attention to these things so he had no idea. Good thing his gi-, ahem, wives did so he won't have to waste time researching. "then I guess I have no other option than to graciously give you the title of my wives and shower you with all love I am capable of, the opinion of others be damned." He sagaciously nodded.

"Damn straight." Five sweet womanly voices rang through the meadow at once.

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Chapter 186 - Ch186. Artificial Bijuu 1

Rei and his wives were in the middle of their vacation when Rei decided it was time to finally perform the second reason why he wanted them in his dimension. After all, he finally finished his little bijuu project.

Rei led the girls into a room containing a massive sealing matrix spreading through the roof, walls, and concentrating on the floor where six circles with the exact same distance between them were inscribed.

"Each of us will sit in one of these circles." Rei informed them after seeing the curious looks they were shooting the sealing matrix. None of them ever saw so many seals concentrated on such a little place. Even Tsunade who had the most knowledge about sealing among the women knew that this should, by all means, result in one massive explosion after the seals start to interact with each other. Suddenly, a realization flashed through their heads.

"This is why you limited our access to the Dimension! You were testing this, weren't you?" Konan asked but her admonishing tone clearly conveyed there was no need for an answer.

Rei could almost see the mouths of his wives opening as thoughts were flashing through their eyes that glared at him worriedly. He had to act fast and say something or be bombarded by angry verbal spanking from five women who felt wronged. 'Dear me...' Rei bitterly thought.

"Yes... Now, I won't doubt your intelligence by lying and saying I used clones for it. We all know there is no way of using only clones for something like this." Rei hurriedly started. His remark thankfully stopped the incoming nagging but it was obvious the storm didn't pass yet. "I had to oversee it myself and..."

"How many?" Tsunade interrupted in a quiet tone and a deathly silence descended on the group. She raised her and glared at Rei before seeing he was reluctant to answer. "How many near-death experiences did it take for you to succeed?" She repeated her question and crossed her hands under her blossom in a displeased manner.

The other four also didn't look very pleased with Rei at the moment. Even Mei understood the implication of what exactly Rei had to do to create the sealing matrix. Such a thing would be extremely explosion-happy and accident-prone. In order to oversee it, Rei would have to be close to it. And since not much of the Dimension was damaged, Rei most likely cut the parts the matrix was located in off from the rest of the dimension, creating a smaller sub-dimension. That only meant Rei was most of his time in the recent years trapped in a small sub-dimension with a very explosive sealing matrix that could most likely go off into the air like a blasted bijuu-dama any moment of a day just because two strokes in a kanji disagreed with each other.

Oh yes, Rei's wives were not having a good time imagining that kind of situation.

Rei awkwardly scratched the back of his head as he wryly smiled at his girls. He had no idea how to appease them so he went with, "Eh, don't worry about the number too much... at least it gave me practice for some defensive Jutsu. I can now say with utmost certainty that even bijuu-dama would be hard-pressed to kill me!" He exclaimed.

Alas, instead of the relieved look he was expecting, the five women in front of him only deepened their glares.

'That was a bad thing to say, wasn't it?' Rei idly thought before the screaming began.

Five hours. That's how long it took for the five women to calm down. Never in his dreams would Rei think Konan could be so loud. Honestly, he wasn't an idiot and knew this would be their reaction. Being ninja meant getting better at reading people and he frankly expected Tsunade to plummet him to the ground for this. Researching the sealing matrix was veritable suicide. Thankfully, Tsunade only screamed her frustrations at him until her throat was hoarse and then clung to him as if her life depended on it. In a way, that was way worse than punching him with her super-strength because it really conveyed how hurt she was and it certainly made Rei feel bad.

Closed-off small sub-dimension going off in one massive explosion... yeah, Rei actually had to spend half-year inventing seals capable of keeping him alive from that before he even started with the real work. Of course, that was after he was almost blown to smithereens due to the first failed attempt... not that he would mention that to his girls anytime soon.

Rei made sure to blurt it out like that because that way, he expected the least damage. He naturally knew the second his girls saw the room with the matrix, the lightbulb would go off in their heads and they would instantly understand what it meant.

If Rei actually shared the method he was using to invent the sealing matrix for creating artificial bijuu, he was sure that he would find himself prevented in any way possible from continuing. Hence, he kept the method secret. He could only thank gods none of his girls knew enough of sealing to guess the process and how explosive it was without actually seeing the matrix.

Fortunately, the five women now reluctantly sat in five of the circles while Rei took the sixth.

"Remember to follow the steps." Rei reminded them one last time, getting a few eye-rolls in return which prompted him to smile. He trusted each of them too much to believe they could ever botch it up.

Pushing a wisp of his chakra into the starting sequence, the sealing 'ritual' began.

...

Tsunade was pissed. Knowing her husband was trying to perform suicide for years made her almost tear up from the sheer rage. She simply didn't understand why this was even necessary. Weren't they already strong enough? Surely, even her grandfather would have problems facing them now. And yet, Rei still wanted to give them an edge. For what?

Her whole being was filled with euphoria as her senses were being bathed in an ocean of soothing nature energy, engulfing her in its entirety. Winds picked up despite them being indoors, chakra started leaking from their bodies into the seals without them even having to do anything. It was all very calming but despite feeling elated, Tsunade knew better. She was the medic ninja of the group and well aware the seals completely shut off the feeling of pain in their bodies. She mentally shuddered at thinking how painful this would be without that. The seals that leaked chakra would most likely set every nerve ending on fire.

The nature energy and the chakra were furiously smashing into each other, the seals slowly taming them and molding them into something else after the energies merged.

The first five minutes were pure bliss.

The next fifteen minutes were still very enjoyable but worry started to seep into Tsunade's mind.

It was however the last forty minutes that had her frowning when the chakra didn't stop leaking. Naturally, as someone who almost died from such a leakage, Tsunade was scared witless when her chakra levels hit 20% full. Since Rei bonded to her, saving her life, she never once went under fifty percent of her full reserves. One could say she had an almost hysterical fear of being low on chakra and this situation was not helping her mental state... not at all.

Inwardly freaking out, Tsunade trembled as even more chakra left her. She shared this worry of hers with her new family but now... she regretted it. Rei would certainly not make this matrix if she did. Tsunade wanted to curl into a ball and start whimpering.

And then, she heard Rei's voice, "Now! Imbue the secondary consciousness!"

Cold calm swept her shaken mental state, and as if in reflex, Tsunade used the technique derived from shadow cloning Rei taught her, to create a secondary consciousness and imbued it into the chakra/nature energy construct in front of her.

With that... her mind grew numb and Tsunade felt as if somebody hit her head with one of her super-powered punches sans the pain. Disoriented, she felt her head spinning and her senses going haywire. For a second, Tsunade thought she was feeling things from two different perspectives and it was beyond weird but when she was about to focus on this feeling, she was dragged into her own mind, her head snapping back as if slapped.

Anf Tsunade could feel her chakra again. Her full reserves. Of which, 90% were currently cutely yipping at her. Her own chakra... alive.

Speechless... didn't give her current state any justice.

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Chapter 187 - Ch187. Artificial Bijuu 2

Rei evenly stared at the black fox cub in front of him, getting an even stare from the fox in return before chuckling. Leaning forward, Rei took the cub into his hands and put it on his l.a.p where the black fox cub curled into a ball and tiredly yawned before falling asleep.

'Little bastard,' Rei's eyebrow playfully twitched, 'Here he falls asleep when I have to keep myself awake. Damn was this tiring!'

Rei slowly rolled his shoulders as his eyes started looking around, checking his wives.

Tsunade looked in wonder at her own blond fox that looked as excited to meet Tsunade. Rei smiled. The fox was definitely as excitable as Tsunade when she was surrounded by family.

Konan was highly amused as she patted her blue fox that almost preened at the attention by straightening her back and slightly lifting its muzzle. Rei could only subtly nod to himself. That reaction was definitely something Konan would subconsciously do every time he showered her with attention.

Mei was a bit lost, not knowing what to do when her auburn fox jumped into her l.a.p and demanded attention. Honestly, Rei could instantly see the similarities between the fox and Mei.

Ringo had her crimson fox already in her hands, nuzzling it to her cheek. Rei could however plainly see the curious gleam in the eyes of both Ringo and the crimson fox as they subtly took the measure of their surroundings.

Lastly... Pakura. Her fox was green and both Pakura and the cub seemed almost hesitant to move from their spot as they eyed each other. Rei was about to look away when Pakura and the fox nodded at each other as if reaching some kind of understanding and then the fox slowly walked towards Pakura who started hesitantly rubbing its fur with a totally awkward expression.

Rei couldn't help but burst into laughter at that. It was the exact same expression Pakura had on her face when they had s.e.x for the very first time.

Rei's sudden laughter broke the atmosphere around each pair of human and fox, causing ten pairs of eyes to redirect at Rei who tried to wave his hand to show he needed time in order to calm down.

"Sorry, sorry. It's just... Pakura was too cute there." Rei mischievously said which made Pakura flush crimson red and give him a slight glare. It didn't take her long to figure out what he meant by that.

Neither did it take long for the other women who threw Pakura knowing looks, causing her to groan while still subconsciously gently rubbing her fox.

'Yes... too cute.' Rei mentally decided, showing a proud smile.

"Let's stop teasing her, shall we?" Konan started speaking as she turned to Rei, "I would like to know how..." She waved her hand around her fox, "this actually works."

Rei slowly nodded, "Yes. It would probably be best if I explained what the foxes exactly are and how they came to be." He threw Tsunade a concerned look. It was ever-so-obvious the woman had a hard time pulling her gaze away from her fox and her body language... well.

"Your first concern would undoubtedly be your chakra reserves, right?" Rei asked, getting nods in return. "They feel full and yet, you have only ten percent in your body. Don't worry, that is normal. Your reserves will fully replenish," Rei smirked, "and the chakra in the fox will also quickly grow."

Hearing that, the women looked pensive before Konan again took the leading role and very carefully asked in a bit disbelieving tone, "You... are saying our reserves will more than double with this?"

She really couldn't believe it. When Konan heard about the term 'bijuu', she never thought it would be her chakra come alive. The problem with that was it was HER chakra. The second Konan's hand touched her fox, Konan knew she could still siphon chakra from the fox and freely use it for Jutsu.

Rei gave her a winning grin, "Nope." He quipped and gave a dramatic pause to let his wives accept the fact before he playfully continued, "They will increase by more than a hundred times. I really have no idea how much exactly the final number would be." He dropped the bomb, blowing the minds of his wives away.

Konan and Rei already had more chakra reserves than even Madara and Hashirama so getting such an increase was something the women really could not even imagine. After all, if Madara and Hashirama are the strongest according to their knowledge... what exactly are they becoming?

"To begin the explanation," Rei started, happy he had the full undivided attention of his wives, "let me give you a small briefing of what exactly Bijuu is. Shukaku, for example, is not made of sand as many would believe. He is actually the chakra in the sand and the seal markings on his skin. That's why it does not matter how many times you cut him in half. He would always simply reform. The concept on which the foxes are based is the same. They are beings made of your chakra." Rei stopped for a moment, letting that fact settle down.

"Now, I could not actually create a soul. After all, I do not own some miraculous eyes of circular bullshittery like the Sage of the Six Paths that could create anything with but a hand clap. Hence, you had to create a secondary consciousness and imbue it into the chakra during the creation process. In the process, this consciousness was strengthened, reshaped, and so on, and on... not important." Rei dismissively waved his hand, "What is important is that the foxes are part of you given sentience."

Hearing that, the women involuntarily smiled and cuddled their fox closer to them. It was almost instinctive. The only difference was Tsunade who held hers almost protectively.

Rei's lips stretched into an almost gleeful smirk before he continued. The next part was the reason why he could proudly proclaim himself a genius. "That means their chakra which is a mix of your own chakra, nature energy, and bijuu chakra they can now produce, is yours to use as you see fit. You can merge with the fox, boosting your reserves in both potency and capacity. Especially since the foxes do not have a limited body of flesh, hence their reserves can grow to insane proportions if we look at it from the perspective of human standards. While they have less chakra than Shukaku right now, with time, they will surpass nine-tails. Of that, I have no doubt." Rei explained, causing the women to look at the cute little foxes in a new light.

They were not just pets. The women quickly understood what Rei meant. These were tools that would help them grow stronger. And yet... Rei's wives knew that the bond they felt between themselves and their fox was not accidental. Rei clearly wanted them to treat the foxes with love.

"Once they grow up, you can use them as Summoning Animals you basically hold within you. And since they were made from your chakra and consciousness, they will never betray you. The best feeling for them is being merged with you, being at home. I also added a few seals on them," Rei winced saying that. The room they were in was a mess. Many seals were burned off, completely dispersed, basically destroyed. The seal matrix was unusable and Rei would have to invest half-year of effort to recreate it. Not that he would ever do something like this again. "thanks to these chakra manipulation seals, the foxes will be able to change their sizes at will. Any questions?"

The room descended into silence as all five women pondered if there was something they wanted to know about.

"How long till they grow up?" Mei eagerly asked.

"Few years... which means," Rei glanced at Tsunade, "you will have to separate." That obviously didn't go well with the women but Tsunade looked positively hurt. "They have to be in my Dimension in order for the nature energy to nourish them, boosting their growth and chakra reserves. Before you ask, yes, they could do it while merged with you but it would take centuries instead of years."

"Rei's dimension can be called one big energy battery." Konan nodded in understanding.

"Which means, they will need to be babysat." Rei smiled when Tsunade instantly perked up, "There are six of us so we will rotate on a daily basis while the seventh day we can take a break from work and spend in the Dimension together."

"I can delegate most of my work to one of my best apprentices and spend more time with the cubs." Tsunade interjected, causing the others to narrow their eyes at her. Only now did the other four women notice that something was off with her.

Rei's lips twitched at Tsunade's remark, "We all need some bonding time with them," Tsunade lowered her head. "But fine. If you can delegate your work, do so. Just... don't let me down by slacking. After all, it was you who wanted the position of the Head of Medics, Tsunade."

Tsunade looked mollified but also a bit hurt that Rei would consider her slacking. Looking at her blond fox... she couldn't in good conscience say she wouldn't do it though. Reluctantly, she nodded and decided for herself that she will teach more medics to show her dedication to Rei while also creating more free time for her to spend with her cub.

"Also, I have to say I am sorry, Tsunade." Rei sheepishly added, causing the women to turn to him with interest springing up on their face, before turning to Konan, "If you remember, when Tsunade bonded to us, her soul was fractured."

Konan smiled, "And this was a way to rectify that, wasn't it?" She then smirked at Tsunade, "But I see there were some side-effects, heh?"

Rei could only sigh in exasperation.

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Chapter 188 - Ch188. Tsunade's soul

Hearing Konan and Rei discuss a possible problem with her soul, Tsunade instantly became serious. She might not know what it exactly meant for her, and the years since bonding with Rei she never once found a problem with her health, but better safe than sorry.

"I didn't really put much thought to Tsunade's problem with her soul, to be honest." Rei slowly started explaining the situation. Making sure to be nonchalant about it which told his girls it was nothing to get worked over for. "Firstly, it didn't really affect Tsunade because none of her techniques depend on her soul and my senses were telling me she was not affected whatsoever. I actually watched her very closely but when no change occurred even after three years and nothing seemed wrong with Tsunade, I simply shrugged it off for the moment. If Tsunade was Yamanaka, the whole situation would be probably different since her techniques would tremendously weaken but as it was, curing her was not very important at the time." Rei stopped, making sure his meaning was conveyed.

"Is it really fine? Fractured soul sounds kind of dangerous." Mei voiced out, frowning, as she scooted closer to Tsunade in a supportive manner.

"Well, that's not really what her ailment was, actually." Rei gave Mei a reassuring smile, "At the time, I didn't have enough knowledge about souls so I called it as I saw it but it's not as if Tsunade's soul is missing a piece. It sure as hell does look like that to my senses but as I got more knowledgeable, I figured out it is not really so."

Hearing him, Konan, Tsunade, and Pakura perked up, interested in the topic. After getting reassurance from Rei that Tsunade was fine, Ringo stopped caring and decided to play with her fox. Mei, on the other hand, was still close to Tsunade but she also didn't care about whatever theory Rei was about to portray. If it was really important, he would force her to learn it anyway.

"From what I know, and do take into consideration that I am no expert by any sort of a stretch," Rei started, "Souls are energy-based constructs... well, sort of? Anyway, Tsunade's soul was lacking energy without any way to replenish it. Our bonding patched her soul up, preventing more energy leakage but it didn't help in any way to replenish the lost energy. And that's where Tsunade's bijuu comes in." He grinned. He might not be an expert on souls but his understanding of Tsunade's problem was good enough to create a solution. The side-effects... those were negligible at best compared to whatever could happen to her because of her weakened soul. Rei wasn't about to leave her in that state, not when he had a solution to it. He was not nearly enough delusional, reckless, or arrogant to think there would be no consequence whatsoever if he let it drag on.

"You used the nature energy to somehow strengthen my soul during the process of creating Blondie." Tsunade interrupted as an understanding gleam suddenly flashed through her eyes.

Rei raised his eyebrow at her, surprised she figured it out but there were more important things right now. "Blondie?" He asked, almost amused.

Tsunade cutely blushed and her eyes lit up with joy as she nodded. "Since she is blond, I will call my girl Blondie."

"That's actually nice." Konan interjected, the corners of her lips slightly up, "Then mine will be Indigo."

"Emerald." Pakura said, joining the conversation as she stroke her almost preening fox.

"I will go with Auburn," Mei nodded, following the theme set by Tsunade. "It's simple and reminds me of my beautiful hair."

"In that case," Ringo held her fox on the level of her eyes as she stared at it intently. "You will be Crimson, understood?" Only when the fox nodded did Ringo smile and briefly kiss its muzzle in satisfaction before putting it back into her l.a.p.

"I guess, there aren't many choices left for me." Rei chuckled before looking at the sleeping black fox in his l.a.p that was also the only male of the bunch. "Sorry, buddy, according to the naming theme you were deemed to be Blackie." He said with a mocking undertone as if he slightly pitied the fox which caused Tsunade to give him a slight unamused glare, recognizing the jab at her naming sense.

"Naming aside." Rei continued, looking at Tsunade with a bit of proudness in his eyes and also a veiled surprise. "I am actually surprised you recognized what strengthened your soul."

Tsunade shrugged, "You threw me enough hints. At first, I thought my senses going so haywire I couldn't recognize which way is up or down was a part of the ritual but now I know why I felt that way and why it felt so familiar. Nature Energy simply supercharged my senses too much as it flowed..." Tsunade's expression became a bit puzzled, "not really into my body but still inside of me? The actual feeling is hard to explain. Anyway, the side-effects?" She added a bit worriedly.

"Don't worry. It's nothing major. You probably noticed how we all share a liking for our foxes. They are akin to an inseparable best friend to us. But in your case, your bond is much, much closer. Considering she," Rei pointed at Blondie, "was born out of your chakra and consciousness, it isn't even that wrong, ya know?" He knowingly smiled at the flabbergasted Tsunade.

"I... Right." Tsunade looked at her hands, unwilling to raise her head higher for the moment.

"If it makes you feel any better, I think you will be a good mother to Blondie." Konan added, causing Tsunade to grow even quieter as her cheeks gained pink dusting while the other girls either silently snickered at her embarrassment or gave their own encouragements.

"Thank you." Tsunade eventually muttered, grateful for the opportunity. Blondie might not have been her real child but she felt attached to her nevertheless. Tsunade knew Rei didn't want children. Not yet, anyway. It didn't even matter as much since their lifespan was lengthened to incredible proportions so they had a few centuries before even thinking about it. But Tsunade craved family ever since she lost hers. Being able to feel a motherly bond to her little fox was... almost heavenly for her.

The group spent the next few moments relishing the pleasant surprise as they played with their new additions before Rei decided to continue the conversation.

"So, any other questions?"

At first, it looked like everybody was content. Rei knew his girls were curious and most likely had loads of questions. But he also knew they would not ask unless they were at the end of their wits or it was something they really deemed important.

That's why he was really surprised when he heard Tsunade's voice.

"In fact... yes." She started unsurely before growing determined, "I would like to ask why. Why exactly do you focus on making us stronger? We are probably the strongest ninjas alive when it comes to chakra reserves and manipulation. And yet," She swiped her hand around, indicating the foxes, "it is still not enough. I want to know why." She bit her lower lip. She really wanted to know and more importantly, she needed to know if there is something she could help Rei with.

"Eh... because I am bored?" Rei weakly tried, only getting eye-rolls in return which turned his expression a bit sheepish. "Fine." He sighed. There wasn't a question of 'Should I reveal it?' in his mind. All five of the women he loved and trusted so he started talking.

"You see, a thousand years ago...

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Chapter 189 - Ch189. Plans and reasons

"You see, a thousand years ago, a person from the Otsutsuki clan came to this planet to gather chakra fruit." Rei started, causing his wives to look at him strangely. Chuckling, Rei continued, "A lot happened, this person betrayed her comrades, stabbing them in their back in order to have the fruit for herself... or that's the story as I know it. Who knows if it is the truth. Too many years passed since then, after all." Rei shook his head before becoming serious again. "But what is important is that this person ate the chakra fruit, becoming the Progenitor of Chakra, the Rabbit Goddess Kaguya."

"Goddess?" Konan looked intently at Rei. "You are training us to fight a Goddess?" She added almost in disbelief.

"No, not at all." Rei smiled at Konan's baffled expression, something not seen that often. "In a fight to the death, you would lose to Kaguya even if you teamed up and possessed fully grown bijuu. No, leave Kaguya to me. Who knows, maybe you will get another sister out of it?" Rei mischievously joked. He seriously didn't believe that. Not really. Kaguya was... well, for a human, calling her Goddess was not that wrong if one took into consideration what she was really capable of. "Anyway, it's not Kaguya who is important here. She was betrayed by her two sons and sealed in the moon. But I digress. They had their own reasons and it is hard to say who was right and who wrong."

"Moon?" Tsunade muttered, for a moment forgetting she was in Rei's dimension and subconsciously looking up. Realizing what she did, her cheeks pinked.

Rei simply appreciated the cute sight and calmly smiled at Tsunade, "The problem here is not Kaguya. Well, not yet anyway. The problem is the Otsutsuki clan."

"You said they came to this planet." Ringo slowly started, "That means they are in fact NOT from this planet, right?" She asked with a bit of an unbelieving undertone, finding it kinda hard to accept that aliens existed.

Rei nodded, causing Ringo to bite her lower lips as a need for more intel flashed through her eyes, her mind switching into her Assassin mode. She needed info, their weaknesses, their habits, their...

Suddenly, a soft blue ball of chakra tenderly impacted Ringo's forehead, getting her out of her funk as the other girls giggled.

"Calm down, Ringo. We have a few decades until they attack." Rei said, "In fact, I have an idea how to hide this planet from them but it would need a LOT of power, time, and resources. But I am up for it. I didn't build my village only to have it destroyed by some wannabe pale-skinned fruit-muncher."

"And I guess, having a Goddess as a power source, would really help these plans, right?" Mei quipped, making Rei blink at her before nodding with a grin.

"But Kaguya is a piece of work in itself. Getting her out of the moon would be incredibly hard. Getting her to cooperate with us would be difficult because I have no idea what her mental state is or if she is really affected by the chakra fruit or not. If I get skilled and strong enough to safely pull her out of the moon while being capable of stuffing her inside of it again? Sure, we can try getting her on our side. If not? F.u.c.k her. Not worth the risk." Rei seriously said, causing all five women to instinctively straighten up.

Rei didn't have any qualms about doing something others would consider a veritable suicide attempt for years. Now he actually says that there is something he thinks is dangerous enough that the risks are not worth the possible results? The girls naturally knew what exactly that meant. Any normal chap trying to pull that off would most likely not survive the next day. Thoughts about getting Kaguya out of the moon quickly left their minds. It would be better to leave that to Rei.

Even Konan decided to focus on something else. Sure, she handled many things but when it came to decisions that really mattered or would propel them a head above the shoulders of others, it was always Rei who made the decision. Konan could live with that. She trusted Rei with her life so there was no need to bother with what to do with a possibly murderous god-like being who was sealed for a millennium. 'Rei will figure it out.' She mentally shrugged while her expression was the perfect image of calm with a slightly amused smile as her mind was deciding what lingerie to take into bed tonight to properly motivate her Rei.

"How strong do you need us to be to contend against Otsutsuki?" Pakura asked the important question as she distractedly patted Emerald. She was the weakest of the group and while she was slowly catching up, this revelation meant she didn't have the leisure of being half-assed in her training.

Rei helplessly shrugged at her question. "I have no idea, to be honest. The bijuu are a nice step-up and it will give us the energy levels necessary to contend against them in case I will be unable to isolate this planet. After we got the bijuu into ourselves? Then we will have to learn more about chakra and its possible applications. We know nothing about it." Rei bitterly stated.

"Ah..." Konan's eyes slightly widened as if she realized something.

"I see..." Tsunade muttered, her tone a bit mischievous.

Ringo simply raised her eyebrow at Rei in an 'Are you serious?' manner.

Pakura stayed stoic but the corners of her lips were twitching. She was one of those who was setting up the system in Rei's hidden village. While she had no idea what good it would be when she was setting it up, now she understood why it was done that way almost instantly.

"I, on the other hand, don't see!" Mei pouted and crossed her hands under her c.h.e.s.t, supported by Auburn who heatedly yipped in agreement.

"That's not very surprising." Konan smugly smirked before continuing in an admonishing tone that had Mei silenced in a jiffy, "You refused any position of management in the village and don't bother with what is going on with it. You would naturally not make the connection." She shrugged. "If you did, you would know that our village has a bit of a different promotion system than others. Not only our ninjas need to reach some standard of power before they can be promoted, every chuunin aiming to become a jonin has to invent a new technique and hand it to the Promotion Board to be reviewed. We made it into a rite of passage of sorts. To think Rei added it so that every single ninja of ours can come up with a new way to use chakra for us when we reach the stage where we need a bit of inspiration to get stronger..." Konan giggled. "It could be actually called cheating."

Rei simply grinned at Konan, "My village, my rules. Even if they knew, they can't really complain. Not with the benefits our village offers." He then moved his gaze towards Ringo, "But yes. Once we get to the level where our chakra reserves would be pretty much big enough and our enemies would have similarly massive reserves, it would all come to technique and that's why having hundreds of working chakra usage concepts from our dutiful ninja force will be helpful. They don't have to make something powerful. Just something to give us a push in the right direction. We can develop the technique to be powerful but we need at the very least a working foundation. This way, we won't have to spend our time trying to come up with one."

"I just now realized." Tsunade raised her eyes towards Rei, affectionately gazing at him. "You really couldn't be bothered what happens to the world, could you?" Her tone was almost sad but also content at the same time. Tsunade's eyes slowly trailed over her sisters, "As long as we are fine, you wouldn't care." Tsunade bitterly smiled, tearing up. "Thank you, Rei. For doing so much for me."

Rei and his other girls stayed silent with their own thoughts, as they listened to Tsunade's muted happy sobs as she tried to regain control of her emotions. Rei... didn't want to go into this discussion because even he knew it was a lost cause. And now that Tsunade said it aloud, his wives knew it too.

In the end, his reasons why he cared what happens to the Elemental Nations were simple. Tsunade was still fond of Konoha. Konan was proud of the Biri-Biri Company she helped build up. Pakura didn't want to see Suna destroyed. And in some way, Ringo still cared about Kirigakure.

That... was honestly it. He simply didn't want to see them sad.

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Chapter 190 - Ch190. Visiting the Daimyo of Fire

Rei, clad in an ornamental kimono usually worn by nobles, with a dressed-up Tsunade on his arm, came in front of Toyotomi Hideyori, the Daimyo of the Country of Fire and slightly bowed in greetings. The man actually showed surprise at their attendance as since the fiasco with ROOT, the diplomat from Land of Spring never attended his birthday parties. The relations between their countries were that bad.

Toyotomi was naturally shocked when a man wearing a kimono decorated with the symbol for the newly-renamed Land of Spring appeared in front of him. Especially since Tsunade freaking Senju, the hardest-to-find person on the damned continent was his date.

Toyotomi distinctly remembered Hiruzen Sarutobi asking him if his spy network caught a whiff of Tsunade's whereabouts. The old coot clearly wanted to beg his former apprentice for money from the Senju accounts but without her explicit permission, Hokage or not, the accounts stayed sealed. Alas, the former Sannin and best medic in the world proved to be far more elusive than even Jiraiya the Sannin who was currently resignedly sat in the corner near the table with deserts while his new whal-, ahem, wife, stuffed her cheeks with sweets.

Happy development, that. It certainly made dealing with Earth country diplomats easier.

But back to the problem at hand... Toyotomi beamed, more at Tsunade rather than the man next to her, and warmly said, "Welcome. I hope you will enjoy the party."

...

The party was over and Tsunade sat on Rei's lower back, straddling him as she massaged his stiff shoulders. Rei really deserved a lot of attention for putting up with Jiraiya's antics. And the white-haired man didn't even know Tsunade was his wife yet. Thankfully, there was Jiraiya's wife to drag him… somewhere. Unfortunately, that meant nobles and merchants swarmed Tsunade and Rei like hungry sharks.

So… yeah, in Tsunade's honest opinion, Rei really deserved some proper pampering. Then again, that might have been her inner pervert speaking. Something about having her husband m.o.a.n under her gentle touch was oddly satisfying and very arousing. It perfectly satisfied her inner d.e.s.i.r.es and stroked her ego in a way that made her feel all warm and fluffy inside of her smug heart.

Is it any wonder she threw a vase at the dipshit who interrupted their massage session which resulted in a cracked skull, three broken ribs, and a fair bit of bruises for the guy after the thrown vase embedded him into the wall behind him?

From there, it didn't take long for disgruntled Tsunade, a fearful squad of samurai that decided to be at the very least three feet away from the seething female at every time, and amused Rei who loved how Tsunade absentmindedly played with his fingers to calm her anger down while they waited for their inviter, sitting in a quite lavish meeting room in the Fire Daimyo's Castle.

The door to the room opened and the Fire Daimyo stepped inside, a relieved friendly smile on his lips. The smile however didn't last long and quickly faltered the second he saw the frown and narrowed eyes of Tsunade.

Rei had to mentally praise the guy for resisting the naturally obvious urge to step back.

"A-, Ah, hi, Tsunade. I see you are still quite the fire-cracker... hehe." Toyotomi averted his eyes as Tsunade's expression became even more annoyed, and awkwardly laughed.

"Toyotomi... you better explain yourself fast or I will give you a reminder of our playdates where you made me mad the first and also the last time." Tsunade sharply said, causing the samurai in the room to straighten up in preparation.

Rei only watched in amus.e.m.e.nt as Toyotomi subconsciously rubbed his b.u.t.t, not even realizing it himself, and a grimace appeared on his face. "I'd rather not get spanked again." He quietly muttered and sat down on the opposite side of the table behind which Rei and Tsunade sat. "Anyway, I would like you to heal my son. I was looking for you for quite some time now but you were always... uh, unavailable." Toyotomi suspiciously glanced at Rei.

Tsunade nodded, "Yes. That's half of the reason why we even are in the Land of Fire." She said, causing Toyotomi to deflate in relief, causing Tsunade's lips to stretch into a content smile as she said her next words. "I also wanted you to meet my husband, Rei Yotsuba from the Land of Spring. It was him that made me, as you said, unavailable. I was kinda lost on the way out of his bedroom." She plagiarised Kakashi.

Tsunade's words froze Toyotomi's happiness and turned it into an arctic cold chill that crept up his spine as he stared with horror at Tsunade before slowly moving his eyes towards Rei, only to look back onto Tsunade, his horror only growing as he saw the woman's hand on her stomach.

"Please... don't tell me you are pregnant." Toyotomi, pale as a ghost, breathlessly rasped out, his eyes the depiction of terror.

Tsunade giggled.

Toyotomi knew Tsunade never giggled. Toyotomi was about to faint from the sheer consequences of this when Tsunade's voice pulled him out of his brief misery.

"No. Of course not." She deadpanned.

And just like that, Toyotomi felt all weight as if lift from his shoulders while his upper body leaned forward, and his forehead impacted the table from the sheer relief. Letting out a brief groan, Toyotomi drawled, "Don't spook me like that, Tsunade. I had enough international incidents to last me a few years." He sighed before mumbling the last part for himself. "You are too old for kids anyway.

"Nice to meet you Hideyori-sama," Rei decided to interject before Tsunade flattened the man who apparently didn't account for enhanced hearing of shinobi, "I must say Tsunade didn't talk much about you." He half-stated and half-asked in an unsure manner.

Toyotomi snorted and Rei was yet again surprised at how casual this meeting became. "Of course she wouldn't talk about me. Once upon a time, we were engaged but she decided to become a ninja rather than my wife. At best, we are childhood friends now." Toyotomi helplessly shook his head. "That said... your relationship is still a massive pain in the a.s.s." He gave Rei his best stern piercing look but much to Toyotomi's surprise, Rei just shrugged as if he didn't care and Tsunade giggled... again.

Toyotomi could feel the beginning of a profound headache forming.

"And why exactly would it be a problem?" Rei asked.

Despite all that, this short meeting held many new revelations for him. Tsunade was engaged to the Fire Daimyo? Shocker. She was his childhood friend? Poor lad.

And for some reason, Tsunade being with him... no, being with a foreigner was apparently a problem. Rei really didn't like where this was going as it might just complicate his previous plans.

Rei glanced at Tsunade, causing her to fidget a bit as she threw him an apologetic look, "Sorry, I only remembered it now. You know how I hate politics so I never gave this much attention." She suddenly stopped herself and with her eyes gestured towards the samurai standing at attention near the walls.

Toyotomi quickly understood the gesture and sent his samurai guards and the hidden member of his ninja guard out of the room before strapping a secrecy seal on the table. Civilian, he may be, but he had a few tricks up his sleeve.

"Tsunade is talking about..." He started.

"Shh!" Tsunade sternly silenced the man before fluidly grasping a needle in her hair and pulling it out, causing her hair to fall onto her shoulders. With a flick of her wrist, the needle sailed through the air towards one of the corners where it nailed a previously invisible figure to the wall, straight through his forehead.

"ROOT." Tsunade deadpanned at Toyotomi who gained a look of realization before his eyes sparkled with barely hidden anger. Neither Rei nor Tsunade had any doubt that there would be harsh words exchanged with Hiruzen about this. After all, the Daimyo spent millions of Ryo because of the diplomatic fallout from the last incident with ROOT, and after that, he gave his explicit order to have them disbanded. To find they ignored it and one was spying on his meetings...

'Sucks to be Sarutobi right about now.' Rei mentally snickered.

"Well, now that we are alone, could you tell me what this is actually about?" Rei turned to Tsunade who sheepishly nodded, squeezing his hand a bit stronger now while her eyes nervously looked at his.

"Ah... you see, he is talking about the Secret Section 27 of Konoha Creation Treaty between the Senju clan and the Hideyori royal family. You see, Konoha is different from other hidden ninja villages on a very fundamental level. The section is about the creation of the Autonomous Country of Konoha..."

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Chapter 191 - Ch191. Konoha Creation Treaty and its results

"Autonomous Country of Konoha?" Rei did almost a double-take, understanding what Tsunade was telling him. Konoha basically didn't belong to the Country of Fire. But... "How? That's not how things are now. Hokage is definitely under the command of Daimyo... well, figuratively speaking, at least."

Tsunade gave Rei an awkward smile and shrugged before giving Toyotomi a meaningful glance, urging him to explain.

"Right," Toyotomi sighed in exasperation, "There is no freaking way Tsunade would pay enough attention in her studies to know this 'political bullshit', as she would claim." He mockingly shook his head before stiffening as Tsunade leaked a bit of her killing intent at the poor guy. To be honest, the amount Tsunade leaked betrayed that she was at most quite annoyed. She really didn't like having her embarrassing moments revealed in front of her husband.

"Anyway..." Toyotomi coughed and averted his eyes from Tsunade to Rei, trying to ignore her. "The Hokage is basically something like a Regent." Seeing how dubious Rei looked, Toyotomi gave him a knowing smile, "I have no doubt people who actually know this could be numbered on one hand. That's why it works and why Konoha can 'elect' their own Hokages as if they were like every other village. But 'elected' Hokage is under the Daimyo of the Fire country in the proverbial food chain. To be honest, the land on which Konoha stands belongs all to the Senju Clan whereas other clans only rent it for free as was decided in initial negotiations when new clans became a part of Konoha while most of the land is rented for a ridiculously small fee. That's why Konoha is such a good place to live in for civilians, and especially merchants. The cost of land there is very low. Alas, the Senju accounts are very fat due to collecting a part of the rent from the whole village while the other part goes to the treasury of the governing body. Mito was really one scarily smart woman." Toyotomi snickered.

"Oh... so that's why it was so easy to relocate the Uchiha clan to the outskirts after the Kyuubi incident. They simply did not own the land on which their residential area stood so they could be ordered to clean it up and get the f.u.c.k out of there by..." Rei stopped for a second before promptly facepalming. "ah, Hokage is also overseeing the usage of the land, right?"

Toyotomi could only shrug in a 'what can you do' kind of way and started explaining.

"Hashirama was naive but my grandfather often said the man was not stupid. He could see the mess in his own clan when Elders tried to grab more political power. And they said the Senju clan was very family-oriented and friendly. If it was bad in the Senju clan, Hashirama knew it would be worse in other clans. He made sure to have his wife, Mito Uzumaki, right next to him when they were creating the treaty doc.u.ment. The woman was supposedly quite fiery and wouldn't give a quarter no matter what." Toyotomi said, taking a sip from his tea, "Hence, the final treaty was made. The Konoha was to be run as it is today, with their Hokages and stuff, and the other hidden villages copied it. What is secret though, is that Senju Mito made damn sure to add a fail-safe clause into the treaty, saying that the Head of the Senju clan can declare himself a Daimyo of Konoha if the ruling body was corrupted, seizing the proverbial reins. After all, the Senju clan already owned all of the Land. They already were Daimyo in all but name and power, of which, neither would be hard for the clan to quickly acquire. Not when the Hideyori royal family would support them." Toyotomi finished the history lesson.

"But nobody ever approached me with problems with the land when I was in the village during the third war. If I owned it and nobody needed anything from me..." Tsunade mumbled, narrowing her eyes.

Toyotomi glanced at Rei, "Your husband is correct, Tsunade. Hokage has the right to oversee the usage and distribution of the land if the Senju clan head doesn't want the duty. Considering you never signed up for it..." He trailed off. "I think the Hokage hopes you have no idea about the treaty since your clan died off so fast. He knows how disinterested you are in politics. Plus, you never really showed any knowledge of its existence, did you?" Toyotomi remarked, causing Tsunade to still as memories flashed through her eyes. Memories of her sensei asking questions... She remembered what she told him. She said she would definitely not want more responsibilities on top of running the hospital.

"That son of a bitch. He basically confirmed I don't want to do it without even mentioning what exactly 'it' is." Tsunade clenched her jaw in disbelief. "He tricked me." She added, her eyes wide.

"Konoha's higher-ups must have been over the moon when they got to know you can not have children." Rei carefully stated, not liking where this train of thoughts is leading them.

"I... wh-, what?" Tsunade stammered, caught off guard by the suddenness of that statement since she was still in the process of accepting that she was tricked by her own sensei. Despite her initial surprise, she lived with Rei for well over a decade and that, for a skilled kunoichi, meant she at least somewhat knew how his mind worked. It didn't take her long to understand what he was insinuating. "Ah." Her eyes dimmed and her fists clenched as anger flooded her. Sure, it was a baseless suggestion but it made a disgusting amount of sense. Especially with the new revelations.

Rei gave Tsunade a side-glance and squeezed her hand in a reassuring manner, getting a weak, extremely fake smile in return. "We have no proof of it yet. Don't be so down. Maybe we are wrong."

"What are you talking about?" Toyotomi asked, frowning at being left out.

Tsunade and Rei looked at each other, and Rei gave her an uncaring shrug, meaning it was up to her if she wanted to tell him. Sighing and rubbing the bridge of her nose, Tsunade started in a somewhat sullen manner, "Sarutobi told me he knew somebody was hunting the surviving Senju clansmen in the period between the first and the second war but he had no way to counter it. I gave him quite the scolding for not telling the Senju clan that it was happening. For all we knew, we were simply unlucky and fate had it for us. But... I understood that it might have started panic or whatever reason he threw at me. I understood his reasoning why he didn't tell and focused on investigating, why it was all so secretive."

Hearing that, Toyotomi showed a baffled expression but deep down, he was angry. Not many knew that the Senju clan was very close allies to the Hideyori family in the past. To think they were hunted down until only Tsunade was left... To think the Hokage didn't do anything meaningful to prevent it. To think they would even conceal this fact...

Toyotomi suddenly stilled as realization hit him and his rage instantly subsided. His face turned pale and his eyes darted from Rei to Tsunade, getting what they were not telling. "You... you actually think somebody from Konoha was responsible for the Senju demise." He summed up the unspoken thoughts, his eyes wide from disbelief.

"There is no other way. We know somebody from Konoha had a hand in it." Tsunade bitterly shook her head. "It's fishy as hell once you start to look at it as one incident rather than multiple unfortunate accidents spread through the years. Every other clan was fine, just the Senjus suffered. While others had close to ten failed missions per year, and even then the ones who failed usually returned, the Senju clansmen had also around ten failures but most of them were fatal. Sure, the Senju clansmen were very skilled and sent on dangerous missions but... you know." Tsunade sighed. "I just never even in my wildest dreams thought Sarutobi-sensei would have any reason to cover it up on purpose."

"Or directly have a hand in it." Rei quipped, causing Tsunade's shoulders to slump even lower. Realizing his mistake, Rei winced and scooted closer to the downtrodden woman, embracing her close to his c.h.e.s.t. "He had no motive. We... er, I knew that Sarutobi is a right bastard." Rei spoke towards Toyotomi while c.a.r.e.s.sing Tsunade's hair. "But we never could think of any motivation why he would support the Senju purge. After all, he was Tobirama's pupil..."

"So was Danzo." Tsunade spat.

"... and he truly cares for Konoha." Rei finished, not minding Tsunade's interruption.

"But with this new revelation, it became self-evident why he, as the Head of the Sarutobi clan, would not want the Senju clan alive. The clause in the treaty is simply a preventive measure if the village became corrupt. The Senju clan had every right to do this and every clan head of that time accepted it, knowing the honorable Senju would not abuse it. But..." Toyotomi sighed.

"It would be awfully convenient if the Senju clan disappeared and nobody could usurp Konoha's leadership on a whim, wouldn't it?" Rei continued. "Why stop somebody helping get rid of the problem, no?"

"But Tsunade is his pupil. Someone he loves like his own daughter. After confirming she knew nothing about it..." Toyotomi nodded.

"But Danzo has no such problem. Once Tsunade started digging in the old files and even got the blood samples proving that somebody purged the Senju blood from Konoha... all bets were off."

"Hence the numerous assassination attempts when I was in Konoha. And here I thought it was because of me blocking his bills. I... I still don't think that Sarutobi is directly responsible. I wouldn't be surprised if he knew about it and knew exactly who was behind it but... I don't think he had a hand in it." Tsunade added, having enough for the day. She nudged Rei, "Let's end this here. I need my cuddly time to get my head away from..."

Rei instantly leaned forward and kissed Tsunade the second she started speaking in that depressing way. "That's fine." He smiled.

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Chapter 192 - Ch192. Breakfast with the Daimyo

Rei yawned as he lazily flopped into a seat opposite the Fire Country Daimyo sitting behind a small cozy table in his gardens, enjoying breakfast. It was weird that there was not even one maid around him but surprisingly enough, Rei's senses told him that maids were not the only thing missing. There was not even one guard around.

'That's some hefty level of trust he is showing me.' He hummed while rubbing his tired eyes.

"Not enough sleep?" Toyotomi chuckled, biting an apple.

Rei could only shrug. "It's not like I can't go on without sleep for a week. But comforting sad Tsunade? Especially since sad Tsunade is an indulgent Tsunade? No matter how pleasurable that is, it is also incredibly tiring."

"Yes... I heard some complaints." Toyotomi's eyes shone with mirth, "While the silencing seals did their job, the surroundings still received quite the... pounding." He smugly said. "I heard the rooms around yours vibrated from the sheer... activity. Some of the servants even suspect it was a small earthquake."

Rei was far beyond being embarrassed by this, nor was he in the mood to entertain the man. He knew Tsunade was wild even without trying to forget her anger and emotional baggage. Shrugging, Rei showed Toyotomi he wouldn't be embarrassed due to his words, which made the Toyotomi sigh in defeat.

"I guess, I should expect some degree of patience and level-headedness from you. Especially since you are used to dealing with Tsunade. Honestly, I was elated when I heard our engagement was canceled. I couldn't help but feel a slight fear towards her after I got my first beating when I... ahem, no forget it."

"No, no, no. Do tell." Rei smirked, grabbing himself a slice of bread, some butter, and jam.

Toyotomi looked quite uncomfortable but despite that, he decided to continue the tale, deeming it a long-forgotten past anyway, "When I tried to touch her c.h.e.s.t." Rei snickered hearing that but Toyotomi quickly continued to give a proper excuse for his actions, "I had a good reason, mind you. I was six and my father just told me kids were made from a loving touch between a girl and a boy. I naturally was curious." Toyotomi shrugged, returning Rei's amused smile.

"Dealing with Tsunade is not hard. All it requires is a whole lot of loving touches," Rei gave Toyotomi a meaningful glance, "and a body that can withstand her accidental use of superstrength." He shrugged. "Despite what her personality would imply, once we really started to love each other, she is a very un-troublesome woman to keep around, as Naras would say. She is unsurprisingly independent and surprisingly low-maintenance. Well, yesterday was a clear exception to the rule but one gotta admit the topic was a bit too much for her emotions. But I doubt you sent a servant to wake me up in order to discuss the nuances of the relationship with Tsunade." Rei said, looking directly at Toyotomi.

"I see. Fair enough." Toyotomi nodded and instantly grew serious, "I just wanted to warn you that you should leave by the evening if you want to have a chance at successfully evading Konoha ANBU inviting Tsunade back 'home'." He gave Rei an apologetic smile. "The ninja guardian from yesterday was one from Konoha and I can't possibly reproach him from sending a missive about Tsunade's presence back to Konoha, now, can I?" He sighed in irritation before rubbing his temples.

"Insubordination? Wau." Rei exclaimed in mock cheer as he grabbed an orange.

"Not really. I forgot to order him to keep it secret. The second he left the room he was on his way to send a message to his beloved Hokage. Some guards they are. That's why I have to get people from the Fire Temple to balance the number of Konoha's ninjas around me." Toyotomi waved his hand dismissively. "Don't get me wrong, they do their jobs but..." He stopped bitterly.

"But their allegiance is not fully for you. Yeah, that must suck considering they are here to guard your very life." Rei nodded. "Anyway, don't worry about Hiruzen. I kinda thought he would be present at your birthday party so I counted on him knowing we are here."

"Ah... I never invite Hokage to my birthday parties. Too many diplomats who would be offended. Frankly, I don't like him all that much. Too manipulative for my tastes. Told him exactly where he can stick his grandfatherly act the second he tried it on me when I took over from my father." Toyotomi rolled his eyes. "Well, I might have threatened to cut the funding in half if he pissed me off too much." He unrepentantly shrugged and bit into a toast in a very satisfied manner. Chewing and biting with enjoyment written on his face as he reminisced about that moment, Toyotomi finally gulped down the food and added, "That was frankly one of the best moments of my tenure as the Daimyo. The sour look of the usually grandfatherly dipshit was priceless. My father might have been naive and easy to manipulate for more money but thankfully, I was taught by my mother."

"Yeah... no. Still gonna make a run for it. I don't wanna meet with the man. We will be off your hair by the time for dinner, right after Tsunade heals your son," Toyotomi visibly deflated in relief at that, "and I discuss with you the real deal I came for." And just like that, Toyotomi tensed again. Friendliness was all good but when deals were mentioned, he had to act like a Daimyo, no matter if it came from a husband of his childhood friend.

"Deal?" He asked warily but Rei only rolled his eyes and suddenly, a file appeared in his hand. Rei then put the file on the table and slid it towards Toyotomi who grabbed it and started to read it. Rei watched as the Fire Daimyo's expression went from wary, to a surprised, then to approving, only to set itself in relieved, almost giddy one after he was done reading the offer.

Then the realization struck Toyotomi hard as a frown appeared on his lips. "I can't accept it. Don't get me wrong, it is the best and most fair offer that came to me in years but nobles won't accept it without proper excu-, uh, reason."

"Then use me bringing Tsunade here and her healing your son as a springboard." Rei advised and Toyotomi looked at him with an unreadable gaze.

"You... already have this all planned, right?" He slowly said after a while, causing Rei to smirk and scoot a bit to the right, making Toyotomi tilt his head before he noticed groggy Tsunade pass him and sit next to Rei, sleepily cuddling into his side with a cute content smile and messy bed hair.

"The second trade routes between the Land of Spring and the Land of Fire are opened, it will be even better than a non-aggression pact, thus cementing our neutrality even further." Rei shrugged as his head landed on the top of Tsunade's head, gently stroking it without him even realising he was doing it. By now, it was something so natural for him it was instinctive. Watching the display, Toyotomi inwardly smiled and decided the two are good for each other as he listened to Rei, "That's why our Daimyo is so fine with giving some benefits to the Land of Fire in this deal."

Well, naturally, Sosetsu, the supposed Daimyo of the Land of Spring, was not 'so fine' with it. He had no opinion about it one way or another. The guy was simply happy it would make the civilians live even more comfortably. Honestly, since Rei became the real owner of the country, its wealth multiplied several-fold and the people were happier than ever. That was all Sosetsu wanted.

"Okay..." Toyotomi slowly nodded and then smiled. "Let's negotiate, then. Section three of the trade agreement is a bit..."

"Shut up, it's too early for politics." Tsunade grunted in annoyance, putting her head on Rei's shoulder, peacefully dozing off much to the amus.e.m.e.nt of the two men.

Both knew their talks had to be postponed.

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